:: wikimiki.org ::

Yorkshire

Yorkshire

:This article is about the English county. For other uses, see Yorkshire (disambiguation). Yorkshire (disambiguation) Yorkshire (disambiguation) Yorkshire is the largest traditional county of England, covering some 6,000 sq. miles (15,000 km²) with a population of some five million. It is traditionally divided into West, North and East Ridings (from Old Norse þriðing, "third part", a legacy of the area's ninth century Scandinavian settlers). The county town, York, is not part of any riding. The emblem of Yorkshire is the White Rose of the House of York, and there is a Yorkshire Day celebrated on August 1. Amongst the celebrations there is a Civic gathering of Lord Mayors, Mayors and other Civic Heads from across the county and convened by the Yorkshire Society, in 2004 it was held in Leeds and in 2005 it was held in Bradford. The people of Penistone will be hosting the Civic gathering in 2006. There is also an "anthem" for the county in the form of the folk song "On Ilkla Moor Baht'at" (on Ilkley Moor without a Hat). The Yorkshire dialect is colloquially known as "Tyke", and this is also the "affectionate" (!) term for a Yorkshireman, though the term is not universally used by all Yorkshiremen and is virtually non-existent on the North Riding coastline. The social stereotype of a Yorkshireman has a tendency to include such accessories as a flat cap and a whippet. Among Yorkshire's unique traditions is the Long Sword dance, a traditional dance not found elsewhere in England. More recently, Yorkshire has been home to its own genre of techno music, Yorkshire Bleeps and Bass.

History

:Main article History of Yorkshire The Ridings were divided further into wapentakes. In about 1823 these were North Riding
- Allertonshire
- Birdforth
- Bulmer
- Gilling East and West
- Halikeld
- Hang East and West
- Langbaurgh East and West
- Pickering Lythe
- Ryedale
- Whitby Strand East Riding
- Buckrose
- Dickering
- Harthill - Bainton beacon, Holme beacon, Hunsley beacon and Wilton beacon
- Holderness South Middle and North
- Howdenshire
- Ouse and Derwent West Riding
- Agbrigg and Morley (Agbrigg and Morley divisions)
- Barkston Ash
- Ewcross
- Claro Lower and Upper
- Morley
- Osgoldcross
- Skyrack Lower and Upper
- Staincliffe East and West
- Staincross
- Strafforth and Tickhill Lower and Upper Apart from these there were the Ainsty wapentake, the City of York (not part of any riding), and Hullshire (geographically in the East Riding though not part of it). The Ridings were used as the basis of administrative counties upon the introduction of local government, in 1888, although many boroughs within the area were made county boroughs in their own right. In 1974 the local government system was reformed, with the bulk of the area being split between:
- North Yorkshire (including Yorkshire's county town of York — although the county town of North Yorkshire is Northallerton)
- South Yorkshire
- West Yorkshire
- Humberside (including parts of Lincolnshire)
- Cleveland (including parts of County Durham) South and West Yorkshire are termed metropolitan counties, as they cover mostly built-up areas. Additionally, small portions were ceded to the control of Cumbria (Sedbergh Rural District), Lancashire (Bowland Rural District, Barnoldswick, Earlby, and part of Skipton Rural District), County Durham (Startforth Rural District) and Greater Manchester (Saddleworth]]). In 1986 the county councils of West and South Yorkshire were abolished, and in 1996 Cleveland and Humberside were broken up into districts, which became independent administrative counties (unitary authority areas) in their own right, as did an expanded City of York. The bulk of the Yorkshire part of Humberside became known as the East Riding of Yorkshire, with Kingston upon Hull being independent. For ceremonial purposes the districts previously covered by Cleveland now fall in the ceremonial counties of North Yorkshire and County Durham, and the districts previously covered by Humberside now fall in the ceremonial counties of East Riding of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire. Much of Yorkshire is now represented by the region of Yorkshire and the Humber.

Villages, towns and cities in Yorkshire

See the list of places in Yorkshire.

Local government areas in ceremonial Yorkshire

- East Riding of Yorkshire
- Kingston upon Hull
- Middlesbrough
- North Yorkshire
- Craven
- Hambleton
- Harrogate
- Richmondshire
- Ryedale
- Scarborough
- Selby
- Redcar and Cleveland
- Stockton-on-Tees south of the river
- South Yorkshire
- Barnsley
- Doncaster
- Rotherham
- Sheffield
- West Yorkshire
- Bradford
- Calderdale
- Kirklees
- Leeds
- Wakefield
- York

External links

- [http://www.britannia.com/history/yorkshire/ The History of Yorkshire]
- [http://www.yorkshire-dialect.org/ Samples of Yorkshire Dialect]
- [http://flagspot.net/flags/gb-en-ys.html Yorkshire flags]
- [http://www.book-lover.com/yorkshire/images/yorkshire.html Yorkshire Images] - a gallery of drawings depicting Yorkshire as it was in the 1800s.

Yorkshire (disambiguation)

Yorkshire may refer to one of the following:

Place-names

- Yorkshire, one of the traditional counties of England.
- Yorkshire, New York:
- Yorkshire (CDP), New York
- Yorkshire (town), New York
- Yorkshire, Ohio
- Yorkshire, Virginia
- Yorkshire Dales
- Yorkshire Wolds

Other uses

- Yorkshire pudding, a traditional type of food in England.
- Yorkshire Television, a television company in England.
- Yorkshire Terrier, a breed of dog.

Traditional county of England

The traditional counties of England are historic subdivisions of the country into around 40 regions. They are also known as the historic counties, or legally as the ancient or geographic counties. The traditional counties were used for administrative purposes for hundreds of years, and over time became established as a geographic reference frame. The establishment of the usually accepted set of counties began in the 12th century (though many assumed their modern form long before then), although it did not become finalised until the 16th century. After local government reform in the late 19th century, the traditional counties are no longer in general use for official geographic purposes (in favour of ceremonial counties or administrative counties), but the system in use is partially based on them, and the postal counties often followed them. County cricket continues to use historical counties. (See Counties of England for an overview of how the different types of county compare.) Various groups exist to promote their continued use, and people engaged in genealogy, family history, and local history tend to follow the names used at the time being researched.

The counties

The map omits all exclaves (detached parts) apart from the Furness part of Lancashire south of Cumberland and Westmorland. Monmouthshire was previously usually considered to be a county of England, but is now generally accepted to be part of Wales. Counties named after towns were often legally known as the "County of" followed by the name of the town — so, for example, Yorkshire would be referred to as "County of York". The modern usage is to use the suffix "-shire" only for counties named after towns, and for those which would otherwise have only one syllable. In the past, usages such as "Devonshire", "Dorsetshire" and "Somersetshire" were frequent. (There is still a Duke of Devonshire, who is not properly called the Duke of Devon.) Kent was a former kingdom of the Jutes, so "Kentshire" was never used. The name of County Durham is anomalous. The expected form would be "Durhamshire", but it is never used. This is ascribed to that county's history as a county palatine ruled by the Bishop of Durham. Customary abbreviations exist for many of the counties. In most cases these consist of simple truncation, usually with an "s" at the end, such as "Berks." for Berkshire and "Bucks." for Buckinghamshire. Some abbreviations are not obvious, such as "Salop" for Shropshire, "Oxon" for Oxfordshire or "Hants" and "Northants" for Hampshire and Northamptonshire, respectively.

Origin

Northamptonshire.]] The traditional counties accreted over hundreds of years, and have differing ages and origins. In southern England, they were subdivisions of the Kingdom of Wessex, and in many areas represented annexed, previously independent, kingdoms — such as Kent (from the Kingdom of Kent). Only one county on the south coast of England has the suffix "-shire". Hampshire is named after the former town of "Hampton", which is now the city of Southampton. When Wessex conquered Mercia in the 9th and 10th centuries, it subdivided the area into various shires, which tended to take the name of the main town (the county town) of the county, along with "-shire". Examples of these include Northamptonshire and Warwickshire. In many cases these have since been worn down — for example, Cheshire was originally "Chestershire". Much of Northumbria was also shired, the best known of these counties being Hallamshire and Cravenshire. The Normans did not use these divisions, and so they are not generally included as traditional counties. After the Norman Conquest in 1066 and "The Harrying of the North", much of the north of the country was left depopulated; at the time of the Domesday Book northern England was covered by Cheshire and Yorkshire. The north-east, land that would later become County Durham and Northumberland, was left unrecorded. Cumberland, Westmorland, Lancashire, County Durham and Northumberland were established in the 12th century. Lancashire itself can be firmly dated to 1182. Part of the domain of the Bishops of Durham, Hexhamshire was split off and was considered an independent county until 1572. The border with Wales was not set until the Laws in Wales Act 1535 — this remains the modern border. In the Domesday Book the border counties had included parts of what would later become Wales — Monmouth, for example, being included in Herefordshire. The traditional county town of Shropshire, Ludlow, was actually included in Herefordshire in Domesday. Because of their different origins, the counties have wildly varying sizes. The huge Yorkshire was a successor to the Viking Kingdom of York, and at the time of the Domesday Book in 1086 was considered to include northern Lancashire, Cumberland, and Westmorland. Lincolnshire was the successor to the Kingdom of Lindsey, and took on the territories of Kesteven and Holland when Stamford became the only Danelaw borough to fail to become a county town. A "Stamfordshire" was probably precluded by the existence of Rutland immediately to the west and north of Stamford — leaving it at the very edge of its associated territory. Rutland was an anomalous territory or Soke, associated with Nottinghamshire, that eventually became considered the smallest county.

Traditional subdivisions

Nottinghamshires of Yorkshire:

]] Some of the traditional counties have major subdivisions. Of these, the most important are the three ridings of Yorkshire — the East Riding, West Riding and North Riding. Since Yorkshire is so big, its Ridings became established as geographic terms quite apart from their original role as administrative divisions. The second largest county, Lincolnshire, is still administratively divided into three historic "Parts" (intermediate in size between county and wapentake) — of Lindsey, Holland and Kesteven. Other divisions include those of Kent into East Kent and West Kent, and of Sussex into East Sussex and West Sussex. Several counties had liberties or Sokes within them that were administered separately. Cambridgeshire had the Isle of Ely, and Northamptonshire had the Soke of Peterborough. Such divisions were used by such entities as the Quarter Sessions courts and were inherited by the later county council areas. Smaller subdivisions also exist. Most English counties were traditionally subdivided into hundreds, while Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire and Lincolnshire into wapentakes and Durham, Cumberland and Westmorland into wards. Kent and Sussex also had an intermediate level between their major subdivisions and their hundreds, known as lathes in Kent and rapes in Sussex. Hundreds or their equivalents are divided into tithings and parishes (the only class of these divisions still used administratively), which in turn were divided into townships and manors.

Authenticity and anomalies

manor in a detached part of Worcestershire. Note the detached portion of Shropshire just to the south-east as well.]] There are at least two sets of county boundaries that have been put forward as the true and genuine traditional borders. The dispute is whether to accept an Act of Parliament in 1844 which purported to modify the counties by abolishing the many enclaves of counties within others, or whether to reject this as mere administrative convenience. The Act itself says the detached parts shall "be considered" to be part of the county they locally lie in, not that they "shall be". However, this is a matter of disagreement within the traditional counties movement itself, with the Association of British Counties acknowledging the changes in its Gazetteer, and saying that the matter is "debatable". The traditional counties have (even if the 1844 changes be accepted) many anomalies, and many small exclaves, where a parcel of land would be politically part of one county despite not being physically connected to the rest of the county. The most significant exclaves affected by the 1844 Act were the County Durham exclaves of Islandshire, Bedlingtonshire and Norhamshire, which were incorporated into Northumberland for administrative purposes — most of the others were smaller, including even a detached part of the Welsh county of Monmouthshire in Herefordshire, called Welsh Bicknor. This was created as late as 1651. Exclaves which the 1844 Act did not touch include the part of Derbyshire around Donisthorpe, locally in Leicestershire; and most of the larger exclaves of Worcestershire, including the town of Dudley, which is locally situated in Staffordshire. Additionally the Furness portion of Lancashire remains separated from the rest of Lancashire by a narrow strip of Westmorland — though accessible by the Morecambe Bay tidal flats. Several towns are historically divided between counties, including Newmarket, Royston, Stamford, Tamworth and Todmorden — in some cases with the county boundary running right up the middle of the high street. In Todmorden, the boundary between Lancashire and Yorkshire is said to run through the middle of the town hall.

Usage

During the 20th century, numerous local government reforms made the usage of county names somewhat confused. When the first county councils were set up in 1888, they covered newly created entities known as administrative counties, and defined in terms of the "counties". The Local Government Act 1888 also contained wording to create both a new "administrative county" and "county" of London, and to ensure the statutory "counties" consisted of agglomerations of administrative counties and county boroughs. In retrospect, these statutory counties can be identified as the predecessors of the ceremonial counties of England. These counties are the ones usually shown on maps of the early to mid 20th century, and largely displaced the traditional counties in such uses. In 1974 a major local government reform took place, through the 1972 Local Government Act. This abolished administrative counties and created replacements for them called in the statute simply "metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties". Several administrative counties, such as Cumberland, Herefordshire, Huntingdonshire (actually in 1965), Middlesex (1965) Rutland, Westmorland and Worcestershire vanished from the administrative map, whilst new entities such as Avon, Cleveland, Cumbria and Humberside appeared. The 1972 Act left the legal status of the traditional counties somewhat ambiguous. It repealed and superseded the parts of the 1888 Act that referred to the traditional counties, and defined 'counties' in reference to existing 'administrative counties'. However it did not formally abolish the 'ancient and geographic' counties. Some have questioned whether Parliament could abolish many of them, given that many were not created by Parliamentary bill or Royal edicts, and, as such, could be argued to have an "untouchable" Common Law existence (see parliamentary sovereignty). On this basis, supporters of the traditional counties assert that they continue to exist. Indeed, the Government has made statements to this effect, and said at the time that traditional county boundaries and loyalties were not supposed to be affected by the 1974 changes. Despite repeated statements by the Government that loyalties were not intended to be affected, many people have accepted (in many places grudgingly) the changes. The Ordnance Survey has always recorded only administrative boundaries and so also adopted the changes. In the private sector, adoption has been mixed. For example, county cricket is still based on the traditional counties. However, this can be due to a reluctance to reorganise existing systems rather than a refusal to acknowledge the new boundaries. The vice counties, another set of entities based on the historic counties, but with modification such as the subdivision of larger areas, are always used for biological recording to this day. This makes it easier to make comparisons in the biodiversity of different parts of England over time. The Post Office largely altered its postal counties in accordance with the reform — with the two major exceptions of Greater London and Greater Manchester. Perhaps as a result of this, along with the cumbersomeness of the names and the resentment of encroaching urbanisation, the traditional counties appear not to have fallen out of use for locating the boroughs of Greater Manchester; along with areas of Greater London that are not part of the London postal district. It is quite common for people to speak of Uxbridge, Middlesex or Bromley, Kent, but much less so to speak of Brixton, Surrey or West Ham, Essex. Where metropolitan counties were given more generic names, such as Merseyside or Tyne and Wear, the new counties appear to have been adopted. However, since 2000 the Royal Mail have removed its postal counties from the authoritative Postal Address File database, creating a separate database which now also lists the traditional, administrative and former postal counties for every address in the UK. There was particular distress in parts of Yorkshire that were administratively incorporated into Cumbria, Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Humberside, Cleveland and County Durham. Some of these areas have been since returned for ceremonial purposes.

Counties and urban areas

County Durham Apart from historic divisions such as Newmarket, Stamford and Tamworth, there are a great number of towns which have expanded (in some cases across a river) into a neighbouring county. These include such towns and cities as Banbury, Birmingham, Bristol, Burton-upon-Trent, Great Yarmouth, Leighton Buzzard, London, Manchester, Market Harborough, Peterborough, Reading, Redditch, St Neots, Swadlincote, Tadley and Wisbech. Although Oxford is on the River Thames, historically the border between Oxfordshire and Berkshire, the traditional border there makes a detour to include Oxford west of the river within Oxfordshire. The built-up areas of conurbations tend to cross traditional county boundaries freely. Examples here include Bournemouth/Poole/Christchurch (Dorset and Hampshire – although the 1974 annexing of Bournemouth and Christchurch into the administrative county of Dorset is perhaps the most widely accepted boundary change), Manchester metropolitan area (Cheshire and Lancashire), Merseyside (Cheshire and Lancashire), Teesside (Yorkshire and County Durham), Tyneside (County Durham and Northumberland) and West Midlands (Staffordshire, Warwickshire and Worcestershire). Greater London itself straddles five traditional counties — Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent, Middlesex, Surrey — and the London urban area sprawls into Buckinghamshire and Berkshire.

The traditional counties movement

The traditional counties movement consists of a national organisation, the Association of British Counties, along with various regional affiliates. The broad objectives of the movement include
- to replace the ceremonial counties with the traditional counties
- to re-establish the pre-1974 terminology of "administrative counties" in the law, rather than the post-1974 terminology of "counties"
- to get the Ordnance Survey and other map suppliers to determine and mark the traditional county boundaries
- to, in some places, restore traditional counties as administrative counties Successive governments have generally been quite happy to issue statements saying that the traditional counties still exist, but have been reluctant to pursue these changes. Political parties to have included support for traditional counties in their manifestos include the English Democrats Party and the United Kingdom Independence Party — neither of which has ever had any MPs elected. In the 1990s the movement enjoyed its greatest success when Rutland became independent of Leicestershire and Hereford and Worcester split to become a unitary authority and shire county respectively — as part of a general local government reform which led to the establishment of many other unitaries. However, the campaign for Huntingdonshire, currently administered as a district of Cambridgeshire, to gain similar status, failed (despite it being pursued by Huntingdon's MP and Prime Minister of the time, John Major). Additionally, the non-metropolitan counties of Avon, Cleveland and Humberside were abolished, and the traditional borders restored for ceremonial purposes. Recent activities undertaken have included lobbying the Boundary Committee regarding the proposed local government reform in the north of England (since abandoned). Suggestions put forward have included basing the names or the borders of the new authorities on traditional counties. Both of these suggestions have been rejected, though the Committee noted a strong level of support in some areas.

External links

- [http://www.britishcounties.info Website with information on the Counties]
- [http://www.abcounties.co.uk/ Association of British Counties]
- [http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/ Family history links to traditional counties of England] Category:History of England England
-

Square mile

:This article is about the unit of measure. The Square Mile is a traditional name for the City of London in the United Kingdom. A square mile is the area equal to a square with sides each 1 mile long. It is not an SI unit. The SI unit of area is the square metre.

Symbol

There is no universally agreed symbol but the following are used:
- square mile
- sq mile
- sq mi
- sq m (this can be confused with square metre)
- mile²
- mi²

Conversions

1 square mile is equivalent to:
- 27 878 400 square feet
- 640 acres
- 2 589 988.11 square metres
- 2.589 988 11 square kilometres In the Public Land Survey System of the US and the Dominion Land Survey of Canada, the size of a standard section of land is one square mile.

West Riding of Yorkshire

. County boroughs are marked in yellow.]] Image:Arms-w-riding.jpg

The term West Riding usually refers to the West Riding of Yorkshire in England, though Lindsey also possessed a West Riding. Yorkshire's West Riding comprised an historical subdivision of the county of Yorkshire, roughly corresponding to its territorial successors West Yorkshire and South Yorkshire plus the Craven and Harrogate districts of North Yorkshire. Small parts lie in Lancashire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester and the post-1996 East Riding of Yorkshire. It had an area of 1,771,562 acres (7,169 km²). Of this area the southern industrial district, considered in the broadest application of the term as extending between Sheffield and Skipton, Sheffield and Doncaster, and Leeds and the county boundary, covered rather less than one-half. Within this district are Barnsley, Batley, Bradford, Brighouse, Dewsbury, Doncaster, Halifax, Huddersfield, Keighley, Leeds, Morley, Ossett, Pontefract, Pudsey, Rotherham, Sheffield, Todmorden (partly in Lancashire), and Wakefield. Major centres elsewhere in the riding include Harrogate, and Ripon. Within the industrial region other urban districts included Bingley, Castleford, Cleckheaton, Elland, Featherstone, Handsworth, Hoyland Nether, Liversedge, Mexborough, Mirfield, Normanton, Rawmarsh, Rothwell, Saddleworth, Shipley, Skipton, Sowerby Bridge, Stanley, Swinton, Thornhill, Wombwell and Worsborough. Outside the industrial region we find Goole, Ilkley, Knaresborough and Selby. Category:Yorkshire Category:Former administrative counties

East Riding of Yorkshire

The East Riding of Yorkshire is a local government district in the United Kingdom. It borders on the ceremonial counties of North Yorkshire (including the City of York), South Yorkshire and Lincolnshire (North Lincolnshire unitary), and surrounds on three sides the City of Kingston-upon-Hull (commonly known as Hull), which is a separate unitary district. It is the largest unitary authority area in England. For ceremonial purposes, the East Riding includes Hull (the ceremonial county). It covers part of the historic county of Yorkshire, and East Riding is also the name for one of the historic divisions of the county and was the name of an administrative county that existed from 1888 to 1974, although all three entities are not commensurate in area. Apart from Hull, the whole of the northern part of what was Humberside from 1974 to April 1, 1996 is now in the East Riding of Yorkshire unitary authority, that is, the former districts of Beverley, East Yorkshire, and Holderness and the northern part of Boothferry. The historic East Riding included some territory in the Ryedale, Scarborough and Selby districts of North Yorkshire (including Filey and Norton). It excluded Goole and the former Goole Rural District, which are in the historic West Riding. The eastern part is the plain of Holderness, the western the Yorkshire Wolds. Image:East_Riding.jpg

Towns and villages

- Beverley, Bishop Burton, Brandesburton, Breighton, Bridlington, Broomfleet, Burnby, Burton Agnes
- Carnaby, Cottingham
- Driffield
- Easington, Everingham
- Flamborough, Fridaythorpe
- Gilberdyke, Goole, Grimston
- Hedon, High Hunsley, Highfield, Holme-on-Spalding-Moor, Hollym, Hornsea, Howden, Hutton Cranswick
- Kilham, Kingston upon Hull (city, ceremonial purposes only), Kirk Ella
- Langtoft, Laxton, Leconfield, Leven, Long Riston
- Market Weighton, Mappleton, Marton
- Nafferton, North Cave, North End, North Ferriby, North Howden
- Ottringham
- Patrington, Paull, Pocklington, Preston
- Riplingham, Roos, Rudston
- Sewerby, Skidby, Skipsea, Skirlaugh, Snaith, South Cave, Stamford Bridge
- Thorngumbald
- Walkington, West Ella, Wetwang, Withernsea, Wold Newton

Places of interest

- Burnby Hall
- Burton Agnes Manor House, Burton Agnes Hall
- Sewerby Hall
- Skipsea Castle
- Fort Paull
- Beverley Minster and Beverley Friary
- Howden Minster
- Skidby Working Windmill
- Hornsea Mere
- River Humber, River Hull, Watton Beck, River Derwent, Yorkshire, River Ouse, River Aire, River Trent, River Don
- Rudston Monolith
- Aire and Calder Navigation
- Driffield Navigation
- Leven Canal
- Market Weighton Canal
- Pocklington Canal
- Yorkshire Wildlife Trust
- Yorkshire Wolds
- Flamborough Head
- Spurn
- Wolds Way, a long distance footpath

Photos

Image:Beverley on market day.jpg|Beverley on market day Image:Beverley 2.jpg|Beverley Image:Beverley Station.jpg|Beverley station Image:Chalk Tower Flamborough Head 058031.jpg|Flamborough Head Image:Humber Bridge.png|Humber Bridge Image:River Hull tidal barrier 1.jpg|River Hull tidal barrier Image:Skidby Working Windmill 1.jpg|Skidby Working Windmill Image:Spurn point with lighthouse.kirin.jpeg|Spurn

External link

- [http://www.eastriding.gov.uk/ East Riding of Yorkshire Council] Category:Local government districts in Yorkshire Category:Former administrative counties Category:Unitary authorities in England

Old Norse

and the green area is the extent of the other Germanic languages with which Old Norse still retained some mutual intelligibility]] Old Norse is the Germanic language once spoken by the inhabitants of Scandinavia and their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300. It evolved from the older Proto-Norse, in the 8th century. Due to the fact that most of the surviving texts are from Medieval Icelandic, the de facto standard version of the language is its dialect Old West Norse, that is Old Icelandic and Old Norwegian. Sometimes, Old Norse is even defined as Old Icelandic and Old Norwegian. However, there was also an Old East Norse dialect which was very similar and was spoken in Denmark and Sweden and their settlements. Moreover, there was no clear geographical separation between the two dialects. Old East Norse traits were found in eastern Norway and Old West Norse traits were found in western Sweden. In addition, there was also an Old Gutnish dialect, sometimes included in Old East Norse due to it being the least known dialect. Until the 13th century these three dialects were considered by their speakers to be one and the same language, and they called it dansk tunga (in the eastern dialect) or dönsk tunga (in the western dialect). This autonym translates as "Danish tongue". Old Norse was mutually intelligible with Old English and Old Saxon and other Low Germanic languages spoken in northern Germany. It gradually evolved into the modern North Germanic languages: Icelandic, Faroese, Norwegian, Danish and Swedish. Modern Icelandic is the descendant which has diverged the least from Old Norse. Faroese also retains many similarities but is influenced from Danish, Norwgeian, and Gaelic (Scots and/or Irish). Although Swedish, Danish and the Norwegian languages have diverged the most, they still retain mutual intelligibility. This could be because these languages have been mutually affected by each other, as well as having a similar development due to impact from Low German.

Geographical distribution

Old Icelandic was essentially identical to Old Norwegian and they formed together the Old West Norse dialect of Old Norse. The Old East Norse dialect was spoken in Denmark and Sweden and settlements in Russia, England and Normandy. The Old Gutnish dialect was spoken in Gotland and in various settlements in the East. In the 11th century, it was the most widely spoken European language ranging from Vinland in the West to the Volga in the East. In Russia it survived longest in Novgorod and died out in the 13th century.

Modern descendants

Its modern descendants are the West Scandinavian languages of Icelandic, Faroese, Norwegian and the extinct Norn language of the Orkney and the Shetland Islands as well as the East Scandinavian languages of Danish and Swedish. Norwegian has decended from West Norse (West Scandinavian), but over the centuries it has been heavily influenced by East Norse (East Scandinavian). Among these, Icelandic and the closely related Faroese have changed the least from Old Norse in the last thousand years, although with Danish rule of the Faroe Islands Faroese has also been influenced by Danish. Old Norse also had an influence on English dialects and particularly Lowland Scots which contains many Old Norse loanwords. It also influenced the development of the Norman language. Various other languages, which are not closely related, have been heavily influenced by Norse, particularly the Norman dialects and Scottish Gaelic. Russian and Finnish also have a number of Norse loanwords; "Russian" itself is derived from "Rus", a Norse term.

Sounds

Vowels

The vowel phonemes mostly come in pairs of long and short. The orthography marks the long vowels with an acute accent. The short counterpart of is not a phoneme but an allophone of . The long counterpart of has merged with in the classical (13th century) language. All phonemes have, more or less, the expected phonetic realization.

Consonants

Old Norse has six stop phonemes. Of these is rare word-initially and and do not occur between vowels. The phoneme is realized as a voiced fricative between vowels.

Orthography

The standardized Old Norse spelling is for the most part phonemic. The most notable deviation is that the non-phonemic difference between the voiced and the unvoiced dental fricatives is marked. As mentioned above, long vowels are denoted with acutes. Most other letters are written with the same glyph as the IPA phoneme, except as shown in the table below.

Dialects and texts

The earliest inscriptions in Old Norse are runic, from the 8th century (although there are 200 inscriptions in Proto-Norse going as far back as the 2nd century), and runes continued to be used for a thousand years. The main literary texts are in the Latin alphabet, the great sagas and eddas of medieval Iceland. As Proto-Norse evolved into Old Norse, in the 8th century, the effects of the umlauts varied geographically. The typical umlauts (for example fylla from
- fullian) were stronger in the West whereas those resulting in diaeresis (for example hiarta from herto) were more influential in the East. This difference was the main reason behind the dialectalization that took place in the 9th and 10th centuries shaping an Old West Norse dialect in Norway and the Atlantic settlements and an Old East Norse dialect in Denmark and Sweden. A second difference was that the old diphthongs generally became monophthongs in East Norse. For instance in East Norse stain became sten, whereas it became steinn in West Norse. In Old Gutnish, this diphthong remained. Old West Norse and Old Gutnish kept the diphthong au as in auga, whereas it in East Norse became øgha. Likewise, West Norse had the ey diphthong, as in heyra, while it in East Norse became ø, as in høra, and in Old Gutnish was oy as in hoyra. A third difference was that Old West Norse lost certain combinations of consonants. The combinations -mp-, -nt-, and -nk- were assimilated into -pp-, -tt- and -kk- in Old West Norse, but this phenomenon was limited in Old East Norse. However, these differences were an exception. The dialects were very similar and considered to be the same language, a language that they called the Danish tongue, for example Móðir Dyggva var Drótt, dóttir Danps konungs, sonar Rígs er fyrstr var konungr kallaðr á danska tungu (Snorri Sturluson, the Ynglinga saga). Translation: Dyggve's mother was Drott, the daughter of king Danp, Ríg's son, who was the first one to be called king in the Danish tongue. Here is a comparison between the two dialects. It is a transcription from one of the Funbo Runestones (U990) meaning : Veðr and Thane and Gunnar raised this stone after Haursa, their father. God help his soul: :Veðr ok Þegn ok Gunnarr reistu stein þenna at Haursa, föður sinn. Guð hjalpi önd hans. (OWN) :Veðr ok Þegn ok Gunnarr ræistu stæin þenna at Haursa, faður sinn. Guð hialpi and hans (OEN)

Old West Norse

Most of the innovations that appeared in Old Norse spread evenly through the Old Norse area, but some were geographically limited and created a dialectal difference between Old West Norse and Old East Norse. One difference was that Old West Norse did not take part in the monophthongization which changed æi/ei into e, øy/ey into ø and au into ø. An early difference was that Old West Norse had the forms bu (dwelling), ku (cow) and tru (faith) whereas Old East Norse had bo, ko and tro. Old West Norse was also characterized by u-umlaut, which meant that for example Proto-Norse
- tanþu was pronounced tönn and not tand as in Old East Norse. Moreoever, there were nasal assimilations as in bekkr from Proto-Norse
- bankiaz. The earliest body of text appears in runic inscriptions and in poems composed ca 900 by Tjodolf of Hvin. The earliest manuscripts are from the period 1150-1200 and concern both legal, religious and historical matters. During the 12th and 13th centuries, Trøndelag and Vestlandet were the most important areas of the Norwegian kingdom and they shaped Old West Norse as an archaic language with a rich set of declensions. As the body of text has come down to us until ca 1300, Old West Norse was a uniform dialect and it is difficult to see whether a text was written in Old Icelandic or in Old Norwegian. It was called norrœn tunga (the Northern tongue). Old Norwegian differentiated early from Old Icelandic by the loss of the consonant h in initial position before l, n and r. This meant that whereas Old Icelandic had the form hnefi (fist), Old Norwegian had the forms næve and neve. About 1300, the court moved to south-eastern Norway, and the old written standard was felt to be old-fashioned. After the union with Sweden ca 1319, Old Swedish began to influence Norwegian, and the plague, about 1350, meant more or less the end of the old literary tradition. The influence from East Norse had only begun and was continued after the union with Denmark in 1380.

Text example

The following text is from Egils saga. The manuscript is the oldest known for that saga, the so called θ-fragment from the 13th century. The text clearly shows how little Icelandic has changed structurally. The last version is legitimate Modern Icelandic, although nothing has been altered but the spelling. The text also demonstrates, however, that a modern reader might have difficulties with the unaltered manuscript text, to say nothing of the lettering.

Old East Norse

Old East Norse, between 800 and 1100, is in Sweden called Runic Swedish and in Denmark Runic Danish, but the use of Swedish and Danish is not for linguistic reasons. They are called runic due to the fact that the body of text appears in the runic alphabet. Unlike Proto-Norse, which was written with the Elder Futhark, Old Norse was written with the Younger Futhark, which only had 16 letters. Due to the limited number of runes, the rune for the vowel u was also used for the vowels o, ø and y, and the rune for i was used for e. A change that occurrered in Old East Norse was the change of æi (Old West Norse ei) to e, as in stæin to sten. This is reflected in runic inscriptions where the older read stain and the later stin. There was also a change of au as in dauðr into ø as in døðr. This change is shown in runic inscriptions as a change from tauþr into tuþr. Moreover, the øy (Old West Norse ey) diphthong changed into ø as well, as in the Old Norse word for "island". Until the early 12th century, Old East Norse was a uniform dialect. It was in Denmark that the first innovations appeared that would differentiate Old Danish from Old Swedish and these innovations spread north unevenly creating a series of isoglosses going from Zealand to Svealand. The word final vowels -a, -o and -e started to merge into -e. At the same time, the voiceless stop consonants p, t and k became voiced stops and even fricatives. These innovations resulted in that Danish has kage, bide and gabe whereas Swedish has retained older forms, kaka, bita and gapa. Moreover, Danish lost the tonal word accent present in modern Swedish and Norwegian, replacing the grave accent with a glottal stop.

Text example

This is an extract from the Westrogothic law (Västgötalagen). It is the oldest text written as a manuscript found in Sweden and from the 13th century. It is contemporaneous with most of the Icelandic literature. The text marks the beginning of Old Swedish. :Dræpær maþar svænskan man eller smalenskæn, innan konongsrikis man, eigh væstgøskan, bøte firi atta ørtogher ok þrettan markær ok ænga ætar bot. [...] Dræpar maþær danskan man allæ noræn man, bøte niv markum. Dræpær maþær vtlænskan man, eigh ma frid flyia or landi sinu oc j æth hans. Dræpær maþær vtlænskæn prest, bøte sva mykit firi sum hærlænskan man. Præstær skal i bondalaghum væræ. Varþær suþærman dræpin ællær ænskær maþær, ta skal bøta firi marchum fiurum þem sakinæ søkir, ok tvar marchar konongi. Translation: :If someone slays a Swede or a Smålander, a man from the kingdom, but not a West Geat, he will pay eight örtugar and thirteen marks, but no wergild. The king owns nine marks from manslaughter and the killing of any man. If someone slays a Dane or a Norwegian, he will pay nine marks. If someone slays a foreigner, he shall not be banished and have to flee to his clan. If someone slays a foreign priest, he will pay as much as for a foreigner. A priest counts as a freeman. If a Southerner is slain or an Englishman, he shall pay four marks to the plaintif and two marks to the king.

Old Gutnish

The Gutasaga is the longest text surviving from Old Gutnish. It was written in the 13th century and dealt with the early history of the Gotlanders. This part relates of the agreement that the Gotlanders had with the Swedish king sometime before the 9th century: :So gingu gutar sielfs wiliandi vndir suia kunung þy at þair mattin frir Oc frelsir sykia suiariki j huerium staþ. vtan tull oc allar utgiftir. So aigu oc suiar sykia gutland firir vtan cornband ellar annur forbuþ. hegnan oc hielp sculdi kunungur gutum at waita. En þair wiþr þorftin. oc kallaþin. sendimen al oc kunungr oc ierl samulaiþ a gutnal þing senda. Oc latta þar taka scatt sinn. þair sendibuþar aighu friþ lysa gutum alla steþi til sykia yfir haf sum upsala kunungi til hoyrir. Oc so þair sum þan wegin aigu hinget sykia. Translation: :So, by their own volition, the Gotlanders became the subjects of the Swedish king, so that they could travel freely and without risk to any location in the Swedish kingdom without toll and other fees. Likewise, the Swedes had the right to go to Gotland without corn restrictions or other prohibitions. The king was to provide protection and aid, when they needed it and asked for it. The king and the jarl shall send emissaries to the Gutnish althing to receive the taxes. These emissaries shall declare free passage for the Gotlanders to all locations in the sea of the king at Uppsala (that is the Baltic Sea was under Swedish control) and likewise for everyone who wanted to travel to Gotland. Some important characteristics of old Gutnish are seen in this text. First, unlike contemporary East Norse all diphthongs are preserved. Second, the diphtong ai in aigu, þair and waita (and probably other words) is not umlauted to ei as in West Norse eigu, þeir and veita.

References

- Gordon, Eric V. and A.R. Taylor. Introduction to Old Norse. Second. ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981.

External links

- [http://www.heimskringla.no «Kulturformidlingen norrøne tekster og kvad»]
- [http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~kurisuto/germanic/language_resources.html Indo-European Language Resources] The resources in question are mostly Germanic, including two dictionaries of Old Icelandic (in English), two grammars of Old Icelandic (one in English, one in German) and a grammar of Old Swedish (in German).
- [http://www.hi.is/~haukurth/norse/sounds/ragn1_2b.mp3 soundsample]
- [http://www.hi.is/~haukurth/norse/ Old Norse for Beginners]
- [http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/lrc/eieol/norol-TC-X.html Old Norse Online], by Todd B. Krause and Jonathan Slocum from the Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas at Austin. Category:Nordic folklore Norse language, Old Category:North Germanic languages ko:고대 노르드어 ja:古ノルド語

Ninth century

. It is housed in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C.]]

Events

- An unknown event causes the decline of the Maya Classical Era
- Beowulf might have been written down in this century, though it could also have been in the 8th century
- Reign of Charlemagne, and concurrent (and controversially labeled) Carolingian Renaissance in western Europe
- Large-scale Viking attacks on Europe begin, devestating countless numbers of people
- Oseberg ship burial
- The Magyars arrive in what is now Hungary, forcing the Serbs and Bulgars south of the Danube.
- The Tukolor settle in the Senegal river valley.
- Muslim traders settle in the north-west and south-east of Madagascar.
- around 813-around 915 - period of serious Arab naval raids on shores of Tyrrhenian and Adriatic seas
- 870 - Prague Castle founded
- 800-909 - rule of Aghlabids as independent dynasty in North Africa
- 850-875 - The first Norse settlers arrive on Iceland.
- 863-879 - period of schism between eastern and western churches
- Late 9th century: Bulgaria stretches from the mouth of the Danube to Epirus and Bosnia.
- In Italy, some cities became free republics: for instance Forlì, in the 889.
- The Christian Nubian kingdom reaches its peak of prosperity and military power. (Early history of Sudan)
- Harald Fairhair was victorious at the battle of Hafrsfjord, and Norway was unified into one kingdom.

Significant people

- Alfred the Great
- Arnulf of Carinthia
- Charlemagne
- Louis the Pious
- Adi Sankara
- Harald I of Norway

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

- Vulgar Latin begins to devolve into various Romance languages
- First image of a rotary grindstone in a European source - illustration shows crank, first known use of a crank in the West (Utrecht Psalter, A.D. 843)
- Invention of gunpowder by Chinese Taoist Alchemists

Decades and years

Category:9th century 09th century ko:9세기 ja:9世紀 nb:9. århundre th:คริสต์ศตวรรษที่ 9

Scandinavia

Scandinavia is the cultural and historic region in Northern Europe consisting of the Scandinavian and Jutland peninsulas and the islands inbetween. Today, this region encompasses three sovereign states: :
- Denmark :
- Norway :
- Sweden These three countries have mutually recognized each other as parts of political and cultural region, since the height of the nationalist movements in these countries in the middle of the 19th century. The region takes its name from the peninsula, which in turn is thought to be named after Skåne (Scania) situated at the southern extreme of the Scandinavian peninsula. Prior to the mid-19th century, the region included a larger area of Northern Europe, comparable to the modern "Greater Scandinavia": :
- Denmark-Norway :
- Sweden-Finland The collective label "Scandinavia" nowadays primarily reflects the linguistic similarities, but also the strong historical and social ties between these countries despite their current political independence and different policies during the two World Wars and Cold War and membership in international organizations.

Greater Scandinavia (Norden)

Like other regions of the world, the usage and meaning of the term 'Scandinavia' can vary depending on defining criteria. Some or all of the following geo-political entities may variously be considered peripherally Scandinavian, since they traditionally have had strong political and economic ties with Scandinavia proper:
- Faroe Islands
- Finland (a sovereign republic since 1917-18)
- Greenland
- Iceland (a sovereign republic since 1944-45)
- Jan Mayen
- Svalbard
- Åland These alternative meanings are sometimes considered incorrect in some parts of Scandinavia, and occasionally some people may take offence at such usage. In recent years "Scandinavia" has again increasingly been used by scholars and teachers, in Scandinavia and other regions, in the historical sense with Finland included. [http://www.h-net.org] The term the Nordic countries is used unambiguously for the Scandinavian kingdoms of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and the republics of Finland and Iceland. More infrequently, the term is also used occasionally to include Estonia, owing to its cultural ties with Sweden and Finland and its proximity to Scandinavia. The terms Fennoscandia and Fenno-Scandinavia are used either to include the Scandinavian peninsula, the Kola peninsula, Karelia, Finland and Denmark under the same term alluding to the Fennoscandian Shield, even if Denmark actually resides on the North European Plain, or they may be used in a more cultural sense, more or less as a synonym for the Nordic countries, to signify the historically close contact between Finnic, Sami and other Scandinavian peoples and cultures.

Etymology

The etymology for the names Scandinavia and Skåne (Scania) is considered to be the same. The name is most probably derived from the Germanic
- Skaðin- meaning "danger" (cf. English scathing and unscathed) and
- awjo meaning "island". It may have referred to the dangerous banks around Skanör (skan- is the same as in Scandinavia, and -ör means "sandbanks") and Falsterbo in Skåne in southernmost Scandinavia. Alternatively, the first element is sometimes attributed to the Scandinavian giantess Skaði from Norse mythology. The original form is considered to be
- Skaðinawjo, which gave rise to different forms in Germanic languages and by non-Germanic scribes. In Beowulf we meet the forms Scedenigge and Scedeland. Ptolemy uses the form Scandia, and Scatinavia appears in Roman texts, e.g. Pliny the Elder, whereas Pomponius Mela used the deviant form Codanovia. The form Scadinavia, the original home of the Langobards, appears in Paulus Diaconus' Historia Langobardorum[http://www.fh-augsburg.de/~harsch/Chronologia/Lspost08/PaulusDiaconus/pau_lan1.html], but in other versions of Historia Langobardorum appear the forms Scadan, Scandanan, Scadanan and Scatenauge[http://www.northvegr.org/lore/langobard/001.php]. In Jordanes' history of the Goths (AD 551) we meet the form Scandza their original home, separated by sea from the land of Europe (chapter 1, 4)[http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~vandersp/Courses/texts/jordgeti.html]. The name of the Scandinavian mountain range, Skanderna in Swedish, is artificially derived from Skandinavien in the 19th century, in analogy with Alperna for the Alps. The commonly used names are bergen or fjällen; both names meaning "the mountains".

History

Languages

Main articles: North Germanic languages, Finno-Ugric languages Most dialects of Danish, Swedish and Norwegian are mutually intelligible, and Scandinavians can with little trouble understand each other's standard languages as they appear in print and are heard on radio and television. However it is often assumed that Swedes have the greatest difficulties understanding the other two languages, which may be a consequence of limited access to Danish and Norwegian radio and television in Sweden. The reason why Danish, Swedish and Norwegian are traditionally viewed as different languages, rather than dialects of one language, is that they each are well established standardized languages (Ausbausprache) in their respective countries. They are related to, but not intelligible with, the other North Germanic languages, Icelandic and Faroese, which are descended from the Norwegian dialect of Old Norse. Danish, Swedish and Norwegian have, since medieval times, been influenced to varying degrees by Middle Low German and standard German. The Scandinavian languages are (as a language family) entirely unrelated to Finnish and Estonian, which as Finno-Ugric languages are distantly related to Hungarian. This said there still is a great deal of borrowings from the Swedish language in both the Finnish and Estonian language. Although Swedish speakers constitute a small but influential minority in Finland—and Finnish speakers constitute a minority in Sweden of similar relative size—and most ethnic Finns have studied Swedish as a mandatory school subject, the linguistic distance between the language families is often seen as indicative of a cultural distance and a reason not to classify the Finns as Scandinavian. This view was particularly prominent among Finns influenced by the ethnic nationalist movement called Fennoman in the beginning of the 20th century, as well as the language-based Scandinavian movement in the other Scandinavian countries in the 1850's. Only in 1902 was Finnish language granted an equal status with Swedish as an official language of Finland. Still in present day, the municipality with the highest fraction of native Swedish speakers of the population in the world, Korsnäs, resides in Finland. A rather typical folk-linguistic view might suggest the following. Finns and Icelanders who have studied Swedish and Danish, respectively, as foreign languages often also find it hard to understand the other Scandinavian languages. On the other end of the scale are the Norwegians, who with two parallel written standards, and a habit to hold on strongly to local dialects, are accustomed to variation and may perceive Danish and Swedish as only slightly more distant dialects. In a conversation between a Swedish speaker and a Dane there can be significant difficulties in understanding each other's spoken language, due to differences in pronunciation and vocabulary. In the Faroe Islands Danish is mandatory, and since Faroese people this way become bilingual in two very distinct Nordic languages find it relatively easy to understand the other two Mainland Scandinavian languages. [http://www.nordkontakt.nu/].

Politics

The modern use of the term Scandinavia rises from the Scandinavist political movement, which was active in the middle of the 19th century, chiefly between the First war of Schleswig (Slesvig in Scandinavian) (1848-1850), in which Sweden-Norway contributed with considerable military force, and the Second war of Schleswig (1864) when Sweden's parliament denounced the King's promises of military support. The King proposed the unification of Denmark, Norway and Sweden into a single united kingdom. The background for this was the tumultuous events during the Napoleonic wars in the beginning of the century leading to the partition of Sweden (the eastern part becoming the Russian Grand Duchy of Finland in 1809) and Denmark (whereby Norway, de jure in union with Denmark since 1387, although de facto merely a province, became independent in 1814 and thereafter was swiftly forced to accept a personal union with Sweden). Finland being a part of the Russian Empire meant that it would have to be left out of any equation for a political union between the Nordic countries. The geographical Scandinavia included Norway, Sweden and parts of Finland, but the political Scandinavia was also to include Denmark. Politically Sweden and Norway were united in a personal union under one monarch. Denmark also included the dependent territories of Iceland, the Faroe Islands and Greenland in the Atlantic Ocean (which however historically had belonged to Norway, but unintentionally remained with Denmark according to the Treaty of Kiel). The end of the Scandinavian political movement came when Denmark was denied military support from Sweden-Norway to annex the (Danish) Duchy of Schleswig, which together with the (German) Duchy of Holstein had been in personal union with Denmark. The Second war of Schleswig followed in 1864. That was a brief but disastrous war between Denmark and Prussia (supported by Austria). Schleswig-Holstein was conquered by Prussia, and after Prussia's success in the Franco-Prussian War a Prussian-led German Empire was created, and a new power-balance of the Baltic sea countries was established. Even if a Scandinavian political union never came about there was a Scandinavian Monetary Union established in 1873, with the Krona/Krone as the common currency, and which lasted until World War I. The modern Scandinavian co-operation after World War I also came to include the independent Finland and (since 1944) Iceland and Scandinavian as a political term came to be replaced by the term Nordic countries; and eventually, in 1952, by the Nordic Council institution.

Historical political structure

1/ The original settlers of the Faroes and Iceland were of Pictish or Celtic origin (from Scotland or Ireland), then Nordic origin (mainly Norwegian). zh-min-nan:Skandinavia als:Skandinavien ko:스칸디나비아 ja:スカンディナヴィア simple:Scandinavia

York

:This article is about the historic English city. For other meanings, see York (disambiguation). York is a city in northern England, at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss. In the 2001 UK census the city had a population of 181,094 [http://www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/pyramids/pages/00ff.asp], of which 137,505 lived on the York urban area. Its geographic coordinates are . York is the traditional county town of Yorkshire, to which it lends its name. However, it did not form part of any of the three ridings of Yorkshire. The modern City of York, created on April 1, 1996, is a unitary authority and an administrative county in its own right. As well as York itself, it includes a number of neighbouring parishes which formerly belonged to the surrounding districts of Harrogate, Ryedale and Selby. It borders on North Yorkshire and the East Riding of Yorkshire. The city was founded in AD 71, and has a rich Roman and Viking history. The historical aspects of York attract a great deal of tourism. York is home to the University of York. The city sometimes suffers from flooding. It is also claimed to be one of the most haunted cities in Europe. York is twinned with:
- Münster, Germany
- Dijon, France
- Fanteakwa, Ghana

History and tourism

Roman York

York is renowned for its history, which is preserved in its architecture. The city was founded during the reign of Roman Emperor Vespasian in AD 71, and for much of the intervening period has been the principal city of Northern England. Every year, thousands of tourists flock to see the surviving mediaeval buildings, interspersed with Roman and Viking remains. The City Council has 27 Conservation Areas, 2,084 Listed buildings and 20 Scheduled Ancient Monuments in its care. For the Romans, York the celtic Eboracum was a major military base; Emperor Septimius Severus died there in AD 211, and Constantius Chlorus, the father of Constantine I, died there in 306. York is also the city in which Constantine's troops proclaimed him emperor. Substantial Roman remains were discovered under the Minster and a re-erected Roman column now stands on nearby Deangate. Other sites of excavated remains include a Roman bath, located under a pub in St Sampson's Square, a Roman temple, near the foot of Lendal Bridge, and the site of a Roman bridge over the River Ouse. Outside the city walls are the remains of substantial Roman cemeteries. A large number of Roman finds are now housed in the Yorkshire Museum. Anglian York was firstly capital of Deira, before shifting to control of a united kingdom and later earldom of Northumbria. Paulinus of York brought Christianity to the region in the early 7th century with the conversion of King Edwin of Northumbria and the first Minster is believed to have been built in 627, although the location of the early Minster is a matter of dispute. York became a centre of learning, its most famous scholar being Alcuin.

Viking York

:For Viking York, see Jorvik. A "great Viking army" captured York in AD 866, and in 876 the Vikings settled permanently in parts of the Yorkshire countryside. Viking kings ruled this area, known to historians as "The Viking Kingdom of Jorvik", for almost a century. In 954 the last Viking king, Eric Bloodaxe, was expelled and his kingdom was incorporated in the newly consolidated Anglo-Saxon state. Another renowned scholar of this era was Wulfstan II, Archbishop of York.

Mediaeval York

Wulfstan II, Archbishop of York Following the Norman Conquest of 1066, York was substantially damaged by the punitive harrying of the north (1069) launched by William the Conqueror in response to regional revolt. Two castles were erected in the city on either side of the River Ouse. In time York became an important urban centre as the administrative centre of the county of Yorkshire, as the seat of an archbishop, and at times in the later 13th and 14th century as an alternative seat of royal government. It was an important trading centre. Several religious houses were founded following the Conquest, including St Mary's Abbey and Holy Trinity Priory. The city as a possession of the crown also came to house a substantial Jewish community under the protection of the sheriff. On March 16, 1190 a mob of townsfolk forced the Jews in York to flee into the wooden castle, which was under the control of the sheriff. The castle was set on fire and the Jews were massacred. It is likely that various local magnates who were indebted to the Jews helped instigate this massacre or, at least, did nothing to prevent it. Commemoration of the York massacre passed into the Jewish liturgy and until 1990 orthodox Judaism forbade Jews from living within the city. York prospered during much of the later mediaeval era and this is reflected in the built environment. York Minster is the largest mediaeval cathedral in England and one of the largest gothic churches in Europe. The mediaeval city walls, with their entrance gates, known as bars, encompassed virtually the entire city and survive to this day. The city was also designated as a county corporate, giving it effective county status. county corporate The later years of the 14th and the earlier years of the 15th centuries were characterised by particular prosperity. It is in this period that the regular cycle of religious pageants (or plays) associated with the Corpus Christi cycle and performed by the various craft guilds grew up. Among the more important personages associated with this period was Nicholas Blackburn senior, Lord Mayor in 1412 and a leading merchant. He is depicted in glass in the (now) east window of All Saints' Church in North Street. The period from the later 15th century seems to have witnessed economic contraction and a dwindling in York's regional importance. The construction of the city's new guildhall around the middle of the century can be seen as an attempt to project civic confidence in the face of growing uncertainty. Dating from the later mediaeval era, and now a popular tourist attraction, is the Shambles, an old street with overhanging timber-built shops, now occupied by souvenir shops as opposed to the original butchers. York is also home to numerous Ghost Walks and also a favourite venue for hen parties.

18th Century York

York elected two members to the Unreformed House of Commons.

Modern York

Unreformed House of Commons] As well as a tourist destination, modern York is a centre of communications, education and manufacturing. It is a major railway junction, situated on the East Coast, Cross Country and Transpennine mainlines. York is also a major venue for horse racing at York Racecourse in the Knavesmire area. York is the headquarters of the confectionary manufacturer Nestlé R

Yorkshire

History

Villages, towns and cities in Yorkshire

Local government areas in ceremonial Yorkshire

See also

External links

Yorkshire (disambiguation)

Place-names

See also

Other uses

Traditional county of England

The counties

Origin

Traditional subdivisions

Authenticity and anomalies

Usage

Counties and urban areas

The traditional counties movement

See also

External links

Square mile

Symbol

Conversions

See also

West Riding of Yorkshire

East Riding of Yorkshire

Towns and villages

Places of interest

Photos

External link

Old Norse

Geographical distribution

Modern descendants

Sounds

Vowels

Consonants

Orthography

Dialects and texts

Old West Norse

Text example

Old East Norse

Text example

Old Gutnish

See also

References

External links

Ninth century

Events

Significant people

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

Decades and years

Scandinavia

Greater Scandinavia (Norden)

Etymology

History

Languages

Politics

Historical political structure

York

History and tourism

Roman York

Viking York

Mediaeval York

18th Century York

Modern York