CAN you tell me how it came about that the names of most Italian towns and regions have been Anglicised, eg Roma, Napoli, Milano, Sicilia, Toscana etc and even Italia. It is understandable that the difficult to pronounce names of Eastern Europe are Anglicised, but Italy has obviously the easiest words to pronounce in western Europe.

We insist on leaving Versailles, Avignon and Le Havre alone and even pronounce these the French way. Apart from changing Bourgogne and Dunkerque and putting an s on the end of Marseille we don't seem to have changed the French names very much. We seem to mostly use the German words, yet for some reason we have to change Koln, Munchen and the River Donnan. We make few changes to Spanish and Portuguese places but why does Porto become Oporto? - K Stephens, Richmond.

WE do not have an English equivalent for every European place name and it is the more familiar place names and regions which tend to have developed Anglicised forms. Thus names of major places like Rome, Naples and Milan are used instead of their longer Italian forms. More obscure places are less likely to develop an English form because they are used less frequently.

Many British people are familiar with the French language. School children are more likely to learn French than Italian. For this reason, attempts to convert a French place name into an English style might seem comical to English people who understand French. We should also remember that France is our near neighbour and so we are more familiar with their pronunciations. It is unlikely that anyone in England would pronounce the s in Calais for example.

German place names seem to more closely resemble English place names in their structure and are less likely to be changed than Italian names. Koln has probably been changed to Cologne because English people feel there is a need for a vowel sound between the l and the n.

I have further information about place names in Teesside featured in last week's Burning Questions. The phrase 'over the border' refers to the railway as the border - but it was actually a real border between the wards of St Hilda's and Newport, Middlesbrough, at election time.

I believe that North Ormesby was called Doggie or Dog Town because of the number of dogs that were kept there. As for the Wilderness on the road from Stockton to Middlesbrough, it was virtually a marsh where the river used to flood the area. One row of houses (Erimus Crescent) existed there but usually managed to stay above the floods. The Wilderness area was once used as an official rubbish dump.

At one time there were many sand bars at the mouth of the Tees and the river used to enter the sea by three channels. Before the cuts were made the Tees was a much more winding river and it took considerable time to navigate. One ship's captain arriving at the mouth of the Tees used to throw his dog overboard. It used to get to the captain's home in Stockton before the ship, so his wife knew when to expect him. - E Reynolds, Wheatley Hill.

l If you have a Burning Question, or can improve on any of the answers above, please write to Burning Questions, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington, DL1 1NF or e-mail David Simpson