Guidance

Place names within the United Kingdom

Updated 3 May 2024

You can see the United Kingdom toponymic guidelines for map and other editors.

In general, The Permanent Committee on Geographical Names (PCGN) deals with geographical names outside of the United Kingdom. The following links will take you to web pages relating to place names within the United Kingdom.

Great Britain

For information on Great Britain, please refer to , the official body responsible for the mapping of Great Britain. There is also information available on the .

The contains historical place names from the 1911 census.

Northern Ireland

For place names in Northern Ireland, please refer to .

England

For information on geographical names in England, in particular the etymology of names, consult the .

Scotland

For information on geographical names in Scotland, contact the .

To search for geographical names in Scotland, please consult the .

Wales

The , describes Ordnance Survey鈥檚 policy for recording Welsh language names in their data. The Policy recognises the as an independent body, with the statutory aim of promoting and facilitating the use of Welsh as the authoritative source on the accepted form and spelling of Welsh names, and commits to referring to the forms published in the online. The Commissioner has also worked in partnership with the Welsh Government鈥檚 translation service to produce a for sovereign countries, UK Crown Dependencies and UK Overseas Territories.