Place names - Changes and Anglicisation

[airbolt]

Apologies if this is a Double Post.

I read that some people in Mumbai continue to refer to it as Bombay. Is this true ? Are there any other place name changes that failed to catch on?

Also - why were certain place names anglicised ( Munich-Munchen , Turin - Torino ) while others such as Marseilles were not?

[keenreader]

Burma got renamed Myanmar and Rangoon got renamed Yangon but most people outside the country still use the old names. Saigon is now Ho Chi Minh City but many people still call it Saigon which is not incorrect as the central part of HCM City is still officially named Saigon. As for your second question, my guess is simply that foreign names were anglicised in the 18th & 19th centuries as wealthy folk did the 'Grand Tour' and found it difficult to get their English tongues round some foreign placenames; Firenze becoming Florence is a good example. You'll recall how Ypres in Belgium during WWI was dubbed Wipers by our troops - I'm sure there are many other examples.

[warpig1]

During the recent terroist attacts in Mumbai my parents were at a lost as to where the news programs were referring to, when I told them it was Bombay they wanted to know why this was not mentioned or made clearer in the news reports even by saying 'Mumbai formally known/referred to as Bombay'.

In their defence they just did not genuinely know,