Welsh Town Name Generator

Welsh town names are built from a small vocabulary of landscape words, which is why they are so recognisable and so easy to get wrong. The most common prefix is Llan, a church enclosure, followed by a saint's name mutated by Welsh grammar: Llanfair (Mary), Llandeilo (Teilo), Llanbedr (Peter), Llanfihangel (Michael). Aber is a river mouth (Aberystwyth), Pont a bridge (Pontypridd), Tre a settlement (Tregaron), Caer a fort (Caernarfon), Cwm a valley, Nant a stream, Rhyd a ford, Bryn a hill, Pen a head or top, Porth a harbour and Ynys an island.

Longer names chain these together with y or yr ("the") in the middle — Betws-y-Coed is "the chapel in the wood", Cwm-y-Glo "the valley of the coal" — and finish with adjectives such as fawr (big), fach (small), newydd (new), uchaf (upper), isaf (lower), gwyn (white), coch (red) and du (black). Double l, double d, double f, w and y as vowels, and ch as in "loch" are all normal; a name without any of them rarely reads as Welsh.

The list is drawn from real towns, villages and hamlets from Anglesey to Gwent, so every name follows the genuine rules; use them directly in fiction set in Wales, or as models for coining a place that is not on any map.