Moresby

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The capital city of Papua New Guinea, a seaport on the island's southeastern coast ; a British family name, borne by the naval officer John Mores-by-name holder
2. A seaport on the southeast coast of Papua New Guinea that serves as its capital ; an English family name carried by the nineteenth century naval surveyor John
3. The coastal capital of Papua New Guinea, lying on its southeastern shore ; a surname of English origin, associated with the Royal Navy officer who gave the city its name

Etymology: Moresby is a village on the Cumbrian coast, and its name is older than almost anything else in the region's written record. It was recorded as "Moresceby" around 1160, and the name is built from a personal name followed by "-by", the Old Norse word for a farmstead or village. The first element belongs to a man called Maurice, so the name simply means the settlement of Maurice. The "-by" ending is one of the most common place-name elements in northern England, where Scandinavian settlers left thousands of villages with names of this pattern. Here the settler's name survives in a form that has been worn down over the centuries, with the middle syllable dropping away in speech and spelling until the modern "Moresby" remained.