British Isles (terminology)
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An Euler diagram clarifying the terminology. Geographical locations are written in red, political entities are written in blue. |
The various terms used to describe the different (and sometimes overlapping) geographical and political areas of the
islands traditionally referred to collectively as
the British Isles are often a source of confusion for people from other parts of the world, and even for the inhabitants of those islands themselves. The purpose of this article is to explain the meanings of and inter-relationships among those terms.
In brief , the main terms and their simple explanations are:
*Geographical terms
**
British Isles =
Great Britain +
Ireland + many smaller surrounding islands (note that this term
is problematic)
**
Great Britain = the largest of the archipelago (sometimes informally referred to as
Britain)
**
Ireland = the second largest island of the archipelago.
*Political terms
**The
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland = a
sovereign state occupying much of the British Isles. Often shortened to 'United Kingdom', and sometimes informally known as
Britain.
**
England,
Scotland,
Wales and
Northern Ireland =
constituent countries of the United Kingdom.
**
Ireland / Republic of Ireland = an independent sovereign state occupying the larger part of the island Ireland.
**
Great Britain = England + Wales + Scotland
These various terms can be confusing not only in themselves (partly owing to the similarity between some of the actual words used), but also because they are often used loosely or inaccurately.
*
Britain = a shortened form of
Great Britain. Also used very commonly to mean United Kingdom.
*
Great Britain (abbreviation:
GB) = the
largest of the British Isles and the
political union of three nations, these being:::*
England and Wales Is a political and administrative term referring to the two
home countries of England and Wales, which share the same legal system. Between
1746 and
1967 the term "England" did legally include Wales. :::*
England (see also the historical
Kingdom of England = England (and later, Wales) prior to 1707).:::*
Wales ::*
Scotland (see also the historical
Kingdom of Scotland)
*The historical
Kingdom of Great Britain = Britain, 1707-1801.:*
Britannia = the
Roman province of Britain, or a poetic reference to later Britain, or a
personification of Britain.:On the history of the name, see
Britain.
*The
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, usually shortened to the
United Kingdom (abbreviation
UK) = Great Britain +
Northern Ireland since 1927. (The Partition of Ireland took place in 1922, but the consequent change in the official title of the UK was only made by Act of Parliament five years later.):*The historical
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland = Great Britain + Ireland, 1801-1927.:N.B.: While "United Kingdom" is normally abbreviated
UK, the official
ISO 3166 two-letter country code is
GB and the three letter code is
GBR. The UK's
internet top-level domain is
.uk, a break from the normal practice of following ISO 3166.:See also
United Kingdom (disambiguation) for other united kingdoms and
UK (disambiguation) for other meanings of the abbreviation.
*
Ireland (in
Irish,
Éire) refers, geographically, to the island of Ireland, or to any of the following:
Historically::*The
Kingdom of Ireland = Ireland, 1541-1801.:*The
Irish Republic =
unilaterally declared 32-county republic encompassing the entire island, 1919-22. During this period, Ireland legally remained part of the UK and its independence was not recognised internationally except by
Russia.:*
Southern Ireland = proposed
Home Rule 26-county state under the
Government of Ireland Act 1920. Never came into practical existence, being superseded by::*The
Irish Free State = Ireland excepting Northern Ireland, 1922-37.
Present::*
Ireland (in Irish,
Éire) = the political entity consisting of the island of Ireland excepting Northern Ireland, 1937-present. This is the name of the state according to the
Irish Constitution.:*The
Republic of Ireland = a legal "description" of Ireland excepting Northern Ireland, 1949-present. This form is used where tact or disambiguity demands. It is also the name used by the international
football team.:*
Northern Ireland 1922-present. = that part of the island of Ireland north of the line of partition of 1922, and which is still part of the United Kingdom. It is sometimes referred to as "the North of Ireland", "the
six counties" or the "occupied six counties," especially by
Irish Nationalists.:*
Ulster The name of one of Ireland's four
provinces. It contains nine counties, six of which make up
Northern Ireland, three of which are part of the
Republic of Ireland. It is now primarily used in sporting and cultural contexts by both communities. However, the six counties which form
Northern Ireland are sometimes called 'Ulster' by loyalists in order to attach more historic legitimacy to
Northern Ireland. See
Ulster (disambiguation).
In sport:*In
Rugby Union, the
Ireland team is drawn from the whole island.
*The
British Isles = the traditional term used to mean the island of Great Britain + the island of Ireland + many smaller surrounding islands, including the
Isle of Man and, in some contexts, the
Channel Islands (
Guernsey and
Jersey). Due to the changes in the common usage of the word "British" (to mean "of the United Kingdom") it is a controversial term.
*
Islands of the North Atlantic = a suggested replacement term for the British Isles, without the same political connotations. However, its convolution, the popularity of the older term and its vagueness have meant that it is not in common use. (Its acronym, IONA, is also the name of the small but historically important island of
Iona off the coast of Scotland.)
*
British Islands (a political term not in common usage) = the UK, the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey (which in turn includes the smaller islands of
Alderney,
Herm and
Sark).
*
Brittany, the historical
Duchy in the West of
France, now a French
région; for this modern administrative sense, see
Bretagne.
The British Isles
The
British Isles is an archipelago in the
Atlantic Ocean off the coast of
Continental Europe. It includes
Ireland and
Great Britain, and the
Isle of Man, but usually excludes the
Channel Islands. Also included are the thousands of small islands off the coast of both the larger islands such as
Shetland and
Orkney. This term dates to usage in a
Greek text of 325 BC in the form
Pretanikai nesoi (Pretanic isles).
Great Britain
Great Britain refers to the largest of the British Isles. The word "Great" simply means "larger" (no connection with "greatness" in other senses is intended) in contrast to
Brittany, a historical term for a
peninsula in modern France that largely corresponds with the present day French province of
Bretagne. That region was settled by
Brythons (from
Cornwall) around
500, fleeing from the
Anglo-Saxons, and named "Little Britain" by them. The
French term "Bretagne" now refers to the French "Little Britain", not to the British "Great Britain", which in French is called
Grande-Bretagne.
Ireland
The second largest island in the archipelago is Ireland. That Ireland is a part of the geographical "British Isles" in no way implies that all of the island is politically British.
Channel Islands
Although the
Channel Islands are associated with the United Kingdom politically, they are clearly an outcrop of the nearby
French geology, and historically they are the last remaining parts of the former
Duchy of Normandy still under the crown of the
United Kingdom.
The United Kingdom
"United Kingdom" is short for
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, which makes it self-explanatory.
Great Britain is also widely, but incorrectly, used as a synonym for the UK. Both
Great Britain and
The United Kingdom are often shortened to
Britain.
The
United Kingdom is a sovereign
state. Its four
constituent countries, whilst having equal rights to elect
Members of Parliament on (nominally) the same terms, are sometimes considered to be of different status. This view may be supported by the existence of
devolved governments with different levels of power in Scotland and Wales (see
Asymmetrical federalism). Due to historical precedent,
England,
Scotland, and
Wales are
countries and
nations in their own right (although none of these is sovereign today). Wales is also a
principality of the United Kingdom (the heir to the
British throne is usually the
Prince of Wales).
Northern Ireland is sometimes described by
United Kingdom citizens as a
province of the United Kingdom, which derives from the Irish
province of
Ulster, which
Northern Ireland is part of. This epithet is also applied because it originally was part of the
UK as part of the country of Ireland rather than as a constituent country or nation in its own right. Northern Ireland also had, until 1972, a far greater degree of
self-government than the other constituent parts of the UK. In contrast to the British unionist usage, Irish nationalists consider all of
Ulster to be the province of
Ulster, and organise their sporting and cultural institutions accordingly.
The four constituent parts of the UK are also known to some as
Home Nations or the "Four Nations"; sporting contests between them are known as "Home internationals" (for example in
football, see the
British Home Championship).
The governing body for soccer in Northern Ireland is called the
Irish Football Association, having been in existence since some 40 years before partition. Its counterpart in the Republic (plus
Derry City) is the
Football Association of Ireland. The Northern national team retained the name "Ireland" for some 50 years after partition. It is only since around 1970 that the two teams have been consistently referred to as "Northern Ireland" and "Republic of Ireland" respectively.
However, in
Rugby Union, the four
Home Nations are England, Ireland (the whole island, i.e. the Republic of Ireland plus Northern Ireland), Scotland and Wales.
Culturally, some consider the
Cornish to be distinct from the English, but, politically,
Cornwall is considered by the UK government to have the same status as any other
county in England. However some have raised questions concerning the
constitutional status of Cornwall.
Thus,
Great Britain is both a geographical and a political entity. Geographically, it is one island, but politically it also contains the islands that belong to its constituent nations - England, Wales and Scotland (most notably England's
Isle of Wight, Wales'
Anglesey and Scotland's
Inner Hebrides,
Outer Hebrides,
Orkney Islands and
Shetland Islands).
However, the abbreviation
GB is sometimes officially used for the UK, for example in the
Olympics - where athletes from Northern Ireland may choose whether to represent the UK or the Republic of Ireland - and as the
vehicle registration plate country identification code, however the
internet code ".gb", although allocated to the UK, is unused (the UK uses
".uk"). UK teams in the Olympics have competed under several different names - most recently in Athens the athletes were presented at the Opening Ceremony under a banner which said simply Great Britain, rather than the full Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Since the
Good Friday Agreement, and the subsequent implementation legislation, sporting organisation (and several other organisations, e.g.
tourism, and
Irish Gaelic and
Ulster Scots language boards) on the island of Ireland has increasingly been cross-border.
Citizens of the UK are called
British or
Britons. The term
Brits may also be used, sometimes
pejoratively, for example by supporters of
Scottish independence when referring to supporters of the
Union. Some rather dated slang names for Britons are
Tommy (for British soldiers),
Pom,
Anglo and
Limey.
Anglo properly refers only to England, but it is sometimes (incorrectly) used as a broader reference as an element in compound adjectives: for example,
"Anglo-French relations" may be used in newspaper articles when referring to relations between the political entities
France and the United Kingdom (the correct term in this case is
"British-French relations").
Anglo-Saxon may be used when referring to the whole English-speaking world, the (correctly named, as it refers to the
English language, not a
"British language")
Anglosphere, although ethnically very few of the world's one billion English-speakers are of
Anglo-Saxon origin. Interestingly while the rest of the world refers to the 'English', derived from 'Angles', the Scots and Welsh refer to them as 'Saxons' [Sassannach, Saesneg].
Ireland
Ireland is the name since 1937 of the independent state which covers the island of Ireland apart from Northern Ireland. Since 1949, the "description" "Republic of Ireland" has been widely used, but the official name in the
Irish constitution is
Ireland, or, in the Irish language,
Éire. This is also the geographical term for the entire island.
The Republic of Ireland gained full recognised independence from the United Kingdom in 1921. Northern Ireland is sovereign British territory, and a majority of the population of
Northern Ireland consider themselves British. Traditionally Ireland is divided into four
provinces -
Leinster,
Connacht,
Munster and
Ulster. The Republic of Ireland takes up 83% of the island, while Northern Ireland takes up six of the nine counties of Ulster.
On the
island of Ireland (as everywhere), the naming of places often raises political issues. The usage of "Ireland" as the official name of the state in the constitution of the
Republic of Ireland causes offence to some
Unionists in
Northern Ireland as it implies that the Republic of Ireland still has a territorial claim to the whole island - the terminology of "Republic of Ireland" or "Éire" is much preferred by Northern unionists when referring to that political state. Similarly, some
Nationalists in Northern Ireland also prefer to reserve to usage of "Ireland" to refer to the whole island.
The Republic of Ireland is often referred to by
Irish republicans by the term "the Twenty-six Counties", with the connotation that the state constituted as such forms only a portion of the ideal political unit, which would consist of all of the
thirty-two counties into which the island is divided. From 1922 to 1937, the state comprising those 26 counties was officially known by the term "The
Irish Free State".
Many people object to these latter two terms, as they are seen to imply that the Republic of Ireland is not a fully independent country. Conversely, some republicans and others refer to Northern Ireland as "the Six Counties" (in reference to Northern Ireland's six counties), a name that avoids the disputed link with Great Britain. Some even call it "the occupied six counties". Some
nationalists use the terms, "the North of Ireland" and, "the North", instead of Northern Ireland; these are terms also used by the Irish national broadcaster
RTÉ.
Many people, especially some
unionists, sometimes refer to
Northern Ireland as
Ulster - this is inaccurate as the
Irish province of Ulster traditionally includes an additional three counties, which are in the Republic of Ireland. The term
Ulster (and
"the Province") are sometimes preferred by Unionists, sometimes because it can suggest an origin of the polity of Northern Ireland that pre-dates 1922, referring back to the
Act of Union 1800, the
Glorious Revolution of 1689, the
Plantation of Ulster in 1610, the ancient migrations between Ulster and Scotland, and even to
biblical tradition. So, it is understandable that certain local place names should still be in dispute: see
Derry/Londonderry name dispute.
British Islands
Since 1978, the term
British Islands (as opposed to
British Isles) has been used by the UK's governments and assemblies to define the United Kingdom, together with the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands.
Under the Interpretation Act
1978 of the United Kingdom, the term
British Islands refers to the
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, together with the
Crown Dependencies: the
Bailiwicks of
Jersey and of
Guernsey (which in turn includes the smaller islands of
Alderney,
Herm and
Sark) in the
Channel Islands; and the
Isle of Man.
In classical times, The prefix "Brit-" implied the
Cruithne peoples and was used when describing the whole archipelago of islands. Native sources used
oceani insulae meaning "islands of the ocean" or
insularum meaning "islands". The phrase
British Isles only appears in the
English language from the
17th Century onwards but has gained common usage within the United Kingdom.
[Collins Paperback Encyclopedia, ISBN 0004708653] In the 18th century the term
Celt was coined linking the Cruithne with continentals who had also spoken
Celtic languages and with the surviving
Celtic nations.
Classical geographers
The inhabitants of Great Britain in classical times were called the
Priteni or
Pretani by classical writers of geographies, who named it after these inhabitants, using a transliteration into their own language such as
Latin (e.g.
Bretannae) or
Greek (e.g. 'ρηττανων).
Irene was the word they used for the island of Ireland, after the
Érainn of its southern coasts.
Throughout Book 4 of his
Geography,
Strabo is consistent in spelling the island Britain (transliterated) as
Prettanikee; he uses the terms
Prettans or
Brettans loosely to refer to the islands as a group - a common generalisation used by classical geographers. For example, in Geography 2.1.18,
…οι νοτιωτατοι των 'ρηττανων βορηιοτηροι τουτον ηισιν (…the most southern of the Brettans are further north than this)
[Translation by Roseman, op.cit.]. He was writing around AD 10, although the earliest surviving copy of his work dates from the 6th century.
Pliny the Elder writing around AD 70 uses a Latin version of the same terminology in section 4.102 of his
Naturalis Historia. He writes of Great Britain:
Albion ipsi nomen fuit, cum Britanniae vocarentur omnes de quibus mox paulo dicemus. (Albion was its own name, when all [the islands] were called the Britannias; I will speak of them in a moment.). In the following section, 4.103, Pliny enumerates the islands he considers to make up the Britannias, listing Great Britain, Ireland, and many smaller islands.
Ptolemy includes Ireland " he calls it
Hibernia " in the island group he calls
Britannia. He entitles Book II, Chapter 1 of his
Geography as
Hibernia, Island of Britannia.
Native sources
The early surviving discussion of the geography is almost exclusively in classical languages. The "British Isles" terminology is found in modern English only in documents written after the
Reformation in England, the earliest quotation of
"British Isles" given by the
Oxford English Dictionary is in
1621.
[Definition of British Isles: OED online, The Oxford English Dictionary. Retrieved 26 June 2006.]The earliest
indigenous source to use a collective term for the archipelago is the
Life of Saint Columba, a
hagiography recording the
missionary activities of the
sixth century Irish monk
Saint Columba among the peoples of modern Scotland. It was written in the late seventh century by
Adomnán of
Iona, an Irish monk living on the
Inner Hebridean island. The collective term for the archipelago used within this work is
Oceani Insulae meaning
"Islands of the Ocean" (Book 2, 46 in the Sharpe edition = Book 2, 47 in Reeves edition), it is used sparingly and no
Priteni-derived collective reference is made.
Another early native source to use a collective term is the
Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum of
Bede written in the early eighth century. The collective term for the archipelago used within this work is
insularum meaning "islands" (Book 1, 8) and it too is used sparingly.
Renaissance mapmakers
Continental mapmakers
Gerardus Mercator (
1512),
Balthasar Moretus (
1624),
Giovanni Magini (
1596),
Abraham Ortelius (
1570) and
Sebastian Munster (
1550) produced maps bearing the term "British Isles". Ortelius makes clear his understanding that England, Scotland and Ireland were politically nominally at least separate in
1570 by the full title of his map: "Angliae, Scotiae et Hiberniae, sive Britannicar. insularum descriptio" which translates as "a description of England, Scotland and Ireland, or the British Isles", additionally many maps from this period show Wales and Cornwall as separate nations, most notably those of Mercator.The
Greeks called the British Isles
Pretaniké and the Romans initially called Great Britain
Britannias or
Alba, and they called Ireland and other smaller islands
Britanniae. After the successful
invasion of
CE 41 they called their province on the island of Great Britain
Britannia (which province eventually covered roughly the same area as present-day England and Wales). The Romans then named Scotland
Caledonia and Ireland
Hibernia to differentiate them from the land that had been conquered - they never conquered either.
The diagram on the right gives an indication of the evolution of kingdoms in the British Isles. Earlier, unmarked kingdoms are the more difficult to define
Celtic,
Saxon and
Viking kingdoms such as
Rheged,
Strathclyde and
Wessex.
|
A timeline of states in the British Isles. (Formally, Ireland (Éire is correctly used only when speaking Irish) continues to exist, but the term "Republic of Ireland" is more widely used). |
In
1603 the
Scottish King James VI inherited the
English throne as "James I of England" (he styled himself as
James I of Great Britain, even though there was not a state called the
Kingdom of Great Britain until 1707), although both states retained their independent parliaments and sovereignty, see
Parliament of Scotland and
Parliament of England. Scottish histories often refer to this monarch as
James VI and I (James the Sixth and First), while conversely English historians may refer to the same monarch as
James I and VI (James the First and Sixth). Many Scots (and not just
nationalists) were upset in 1953, when at the
coronation of the present monarch,
Elizabeth Windsor, she gained the title
Elizabeth II, when in fact neither the former Kingdom of Scotland (c843 - 1707), nor its successors the Kingdom of Great Britain (1707-1801) and the current United Kingdom (1801 - present day), ever had an Elizabeth I. The former
Kingdom of England (927 - 1707), however, had a monarch titled
Elizabeth I. The current rule is that the monarch's number is the higher of the two that he or she would have if England and Scotland remained separate; see
List of regnal numerals of future British monarchs. Therefore, were there to be another King James, he would be King James VIII, not III (following
James VII of Scotland and II of England.)
British overseas territories such as
Bermuda,
Gibraltar,
Hong Kong, the
Falkland Islands, and the
British Antarctic Territory have (or have had) various relationships with the UK. The
Commonwealth of Nations (formerly the British Commonwealth) is a loose confederation of nations roughly corresponding to the former
British Empire, mostly for economic co-operation, formalised in
1931. (The
Commonwealth of England and
The Protectorate have nothing to do with this and were short-lived
republics replacing the previous kingdoms during the
Interregnum (
1649 -
1660).)
The
adjectives used to describe the contents and attributes of the various constituent parts of the British Isles also cause confusion.
British is generally used to refer to the
United Kingdom. However, in a specifically physical geographical sense,
British is used to refer to the island of
Great Britain. The cumbersome adjective
Great British is very rarely used to refer to
Great Britain, other than to contrive a
pun on the word
great, as in "Great British Food".
Irish, in a political sense, is used to refer to the
Republic of Ireland.
Northern Ireland, as a constituent part of the
United Kingdom, would be included within the umbrella of the political term
British, though many unionists in Northern Ireland would also consider themselves Irish in a geographical sense. In order to be more specific,
Northern Irish is therefore in common usage. The term
Ulster can also be used as an adjective (e.g. "
Royal Ulster Constabulary"), but this is more likely to be used by
Unionists and has political connotations in the same fashion as its use as a proper noun (because only six of the traditional nine counties of
Ulster, namely
Antrim,
Armagh,
Down,
Fermanagh,
Londonderry and
Tyrone, are included in Northern Ireland with the remaining three counties
Cavan,
Donegal and
Monaghan forming part of the Republic). Likewise,
Nationalists might describe, say, a lake in Northern Ireland as
Irish. However, some
Nationalists might attribute what they see as less attractive aspects of
Northern Ireland to Britain or even to England (e.g. "The Northern Ireland squad is an English football team").
The "Northern" in "Northern Ireland" is not completely accurate. A large portion of Northern Ireland lies to the south of
County Donegal, which is in the Republic. The northern tip of the island,
Malin Head, is on Donegal's
Inishowen Peninsula.
Scottish,
English and
Welsh are self-explanatory. The term
English is, however, commonly and completely incorrectly used to mean
British by many Anglophones, both within and without the archipelago.
Although the terms's origins are believed to have been
geographical and
ecological rather than political, the fact that the British Isles in general coincided with the former
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1801 - 1922) meant that the term developed geopolitical, economic and cultural meanings also.
[For example, Kathleen Burk The British Isles Since 1945 (Short Oxford History of the British Isles) (Oxford University Press, 2003) 0199248389; Britannia.com, which describes itself as "American's Gateway to the British Isles since 1996" and covers government, parliament, the law, the monarchy, the media and other topics.]The division of the former United Kingdom into two states in 1922, the
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland,
[Though the Irish Free State exited the former United Kingdom in 1922, the name of the new United Kingdom was not changed until 1927.]and the
Irish Free State (now the
Republic of Ireland) complicated usage of the term
British Isles, with the new Irish state viewing itself as having left the British Isles as a cultural and political identity also. No branch of the Irish government, including the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Irish Embassy in London, uses the term.
["Written Answers - Official Terms", Dáil Éireann - Volume 606 - 28 September, 2005. In his response, the Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs added that "Our officials in the Embassy of Ireland, London, continue to monitor the media in Britain for any abuse of the official terms as set out in the Constitution of Ireland and in legislation. These include the name of the State, the President, Taoiseach and others."]However, many public bodies still use the term,
[Two Irish-based or partially-based institutions which date from the former United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland retain references to the "British Isles". Due mainly to administrative convenience, neither the Commissioners for Irish Lights nor the Royal National Lifeboat Institution were passed from United Kingdom to Irish control at independence. Both exist in effect as shared British-Irish institutions and are referred to as "British Isles" institutions.]though others regard references to it still being part of the British Isles as controversial and sometimes offensive.
[Norman Davies, The Isles: A History. p.xxii.]["Irish Genealogical Sources No. 25 - History of the Royal Hibernian Military School, Dublin" uses the term "then British Isles" to refer to Ireland's relationship association with it prior to 1922.][As evidenced by the complaints received by the readers' editor of a major British newspaper: Ian Mayes, "Where are we?", The Guardian'', August 11, 2001.] Despite this, Irish opinion is certainly divided on the issue, and government ministers will use the term freely in speeches.
[For example Síle de Valera, Minister for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands, at the official opening of a theatrical festival in 2002, as reported on the Irish government website.]In the
Republic of Ireland it is often assumed that the term British Isles does not include the
Republic of Ireland itself
[Reform of Irish Insurance Market: Presentation: Joint Committee on Enterprise and Small Business. Retrieved 25 June 2006.][Scoping Study to assess the status of Irelands tide gauge infrastructure and outline current and future requirements, Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, University College Cork. Retrieved 25 June 2006.];moreover, it is also sometimes assumed that the term does not include the Republic of Ireland in British usage;
[The British Isles: The British Isles website. Retrieved 25 June 2006.][British Isles and Ireland, BBC Schools, Music, World Music Website. Retrieved 25 June 2006.]and Manx
[Isle of Man Tourism: Tourism website. Retrieved 25 June 2006.]hence the occasional use of the phrase '"British Isles and Ireland".
Thus the term
British Isles may cause offence to those who interpret it politically, as implying continued
United Kingdom sovereignty over the Republic of Ireland, or that the Republic of Ireland is politically related to the United Kingdom in some sense.
The term
British Isles has led to several high-profile and embarrassing
faux pas. The then
United States First Lady Nancy Reagan, on a state visit to Ireland with her husband, the
President Ronald Reagan, inquired of Irish officials how often members of the
British Royal Family visited. When told that they didn't, Mrs Reagan expressed surprise, given the fact that Ireland was "in the British Isles". Irish officials informed her that Ireland is not part of the British Isles and had not been since Irish independence in December 1922. During a stop-over visit to the Republic of Ireland in 1989 by the then leader of the
USSR,
Mikhail Gorbachev, he indicated that he assumed Ireland's
head of state was
Queen Elizabeth II, given that she was the British Queen and his officials said that Ireland was a part of the British Isles.
[http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu/1989-4/1989-04-02-NBC-2.html Tom Brokaw report.]] Even those who should be familiar with its use are prone to mistakes — such as the
BBC in an article on the British weather, which refers to the "country" of the British Isles.
[British Weather (Part One): BBC Weather. Retrieved 25 June 2006.]Alternative terms
Because of the controversy alternative names for the archipelago have been suggested, notably the
Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA). This suggestion was made by Sir
John Biggs-Davison, a
Conservative MP, in the 1980s.
[For usage of IONA, in preference to the "British Isles" see Taoiseach Bertie Ahern's speech at the Forty-Second Plenary Session of the Forum for Peace and Reconciliation, Dublin Castle, Friday, 5 December, 1997.] It was later used as a term in the Northern Ireland peace process. In a wider context, however, the term might be misunderstood as including
Iceland,
Greenland, the
Azores and other islands
Other alternatives include
Great Britain and Ireland[The Royal Anthropological Institute. Website. Retrieved 25 June 2006], but this has its own difficulties. In Ireland the term "these islands" is more often used to refer in aggregate to the islands in question
[Surf the Isles.com: Comercial website for finding Products from the North-West European Archipelago. Retrieved 26 June 2006] , though is clearly inadequate as a general term for the islands. The
Anglo-Celtic Isles, is another alternative occasionally used in academia.
[See "The Anglo-Danish and Anglo-Norse Coinages of York" by Michael Dolley for recent examples of academic usage. It is also used in book categorisation alongside, or in preference to, "British Isles. For example here.]Isle of Man and Channel Islands
The Isle of Man and the two
bailiwicks of the Channel Islands are
Crown Dependencies; that is, non-sovereign
nations, self-governing but whose sovereignty is held by the British
Crown. They control their own politics, but not their defence. They are not part of the United Kingdom nor part of the
European Union.
*The
Isle of Man is part of the British Isles, situated in the
Irish Sea between Great Britain and Ireland.
*The
Channel Islands consist politically of two self-governing
bailiwicks: the
Bailiwick of Guernsey and the
Bailiwick of Jersey. They are the remnants of the
Duchy of Normandy, which was once in
personal union with the Kingdom of England. They are sometimes, despite their location next to mainland
France, considered part of the British Isles.
Celtic names
The
Celtic languages in the region "
Cornish,
Irish,
Scottish Gaelic,
Welsh and
Manx" each have names for the various countries and subdivisions of the British Isles.
Some of the above are:
; England:Cornish:
Pow Sows:Irish:
Sasana ('Saxony'):Manx:
Sostyn:Scottish Gaelic:
Sasainn ('Saxony'):Welsh:
Lloegr ; Scotland:Cornish:
Alban :Irish:
Albain,
Alba:Manx:
Nalbin:Scottish Gaelic:
Alba:Welsh:
Yr Alban; Wales:Cornish:
Kembra:Irish:
An Bhreatain Bheag ('Little Britain'):Manx:
Bretin:Scottish Gaelic:
a' Chuimrigh:Welsh:
Cymru; Cornwall:Cornish:
Kernow:Irish:
Corn na Breataine,
an Chorn:Manx:
Yn Chorn:Scottish Gaelic:
a' Chòrn :Welsh:
Cernyw; Ireland:Cornish:
Ynys Iwerdhon:Irish:
Éire,
Éirinn:Manx:
Nerin:Scottish Gaelic:
Èirinn:Welsh:
Iwerddon; Republic of Ireland:Cornish:
Repoblek Iwerdhon:Irish:
Poblacht na hÉireann:Manx:
Pobblaght Nerin:Scottish Gaelic:
Poblachd na h-Èirinn:Welsh:
Gweriniaeth Iwerddon; Northern Ireland :Cornish:
Kledhbarth Iwerdhon:Irish:
Tuaisceart Éireann,
Tuaisceart na hÉireann:Manx:
Nerin Twoaie:Scottish Gaelic:
Èirinn a Tuath:Welsh:
Gogledd IwerddonNote: In Irish there are actually several terms for Northern Ireland:
An Tuaisceart, meaning "the North", is usually used, but a more recent term for official use is
Tuaisceart Éireann.
Ulaidh, the Irish word for Ulster, is also sometimes used, though the traditional region of Ulster also includes 3 counties which are not included in the political region of Northern Ireland. Ironically the most northern point in Ireland is 'down South', that is ruled from Dublin, not London.
The English word
Welsh is from a common
Germanic root meaning "foreigner" (
cognate with
Wallonia and
Wallachia, and also cognate with the word used in Mediaeval German to refer to the French and
Italians). The English names
Albion and
Albany are related to
Alba and used poetically for either England or Scotland, or the whole island of Great Britain. English
Erin is a poetic name for Ireland derived from
Éire (or rather, from its dative form
Éirinn)
Rockall
The island of
Rockall is a disputed territory in the Atlantic Ocean. It is a small, uninhabited island lying some 301.4 km (187.3 miles) west of
St Kilda (
Outer Hebrides) and 424 km (229.1 miles) north-west of Ireland. It is claimed by the
United Kingdom (as part of the
Isle of Harris), whilst its surrounding
continental shelf (but not the island itself) is claimed by the Republic of Ireland,
Iceland and
Denmark (through the
Faroe Islands). Its remote position, however, means that it is open to question whether or not, geographically, it belongs to the British Isles.
Blighty is a slang word for Britain derived from the
Hindustani word
bilāyatī ("foreign"). Depending on the user, it is meant either affectionately or archly. It was often used by British soldiers abroad in the First World War to refer to home.
Europe
The term "
Europe" may be used in one of several different contexts by British people; either to refer to the whole of the European continent, to refer to only to
Mainland Europe, sometimes called
"continental Europe" or simply
"the Continent" by some people in the archipelago " as in the apocryphal newspaper headlining "Fog shrouds Channel, continent cut off."
Europe and the adjective European may also be used in reference to the
European Union, particularly in a derogative context such as "The new regulations handed out by Europe".
*
Alternative words for British*
British-Irish Council*
British Overseas Territory*
"The British Isles and all that..."*
"The Great British Venn Diagram"
