The North of England - where does it start?

[Busaholic]

from a South London perspective, it's simple.

Working from the south, there is

the seaside

the country

the bit where the stockbrokers live

South London

The River

the bit where posh people shop / work

north london (and the less said about it the better)

watford and luton

the north

and then a bit further on, there's Scotland and then the north pole.

You have it entirely in perspective

 

[Gathursty]

I can't speak for the eastern part of Britain but this Wiganer's perspective on where the North of England starts is roughly the horizontal line from the southernmost point at which the Winter Hill mast comes into view. For me, this is commonly between Holmes Chapel and Knutsford on the M6 - YMMV.

 

[Howardh]

I can't speak for the eastern part of Britain but this Wiganer's perspective on where the North of England starts is roughly the horizontal line from the southernmost point at which the Winter Hill mast comes into view. For me, this is commonly between Holmes Chapel and Knutsford on the M6 - YMMV.

Mmm. Driving up the M6 as soon as Winter Hill emerges it's "ahh, home..".

 

[fowler9]

I reckon if you draw like a wavy line from Liverpool to Hull covering Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield then that is the North. We are a welcoming bunch though I think. I have nothing against the people further South. It seems a convenient cut off point. In the West you have the North Wales coast meeting up with the Wirral and on the East the fens join up with the Humber Estuary.

We are the skinny bit of the country because we are poor. Ha ha.

 

[najaB]

Wales and Northern Ireland are honorary members of the North.

In many ways, Northern Ireland is more Lowland Scottish than it is northern English.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

I can't speak for the eastern part of Britain but this Wiganer's perspective on where the North of England starts is roughly the horizontal line from the southernmost point at which the Winter Hill mast comes into view. For me, this is commonly between Holmes Chapel and Knutsford on the M6 - YMMV.

How can you deign to use any derivation of the word common when describing areas of Cheshire East....:roll:
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In many ways, Northern Ireland is more Lowland Scottish than it is northern English.

Have a care young sir, you are bringing historical ethnic happenings into play here without due care and attention in what you say above...:roll:

 

[Harbornite]

How can you deign to use any derivation of the word common when describing areas of Cheshire East....:roll:
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He's not saying that.
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In many ways, Northern Ireland is more Lowland Scottish than it is northern English.

Indeed. As for Wales being in the North, that's just wrong. Cardiff is closer to Bristol than Cheshire, let alone Manchester.

 

[Lankyline]

Brilliant sir, take a bow !
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Really surprised no Yorkies have bitten yet

 

[backontrack]

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PAH! You Lancastrians are budget Yorkies. When you think of a northerner, you think of a Yorkie. Even your Lancashire stereotype is a watered-down Yorkshireman.

We have the biggest county in the UK. We make fine puddings out of golden-brown batter, and you make puddings out of pig's blood. We're famous for our tea - Yorkshire Tea and Tetley - and our beer. We have the UK's biggest curry restaurant, the UK's biggest chip shop, the UK's oldest first-class cricket ground - and what do you have? A poncy bus station. Pah! A pig shed. We have railway stations like York and Harrogate that Lancashire haven't matched, and we have the world's biggest railway museum. We have abbeys at Bolton Abbey, Whitby, Kirkham, Jervaulx and Rievaulx, big heritage railways through the Dales and Moors, we have two national parks and 4 AONBs, the town chosen by Bram Stoker as the arrival point of Dracula onto British shores, we have Flamborough Head and its coastal cliffs, the York Minster, the Beverley Minster, the Dewsbury Minster, our rose is bigger than your rose, Scarborough's better than Blackpool and Yorkshire are better at cricket! You have Man Utd, but the last time York City went to Old Trafford, we won! We have Pen-y-Ghent, Ingleborough and Whernside, the Settle & Carlisle Line and the Penistone Line, we have films like The Full Monty and Brassed Off (while Lancashire has...?), we have farms in the middle of motorways and the sport of Rugby League, which we invented, we have Geoff Boycott and Fred Trueman, Thora Hird and Brian Blessed, Tom Courtenay, James Cook, Harold Wilson, Herbert Asquith, Guy Fawkes, Alan Bennett, the Brontës, Ted Hughes, J.B Priestley, Dame Judi Dench, the Chuckle Brothers, Michael Palin, Charles Laughton, Ben Kingsley, Sir Patrick Stewart, Tom Wilkinson, Vic Reeves & Bob Mortimer, Ernie Wise, the Arctic Monkeys, the Human League, Pulp, the Brownlees, Jessica Ennis-Hill, Brian Clough, Darren Gough, Len Hutton, Kevin Keegan, Danny Willett and Robinson Crusoe! We are God's Own County, and we'll take you on if we have to! The Kingdom of Jorvik will rise, and subdue all who question its power! Though we bear the white rose of peace, we will overpower any attempt to subjugate the spirit of Yorkshire! We cannot be broken, and wherever we are, in Sheffield, Doncaster, York or Leeds, Hull, Halifax, Harrogate or Richmond, Ripon, Scarborough, Bridlington and Selby, Settle or Thirsk or Bradford or Huddersfield or Wakefield or Rotherham or anywhere within our great county, we will continue to have our Yorkshire spirit, and it shall prove victorious, whatever the circumstances! I say that we raise our Pontefract liquorice aloft, and follow the path to glory like a massive stick of rhubarb! WE are the glory of the north, and we will defend that title to the limit, with the sword of Constantine I, until Lancashire bows to our power and wisdom and proclaims us BETTER THAN THEM! Because it doesn't matter what you face us with. Yorkshire will be victorious.

Mind you, you can have Middlesbrough. Though we're keeping the bridge.

 

[Harbornite]

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PAH! You Lancastrians are budget Yorkies. When you think of a northerner, you think of a Yorkie. Even your Lancashire stereotype is a watered-down Yorkshireman.

We have the biggest county in the UK. We make fine puddings out of golden-brown batter, and you make puddings out of pig's blood. We're famous for our tea - Yorkshire Tea and Tetley - and our beer. We have the UK's biggest curry restaurant, the UK's biggest chip shop, the UK's oldest first-class cricket ground - and what do you have? A poncy bus station. Pah! A pig shed. We have railway stations like York and Harrogate that Lancashire haven't matched, and we have the world's biggest railway museum. We have abbeys at Bolton Abbey, Whitby, Kirkham, Jervaulx and Rievaulx, big heritage railways through the Dales and Moors, we have two national parks and 4 AONBs, the town chosen by Bram Stoker as the arrival point of Dracula onto British shores, we have Flamborough Head and its coastal cliffs, the York Minster, the Beverley Minster, the Dewsbury Minster, our rose is bigger than your rose, Scarborough's better than Blackpool and Yorkshire are better at cricket! You have Man Utd, but the last time York City went to Old Trafford, we won! We have Pen-y-Ghent, Ingleborough and Whernside, the Settle & Carlisle Line and the Penistone Line, we have films like The Full Monty and Brassed Off (while Lancashire has...?), we have farms in the middle of motorways and the sport of Rugby League, which we invented, we have Geoff Boycott and Fred Trueman, Thora Hird and Brian Blessed, Tom Courtenay, James Cook, Harold Wilson, Herbert Asquith, Guy Fawkes, Alan Bennett, the Brontës, Ted Hughes, J.B Priestley, Dame Judi Dench, the Chuckle Brothers, Michael Palin, Charles Laughton, Ben Kingsley, Sir Patrick Stewart, Tom Wilkinson, Vic Reeves & Bob Mortimer, Ernie Wise, the Arctic Monkeys, the Human League, Pulp, the Brownlees, Jessica Ennis-Hill, Brian Clough, Darren Gough, Len Hutton, Kevin Keegan, Danny Willett and Robinson Crusoe! We are God's Own County, and we'll take you on if we have to! The Kingdom of Jorvik will rise, and subdue all who question its power! Though we bear the white rose of peace, we will overpower any attempt to subjugate the spirit of Yorkshire! We cannot be broken, and wherever we are, in Sheffield, Doncaster, York or Leeds, Hull, Halifax, Harrogate or Richmond, Ripon, Scarborough, Bridlington and Selby, Settle or Thirsk or Bradford or Huddersfield or Wakefield or Rotherham or anywhere within our great county, we will continue to have our Yorkshire spirit, and it shall prove victorious, whatever the circumstances! I say that we raise our Pontefract liquorice aloft, and follow the path to glory like a massive stick of rhubarb! WE are the glory of the north, and we will defend that title to the limit, with the sword of Constantine I, until Lancashire bows to our power and wisdom and proclaims us BETTER THAN THEM! Because it doesn't matter what you face us with. Yorkshire will be victorious.

Mind you, you can have Middlesbrough. Though we're keeping the bridge.

I wouldn't be that proud of Harold Wilson. Oh and they lost the war of the Roses. I'm sure someone here could draw up a list for Lancashire. Also I recommend splitting your post into paragraphs, it's a bit tiresome reading a wall of text.

 

[backontrack]

I wouldn't be that proud of Harold Wilson. Oh and they lost the war of the Roses. I'm sure someone here could draw up a list for Lancashire.

1) Why not?

2) We didn't win the Wars of the Roses, but we didn't lose them either. We fought Lancashire several times and won heavily, then we fought a Welsh man that had just come back from France. In Leicestershire. And his army had mostly been picked up along the way - barely a Lancastrian among them.
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Also I recommend splitting your post into parsgraphs, it's a bit tiresome reading a wall of text.

Sorry, I don't know what a 'parsgraph' is

Oh, and it's meant to be like that. It's meant to be one long rant that becomes more comical - and, if you were ranting, would you split it into paragraphs? I think not.

My advice is to start at the top and just read along each sentence, then go down to the next one.

 

[Harbornite]

1) Why not?

2) We didn't win the Wars of the Roses, but we didn't lose them either. We fought Lancashire several times and won heavily, then we fought a Welsh man that had just come back from France. In Leicestershire. And his army had mostly been picked up along the way - barely a Lancastrian among them.

Good points. In fairness to Yorkshire, they have quite a few strings to their bow. I was going to say that Manchester and Liverpool also have fine musical heritage, but the former is no longer in Lancs and the latter never was.
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1) Why not?

2) We didn't win the Wars of the Roses, but we didn't lose them either. We fought Lancashire several times and won heavily, then we fought a Welsh man that had just come back from France. In Leicestershire. And his army had mostly been picked up along the way - barely a Lancastrian among them.
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Sorry, I don't know what a 'parsgraph' is

Oh, and it's meant to be like that. It's meant to be one long rant that becomes more comical - and, if you were ranting, would you split it into paragraphs? I think not.

My advice is to start at the top and just read along each sentence, then go down to the next one.

Ah sugar, I better correct my spelling. Darn Ipad keyboards!

I am aware of how to read, but it's a tad tedious at times.
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I should add that it is noticeable just how large Yorkshire is, and to me, it feels odd that Sheffield is part of Yorkshire and yet it is so far south in the big scheme of things (I should add that I mean the south of thr north, not the south of England)

 

[backontrack]

I should add that it is noticeable just how large Yorkshire is, and to me, it feels odd that Sheffield is part of Yorkshire and yet it is so far south in the big scheme of things (I should add that I mean the south of thr north, not the south of England)

Their choice. And a canny one too.

 

[Harbornite]

Their choice. And a canny one too.

Hmmm. Anyway I can't draw up a list to defend to defend Lancs because that's not my battle. Now the West Midlands on the other hand... Home to the workshop of the world!

 

[backontrack]

Hmmm. Anyway I can't draw up a list to defend to defend Lancs because that's not my battle. Now the West Midlands on the other hand... Home to the workshop of the world!

As we've said, Sheffield is in Yorkshire.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Really surprised no Yorkies have bitten yet

You know the old adage...
"Yorkshire born,
Yorkshire bred,
Strong in th'arm
Thick in th'ead"

We all know that the Yanks cannot appear to use the letter "T" in the middle of a word and use "D", well the Tykes have the same problem with the letter "D" in the middle of a word and use "T"...where, I first wondered was "Bratford"..:roll:

 

[backontrack]

You know the old adage...
"Yorkshire born,
Yorkshire bred,
Strong in th'arm
Thick in th'ead"

We all know that the Yanks cannot appear to use the letter "T" in the middle of a word and use "D", well the Tykes have the same problem with the word "D" in the middle of a word and use "T"...where, I first wondered was "Bratford"..:roll:

At least Yorkies actually, y'know, have a rhyme! There's nothing that can endear the Lankie - you don't even get a rhyme.

And as for the Ds and Ts - you Lankies like to pretend to be us yourselves...

 

[Harbornite]

As we've said, Sheffield is in Yorkshire.

Errrmmmm, I know.

You might have misinterpeted my comment, I was referring to the whole Lancs vs Yorks thing, not Sheffield

 

[Cowley]

First off I'm from Devon but my mothers side of the family are all from Nottingham, my father's from London and my wife is from Northern Ireland. I know that geographically speaking the line across the country probably is just above the midlands, somewhere around South Yorkshire, Cheshire etc but when you're from down here many people summorise it thus: If you go to the pub you're from the south, if you go to the poob then you're from t'north. I had a chat with my cousin (from Nottingham) recently about where this accent change takes place and he reckons around Melton Mowbray.
Clearly Melton Mowbray is not in the north, yet for many people in the south or southwest anywhere north of there probably seems northern.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

At least Yorkies actually, y'know, have a rhyme! There's nothing that can endear the Lankie - you don't even get a rhyme. And as for the Ds and Ts - you Lankies like to pretend to be us yourselves...

Shall we look for a royal perspective on matters then....

In the "pecking order" who is the highest between the Duke of Lancaster and the Duke of York?

 

[backontrack]

Errrmmmm, I know.

You might have misinterpeted my comment, I was referring to the whole Lancs vs Yorks thing, not Sheffield

Well, you've misinterpreted my comment then! Sheffield is the workshop of the world, unless you mean chocolate, in which case it's not Bournville, but York.

That should clear things up for you

 

[EM2]

Take the line of the southern boundaries of Cheshire and Yorkshire. Above that is the North.
Take the line of the northern boundaries of Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire. Above that is the Midlands.

 

[Harbornite]

Well, you've misinterpreted my comment then! Sheffield is the workshop of the world, unless you mean chocolate, in which case it's not Bournville, but York.

That should clear things up for you

No it isn't. Birmingham the second city and was regarded as the workshop of the world, we were the city of 1000 trades and that's not including the towns of the black country.

 

[backontrack]

Shall we look for a royal perspective on matters then....

In the "pecking order" who is the highest between the Duke of Lancaster and the Duke of York?

A good question. The original Duke of Lancaster, William of Grosmont, died without an heir, so the title passed to John O' Gaunt, thence to his son, Henry Bolingbroke. When he deposed Richard II, the title merged into the crown. So, purely by luck, the Duchy of Lancaster usurped that of the Duke of York, purely due to the tenuous connection between its original owner and its next.

However, the title of 'Duke of York' carries some actual status, as it has done since Edmund Langley founded the House of York. The Duchy has become famous as the name of many ships and from the nursery rhyme 'The Grand Old Duke of York', while the title of Duke of Lancaster is an obscure one. Not many people know that the Duchy of Lancaster has been merged into the crown, and Oliver Letwin is probably one of them.

I think that that levels the playing field rather well

 

[43074]

If we're talking about a binary North/South split (i.e. the Midlands don't exist) then I would suggest it would be everything above a line between the Wash and the Severn - I think that's relevant because I have lost count of the number of times people have asked me - being from Leicester - are you from the North or the South? That alone shows many people see it that way, and it has also been demonstrated on this thread.

Acknowledging the existence of the Midlands, I'd define the North as being everything North of a line between the Dee and the Humber - running near Chester, Crewe, Sheffield, Doncaster, Grimsby if you like. IMO the The South East starts somewhere near Watford Gap, whilst the South West is everything below Gloucester & Cheltenham, and everything in the hinterland between are the Midlands, split East and West of course.

East Anglia's one I've never been able to put my finger on - it often gets lumped into the South East, but personally I'd suggest it was a standalone region of Essex/Norfolk/Cambridgeshire, whilst Hertfordshire & Essex could be South East.

 

[backontrack]

No it isn't. Birmingham the second city and was regarded as the workshop of the world, we were the city of 1000 trades and that's not including the towns of the black country.

Birmingham comes second population-wise, but Leeds comes first and Sheffield takes fifth. Bradford, Kirklees, and Wakefield are all bigger than the West Midlands' next town, Dudley.

 

[Harbornite]

Birmingham comes second population-wise, but Leeds comes first and Sheffield takes fifth. Bradford, Kirklees, and Wakefield are all bigger than the West Midlands' next town, Dudley.

Well yes. On its own, Birmignham has a bigger population than Leeds' on its own, so to speak

 

[Busaholic]

Shall we look for a royal perspective on matters then....

In the "pecking order" who is the highest between the Duke of Lancaster and the Duke of York?

The Duke of Cornwall is visiting my adopted home on Monday: I'm otherwise engaged, so shan't be seeking an audience, but I think I read somewhere he's got a bit more status than those two - I stand to be corrected, I don't have an intense interest in the subject.

 

[backontrack]

Well yes. On its own, Birmignham has a bigger population than Leeds' on its own, so to speak

But Yorkshire beats the West Midlands. I believe that that is what we were talking about?

 

[DasLunatic]

Birmingham comes second population-wise, but Leeds comes first and Sheffield takes fifth. Bradford, Kirklees, and Wakefield are all bigger than the West Midlands' next town, Dudley.

That's only if you include Stourbridge and Halesowen (its metropolitan area). I think you'll find Coventry is the second-largest, good Sir.