The meaning of the Discworld names

[AgProv]

The Streets of Ankh-Morpork and their place in English poetr

Let us now consider derivations for some of the street and location names in the city of Ankh-Morpork.

Hope Springs, up in the Tump area of Ankh: think poet poet Alexander Pope:- "Hope springs eternal in the human breast"

Mollymog Street: Pope is referenced again. Molly Mog, the Rose of Wokingham, was a seventeenth century barmaid in Berkshire whose beauty inspired a ballad written by poet Alexander Pope.

There may be other Pope references in the city that I haven't found yet...

 

[AgProv]

Holofernes Street: In the almost-Biblical Book of Judith, Holofernes is the Persian general who she slays after first "marrying" him. As there is always a glamour to a female Assassin using her womanly wiles to bring about an inhumation, the story has resonated down the years in moral fable, poetry, plays, operas, et c.

 

[AgProv]

And I don't want to monopolise this, but the Rim Bank is the riverside walk running around the edge of the Isle of Gods. Think "Embankment" in London and the Rive Gauche in Paris; the Parisian comparison is possibly more apt, as "Rim(wards) Walk", Rimwards corresponding to "gauche" in the Left Bank/West Bank sense.