Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyll Llantysiliogogogoch

Gesundheit! There's a place in Wales (Is it true that there's an inverse relationship between the size of a Welsh town and the length of its name?) that used to be called LlanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyllLlantysiliogogogoch. I kid you not. Now it has been officially shortened to LlanfairPwll. Spoilsports.

It translates as:

: "Saint Mary's Church in the hollow of the white hazel near a rapid whirlpool and the Church of St. Tysilio of the red cave."

The name was basically made up in the 19th century as a tourist attraction. The town happens to be the location of the first WomensInstitute? in the UK.

I didn't believe you but there are other references to this on Google. What an odd name.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyll+Llantysiliogogogoch

My Welsh grandmother could rattle it off easily. I have to work my way through it slowly. "Ll" is a hissing sound, with your tongue pressed against the top of your mouth; "w" is "oo"; "f" is "v"; "y" is like the "i" in "in"; and "ch" is gutteral, as in Scottish or German.

How about you post a WAV file of your grandmother pronouncing it?

Yes, it would be worth it!;)

It's not his grandmother, but you can hear it here: http://llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.co.uk/soundfiles/llandad4.wav

There's a scene in a BennyHill? skit where a gent sits in a train; behind him out the window is a big sign with the name of the current Welsh town. The train takes off and stops in the next town, where the sign finally ends.

Apparently this is only the third longest name in the world, though [broken link removed].

Sadly, at 59 characters long, this is not the longest WikiName on this wiki. [broken link removed]

And I thought this might just be an extreme case of HungarianNotation.

Hmmm...and I thought it was the initials from the names of all the people who lived there. ;->

CategoryJoke