This article contains detailed information on British Counties. A county originally refers to a local government or a jurisdiction in modern nations. Previously, the term ‘shire' was used to refer the administrative division, but later the term ‘county' was used for designating the same of any national government. County can be in turn subdivided into town or some other administrative jurisdiction, which in turn falls directly under the control of that county.

Since we are primarily concerned with discussions upon the British Counties, we will look after the different counties that are located within the entire United Kingdom. United Kingdom has been subdivided broadly into two categories of counties. They are the metropolitan counties and the non-metropolitan counties. It is said that England itself occupies a total of 42 different counties, Scotland and Ireland has 32 counties each and Wales having a least number of only 12.

Some of the different British counties that fall under the country of England, Scotland and Ireland, and Wales are listed below:

COUNTIES OF ENGLAND	COUNTIES OF SCOTLAND	COUNTIES OF IRELAND	COUNTIES OF WALES
Buckinghamshire	AYR-shire	Antrim	BRECKNOCKSHIRE
Bedfordshire	Dumbarton-shire	CARLOW	Carnarvon-shire
Cambridge-shire	Forfarshire	Dublin	Cardiganshire
Derbyshire	Kinross-shire	Down	Den-big-shire
Hertfordshire	Lanark-shire	Clare	Glam-organ-shire
Leicestershire	Perth-shire	Galway	Montgomery-shire
Lancashire	Stirlingshire	Limerick	Flint
Northampton-shire	Wigtownshire	Long-ford	Pembroke-shire
Nottinghamshire	Argyll-shire	Mayo
Oxford-shire	CAITHNESS	Queens County
Cumberland	BUTE	SLIGO
Durham	Fife	Tyrone
Essex	Elgin	Waterford
Hampshire	Midlothian	Wick-low
Kent	NAIRN	Cork
Norfolk	Ross and Cromarty	Kildare
Sussex	Sutherland	Londonderry
Suffolk	EASTLOTHIAN	Monaghan
Somerset	Berwick-shire	Roscommon

Within England, the county of Yorkshire has three different ridings and they are thus counted separately. The counties of Cambridge-shire, Lincolnshire, Northampton-shire, Suffolk and Sussex are being counted on a single basis.

Within the country of Ireland, the Connaught province consists of five counties. Since the time when Irish Republic was established, all the thirty-two counties have been divided into six counties that lies to the north of the country and twenty-six other counties, which lies to the south of the country. Among the thirty-two different counties, all are not so diverse with respect to their size. The largest county among Ireland is the county of Cock and the smallest one being the county of LOUTH.

As we have seen, Scotland holds 32 counties all total and is the dubious of the four main countries. Within Scotland, Ross and Cromarty are considered together as a single county. The rule is also applicable for Shetland and Orkney. Wales has a total of only 12 counties and it is necessary to state that Mon-mouth-shire have been excluded from the list under it.