Polish City Name Generator

Polish place names are built from a small set of endings that each mean something. Towns in -ów and -owo (Kraków, Rzeszów, Wejherowo) began as someone's property: Kraków is Krak's town. Names in -ice and -owice (Katowice, Gliwice, Pabianice) started as the settlement of a man's people. The -sk and -sko endings (Gdańsk, Płock, Bielsko) are among the oldest, -in and -yn (Szczecin, Lublin, Olsztyn) mark possession, and -no (Gniezno, Leszno, Mielno) describes the ground. Many names are plain words: Zielona Góra is Green Mountain, Biała Podlaska is White (town) of Podlasie, Dąbrowa Górnicza is Mining Oakwood.

Two towns that share a name are told apart by a regional adjective or a river: Tomaszów Mazowiecki versus Tomaszów Lubelski, Ostrów Wielkopolski versus Ostrów Mazowiecka, Kostrzyn nad Odrą (on the Oder). Spa towns carry a hyphenated -Zdrój (Krynica-Zdrój, Busko-Zdrój, Polanica-Zdrój). Nowy and Stary mark new and old foundations (Nowy Sącz, Stary Sącz), and double-barrelled names such as Bielsko-Biała and Kędzierzyn-Koźle are two merged towns. The letters ł, ś, ź, ż, ć, ń, ą, ę and ó are real letters, not decoration, and the final vowel sets gender: Warszawa and Łódź are feminine, Kraków and Gdańsk masculine.

The list opens with every major Polish city and county towns, then adds invented names that follow the same patterns for maps, novels and games.