Albion

The White Cliffs of Dover may have given rise to the name Albion.

Albion is an alternative name for Great Britain. The oldest attestation of the toponym comes from the Greek language. It is sometimes used poetically and generally to refer to the island, but is less common than "Britain" today. The name for Scotland in most of the Celtic languages is related to Albion: Alba in Scottish Gaelic, Albain (genitive Alban) in Irish, Nalbin in Manx and Alban in Welsh and Cornish. These names were later Latinised as Albania and Anglicised as Albany, which were once alternative names for Scotland.

New Albion and Albionoria ("Albion of the North") were briefly suggested as names of Canada during the period of the Canadian Confederation.[1][2] Francis Drake gave the name New Albion to what is now California when he landed there in 1579.

  1. ^ "How Canada Got Its Name". about.com. Archived from the original on 7 December 2010. Retrieved 3 May 2018.
  2. ^ Rayburn, Alan (2001). Naming Canada: Stories about Canadian Place Names. University of Toronto Press. p. 16. ISBN 978-0-8020-8293-0.

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