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[Nordlicht]

Hello everyone,


Roads between towns have names, but how about adding names to the streets in towns?
A small suggestion that would benefit finding people / services and add to the atmosphere.

There could be sign poles on the corners (stating: NE: Oak Road, SW: Willow Alley).

The fast travel map could show the name of the current street.

When you ask for someone people could add the street name where the person lives (if they know it), or where the temple or an Inn may be located.




 

[PlumpHelmetMan]

How common were individual street names in the Middle Ages, since I'm not an expert on that kind of thing? If they were a widespread thing by that point though then I'm all for it, would certainly make things easier for adventurers.

[Arthropleura]

Roads have names? Is that only visible in fort mode or have I been missing something? 

[PlumpHelmetMan]

In legends mode you can find events saying things along the lines of "in year X, Civilization Y built the Road of Z connecting Humantown and Dwarfville". Pretty much the only way to find out about it AFAIK.

[Nordlicht]

How common were individual street names in the Middle Ages, since I'm not an expert on that kind of thing? If they were a widespread thing by that point though then I'm all for it, would certainly make things easier for adventurers.

In europe medieval cities would have street names based either on professions that lived there (e.g. "Baker Street"), other cities they lead to, or landmarks (e.g. "Bridge Road"). It could also be named after a group of people that live there (e.g. "Jew Street"). (I think random names would be enough for DF streets, though)

I tried to google how common this was, because I only know it from my town. Every street in the old town has a name dating back to the middle ages, so I think it's not that uncommon.

[FantasticDorf]

I wouldnt mind actually sectoring up my fortress, or walking around procedurally named areas when given a vague instruction to go to x person's house on x road in a particular town.

You can sort of pseudo used paved road objects like this though with CTRL+N

[VABritto]

I think this is a great idea and would add to immersion

[MaxTheFox]

+1, this would make towns feel a lot more "real".

[therahedwig]

Most of the time the street names tend to be more landmark like. Medieval people typically weren't expected to travel lots(their superior, a lord or something, would want to know where they hang out), so people tended to know their towns pretty well. So hence you get stuff like 'the jew quarter', 'bakers street', 'church square'. Probably, such names would be something like 'castle street', 'market street', 'temple street', 'well street', if the names were just based on the facilities of a town/city. To get more detail though, we're proly gonna need to wait for any kind of urban planning diversity that the law and property arc might bring.

That said, here's a nice link: Street names of london some of these go back to the 12th century.

And of course, having streets named after uglog the magnificent, the necromancer who assaulted the town 30 years ago doesn't seem like it would be out of place...

Part of me wishes fresh histfigs were more aware of their surroundings though, but that type of stuff is still pretty far away.

[Nordlicht]

Medieval people typically weren't expected to travel lots(their superior, a lord or something, would want to know where they hang out)

I think people that lived for one year in a medieval city were free. I know that during ancient times tourism was already a thing (we have written warnings about tourist guides that rip tourists of in olympia), and pilgramage wasn't that uncommon. Then you have also traders and other travelling people like artists or craftsman (either on their journey years, or those offer to work in peoples homes). I think there was already quite a bit of traveling going on.

[therahedwig]

I was mostly summarizing the last time I trawled r/askahistorian on the topic of towns and townguards. I think even in those threads the big problem with any statement about the medieval period also applied to how towns work: It was different per country. So, given that reddit is mostly anglophonic, that statement is proly either only about england, or about north of france. Apparantly the germans did things quite differently.

[Azerty]

I found this article about odonyms, giving the following sources for street names:

• Activities: which activities are undertaken there, for exemple a Smith Street and an Iron Road for smiths or a Leather Place for leatherworkers.
• Inhabitants: for the inhabitants, if they are different from the norm, for exemple a Jewish Road for the place where Jews lived.
• Notables: famous characters or group, such as a ruler or a hero, whether local, national or global.
• Landmarks: famous places, such as a temple, a palace or a castle. Natural places, such as rivers, are also included.
• Descriptive: names drawn from a characteristic of the road, such as the length, widtf or the direction.

[Timeless Bob]

+1

This is a great idea. However, the memory bloat of all these names would be immense unless they could be procedurally created each time an adventurer walked up to a site.  As such, the names would have to be integrated with the site-creation system itself.