I am tired of the constant changing of the names of British counties.
I often see addresses for places in Middlesex, however I have discovered that Middlesex was abolished in 1965.
I used to write to places in Gwynedd, but according to this map it is now called Caernarfonshire.
In an atlas I have, Gwent is shown as a county, however I now see that it no longer exists, and the atlas is approximately 6 years old.
The atlas shows that Bristol is in Avon, however it seems to have disappeared. I have no idea which county Bristol is in now.
Another thing is the inconsistency in abbreviating counties.
Lincolnshire is Lincs but it seems that people use Oxon for Oxfordshire. Gloucester is in Gloucestershire but what about Berkshire and Hampshire. Where are Berk and Hamp?
And Shrops. sounds fine, but what about Salop?
Go to www.abcounties.co.uk for information.
It appears that local government reforms in 1974 created new counties. However many, including Gwent, Avon and Humberside were abolished on 1st April 1996.
This was explained in this thread.
Names of counties can change too as Cumberland is Cumbria and Northumberland is Northumbria.
Yorkshire now seem to have been divided into areas such as East Riding of Yorkshire, the origin of which I have no idea.
In some areas, there seem to be two counties. I visited Tayside but now it’s in Perthshire. If I am writing there, how am I supposed to know which one to use?
Devon may also be called Devonshire.
Abingdon used to be in Berkshire however it is now in Oxfordshire. I’d be interested to know if any other people are as tired as I am of the changes. The problem is that the names of counties change, counties such as Rutland are restored, counties appear to have more than one name and towns ares shifted between counties. I’d like to know your thoughts on this.
Good lord, how do you get mail with that kind of system? Or is county not part of a British mailing address (it’d have to be…wouldn’t it?)
Cerri I think the Royal Mail operates by Pot Luck when choosing where to send things 
Seriously though, Post Codes negate problems with counties.
gah, I don’t think pot luck is a proper noun though …
Bollockshire
I’d like to add in the famous GAA chant
Up Down!
I’ll pick up a few of these:
Bristol, I think, is a County Borough all by itself. Nobody ever liked “Avon” nor was sorry to see it go.
I’m not sure about “Berk” but “Hamp” is better known as “Hampton”… of course, it’s given the appropriate prefix to distinguish it from the “North Hampton”, and we stopped worrying about splitting all of this into separate words years ago
Yorkshire has been divided into “Ridings” since the time of the Danelaw. It means “Third”, more or less: north, west and east.
Some of the county abbreviations are Latinised for historical reasons, such as Shropshire. (No, I don’t know where “Shrop” was.)
As already pointed out, the postcode will get the mail delivered, and for actual travelling from place to place you don’t usually need to know what county you’re heading for (though if you want to look over Leeds Castle, it helps to know that this is in Kent, not Yorkshire).
Dunmurry: the one big mistake you’re making here is in trusting the Association of British Counties as a reliable source. They have no official standing and don’t decide what changes are made if any. The map you linked to shows the names of counties as they were before the big reorganisation of 1974, so for example Gwynedd has not been replaced by Caernarfonshire; Caernarfonshire was one of the old counties absorbed into Gwynedd.
Some of the name and boundary changes you’re complaining about have taken place gradually over more than a thousand years. Is that unreasonable?
Centuries ago, Hampshire was called Southamptonshire, so the county town of Southampton makes sense. You don’t need to know how or why this change happened to send a letter.
“Names of counties can change too as Cumberland is Cumbria and Northumberland is Northumbria.” is simply not true. Cumbria was combined from Cumberland, Westmoreland and little bit of Lancashire in the 1974 change. Northumbria hasn’t existed for many centuries. Devon is not called Devonshire. The Ridings of Yorkshire take their name from Anglo-Saxon – this is not a new change.
I can understand you being pissed off if you are confused, but you’re making things worse for yourself by exaggerating the number and frequency of changes. If you use the post code your letter will get there. If you want to know more about postal addresses ask the Royal Mail, don’t rely on a website run by an ancient history society or a bunch or reactionary hobbyists.
Would Arseborrough work? Has a nice ring to it.
That’s right. In fact, I’m writing this now from the bit of Cumbria that used to be Lancashire-across-the-sands.
I think that would be the county town.
While we’re whingeing, how about the bizarre archaic abbreviations?
Hampshire => Hants
Oxfordshire => Oxon
Reminds me of a famous old limerick.
Reminds me of a famous old limerick.
Mr. Croydon Vowel-Bidet
7.30 Cinerama Duct
Arseborough, Bollockshire XVL7N
To better understand Steve’s limerick, the abbreviation for Salisbury is “Sarum”.
Just remembered:
Shropshire => Salop
I wouldn’t worry about it. Many companies insist on using shires in the post they send out to Scotland that haven’t existed for over 30 years. Doesn’t matter what you tell them for your address, their mailing software does a look up on the postcode and sticks in these shires that no-one uses anymore and mean very little to anyone. If anything they could confuse as some of the new local political divisions have similar names, but cover different areas.
But I doubt the Post Office pays them any attention either and just uses the postcode. So who knows why they insist on putting them in addresses on post???
So, since Leeds is in Yorkshire, how come when I lived there my address never included Yorkshire? Instead, it was Woodlesford, Leeds, as if you could be in two cities at once, or did Leeds suddenly become a county as well?
Steve, my wife, who collects “visual limericks” and is presently ROFL, almost literally, from yours, thanks you for that contribution.
On a more serious note, does anybody have a link to a map and list of the current counties (including Scotland and Wales) and what traditional counties went to comprise them?
Geshundheit.