Map of Fictional Place Names

 

It is rare that I am blown away by the mainstream press, but The Londonist has achieved something truly extraordinary. They have created a map of fictional locations and they have gathered hundreds. The map displays a geographical area roughly parallel with real life Great Britain and its surrounding islands; and it includes imaginary places from ancient mythology and classic literature to modern soap operas and children's TV. So you can clearly see Cantre'r Gwaelod, an island kingdom from Welsh folklore; along with buzzwords from today's prolefeed like Emmerdale, Wetherfield, Walford, Ambridge and Hollyoaks. Sodor is an island loosely analogous to the Isle of Man where Thomas the tank engine and the other sentient railway vehicles of Rev. W Awdry's books is set. Some places cannot be mapped like the mysterious vanishing and reappearing Scottish village of Brigadoon; and they are marked by a spiral in their rough positions. The same goes for the otherworld of Harry Potter's school, Hogwarts. Source: https://londonist.com/london/maps/fake-britain-map-fictional-locations-england-scotland-wales. The Londonist has also published a gazetteer to accompany the map, see: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1djax783rILHf56Mue-huoVNkAgTL5mULyiBBY_AR5nU/edit?pli=1#gid=0. Detailed prints can be purchased from the source page. The creators know that their work is incomplete and have put out an appeal for additional names from anybody who has come across settings in the endless wastes of literature. Well, my readers and I can help them out there, can't we? There's Lancombe Pond; two in fact. The town in Bedfordshire where Evan Hughes begins his hero's journey; and the microstate in the East Midlands central to The Obscurati Chronicles. Evan's Land contains other fictional towns and villages in North Wales such as Llangeri, Nantmawr, Llanigmur and Nagelluw. There are many other real places in the story that I have changed in size and nature. I have done the same to Rockall. This is a real island in the Atlantic, but I have changed it in my novel of that name into a much larger land five miles across. I post my adjusted map below.