Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein
Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein is a farm in the
North West province of
South Africa, located about 200 km west of
Pretoria and 20 km east of
Lichtenburg[SUP]
[1][/SUP]
Coordinates:
26°10′S 26°28′E / 26.167°S 26.467°E / -26.167; 26.467 whose 44-character name has entered South African folklore. It is the longest place name in South Africa
The name, which follows a common format for Afrikaans place names in South Africa, is
Afrikaans for "The spring where two
buffaloes were killed with a single shot". The literal translation is "
Twee buffels" = "Two buffaloes", "
met een skoot" = "with one shot"; "
morsdood" = "stone dead"; "
geskiet" = "shot"; "
fontein" = "spring (river source)" or "fountain". This name illustrates the compounding nature of Afrikaans.[SUP]
[5][/SUP] All the descriptive terms relating to one concept can generally be tied together into one long
word. Another example of this would be
wildewaatlemoenkonfytkompetisiebeoordelaarshandleiding, which translates to "wild
watermelon jam competition judge's manual". Such use is, however, not common, and such words are often separated using one or more
hyphens if they become too long or unwieldy.
True story
Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia