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Looking for a name
It’s not easy to keep geography and politics apart. Geographically speaking, it is clear that Great Britain, Ireland and all those smaller islands belong together. So you would think there would be a (single) name for them. During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, they were generally called ‘The British Isles’. But most people in Ireland and some people in Britain regard this name as outdated because it calls to mind the time when Ireland was politically dominated by Britain.
So what can we call these islands? Among the names which have been used are ‘The north-east Atlantic archipelago’, ‘The north-west European archipelago’, ‘IONA’ (Islands of the North Atlantic) and simply ‘The Isles’. But none of these has become widely accepted.
The most common term at present is ‘Great Britain and Ireland’. But even this is not strictly correct politically because there are two small parts of the area on the maps which have special political arrangements. These are the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, which are ‘crown dependencies’ and not officially part of the UK. Each has complete internal self-government, including its own parliament and its own tax system. Both are ‘ruled’ by a Lieutenant Governor appointed by the British government.
The origin of the adjective ‘great’ in the name Great Britain was not a piece of advertising (although modern politicians sometimes try to use it that way!).It was first used to distinguish it from the smaller area in France which is called ‘Brittany’ in modern English.
Some historical and poetic names
* Albion is a word used by poets and songwriters to refer, in different contexts, to England or to Scotland or to Great Britain as a whole. It comes from a Celtic word and was an early Greek and Roman name for Great Britain. The Romans associated Great Britain with the Latin word ‘albus’, meaning white. The white chalk cliffs around Dover on the English south coast are the first land formations one sights when crossing the sea from the European mainland.
* Britannia is the name that the Romans gave to their southern British province (which covered, approximately, the area of present-day England and Wales). It is also the name given to the female embodiment of Britain, always shown wearing a helmet and holding a trident (the symbol of power over the sea), hence the patriotic song which begins ‘Rule Britannia, Britannia rule the waves’. The figure of Britannia has been on the reverse side of many British coins for more than 300 years.
Flag
The Union flag, often known as the ‘Union Jack’, is the national flag of the UK. It is a combination of the cross of St. George, the cross of St. Andrew and the cross of St. Patrick.Wales had no explicit recognition in the Union Flag as it had been a part of the Kingdom of England since being annexed by Edward I of England in 1282 and its full integration by the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542, and was therefore represented by the flag of England
Other signs of national identity
* Briton is a word used in official contexts and in writing to describe a citizen of the United Kingdom. ‘Ancient Britons’ is the name given to the people who lived in southern Britain before and during the Roman occupation (AD 43-410). Their heirs are thought to be the Welsh and their language has developed into the modern Welsh language.
* Caledonia, Cambria and Hibernia were the Roman names for Scotland, Wales and Ireland respectively. The words are commonly used today in scholarly classifications (for example, the type of English used in Ireland is sometimes called ‘Hiberno-English’ and there is a division of geological time known as ‘the Cambrian period’) and for the names of organizations (for example, ‘Glasgow Caledonian’ University).
* Erin is a poetic name for Ireland. The Emerald Isle is another way of referring to Ireland, evoking the lush greenery of its countryside.
* John Bull (see below) is a fictional character who is supposed to personify Englishness and certain English virtues. (He can be compared to Uncle Sam in the USA.) He appears in hundreds of nineteenth century cartoons. Today, somebody dressed as him often appears at football or rugby matches when England are playing. His appearance is typical of an eighteenth century country gentleman, evoking an idyllic rural past.
Other tokens of national identity
The following are also associated by British people with one or more of the four nations.
* Surnames
The prefix ‘Mac’ or ‘Mc’ (such as McCall, MacCarthy, MacDonald) is Scottish or Irish. The prefix ‘O’ (as in O’Brien, O’Connor) is Irish. A large number of surnames (for example, Evans, Jones, Morgan, Price, Williams) suggest Welsh origin. The most common surname in both England and Scotland is ‘Smith’.
* First names for men
The Scottish of ‘John’ is ‘Ian’ and its Irish form is ‘Sean’, although all three names are common throughout Britain. Outside their own countries, there are also nicknames for Irish, Scottish and Welsh men. For instance, Scottish men are sometimes known and addressed as ‘Jock’, Irishmen are called ‘Paddy’ or ‘ Mick’ and Welshmen as ‘Dai’ or ‘Taffy’. If the person using one of these names is not a friend, and especially if it is used in the plural (e.g. ‘Micks’), it can sound insulting.
* Clothes
The kilt, a skirt with a tartan pattern worn by men, is a very well-known symbol of Scottishness (though it is hardly ever worn in everyday life).
* Musical instruments
The harp is an emblem of both Wales and Ireland. Bagpipes are regarded as distinctively Scottish, although a smaller type is also used in traditional Irish music.
Characteristics
There are certain stereotypes of national character which are well known inn Britain. For instance, the Irish are supposed to be great talkers, the Scots have a reputation for being careful with money and the Welsh are renowned for their singing ability. These are, of course, only caricatures and not reliable descriptions of individual people from these countries. Nevertheless, they indicate some slight differences in the value attached to certain kinds of behaviour in these countries.
Population in 2006
These figures are estimates provided by the Office for National Statistics (England and Wales), the General Register Office for Scotland and the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. In the twenty-first century, the total population of Britain has risen by about a quarter of a million each year.
Careful with that address!
When you are addressing a letter to somewhere in Britain, do not write anything like ‘Edinburgh, England’ or ‘Cardiff, England’. You should write ‘Edinburgh, Scotland’ and ‘Cardiff, Wales’-or (if you feel ‘Scotland’ and ‘Wales’ are not recognizable enough) write ‘Great Britain’ or “United Kingdom’ instead.
The people of Britain
As you can see, about one in nine people identified themselves as something other than ‘white British’. The largest category was ‘white other’, but these people were from a variety of places and many were only temporarily resident in Britain. As a result, they do not form a single identifiable community. (For these and other reasons, the same is largely true of those in the white Irish and black African categories.) By far the largest recognizable ethnic grouping was formed by people whose ethnic roots are in the Indian subcontinent (Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi in the chart); together they made up more than two million people. The other established, recognizable ethnic group in Britain were black Caribbeans (a little over half a million people).
What this chart does not show are all the people who came to Britain from eastern Europe (especially Poland) in the years 2004-2007. Their numbers, estimated between three quarters of a million and one million, represent the largest single wave of immigration to Britain in more than 300 years. However, it is not clear at this time how many will set up home in Britain.
Another point about the people of Britain is worth nothing. Since the 1980s, more people immigrate to Britain than emigrate from it every year. A quarter of all babies born in Britain are born to at least one foreign-born parent. At the same time, emigration is also very high. The people of Britain are changing.
