THE HISTORICAL FORMATION OF ENGLISH TOPONYMS: ETYMOLOGICAL LAYERS, FORMANTS, AND CANONIZATION

This article analyzes the historical formation of English place names from a diachronic perspective. Based on a revised corpus of English units from the original comparative study, the article examines Celtic, Latin, Old English, Scandinavian, and Anglo-Norman layers, mechanisms of phonetic-morphological adaptation, as well as the role of written and cartographic canonization. It is shown that hydronyms and the names of large settlements prove to be the most stable, whereas settlement suffixes such as -ham, -ton, -ford, -by, and -chester preserve the memory of specific stages of colonization and economic development of the territory. A model of the historical development of English toponyms is proposed: substrate – contact – adaptation – canonization. The practical value of this work relates to historical onomastics, regional history, and the standardization of geographical names.