I feel like here in Lloegr, having a Welsh exonym is something that should be promoted. “Oxford - twinned with Rhydychen” might work - slap a bit of paint up & pocket the rest of the twinning budget 
Isn’t Rhydychen a makey-uppy* translation rather than a ‘natural’, original Welsh name?
*Yes, I know, all words are ultimately made up. 
Where I live in the Basque Country, the city started as a small town with a Basque name similar to Gasteiz, then the Spanish arrived and named it Vitoria, but as it grew it was given the official hyphenated name Vitoria-Gasteiz to include both. Spanish speakers tend to call it Vitoria and Basque speakers Gasteiz, but at least officially everyone has to use both.
I wonder if that would work in some places in Cymru, or would people think Swansea-Abertawe or Abertawe-Swansea was too long? And would they disagree about the order?
Not really - I mean, Yes, it’s clearly a translation of the English name, but it’s first recorded (as far as I know) in one of the “independent native tales” that tends to get bundled together with the Mabinogi in translations & popular editions. According to the story of Lludd and Llefelys, in the Red Book of Hergest (plus a fragment in the White Book of Rhydderch), an ancient king of all Britain, Lludd, found his realm troubled by three unexplained plagues, and went to seek the advice of his brother, Llefelys, king of France, about them. The second of the three was a fearful scream that was heard in every home in Britain at midnight of May Eve, Calan Mai or Centefin, and scared people out of their senses. The scream, Llefelys explained, came from two dragons who fought each other once a year. They were to be killed by being intoxicated with mead that was to be placed in a pit dug in the very centre of Britain. So when Lludd went back to Britain, he measured the whole island, and found its centre, in Oxford, and he dug a pit there; and he used it to catch the red and the white dragon; and they were carried to Wales and buried in Dinas Emrys.
The business of the red dragon and the white fighting is obviously linked to the story in Geoffrey of Monmouth - but the version here means (a) that “Rhydychen” has been a thing since at least the 14th century, and (b) that in Welsh I always tell people that I come from Oxford “like the Ddraig Goch”
Lludd a beris messuraw yr ynys ar y hyt ac ar y llet. Ac yn Rytychen a cauas y pwynt [perued] i.e. Mi barodd Lludd mesuro hyd a lled yr ynys. A chafodd o’r pwynt perfedd yn Rhydychen.
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If the Anglo Saxons named this as a useful place for oxen to cross the river, might it not be quite possible that others before them, i.e. Celts & Romans, used it for the same purpose (even with no settlement of any significance being there) so maybe so perhaps a Celtic name to identify the spot could have come first??
I imagine that’s entirely possible - and very nearly wrote “are obviously translations of each other,” which might have been a more accurate way of putting it (although the English version of the name is recorded in the 10th century, so about 400 years earlier than our first Welsh evidence). I have also seen suggestions that the English name might come from the same Celtic root as Usk, Caer Wysg, etc. - but I think that’s really wholly speculative, when the existing name is transparently meaningful, and when being able to get livestock across a big river is an obviously important thing.
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Yes, I’ve seen that. Afon Tafwys is the modern Welsh name for the river. Fanciful stuff from the romantic era, I think.
Thanks for that. I thought the name was much later - Tudor, possibly - from the time when the university became popular with Welsh students.
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Might be of interest
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Practically all of those (English) names are very, very recent, and related to the tourism industry. I think, by now, we can hope that English speaking visitors won’t get a fit of the vapours when seeing the name Llyn Tegid on a map.
In fact, Bala Lake isn’t even it’s original English name - That would be Pemblemere. Further, Bala Lake is etymologically mind-bending, since the town of Bala is named after the lake’s outlet into the Afon Dyfrdwy, so Bala Lake could be taken to mean Lake of the Lake Outlet.
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In the light of “Poet’s Island Island” (Bardsey Island), “River River” (the Avon), “Lake Windy-lake” (no comment), and “Hill Hill Hill” (Pendle Hill or Bredon Hill, you choose), I’d say “Lake Lake Outlet” was 100% cromulent English toponymy.
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