Quote:
Originally Posted by 1andrew1
If it ends up as England and Wales, would it still be called Great Britain? Genuinely don't know the answer as to what a rump nation could be called.
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The Kingdom of Great Britain only existed from 1707 until 1801. It was a unitary state created from the permanent joining of two separate states - England and Scotland.
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland came into being in 1801 in a similar way, by the joining of Ireland and Great Britain. Latterly, following partition and a progressive lessening of London’s influence in Irish affairs we find ourselves where we are today, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Without the union between England and Scotland, there is no political entity called Great Britain. A nation state comprising England and Northern Ireland would be the United Kingdom of England and Northern Ireland, if the same naming convention used since the 18th century were followed.
A previous Act of Union, in force from 1536, United England and Wales, but unlike the union with Scotland, Wales’ distinctive legal system was not retained and the new unitary state was not renamed in recognition. From 1536, the nation state called “England” effectively included all the territory of Wales (although the world did not understand nation states in the 16th century in the way we do today).