Endonyms and exonyms are usually defined as geographic name variants, used by communities in loco and by outsider communities, respectively. Jordan (Challenges in synchronic toponymy: structure, context and use. Narr Francke Attempto Verlag, Tübingen, 2015) has argued that, at a cognitive level, coastal dwellers may be aware of an 'artificial' line between the sea area where their own name has endonym status, contrary to the area where others have different names for the same referents—the latter being exonyms in the view of the first mentioned community. Endonyms, the author states, reflect that the name giving community feels 'at home' in the territory concerned, or emotionally attached to it. The author has proposed to consider names in uninhabited areas as endonyms if they (1) have first been attributed by one of the adjoining language communities, or (2) have etymological roots in the language of such a community, or (3) have been attributed from the perspective of such a community. His proposal meets, however, with a difficulty: translations or adaptations in another language may be felt in due time as endonyms by the speakers of that language. This paper will mainly focus on names of geographic features in the southern North Sea. A strictly synchronic approach will be applied. The consequence is, that no distinction will be made between endonyms and exonyms in the sense that they would reflect the feeling of 'being at home'. This paper discerns: (1) Dutch names without English equivalent, (2) English names without Dutch equivalent; and (3) Dutch and English name pairs. It examines their geographic distribution and will try to draw some conclusions concerning the name giving processes involved.