Ad
related to: map of england shires
Search results
Results from the Think 24/7 Content Network
The historic counties of England are areas that were established for administration by the Normans, in many cases based on earlier kingdoms and shires created by the Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Celts and others. They are alternatively known as ancient counties, [ 2][ 3] traditional counties, [ 4] former counties[ 5][ 6] or simply as counties. [ 7]
The counties of England are a type of subdivision of England.Counties have been used as administrative areas in England since Anglo-Saxon times. There are three definitions of county in England: the 48 ceremonial counties used for the purposes of lieutenancy; the 84 metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties for local government; [a] and the 39 historic counties which were used for ...
The older term, shire is historically equivalent to county. By the Middle Ages, county had become established as the unit of local government, at least in England. [1] By the early 17th century, all of England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland had been separated into counties. In Scotland shire was the only term used until after the Act of Union 1707.
The division of England into shires, later known as counties, began in the Kingdom of Wessex in the mid-Saxon period, many of the Wessex shires representing previously independent kingdoms. With the Wessex conquest of Mercia in the 9th and 10th centuries, the system was extended to central England.
Shire ( / ʃaɪər /, also / ʃɪər /) is a traditional term for an administrative division of land in Great Britain and some other English-speaking countries such as Australia. It is generally synonymous with county. It was first used in Wessex from the beginning of Anglo-Saxon settlement, and spread to most of the rest of England in the ...
Map of the Hundreds of Staffordshire, c. 1650. North is to the right. In south and western England, a hundred was the division of a shire for military and judicial purposes under the common law, which could have varying extent of common feudal ownership, from complete suzerainty to minor royal or ecclesiastical prerogatives and rights of ...
Most of the historic counties of England (and modern Ceremonial counties) south of the Mersey and Humber derive directly from this time. Another important shire official was the shire-reeve; the modern day derivative is a sheriff or high sheriff. The shire-reeve was responsible for upholding the law, and holding civil and criminal courts in the ...
Administrative counties were subnational divisions of England used for local government from 1889 to 1974. They were created by the Local Government Act 1888 ( 51 & 52 Vict. c. 41), which established an elected county council for each area. Some geographically large historic counties were divided into several administrative counties, each with ...
Ad
related to: map of england shires