Classical Antiquity The earliest known names for the islands come from
Greco-Roman writings. Sources included the
Massaliote Periplus (a merchants' handbook from around 500 BC describing sea routes) and the travel writings of the Greek,
Pytheas, from around 320 BC. Although the earliest texts have been lost, excerpts were quoted or paraphrased by later authors. The main islands were called "Ierne", equal to the term
Ériu for Ireland, and "
Albion" for present-day Great Britain. The island group had long been known collectively as the Pretanic or Britanic isles. There is considerable confusion about early use of these terms and the extent to which similar terms were used as self-description by the inhabitants. Cognates of these terms are still in use. According to
T. F. O'Rahilly in 1946 "Early Greek geographers style Britain and Ireland 'the Pretanic (
or Brettanic) islands', i.e. the islands of the Pritani or Priteni" and that "From this one may reasonably infer that the Priteni were the ruling population of Britain and Ireland at the time when these islands first became known to the Greeks". O'Rahilly identified the Preteni with the and the , whom he stated were the earliest of the "four groups of Celtic invaders of Ireland" and "after whom these islands were known to the Greeks as 'the Pretanic Islands'". Today O'Rahilly's historical views on the Preteni and the ethnic makeup of early Ireland are no longer accepted by academic archeologists and historians. According to
A. L. F. Rivet and Colin Smith in 1979 "the earliest instance of the name which is textually known to us" is in
The Histories of
Polybius, who referred to them . According to Rivet and Smith, this name encompassed "Britain with Ireland". According to Snyder, "Preteni", a word related to the and to the , was used by southern
Britons to refer to the people north of the
Antonine Wall, also known as the Picts (). According to
Kenneth H. Jackson, the
Pictish language was a
Celtic language related to modern Welsh and to ancient
Gaulish with influences from earlier
non-Indo-European languages. and in the 38th chapter of the third book Diodorus remarks that the region "about the British Isles" () and other distant lands of the
oecumene "have by no means come to be included in the common knowledge of men". According to Philip Freeman in 2001, "it seems reasonable, especially at this early point in classical knowledge of the Irish, for Diodorus or his sources to think of all inhabitants of the Brettanic Isles as
Brettanoi". According to
Barry Cunliffe in 2002, "The earliest reasonably comprehensive description of the British Isles to survive from the classical authors is the account given by the Greek writer Diodorus Siculus in the first century B.C. Diodorus uses the word , which is probably the earliest Greek form of the name". According to Snyder, the derives from "a Gallo-Brittonic word which may have been introduced to Britain during the P-Celtic linguistic innovations of the sixth century BC". According to Cunliffe, Diodorus Siculus used the spelling , while
Strabo used both and ''
. Cunliffe argues the B'' spelling appears only in the first book of Strabo's
Geography, so the
P spelling reflects Strabo's original spelling and the changes to Book I are the result of a
scribal error. According to
Stefan Radt's 2006 commentary to his
critical edition however, although the medieval manuscripts of Strabo's
Geography vary in the spelling, the older
epitome, which is often the only witness to preserve the correct reading, consistently uses the
B spelling. According to Radt, "Where it is missing, one may confidently adopt the
B found in secondary manuscripts, assuming it was also present in the Strabo text underlying the epitome" (). Strabo was disapproving of Pytheas, whose work was used by Strabo's predecessor
Eratosthenes. Strabo wrote:Around AD 70,
Pliny the Elder, in Book 4 of his
Naturalis Historia, describes the islands he considers to be "Britanniae" as including Great Britain, Ireland, Orkney, smaller islands such as the Hebrides, the Isle of Man, Anglesey, possibly one of the Frisian Islands, and islands which have been identified as
Ushant and Sian. He refers to Great Britain as the island called "Britannia", noting that its former name was "Albion". The list also includes the island of Thule, most often identified as Iceland—although some express the view that it may have been the
Faroe Islands—the coast of
Norway or
Denmark, or possibly
Shetland. After describing the
Rhine delta, Pliny begins his chapter on the British Isles, which he calls "the Britains" (): opposite the
Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, photographed from across the
North Sea by the astronaut
Alexander Gerst. According to
Thomas O'Loughlin in 2018, the British Isles was "a concept already present in the minds of those living in continental Europe since at least the 2nd–cent. CE". In his ,
Dionysius Periegetes mentions the British Isles and describes their position opposite the Rhine delta, specifying that there are two islands and calling them the "Bretanides" ( or ). In
Priscian's Latin adaptation of Dionysius's Greek , the British Isles are mentioned as "the twin " (). In his ,
Arrian referred to "people living in the islands called "Britannic" which belong to the Great Exterior sea" () as being the only people in the world still to use
war chariots. In his
Almagest (147–148 AD)
, Claudius Ptolemy referred to the larger island as Great Britain () and to Ireland as Little Britain (). According to Philip Freeman in 2001, Ptolemy "is the only ancient writer to use the name "Little Britain" for Ireland, though in doing so he is well within the tradition of earlier authors who pair a smaller Ireland with a larger Britain as the two Brettanic Isles". In the second book of Ptolemy's
Geography (), the second and third chapters are respectively titled in and . 's "first European map" from a Greek manuscript edition of
Geography, dated , once owned by
Charles Burney and now in the
British Library, depicting
Ireland. The island is labelled in . In the fifth chapter of the seventh book of
Geography, Ptolemy describes the British Isles as being at the northern limits of the
oecumene: "in the north, the
oecumene is limited by the continuation of the ocean which surrounds the British Isles and the northernmost parts of Europe" (). In the same chapter, he enumerates in order of size the ten largest islands or peninsulas known to him, listing both Great Britain and Ireland: In the third chapter of the eighth book of
Geography, Ptolemy summarizes the content of his maps, stating that "The first map of Europe includes the British Isles and the surrounding islands" (). Ptolemy included Thule in the chapter on Albion; the coordinates he gives correlate with the location of Shetland, though the location given for Thule by Pytheas may have been further north, in Iceland or Norway.
Geography generally reflects the situation c. 100 AD. Following the
conquest of AD 43 the
Roman province of Britannia was established, and
Roman Britain expanded to cover much of the island of Great Britain. An invasion of Ireland was considered but never undertaken, and Ireland remained outside the Roman Empire. The Romans failed to consolidate their hold on the
Scottish Highlands; the northern extent of the area under their control (defined by the
Antonine Wall across
central Scotland) stabilised at
Hadrian's Wall across the
north of England by about AD 210. Inhabitants of the province continued to refer to themselves as "Brittannus" or "Britto", and gave their
patria (homeland) as "Britannia" or as their tribe. The vernacular term "Priteni" came to be used for the barbarians north of the Antonine Wall, with the Romans using the tribal name "
Caledonii" more generally for these peoples who (after AD 300) they called
Picts. The post-conquest Romans used
Britannia or
Britannia Magna (Large Britain) for Britain, and
Hibernia or
Britannia Parva (Small Britain) for Ireland. The post-Roman era saw
Brythonic kingdoms established in all areas of Great Britain except the
Scottish Highlands, but coming under increasing attacks from
Picts,
Scotti and
Anglo-Saxons. At this time Ireland was dominated by the Gaels or Scotti, who subsequently gave their names to Ireland and Scotland. In the grammatical treatise he dedicated to the emperor
Marcus Aurelius (), ,
Aelius Herodianus notes the differences in spelling of the name of the British Isles, citing Ptolemy as one of the authorities who spelt the name with a
pi (): " islands in the Ocean; and some [spell] like this with
pi, , such as Ptolemy" (). Herodianus repeated this information in : " islands in the ocean. They are called with
pi, , such as by Ptolemy" (). The chronicle attributed to
Pope Hippolytus of Rome mentions the British Isles as part of the lands allotted to
Japheth in the
table of nations: 55
recto of the 's Greek manuscript 4701 (formerly 121), probably copied in the second half of the 10th century and including the phrase . In the manuscript tradition of the
Sibylline Oracles, two lines from the fifth book may refer to the British Isles: In Aloisius Rzach's 1891
critical edition, the manuscript reading of is retained. Rzach suggested that
Procopius of Caesarea referred to these lines when mentioning in his that the
Sibylline Oracles "foretells the misfortunes of the Britons" (). 1902 critical edition accepted Wilamowitz's emendation, printing . According to the editor Paul Schnabel in 1935, the manuscript traditions spelt the name variously as: , , or . In the manuscript copy of the
classical Armenian adaptation published in 1880 by the
Mekhitarists of , the British Isles are , which in the Latin translation of 1887 is . In his ,
Prosper of Aquitaine mentioned the British Isles to which
Pope Celestine I () sent
Palladius as "the Britains" () including both Great Britain and Ireland
– the "Roman island" and the "barbarian island". Prosper praised Celestine as thereby having dealt with
Pelagianism in Great Britain and having established
Christianity in Ireland: The of
Stephen of Byzantium mentions the British Isles and lists the Britons as their inhabitants'
ethnonym. He comments on the name's variable spelling, noting that
Dionysius Periegetes spelt the name with a single
tau and that Ptolemy and
Marcian of Heraclea had spelt it with a
pi:The of
John Malalas mentions the British Isles as part of the lands allotted to Japheth in the table of nations.The of
Jacob of Edessa twice mentions the British Isles (), and in both cases identifies Ireland and Great Britain by name:
Middle Ages At the
Synod of Birr, the signed by clergymen and rulers from Ireland, Gaelic Scotland, and Pictland was binding . According to
Kuno Meyer's 1905 edition, "That here means Britain, not Scotland, is shown by the corresponding passage in the Latin text of § 33: ''". The text of the describes itself: . while others write that it is simply unknown whether it was meant to apply to areas of Britain not under such strong Irish influence. Adomnán similarly refers to "Ireland and Britain" when commenting on the
Plague of 664 in his
Life of Columba, writing "oceani insulae per totum, videlicet Scotia et Britannia." He notes that only the people of Pictland and the Irish of Britain ("Pictorum plebe et Scotorum Britanniae") were spared the pestilence. In 1993, the editor Otto Prinz connected this name with the of
Isidore of Seville, (). 6
verso of the 's manuscript Latin 4884, probably written in the 780s at
Corbie Abbey and including the phrase . In
medieval Islamic geography and cartography, the British Isles were known by the
Arabic names or . England was known as , , or (), Scotland as (), and Ireland as or . According to
Douglas Morton Dunlop, "Whether there was any Arab contact, except perhaps with Ireland, is, however, more than doubtful".The '
of Ahmad ibn Rustah describes the British Isles as the "twelve islands called '" (). He also describes the
Faroe Islands as being two days' sailing from "the northernmost British Isles" (). According to Irmeli Valtonen in 2008, on the so-called
Cotton mappa mundi, an
Anglo-Saxon mappa mundi based on the
Old English Orosius, "The largest feature is the British Isles, which is indicated by the inscription ". The same codex, Codex Tiberius B.V.1, also contains a copy of
Priscian's translation of
Dionysius Periegetes's , and according to Sean Michael Ryan, "Britain is described, strikingly, as a pair of islands (), comparatively vast in scale (among the islands of the Ocean). For a monastic viewer of our these twin islands are identifiable as Britannia and Hibernia ... although on the drawn map the former dwarfs the latter." Furthermore, according to Ryan, "The verse description of the
Periēgēsis encourages the monastic reader to simultaneously locate the British isles (plural) with reference both to the continent of Europe – the mouth of the Rhine – and to the northern periphery of the encircling Ocean. The British isles are related to, yet distinct from, the continent of Europe as islands of the encircling Ocean." The '''' of
al-Masʿūdī describes the British Isles as "the so-called Isles of Britain, twelve in number" (). between 1143 and 1147, which includes the
rubric .
John Tzetzes mentioned the British Isles in the eighth book of his
Chiliades as , describing them as "two of the greatest of all" () and naming them as and . According to
Jane Lightfoot, John Tzetzes's conception of the British Isles was "two major islands plus thirty Orkneys and Thule near them". The
noun (variously spelled , , , , , , , , , or ) meant "a native of the British Isles, a Celt". The same word was also an
adjective meaning "
Brittonic, British" or "Breton". The so-called "Defective" manuscript tradition – the most widespread English version – spelled the toponym "Britain" in various ways. In the 2002
critical edition by M. C. Seymour based on manuscript 283 in the library of
Queen's College, Oxford, the text says of Helena, in . The chronicler John Stow in 1575 and the poet William Slatyer in 1621 each cited the spelling of "'
" or "'" in ''Mandeville's Travels
as evidence that Brutus of Troy was the origin of the name of the British Isles. The surviving Early Modern English translation by of the since-lost Gaelic Annals of Clonmacnoise also describes this attack on "Islands of Britain", but under the year 791: "''" The describes 's attack on the "islands of Alba" () under the entry for the year 940 or 941: According to Woolf, "This latter entry undoubtedly refers to the Hebrides".
John O'Donovan's 1856 edition glossed "Insi-Alban" as "the islands of Scotland".
Early Modern Period Michael Critobulus, in his
Historys dedicatory letter to
Mehmed II (), expressed his hope that by writing in Greek his work would have a wide audience, including "those who inhabit the British Isles" (). According to Charles T. Riggs in 1954, Critobulus "distinctly states that he hopes to influence the
Philhellenes in the British Isles by this story of a Turkish sultan". of the British Isles from the
Egerton 2803 maps (
folio 6b), probably made by
Visconte Maggiolo between 1508 and 1510 and now in the
British Library. Great Britain and Ireland are each labelled in .Andronikos Noukios, a Greek writing under the
pen name Nikandros Noukios (), visited Great Britain in the reign of
Henry VIII () as part of an embassy. In his account, he describes the British Isles as having taken their name from colonists from
Brittany, rather than the other way around. He wrote: 's map of the British Isles from the
Florentine Palazzo Vecchio's
Stanza delle Mappe geografiche, 1565: The term "British Isles" entered the English language in the late 16th century to refer to Great Britain, Ireland and the surrounding islands. In general, the modern notion of "Britishness" evolved after the 1707 Act of Union. 's "first map of Europe", representing the British Isles (), from
Sebastian Münster's 1550 German edition of his
Cosmographia published in
Basel (
Basel University Library).
Gerardus Mercator, on his 1538 world map on a double cordiform
projection, labelled the British Isles . By the middle of the 16th century, the term appears on maps made by geographers including
Sebastian Münster. Münster in (a 1550 reissue of Ptolemy's
Geography) uses the heading
. Mercator, in the legend to the map of the British Isles he published as '''' at
Duisburg in 1564, refers to the work as . On the map itself, a
cartouche in the Irish Sea contains the statement . 's map of the British Isles, published by
Christophe Plantin at
Antwerp , entitled in . (
National Library of Israel).
Abraham Ortelius, in his atlas of 1570 (), uses the title . According to
Philip Schwyzer, "This is among the very first early modern references to the 'British Isles', a term used anciently by Pliny but rarely in the medieval period or earlier in the sixteenth century".
John Stow, citing
Aethicus Ister, ''
Mandeville's Travels, and Geoffrey of Monmouth, described the naming of Great Britain and the British Isles by Brutus of Troy () in his 1575 work A Summarie of the Chronicles of England''. According to Stow's second chapter, Brutus: The 1580 edition of Stow's work spelled the Latin name and the English names '
and ', and additionally cited the authority of the
Sibylline Oracles for the conflation of the Latin letter
Y with the or (
upsilon): Schwyzer states that
Raphael Holinshed's 1577
Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland is the first work of historiography to deal with the British Isles in particular; "To the best of my knowledge, no book published in England before 1577 specified in its title a scope at once inclusive of and restricted to England, Scotland, and Ireland". was an adviser to
Elizabeth I () and prepared maps for several explorers. He helped to develop legal justifications for colonisation by
Protestant England, breaking the
duopoly the Pope
had granted to the
Spanish and
Portuguese Empires. Dee coined the term "
British Empire" and built his case, in part, on the claim of a "British Ocean"; including Britain, Ireland, Iceland,
Greenland and (possibly)
North America, he used alleged Saxon precedent to claim territorial and trading rights. Dee used the term "'
" in his ' of 1577. Dee also referred to the '
, which he called an ', and to the ''''. Dee described these orations as "now published" – they had been translated into Latin by
Willem Canter from a manuscript owned by
János Zsámboky and published at
Antwerp in 1575 by
Christophe Plantin. Dee wrote: According to Yates, "In spite of the difficulties of Dee's style and punctuation his meaning is clear" – Dee argued "that the advice given to the Byzantine Emperor by Pletho is good advice for Elizabeth, the Empress of Britain". Invoking the
Cosmography of Aethicus and its supposed translator
Jerome, Dee argued that the British Isles had been misnamed, noting: According to Peter J. French, "Like
Leland,
Lhuyd and other antiquarians, Dee believed that it was mistakes in orthography and pronunciation that had confused the spelling of the name", which had come from the name of Brutus. The supposed alteration in spelling had caused: The Latin expression was used by some
panegyrists of James VI and I after his accession to the Anglo-Irish throne and his proclamation as "king of Great Britain".
Andrew Melville used the title for his 1603 Latin poem .
Isaac Wake used the same title in his Latin poem on the king's August 1605 visit to
Oxford: . which extolled the historic naval powers of English kings and which was cited approvingly by
John Selden in his 1635 work
: Of the Dominion, or, Ownership of the Sea.
Stanley Bindoff noted that the same title was formally adopted in 1801. Before the first chapter, Speed introduces his map of the British Isles as "''''". 's 1611 map of the British Isles, labelled '''' (
Cambridge Digital Library). Speed describes the position of "the Iland of
Great Britaine" as being north and east of Brittany, Normandy, and the other parts of the coast of Continental Europe: In his 1621 verse work '
, William Slatyer described the British Isles as named "the ' in ''
Dialect". Slatyer explained this spelling of the name in a marginal note that, like Stow, cited Aethicus and Mandeville's Travels
and the confusion between the Latin letter u and the Greek letter upsilon'' (): One of the
Oxford English Dictionary citations of "British Isles" was in 1621 (before the civil wars) by
Peter Heylin (or Heylyn) in his
Microcosmus: a little description of the great world (a collection of his lectures on historical geography). Writing from his English political perspective, he grouped Ireland with Great Britain and the minor islands with these three arguments: • The inhabitants of Ireland must have come from Britain as it was the nearest land • He notes that ancient writers (such as Ptolemy) called Ireland a
Brttish Iland • He cites the observation of the first-century Roman writer
Tacitus that the habits and disposition of the people in Ireland were not much unlike the
Brittaines Modern scholarly opinion) continued to use terms like "", the precedent set by Mercator and Ortelius (who were probably the most influential mapmakers of the period), and the ongoing changes in the political situation in Great Britain and Ireland during the seventeenth century, meant that the term was very commonly used in maps by the late seventeenth century and quickly became near universal.-->
Geoffrey Keating, in his , discussed the mention of
druids from the British Isles in Gaul in Julius Caesar's , suggesting that the island Caesar had in mind was Ireland or – Anglesey or the Isle of Man.
John O'Mahony's 1866 translation was "from the British Isles", 's map and description of the British Isles, from
Geography Rectified, published at London, 1680.
Christopher Irvine, in his 1682 , defined as "The British Islands; which comprehended under them both Albin, Erin, and all the other small islands that are scattered about them". == Reception ==