Resources
Large Scale Map of UK Counties
A large-scale map of the United Kingdom showing the ninety-two historic counties of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Feel free to download it and use it as an electronic resource or print it for physical display.
This map will print upto A0 size and is available in png and pdf format.
Large Scale Map of Great Britain and Ireland Counties
A large-scale map of Great Britain and Ireland showing the 118 historic counties of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. Feel free to download it and use it as an electronic resource or print it for physical display.
This map will print upto A0 size and is available in png and pdf format.
Large Scale Map of Great Britain’s Counties
A large-scale map of Great Britain showing the 86 historic counties of England, Scotland and Wales. Feel free to download it and use it as an electronic resource or print it for physical display.
This map will print upto A0 size and is available in png and pdf format.
Interactive County Map
Wikishire is a fantastic online resource and an alternative to Wikipedia, which consistently refuses to accept that traditional counties even exist, never mind properly include them on their platform.
Wikishire provides comprehensive coverage of information about places across the British Isles, with a simple search system to make it easy to use. Take a closer look.
Wikishire also has an interactive map of all traditional counties within the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland. Search for a specific town or look for the boundaries of a particular county with ease. You never need to wonder which proper county a place belongs to again!
Historic Counties Standard
The Historic Counties Standard (from the Historic Counties Trust) provides a comprehensive definition of the names, areas and borders of the historic counties of the United Kingdom.
By providing a definition for the terminology and the names, areas and borders of historic counties, the Standard enables a consistent use of the historic counties in all contexts. These include history, geography, heritage and education.
This is recognised by the UK Government and used by the Office for National Statistics, for example in their ‘Index of Place Names’ (see below for more on this).
The Flag Institute
The Flag Institute is the world’s leading research and documentation centre for flags and flag information. The Flag Institute also maintains and manages the national UK Flag Registry to ensure there is a definitive record of those United Kingdom flags which exist, both nationally and regionally.
The Flag Institute also keeps a calendar of County Celebration days.
Ordnance Survey
The Ordnance Survey was founded in 1791 with the primary aim of preparing a map of Great Britain on a scale of 1” to 1 mile. The resulting maps (the Old Series), published between 1805 and 1873, are the first reasonably accurate maps covering the whole of England and Wales.
Great effort was made and much of the work carried out on a county by county basis.
In 2015, the government commissioned Ordnance Survey to produce historic and ceremonial county boundary datasets representing those counties based on historic records/mapping circa 1888 and using the primary sources of the Local Government (England and Wales) Act 1888, the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1889 and the Sheriffs Act 1887.
The dataset and map also show the ‘ceremonial counties’ (more accurately ‘lieutenancies’) in the UK (whose existence contributes massively to the current confusion regarding what constitutes a ‘county’).
While we welcome the Government going to lengths that no previous government has in recent history, unfortunately the data used by the OS was *not* accurate. We are hopeful that this will be revised with the correct data.
See the Ordnance Survey dataset and online map.
ONS ‘Index of Place Names’ (IPN)
The historic counties are recommended by the UK Government’s Office for National Statistics.
On page 13 of the ‘Index of Place Names’ User Guide (latest version 2024), it states that the historic counties “are recommended as a stable, unchanging geography which covers the whole of Great Britain.”
It goes on to add that Definition A of the Historic Counties Standard is used, “whereby detached parts of counties are not separately identified, but are associated with their host county”.
Government Guidance on Historic Counties
In the last decade, the UK Government has issued numerous documents and guidance on the celebration of traditional counties.
Collection of Government documents on England’s traditional counties – published 1 October 2013 and updated 27 November 2014.
Guidance for councils on celebrating the historic counties – placing boundary road signs, flying county flags and celebrating county days – 16 July 2019.
House of Lords Questions on Historic Counties
We supported Lord Lexden’s efforts for cross-party questions on historic counties on 16 September 2021.
During the session, Lord Greenhalgh, Minister for Communities and Local Government, replied for Her Majesty’s Government.
Also participating were Lord Blunkett (Lab); Baroness Rawlings (Con); Lord Wallace (LibDem); Lord Hannan (Con); Baroness Blake (Lab); Lord Randall (Con); Lord Caine (Con); Lord Holmes (Con); Lord Flight (Con); Lord Cormack (Con).
The full text of Questions & Answers:
Lieutenancies Act 1997
The Lieutenancies Act 1997 governs the organisation of the lieutenancies of Great Britain.
In contrast to England and Wales, many of the lieutenancies of Scotland are more closely aligned with an historic county. This presents no problem to their operation.
Prior to 1889, the lords lieutenant and sheriffs were appointed directly to the historic counties and their areas remained very close to the historic counties until 1974. There is no practical obstacle to a return to this approach.
One of our objectives is that this Act should be amended to realign the lieutenancies to match the historic counties.
Campaign for Historic Counties 