Great Britain

[Coldfusion]

Where does the Name Britain/Britannia come from and how long has it been used?

[darth vader]

Named by J. Caesar when he landed here and mistakenly thought we eengleesh peegs were simply invasion tribes from the Britanny area (as they were then called [France]) and the island wasn't actually inhabited. so answer to part 2 is Roman times

[darth vader]

sorry in my humour i denounced the Scots, Irish, Welsh so my apologies before sft et al get on their defensives about what makes the nation of Great Britain

[tartanwiz]

From the native Celtic inhabitants, the Britons. The Celts of Albion (which they called the whole island) called themselves Britons. The Romans called what is now England and Wales 'Brittania' after the Britons (what is now Scotland they called Caledonia). After the Romans left in the 6th century AD, the island was divided up into several Celtic and Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, eventually becoming Scotland, England and Wales (Wales became annexed by England in the 16th century). It was not until the Union of Parliaments between Scotland and England in 1707 that the country became the United Kindom of Great Britain.

[darth vader]

Its hard to get confirmation on the web as to why the name was given, but i am pretty sure (having read it in a historical webpage which i can't locate) Caesar named it Britannica after he mistakenly thought he was fighting (he invaded here remember) tribes from Britanny. This site gives a good account of the makeup and history of GB. http://www.peak.org/~jeremy/dictionary/chapters/hi
story.php

[beale]

The actual name comes from the ancient Britons' Mother Goddess Bridgit.

[omblod]

Try this; http://www.holyrood.org.uk/picts/name.htm

[Britannia]

Well actually, Coldfusion, I have been using the name for about 3 weeks, and by a happy accident it turns out to have been the perfect choice ... I always wanted to be a goddess! Now, where's the nectar?

[Hovite]

The name is first recorded in various ancient Greek texts in a variety of version. (Transcribed into Roman) the earliest forms were Prettania and Brettania, and this became Britannia in Latin. The largest island in the group is called Great Britain (just as the largest of the Canary Islands is Gran Canaria); this eventually replaced the earlier name, which was Albion. The earliest known use Great Britain is in a Roman geography text (written in Greek) in which the larger island is called Megale Brettania, while Ireland was called Micra Brettania.