England, We Made Your Country
The Flag
- Despite popular belief, the flag of England is not the same as the British flag.
- The British flag consists of the flags that belong to the three main countries that make up Great Britain.
- These flags are the ones that belong to England, Ireland, and Scotland.
- The Flag of England consists of a white background and the Cross of St. George.
- In the late 1200s King Edward I would use this flag with inverted colors while leading troops into battle (this flag became known as the Banner of Victory).
- In the late 1100s St. George would have a flag similar to this when riding into Battle of Antioch along with his Crusaders.
#Even The Flag Is Stolen
England's Flag
The England flag is what makes up the main cross in the British flag.
Scottish Flag
The Scottish flag is what gives the British flag the famous blue around the edges.
Irish Flag (at the time)
The Irish flag is what is used to edge the white ¨X¨ that cuts the blue rectangles in half.
British Flag
The Nations Origins
- The creation of England itself is a widely disputed idea with no true answer for a lot of the facts have been washed away through out history.
- One of the most popular ideas is that the identity was created long after the Norman conquest of the area.
- Another idea is that Anglo-Saxons who are the successors of Alfred the Great created the laws and the crown well before 1066 ad
- No matter how the Empire was created, it managed to grow into one of the greatest countries at the time and still holds a strong backing to this very day.
- To help this country form they had to turn to imperialism which caused many wars, but have caused a lot of countries to help develop and even start to thrive once they have left the are all together.
#Identity Crises
A Line from their National Anthem
- The national anthem of the people in England is God Save The Queen.
- The line that I desired to focus on is this, Lord our god arise, Scatter her enemies, and make them fall, Confound their politics, Frustrate their knavish tricks.
- The best way to figure out what they are attempting to say is to actually take it apart and study it individually.
- The first part ¨Lord our god arise¨. This part and all of the parts that state ¨God Save the Queen¨ is a good example as to how Catholicism is a major part in every day life.
- The second part, ¨Scatter her enemies¨ shows that they had to defend everything that they held dear almost on a regular basis. With them being as large and powerful as they are they were bound to step on a few toes and make enemies along the way.
- The third part, ¨Make them fall¨ will show how far they are willing to go to defend what they held closest to them. This part shows that simple defense was not good enough for the survival of this nation. If it was necessary they were willing to take the opposing nations government and tare it down to nothing. From there they could and would build it into whatever they felt they need it to be.
- For the last two parts to this, well its quite simple, this is them doing what they were doing for so long now against their enemies. These parts are just them defending their nation and even destroying others just to stay on top.
Queen Elizabeth I
- Just to start things off here I and many others would find it quite hard to talk about important people and not include Queen Elizabeth I just because of all the good that she had done for the people that she ruled over and how she got to where she was at her peak.
- When she was at the age of only 25 years old she was able to be have the tittle of queen despite the fact that there was never a king on the throne at the same time.
- When she was crowned the Queen of Britain she had to take on a lot of challenges that normally would make a nation like hers break down and be concord by other nations.
- One of the main challenges that she had to deal with as soon as possible was the massive civil war that was occurring between the two major religions time.
- She was also the child of the infamous King Henry VIII and the ¨The Great Whore¨ Anne Boleyn.
- While on the throne she was able to stop a revolution that would have surly ended with her head being cut off.
- 99% of the things that she did was for the inevitable good for the people and the nation.
- Another way you can tell this is threw the fact that she was never married, because if she was then chances are she would have to marry a king from a different nation and that would have given them complete control over England.
#Hillary Got Nothing On Her
Big Ben
- One of the best ways to tell the power of a nation is its ability to have tall and very predominate monuments that it can show off to the rest of the world.
- In London the Monument Big Ben is the exact thing that they will use to show their power, not too belittle the Eye I chose this because I can find more unknown facts about it.
- One of those unknown facts is that Big Ben is NOT the tower it is only the clock within, the tower is called St. Stephens Tower.
- Big Ben sits up about 320 ft up in the tower itself.
- Sir George Airy, The Royal Astronomer at the time wanted the clock to be one of, if not, the most accurate clocks in the world and this would be accomplished with twice a day checks conducted by the Royal Greenwich Observatory.
- The construction company, E.J. Dent& Co., used Denison´s design on the tower which took approximately five years to fully complete and the end weight of this massive project was about 13 tons
- To get the huge bell into the tower they decided that 16 horses powered by food and the cheers of the onlookers was the best way to do this, at the end of the day they weren´t wrong due to them getting it in.
- When Parliament is in session the lights on top of Big Ben will be lit to inform the people, while at night each of the four 23 ft diameter faces will also be lit.
- During WWII an incendiary bomb landed on the Chambers of the house of Commons, St. Stephens Tower and Big Ben were both still standing and were in working order.