this is the most informative thread in ages. I got a text message complaining about how inappropriate it would be to have the mooted multi faith funeral for someone who would have died a follower of the pope. But as I pointed out, he may have been posthumously converted by the mormons, so a multi-faith funeral might be appropriate.

Brilliant thread.

I bring up QI again, because they mentioned something about the original 'lions' on the crests all over, and were actually called leopards. (Something to do with king of something or other.)

I didn't realise that I knew some of the above (from other posters), but a memory got massively jogged. And bloody hell, I did.

The 'Roses' thing was more an internecine thing (possibly the wrong word), and lots of Yorkshire-peeps fought for the Lancashire side.

Cricket keeps the bullshit going, because it needs something to excite.

Great thread. Only sorry, I have so little to contribute.

The lion/leopard confusion stems from old French heraldic terminology. It's bit tricky but basically if the beast's head is in profile it's a lion, if it's head is facing you (guardant) it's a léopard. It's further conditioned by what it's doing with it's paws, but I won't get into that. Basically it's the same beast and has nothing to do with whether it is portrayed with spots or a mane. English heraldry refers to them all as lions. Technically, by the old French rules, the three English lions are léopards.

Thanks Amor. You summed up my post by actually explaining exactly what I meant, without me being able to say it.

(I know about the passant, rampant and the other one*.)

*de rigeur?

A go-go?

I've never quite understood how counties work as administrative units in the US. What exactly is administered at the county level or does it vary from state to state?

Like virtually all such matters, it varies from state to state, and even from county to county.

As a general rule, more is done at the county level in rural areas than in urban or suburban ones, where services such as education, police, fire, etc. are more likely to be in the hands of municipal governments than their county counterparts.

Traditionally, counties were important to the judicial system, as the basic element of the state court system, and that is still the case in many (but not all) places. When Americans were fighting about which towns were to become the "county seat" they were essentially fighting over the location of a courthouse, jail and the ancillary businesses that congregate around them.

what I want to know is why are so many of them called orange county?

sw2boropetrovsk wrote:


Killed: Scrope, Dudley

Indeed, as UA says, it varies.


For example, in Maryland and Virginia, school districts are coterminous with the county.

But in Maryland, you can live in a town and a county - like Rockville, MD or just the county. Bethesda, MD, despite being a prosperous and well-known place, isn't really there. It's just a "census designated place." Anyone in Bethesda is served only by the county. A relator could call where I used to live North Bethesda, to make it sound posh, when it was really just in the undesignated sprawl between Bethesda and Rockville. There's a town near where IMP lives (in Chevy Chase - which is a real place, but I'm not sure if he's in the real part of it) called Kensington that for years I thought didn't really exist. Then one day I got lost and found myself at an intersection with a sign saying Welcome to Kensington. It was like Brigadoon.

In Virginia, you're either in a county or in the city, but not both. For example, Williamsburg is a city (so-called. It's not very big). James City is the county next door, but Williamsburg is not in James City County.

In Pennsylvania, you live in a municipality - borough, township, city, or, in the case of Bloomsburg, a town - and also a county (except that Philadelphia is both a county and a city). That is totally separate from the school district, which usually encompass several municipalities and have their own tax authority. Water/sewage and parks are usually also coordinated between several municipalities, but not always the whole county.

The county government, such as it is, does the courts, various social services stuff, and some assorted planning things, but the municipalities or the state do everything else. Some rural municipalities are wise enough to leave functions like policing to the state. But some municipalities have only one or two people in their "Police Department." It's a terribly inefficient and redundant system. Roads don't always line up at municipal borders, urban or suburban areas that ought to coordinate development planning don't, you've got multiple people being paid to do a job that one of them could do more efficiently, etc, etc.

In Massachusetts, the county didn't seem to do much except the courts. It was all about the town/city and the state. The school districts were, as far as I could tell, the same as the town, which had it's pluses and minuses.

Those are the only places I lived long enough to pay attention.

As for Orange - there's an Orange County in New York and Orange County in California and a city in New Jersey called Orange. Are there more?

there's one in florida, texas, virginia and north carolina. Some of these places grow oranges. some don't

Of the non-citrus ones, the explanations are almost certainly an evocation of Dutch origins (New York) or Protestant leanings (Virginia and North Carolina)

I love when people named places in the US after where they were from, or whatever they were up to back home. it makes for some very incongruous situations altogether, like the genius of menlo park, and the like.

There are also lots it the east named after places in the UK. For example, my parents live in Lewes, Sussex Co, Delaware. Delaware also has a Kent Co, and and New Castle Co. (spelled with two words).

Correction on Massachusetts. Apparently, all but five county governments, including Suffolk where Boston is, are just historical areas now with no government of their own any more. Some of the courts still bear the name of the county, but I believe they're all technically working for the state. I don't recall ever being asked to elect or retain a judge in Mass, but then I didn't live there long.

ursus arctos wrote:


The Bosworth one was excellent, and I have just downloaded about another twenty from the IOL Archive. Currently listening to the Sassanid Empire. Thanks again UA.

Nesta Makhno wrote:


Noticing suddenly that the Middle Ages were coming to an end, the Barons now made a stupendous effort to revive the old Feudal amenities of Sackage, Carnage and Wreckage to stave off the Tudors for a time. They achieved this by a very clever plan, known as the War of the Roses (because the Barons all picked different coloured roses in order to see which side they were on).

Wonderful thread, lots of good history and explanation flying around the place. Disappointed though not much joyful evisceration (as I'd hoped) of the documentary on Channel 4 about the finding of Richard III's skeleton, i.e. what the hell was up with the slightly unhinged Phillipa Langley? Though Simon "Horrible Histories" Farnaby was a pleasingly left-field choice as presenter and did a very good job maintaining a straight face while dealing with the aforementioned lady, as did the assorted scientific and historical experts that had to deal with her, though I think you could occasionally spot slight panic/pity in their eyes when she started to go off on one.

Anyway, was going to mention the lion/leopard thing but see others have chipped in on that – yes, I believe it's the case that mediaeval folk generally hadn't quite worked out the distinction between the two big cats, and as mentioned were likely to call what we would call a lion a "leopard"... The word leopard just means 'tawny (pardus) lion (leo)' in Latin, which does seem to describe the uniformly tawny-coloured lion better than the spotted leopard, no...?

Just listened to the Wars of the Roses IOT UA linked, and in discussing the end of the Hundred Years' War, they mentioned that the population of England in the 1430s would have been around 2m, whilst in France it was 16m.

That's an enormous difference, especially since the war had been played out on French soil. Was this a longstanding difference which only begins to be closed in the 1700s, and if so why?

Did anyone else catch the Hundred Years War programme on BBC4 last night with the rather intense young Dr?

Interesting and laying the foundations for all of this. Well, not the car park.

NHH wrote:


Later than that I'd say - even in 1800 you're looking at about 30m in France and around 10m for England, Scotland, Wales combined. France still had the larger population in 1900 but it was much closer by then. The French population didn't see the same growth spurt as several other countries in the 19th century, something which prompted French nationalists to fear that they were going to be outbred by the Germans.

There are a variety of long-term reasons for this population gap. Mainly it comes down to the fact that France was richer, more powerful and more geographically significant than England or Britain for most of European history, going back at least to Roman times. England's significance for European history in the 14th/15th centuries was due to its monarchs' interests in France rather than anything relating to England itself.