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@melancholicwriter

My usual strategy is to take names from whatever real culture I’m using as inspiration and occasionally making up things that fit with those names.  Or to look up the definition of the word I want the name to mean and use either synonyms or a root of the word (usually for place names).  Ost Tarn is the name of an observatory on a lake in the eastern mountain range.  ‘Ost’ is an old english word that eventually morphed into the modern ‘East’ and ‘Tarn’ is a word meaning ‘mountain lake’.  For character names I’ll find a real name (‘Karin’) and make modifications (‘Kharin’) until it becomes its own thing (‘Kaharin’) that I can work with.  I’ll alter spelling a bit to make it more unique (‘Brandon’ to ‘Brendin’) and so on.  Name generators are a wonderful resource.

And if you’re specifically stuck on place names, think about what the land would be known for.  The main land of my fantasy is called Haven because this plains area bordered on 3 sides by mountains and the other by a vast marshland is a sort of safe zone amidst a myriad of Australian-like wild horrors*.  Tyggr-höfn (safe haven, roughly) is so named because it is the least treacherous harbor on the island.  On a smaller scale the abandoned city of Cairne is so named as it is a city of the dead where emperors and their courts were buried.  Tome is the home of the University and the largest library known.  The Huldrevale is a broad, lush valley that is the capitol of the huldrefolk community.  And so on.

*These include wyverns (coconut crabs but as dragonoids), sædracans (saltwater crocodiles but worse), drakes (30 foot long tree-eating lizards), cassowaries (Google if you don’t know), a forest of wild boars and the deadliest archers known, basilisk-infested mires, gryffins, etc.