Also erron. toponomy. [f. TOPO- + Gr. -ωνυμία, f. ὄνομα name: cf. homonymy, synonymy.]
1. The place-names of a country or district as a subject of study.
1876. W. K. Sullivan, in Encycl. Brit., V. 306/2. The substitution of vague descriptions of dress and arms, and a vague toponomy, for the full and definite descriptions and precise toponomy of the primitive poems.
1887. Athenæum, 20 Aug., 240/3. This book … does not deal at all with topography in the proper sense, but merely (if the word may be tolerated as English) with ‘toponymy.’
1893. Academy, 22 July, 72/3. These papers are of interest for Basque toponymy and language.
1900. Deniker, Races of Man, xiii. 557. The pre-Columbian aborigines of Porto Rico, Haiti, Jamaica, and Cuba were Arawaks, to judge from the toponymy of these islands.
2. Anat. (See quot.)
1882. Wilder & Gage, Anat. Techn., 20. Terms of Position and Direction—Toponymy. Ibid., 23. The Intrinsic Toponymy…. We … shall designate the aspects and regions of the body by terms derived from names which have been applied to the parts themselves.
1899. in Syd. Soc. Lex.
So Toponym: see quot.; Toponymal a., of or pertaining to toponymy; Toponymic, a. = prec.; sb.: see quot. 1906: cf. patronymic; Toponymical a. = prec. adj.; Toponymist, one who deals with place-names.
1891. Cent. Dict., *Toponym,… the technical designation of any region of an animal, as distinguished from any organ. Ibid., *Toponymal,… *Toponymic.
1896. Nat. Geog. Mag. (U.S.), VII. 222. We miss in the works of a government board of names all evidence of acquaintance with toponymic literature.
1906. Cornish N. & Q., 142. Toponymics, i.e. personal names derived from the place where a particular ancestor lived.
1882. Wilder & Gage, Anat. Techn., 20. Such terms constitute a *Toponymical Vocabulary which is based upon intrinsic instead of purely extrinsic and accidental relations.
a. 1852. Macgillivray, Nat. Hist. Dee Side (1855), 235. Appropriately named by the Celts—who were famous *toponymists,… Na claisean—The Furrows.
