Quote:
Originally Posted by pdurrant
Ummm... not quite. Great Britain is certainly England, Scotland and Wales (& Cornwall). But the United Kindgom hasn't always included Ireland.
The full name of the country in which I live is "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland".
But you are parsing the name incorrectly. It is more "The (United Kingdom of Great Britain) and (Northern Ireland)" than "The United Kingdom of (Great Britain and Northern Ireland)". ("The United Kingdom of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland" might be more accurate.)
The kingdoms that are united in the "United Kingdom" are really England and Scotland, done in the Act of Union in 1707, forming "The United Kingdom of Great Britain". (Although both kingdoms had had the same kings from 1603, the first being James I of England, James VI of Scotland, the Act of Union formally united them.)
Ireland was formally merged in 1800, forming "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland"
A lot of this confusion could have been avoided if in 1800 they'd chosen a different name. Perhaps "The United Kingdom of the British Isles" would have been good.
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We will have to agree to disagree on that score then, and a search on google would appear to back up my view.
However in general terms, Great Britain and United Kingdom are generally interchangeable, ESP for the less well educated.
Regardless of which one of us is correct, neither would explain how the USPS can make an abbreviation of GB mean United Kingdom.