Jacksonville

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The largest city in Florida, located on the Atlantic coast in the northeastern part of the state
2. A major port city on the St. Johns River in northeastern Florida, known for its large population and coastline
3. A large city in northeastern Florida, United States, situated on the St. Johns River near the Atlantic Ocean

Etymology: Jacksonville is a place name built from the surname Jackson and the suffix "-ville," which comes from the French "ville," meaning town. The pattern was popular in the United States, where settlers and developers attached "-ville" to family names to create town names, so the word is less a single coinage than a repeated formula. The most famous bearer of the name is Andrew Jackson, the seventh President of the United States, and many places called Jacksonville were named in his honour. The Florida city, for instance, is one of the largest in the country by area, and it shares its name with numerous towns across the south and midwest. Because the same construction was applied independently in so many places, the word now points to several different towns rather than one. Because the name is a proper noun, its meaning depends on context: a reader who sees it on a map is usually looking at a town named after a man called Jackson, not a general word for a settlement.