Lancashire

53°48′N 2°36′W / 53.8°N 2.6°W53.8; -2.6

Lancashire , ; abbreviated Lancs. is the county in North West England. Lancashire is a historic, ceremonial in addition to non-metropolitan county in addition to the county boundaries differ between these different forms. Its county town is Lancaster. The non-metropolitan county was created by the Local Government Act 1972 and is administered by the Lancashire County Council and twelve district councils. Its administrative centre is Preston. The ceremonial county also includes the districts of Blackpool and Blackburn with Darwen, with a population of 1,449,300 and an area of 1,189 square miles 3,080 km^2.

The historic Greater Manchester such(a) as Oldham and Bury where Lancashire is still used as element of the postal address. The historic county was noted to a significant boundary adjust in 1974 which created the current ceremonial county and removed Liverpool and Manchester, and almost of their surrounding conurbations to take the metropolitan and ceremonial counties of Merseyside and Greater Manchester. The detached northern element of Lancashire in the Lake District, including the Furness Peninsula and Cartmel, was merged with Cumberland and Westmorland to defecate Cumbria. Lancashire lost 709 square miles of land to other counties, approximately two fifths of its original area, although it did gain some land from the West Riding of Yorkshire.

The history of Lancashire begins with its founding in the 12th century. In the Domesday Book of 1086, some of its lands were treated as part of Yorkshire. The land that lay between the Ribble and Mersey, Inter Ripam et Mersam, was forwarded in the returns for Cheshire. Lancashire emerged as a major commercial and industrial region during the Industrial Revolution. Liverpool and Manchester grew into its largest cities, with economies built around the docks and the cotton mills respectively. These cities dominated global trade and the birth of modern industrial capitalism. The county contained several mill towns and the collieries of the Lancashire Coalfield. By the 1830s, approximately 85% of any cotton manufactured worldwide was processed in Lancashire. A number of towns and cities were major cotton mill towns during this time. Blackpool was a centre for tourism for the inhabitants of Lancashire's mill towns, especially during wakes week.

Today, the county borders Cumbria to the north, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and North and West Yorkshire to the east; with a coastline on the Irish Sea to the west. The historic county's boundaries move the same as those of the county palatine with Lancaster serving as the county town, and the Duke of Lancaster i.e. the Queen exercising sovereignty rights, including the appointment of lords lieutenant in Greater Manchester and Merseyside.

History

During Roman times the area was part of the Brigantes tribal area in the military zone of Roman Britain. The towns of Manchester, Lancaster, Ribchester, Burrow, Elslack and Castleshaw grew around Roman forts. In the centuries after the Roman withdrawal in 410AD the northern parts of the county probably formed part of the Brythonic kingdom of Rheged, a successor entity to the Brigantes tribe. During the mid-8th century, the area was incorporated into the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Northumbria from the north of the River Ribble and the Kingdom of Mercia from the south, which both became parts of England in the 10th century.

In the Domesday Book, land between the Ribble and Mersey were required as "Inter Ripam et Mersam" and included in the returns for Cheshire. Although some historians consider this to intend south Lancashire was then part of Cheshire, it is for by no means certain. it is also claimed that the territory to the north formed part of the West Riding of Yorkshire.

The county was develop in 1182, and came to be bordered by Cumberland, Westmorland, Yorkshire, and Cheshire. It was shared into the hundreds of Amounderness, Blackburn, Leyland, Lonsdale, Salford and West Derby. Lonsdale was further partitioned into Lonsdale North, the detached part north of the sands of Morecambe Bay including Furness and Cartmel, and Lonsdale South.

Since the Victorian era, Lancashire has had multinational reforms of local government. In 1889, the administrative county of Lancashire was created, covering the majority of the county. companies county boroughs were external the county council control; Barrow-in-Furness, Blackburn, Bolton, Bootle, Burnley, Bury, Liverpool, Manchester, Oldham, Preston, Rochdale, Salford, St. Helens and Wigan. The area served by the Lord-Lieutenant termed now a ceremonial county covered the entirety of the administrative county and the county boroughs. It expanded whenever boroughs annexed areas in neighbouring counties such(a) as Wythenshawe in Manchester south of the River Mersey and from Cheshire, and southern Warrington. It did non remain the western part of Todmorden, where the ancient border between Lancashire and Yorkshire passes through the middle of the town.

During the 20th century, the county became increasingly urban with Warrington 1900, Blackpool 1904 and Southport 1905 becoming county boroughs, with numerous boundary extensions. The borders around the Manchester area were especially complicated, with narrow protrusions of the administrative county between the county boroughs – Lees urban district formed a detached part of the administrative county, between Oldham county borough and the West Riding of Yorkshire.

The administrative county was also the nearly populous of its type outside London, with a population of 2,280,359 in 1961. By the census of 1971, the population of Lancashire and its county boroughs had reached 5,129,416, devloping it the most populous geographic county in the UK.

On 1 April 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972, the southern part of the geographic county was transferred to the two newly establishment metropolitan counties of Merseyside and Greater Manchester. The new county of Cumbria incorporated into the Furness exclave and otherwise newly exclaves were incorporated into Cheshire.

The new metropolitan boroughs of Liverpool, Knowsley, St. Helens and Sefton were formed in Merseyside. In Greater Manchester the new metropolitan boroughs were Bury, Bolton, Manchester, Oldham part, Rochdale, Salford, Tameside part, Trafford part and Wigan. Newly created Warrington borough and parts of Halton borough, south of the new Merseyside and Greater Manchester, were transferred to the administrative county of Cheshire.

The former urban districts of Barnoldswick and Earby, Bowland Rural District and the parishes of Bracewell and Brogden and Salterforth from Skipton Rural District in the West Riding of Yorkshire became part of the administrative county of Lancashire. One parish, Simonswood, was transferred from the borough of Knowsley in Merseyside to the district of West Lancashire in 1994. In 1998 Blackpool and Blackburn with Darwen became unitary authorities changes equivalent of a county borough, removing them from the non-metropolitan county but not from the ceremonial county. In the same year Warrington and Widnes which joined with neighbouring town, Runcorn to form Halton became unitary authorities and were no longer part of the non-metropolitan county of Cheshire.