Polska eponimia biblijna: Sodoma. Od urbonimu starożytnego miasta do sodomawirusa

Sodom (in Polish: Sodoma) does not exist. Although this Palestinian town has been known since prehistoric times and it is mentioned in the Bible, there is no archaeological proof which would confirm its location. In 2011, the name Sodoma was removed from the official list which includes Polish equivalents of geographical names of the world. However, the onym is still used in the Polish language. This name and its derivatives appear mainly in numerous eponyms. We can find here semantic derivatives (eg. sodoma), structural-semantic ones (eg. sodomia, sodomita, sodomizować), phraseological ones (eg. sodoma i gomora, grzech sodomski, jabłko sodomskie, jeden (jedyny) sprawiedliwy w Sodomie i Gomorze), and the ones which were created as a result of transonymisation. Other proper names derived from Sodoma are usually international in their character. The most frequent ones are artiphonyms and titles of various pieces of art – in painting, music, literature, etc. The connotative value of Sodoma is wider than it seems when we take only a cursory look at eponymous forms, but the dominant connotations are sexual ones (from heterosexual practices through homosexual ones to zoophilia). Sodoma is also related to catastrophe, mess, as well as to justice and morality. Probably thanks to its wide range of eponymous forms, the onym Sodoma is still present in Polish dictionaries of proper names. What is more, phraseological associations with Gomorrah (in Polish: Gomora, another biblical town) are so strong that in a few dictionaries the information about the name Sodoma appears only in the entry devoted to Gomora.