The City of Manchester

2024

2023

The name

The name Manchester, a reference to the city in England, derives from the Latin Mamucium or Mancunium, which in turn comes from either mamm- (“breast,” in reference to a breast-like hill) or mamma (“mother,” in reference to a local river goddess), plus castrum, Latin for a fort.  Amusingly, the Uncanoonuc Mountains, directly west of Manchester, derive their name from the Massachusett term kuncannowet, which also means “breast.”

Manchester is probably one of the few -chester placenames still pronounced with all its syllables intact.  The Welsh name for Manchester was originally Manceinion, which in modern Welsh has somehow become Caerfawnwydd.  People from Manchester are known as Mancunians.  The Latin term for something of or from Manchester is Mancuniensis.  ▰