Talk:Shire
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I don't know if this should be put in or prob. shortly referenced to? but Cornwall which is now an administrative county (I can't be bothered to go into its constitutional position here) was originally divided into shires, eg. Pydershire, East and West Wivelshire Powdershire , I think there were more, they appeared some timein the 12th century.
Cornwall originally had a different 'administration' to england ( beware of historeography here) but the 'shires' in cornwall apparently mirrored the shires in england even though cornwall was comparitevely tiny.(remember pre 1600ish views of cornwall were very different to now.) I don't know when but they became hundereds by the 15th century when cornwall was being absorbed into england. Just to illustarte the 'replication' rather than each hundered having a constable in cornwall there was one per parish, some of these differences remained long after the names changed.
There was another name for these cornish 'shires', I think it was kantrev/cantrev?, sorry if spelling is bad there but there has never really been a standard cornish spelling!
- There's an article at Cantref, but that only deals with Wales. For some strange reason Cornwall is dealt with in Hundreds of Cornwall. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:26, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Shires in today's common usage are the non-metropolitan counties of England outside London.
Does that include Devon, Kent, Essex, etc.? Or only counties with the suffix -shire? - Efghij
I think the full name for devon is devonshire anyway but its not often used now. WPM 131.111.8.104
I assume we still have Devonshire cream???
We have shires in Australia, too. A shire here is a local government (or local government area) which is either regional or is metropolitan but without sufficient population to be called a 'town' or a 'city'. Maybe this should be incorporated into the article? Surely Britain and Australia aren't the only countries with shires? Mark Ryan 05:48, 18 Nov 2003 (UTC)
What is meant by the following line:
- In England and Wales, the term "shire county" is used to refer to shire counties.
It seems an extreme case of circular definition to me. - Andre Engels 17:54, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
- Absolutely - it originally said that "shire county" is used to refer to non-metropolitan counties, but non-metropolitan county is now a redirect to shire county - so I've replace it with the definition from that article. Warofdreams talk 00:52, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Downshire
Shouldn't there be a mention of Downshire (as in Marquess of) in the article? Does this simply refer to County Down, or is it a separate place altogether? Are there any other place-names with the "-shire" suffix in Ireland? 195.92.40.49 12:28, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
- Downshire and County Down were indeed the same place in the eighteenth century. I was at lecture about the Irish Militia of 1793 - 1802 and there were a number of mentions of the Downshire Militia. On googling I find this confirmed. Mind you on further investigation I also find downshire was a fictional county where Miss Marple lived!
- There are a couple of books in Google Books from the mid nineteenth century with Antrimshire, Cavanshire and Wicklowshire. I haven't tried the other 28!Lozleader 15:09, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
-
- Just had a look at the Times Digital Archive. On August 22, 1818 a list of members returned for parliament shows the follwing Irish counties:
- Antrim
- Armagh
- Carlowshire
- Cavanshire
- Clare
- Cork
- Donegalshire
- Downshire
- Dublinshire
- Fermanaghshire
- Galwayshire
- Kerryshire
- Kildareshire
- Kilkennyshire
- King's County
- Leitrim
- Limerick
- Londonderry
- Longfordshire
- Louthshire
- Mayo
- Meathshire
- Queen's County
- Roscommonshire
- Sligoshire
- Tipperary
- Westmeath
- Wicklow
There seems to be no rhyme or reason to the list.Lozleader 15:28, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Shires within shires
In Yorkshire there were also several areas within the county that were called shires e.g.Hallamshire, Richmondshire. Were these shires just administrative units ?--88.111.242.89 (talk) 19:30, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
- That's a good question. Unfortunately it doesn't have a good answer. Yorkshire is post-1066 creation. The suspicion is that the smaller shires found in Yorkshire and points north as far as the Mounth are older, and possibly related to pre-Viking Northumbria, which included all of Yorkshire. The suggestion is that these are related to the way royal estates were laid out. There's a short discussion of Northumbrian shires in Nick Higham's The Kingdom of Northumbria (about p. 100 onwards) if there's a copy of that in a library near you. If not, this, while it's about Scotland ("there are two Englands, and one of them is Scotland" said James Campbell in The Anglo-Saxon State), it is probably as relevant to early Yorkshire as anything you might read about Wessex. Just forget the funny names: toiseach -> praepositus/reeve/thane; mormaer -> dux/ealdorman/earl. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:43, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
