重探臺北市內「古亭」和「大安」地名源流：一個跨學科考證的嘗試

Placename reflects human activities in a particular place. It also helps us to reconstruct local history of a less-documented place. However, this kind of reconstruction requires a synthetic approach that analyzes placename through linguistic, geographical, and historical methods, and then a sound reconstruction may be attained. This paper examines two well-known placenames in Taipei City, Da'an and Guting, and finds the existing etymologies of them cannot pass the verifications of linguistics, geography, and even basic historical criticism. This paper is to propose new etymologies with evidences drawn from materials which reflect the Southern Min spoken in the genesis of the placenames in question. These linguistic proposals are then verified with geographical and historical evidences. I propose two possible etymologies for Guting, kóo-tîng or kóo-tân. Kóo-tîng may be a forgotten form of Koo-liâu (storage of fishing net(, and Guting does situated in a good fishing place. On the other hand, Kóo-tân means a simple alter for neglected graves or unidentifiable dead, and Kóo-tân became Kóo-tîng (Guting( at an unknown point of time. For Da'an, I first verify that Da'an is the altered form of Tuā-uan. Tuā-uan was traditionally interpreted as ”big curve”, denoting a significant curve of the Liugong Canal, an irrigation system completed in 1760's. However, I falsify the traditional etymology by proving that Tuā-uan was attested two decades before the curve appeared. In fact, uan also meant ”pond” in the Southern Min spoken in the eighteenth century, and geographical and historical evidences also suggest there had been a pond in today's Da'an District until 1910's. Thus I argue a new etymology for Tuā-uan that it was named after the big pond, and the meaning of pond had faded out in the nineteenth century, making Tuā-uan difficult to be interpreted literally.