there was this other, similar town pronounced -bruh or -boro that people talked about.
You were so close: Edinburgh only got its name after Edward I invaded Scotland in 1296. Before that it (which was then a larger area than the present Edinburgh) had just been called “the Burgh”, which depending on regional variation would have been pronounced either “burg” or “boro”. “Edinburgh” referred to a smaller area within the Burgh that the king’s guards would patrol more severely due to the perceived increased risk of rebellion due to higher population density.
()
Pure speculation: could this have been motivated, to any extent, by some desire to maintain a predictable portion of the population conscriptable, given that only men are conscripted?
The war isn’t going quite in the way Putin would have hoped, after all.