Has anyone noticed that many of NY's towns/cities are named after ancient cities?

Question

I was just New York (the state) there this weekend for a family reunion and there was a startling number of cities and towns with ancient counterparts. I saw Rome, Utica, Syracuse, Bethlehem, Marathon, and a few more I can't remember? Syracuse was an ancient Greek city on Sicily. Utica was an African village, where Cato and Scipio fled after being defeated at the Battle of Thapsus. Am I the only person who noticed this?

Answer 1

Plenty of cities in New York, as well as s'mother cities, r named after old cities. Rome (which still exists) is a good example, along w/ Syracuse, which is a town in Sicily (in the local language, it's Siracusa.) Philadelphia, PA is named after a ancient city mentioned in the Bible (specifically the Revelation to John) which I think is in modern-day Syria. I dunno if it's what Damascus is now. Memphis, TN is named after the ancient Egyptian city, along w/ Cairo, IL just up the MS River. Cairo, which also still exists, was not in ancient Egypt as it was founded in 969 A.D. according 2 Wikipedia. I'm assuming that Memphis & Cairo got their names 2 associ8 themselves as river cities, u'no, likening the MS to the Nile. I'd also assume there are now three Bethlehems, in NY, PA & the original one which is now in the West Bank.

Answer 2

Yes, not just NY state but  throughout much of the country in the early to mid 1800's there was a classical influence(Greco-Roman) in the culture where Roman and Greek locales ( as well as Egyptian and a few others) were used as place names for new communities being founded. Some of these cities are Athens, GA, Macedonia, OH, Memphis TN, and many, many others.

Most of these are in New York state, but the midwest and southeast are also very well represented, but central upstate NY state does seem to have the greatest density of classical place names

Answer 3

I live in Troy. :D

Answer 4

yes  we  have..........many  other  places  in  the  world  have  similar  names  too

Answer 5

Yeah, I guess.

The names of towns and cities in New York are mostly Dutch, Dutch translated to English, and Native American lol

Oh hey, I forgot..we have Babylon here, too.