Santiago de Compostela (also Saint James of Compostela) is the capital of the autonomous community of Galicia and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Located in the north west of Spain in the Province of A Coruña, it was the "European City of Culture" for the year 2000. The city's Cathedral is the destination today, as it has been throughout history, of the important 9th century medieval pilgrimage route, the Way of St.

James (Galician: Camiño de Santiago, Spanish: Camino de Santiago). Folk etymology for the name "Compostela" is that it comes from the Latin "Campus Stellae" (i.e. Stars Field), but it is unlikely such a phonetic evolution taking account of normal evolution from Latin to Galician-Portuguese. A more probable etymology relates the word with Latin "compositum", and local Vulgar Latin "Composita Tella", meaning "burial ground" as a euphemism.

Many other places through Galicia share this toponym (with identical sense) and even exists a "Compostilla" in the León province. An even more probable etymology may relate to ancient Celts and Picts Combe or Cumbo of Cumbria and Cumberland who migrated from Central Asia as Germanic people to Europe and as Kermanic people to Asia (India and Cambodia). Many places having Combe as part of their name in Great Britain must be related to Compostella.

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