This information is out of date! Update may follow. (April 2022)

What is a County?

Map of counties After 40 years of piecemeal Local Government Reorganization, this is not an easy question to answer, and it has been raised often enough for me to attempt to answer it in this page. This is the way I see it. In England we have:

39 Traditional Counties of immemorial antiquity. These no longer have any legal standing but still represent what many people continue to think of as "counties", such as "Middlesex", "Sussex" and "Yorkshire".
32 Non-metropolitan Counties - areas covered by county councils, 7 of which (Buckinghamshire, Cornwall, County Durham, Isle of Wight, Northumberland, Shropshire and Wiltshire) have become unitary authorities absorbing the functions of former districts now abolished.
- Rutland and Herefordshire councils are not county councils (they are unitary district councils) despite sticking the word "County" into their corporate names. It is not clear that this distinction has any practical consequence other than determining the years in which they hold their all-out elections (2013 + 4n for counties, 2015 + 4n for districts).
- In most cases, the area a new unitary authority created from 1995 onwards has been defined as a separate "county". (The districts in Berkshire and Cleveland seem to have missed out on this.) Except for the 7 mentioned above, the statutory instruments creating them have exempted them from the provision of the 1972 Act that "every county shall have a (sc. county) council".
48 Ceremonial Counties (areas for which a Lord Lieutenant acts as the Queen's deputy). Every County Council area has a Ceremonial County of the same name, but the Ceremonial County is in many cases larger as it takes in areas served by Unitary Authorities. The other 15 Ceremonial Counties do not have an County Council of the same name. Insofar as there is an official definition of "Geographical" county I believe this is it. Everywhere in England falls within one (and only one) Ceremonial County. The term "Lieutenancy" is also sometimes used for these areas. (The City of London is a separate Ceremonial County from Greater London - it is too small to show on the adjoining map).

In Scotland 31 lieutanancies were established in 1975 and revised in 1996, bearing some resemblance to the counties existing pre-1973. There are also 4 cities which have been "Counties of Cities" for centuries, where the Lord Provost is the Lord Lieutenant ex officio.

In Wales for Ceremonial purposes there are eight "preserved counties" which have the same names as the 1974 - 1996 Administrative Counties, but have had their boundaries shifted to align more closely to the unitary councils.

In Northern Ireland the traditional six counties and two cities remain as they were before 1973. Lord Lieutenants and High Sherriffs are appointed for each county.

Thanks to Laurence Jones for the information on Scotland, Wales and NI. More details

THE LIST

England
Bedfordshire Berkshire Bristol Buckinghamshire Cambridgeshire Cheshire City of London Cornwall Cumberland Cumbria Derbyshire Devon Dorset Durham East Riding of Yorkshire East Sussex Essex Gloucestershire Greater London Greater Manchester Hampshire Herefordshire Hertfordshire Huntingdonshire Isle of Wight Kent Lancashire	Trad, Cerem Trad, Cerem Ceremonial Trad, Admin (U), Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Cerem Ceremonial Trad, Admin (U), Cerem Traditional Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin (U), Cerem Ceremonial Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Ceremonial Ceremonial Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Traditional Admin (U), Ceremonial Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem	Leicestershire Lincolnshire Merseyside Middlesex Norfolk Northamptonshire Northumberland North Yorkshire Nottinghamshire Oxfordshire Rutland Shropshire Somerset South Yorkshire Staffordshire Suffolk Surrey Sussex Tyne & Wear Warwickshire West Midlands West Sussex West Yorkshire Westmorland Wiltshire Worcestershire Yorkshire	Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Ceremonial Traditional Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Cerem Trad, Admin (U), Cerem Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Cerem Trad, Admin (U), Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Ceremonial Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Traditional Ceremonial Trad, Admin, Cerem Ceremonial Admin, Cerem Ceremonial Traditional Trad, Admin (U), Cerem Trad, Admin, Cerem Traditional
Scotland		Wales	Northern Ireland
Aberdeenshire Angus Argyll and Bute Ayrshire and Arran Banffshire Berwickshire Caithness Clackmannan Dumfries Dunbartonshire East Lothian Fife Inverness Kincardineshire Lanarkshire Midlothian Moray Nairn	Orkney Perth and Kinross Renfrewshire Ross and Cromarty Roxburgh, Ettrick and Lauderdale Shetland Stirling and Falkirk Sutherland Stewartry of Kirkcudbright Tweeddale West Lothian Western Isles Wigtown City of Aberdeen City of Glasgow City of Dundee City of Edinburgh	Clwyd Dyfed Mid Glamorgan South Glamorgan West Glamorgan Gwent Gwynedd Powys	Antrim Armagh Down Fermanagh Londonderry Tyrone City of Belfast City of Londonderry

This information is out of date! Update may follow. (April 2022)

What is a County?

THE LIST

References