This map, drawn by Michael Garber, was published by the Association of British Counties (ABC) in 2011.

The ABC is an organisation founded in 1989 with the aim of promoting the 92 historic counties of the United Kingdom as the country’s standard geographical framework, as opposed to the current administrative divisions, which have undergone numerous changes since the 1970s.

The map shows the 92 historic counties of the United Kingdom: 39 in England, 34 in Scotland, 13 in Wales and 6 in Northern Ireland. Each county is coloured and labelled, with no information other than its territorial boundaries. The author has deliberately not included the many changes that took place in the second half of the 20th century: Yorkshire is a single county and Greater London is divided into multiple counties.

The historical division of the United Kingdom into counties has medieval roots. The shires The English administrative structure took shape during the Anglo-Saxon period and its boundaries were consolidated following the Norman Conquest in the 11th century. For centuries, this map remained relatively stable, until the Local Government Act 1972, which came into force in 1974, radically transformed it: it reduced the number of councils in England from 1,245 to 412, created new authorities such as Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire, and altered boundaries that had been considered immutable.

Sources

• About the Counties