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Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg

6/2/2019

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There's a body of water in the Massachusetts town of Webster called Lake Chaubunagungamaug, which is often referred to by its longer variant, Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubuna-gungamaugg. This has an interesting etymology; the shorter of the monikers comes from Nipmuc (one of the Algonquian languages) and means something like "lake divided by islands", although an exact translation is difficult. People often like using the longer name, though, because it's quirkier to do so and Webster actually has gotten a bit of tourism out of marketing the lengthy name. However, it's a sham. The extended version is actually meaningless and was coined in 1921 by local newspaper editor Laurence J. Daly, who made it as a joke, only to have a bunch of people start seriously using it. A bunch of disinterested parties to the issue just call it Webster's Lake at this point, but the whole kerfuffle is still pretty neat.
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    Hello! I'm Adam Aleksic. I have a linguistics degree from Harvard University, where I co-founded the Harvard Undergraduate Linguistics Society and wrote my thesis on Serbo-Croatian language policy. In addition to etymology, I also really enjoy traveling, trivia, philosophy, board games, conlanging, and art history. 

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