England: mysterious foggy Albion

Probably everyone at least once in his life heard the words: "mysterious foggy Albion". Immediately remember King Arthur, Merlin and the knights of the round table ...

That's right, it's all from one opera. Or rather - from one country. After all, England is a foggy Albion. And this is not a invented fantastic name, but already a historically established image of the British Isles .

So, let's figure out why England is called the foggy Albion.

Albion

First, what does Albion mean? This name was established after Britain since ancient times. But why? On this account, there are several versions.

According to one of them, the word "Albion" came from the Roman albus, which translates as "white". When the ancient Roman conquerors swam to the shores of the British Isles, white-white cliffs emerged from the fog. Therefore, they called the island "Albion".

According to another version, the "Albion" is a word of Celtic origin, meaning mountains. As, for example, the Alps. The first official designation of the British Isles as Albion was made by Ptolemy. This fact can be a confirmation for both theories. After all, this scientist was a traveler and knew many languages, including Celtic and Latin.

The "foggy Albion" island

The famous island, which first met the ancient Romans, is Dover. It is to him that Great Britain owes the name "foggy Albion". It is at the most extreme point in the southeast of the United Kingdom. If you approach the island from the high seas, the first thing you'll see is white cliffs of white cliffs (White Cliffs of Dover). They extend to a vast territory along the county of Kent and end at the Strait of Pas-de-Calais.

Dover Rocks are also called "Keys of England" for being a gateway to the country. They are the first to meet the seafarers and amaze them with their cold white beauty. To the neighboring France from Dover only thirty-odd kilometers. According to local residents, when the weather is fine, you can even see a white line of rocks on the horizon from the French coast.

There are many similar rocks in the southeast of England. However, the most popular are the Dover. Their beauty will not leave anyone indifferent. High (up to 107 meters above sea level), powerful, snow-white. They have become a symbol of England, its business card. They are devoted to more than one work of literature and painting.

Nature miracle

Dover rocks are unusual mountains, which can be judged by their color. They became white because of chalk, which is a huge part of their breed, and calcium carbonate. This rock has a very small structure, therefore it is fragile enough and easily collapses. And the small black patches in the rocks are flint.

During the Cretaceous, millions of small marine inhabitants that lived in the shells died and remained on the seabed, thus creating a layer by layer. As a result, the chalk layers were pressed into a huge solid white platform. After thousands of years, when the water left, the platform remained, forming powerful white rocks. And today we can admire them.

The island in the fog

A beautiful poetic name for the foggy Albion was also due to its cloudy weather. So, because of the high humidity of the air, the low-lying parts of the island are constantly shrouded in fog, the sky is gray, and the rains are raining.

The unusual fogs of Great Britain became the theme for many paintings and works. Writers and artists especially came to London to see with their own eyes and capture this phenomenon of nature.

Sometimes the fog is so dense and impenetrable that traffic on the streets of cities stops. People just do not see where to go and stay where they are, so as not to get lost and wait until the mist is dispersed.

Currently, foggy days in the UK are significantly less than in previous centuries. So, for example, in London there are no more than fifty of them per year. Most of these days are in the second half of winter: the end of January and the beginning of February.

Treacherous Albion

There is also another concept of "foggy Albion", which has an ironic meaning. This term used to be used in politics. That's how they talked about England and its political intrigues. Foggy - unknown, hidden, indefinite and changeable.

In France and pre-revolutionary Russia, England was even called "the insidious Albion." This is how the foreign policy of the country was figuratively expressed, steadfastly following only its national goals, for which more than once it was going to renounce previously concluded treaties with other powers.

In general, during the Great French Revolution, other similar expressions were very popular. For example, "English treachery" or "insidious island". England has repeatedly betrayed France: it concluded a peace treaty, then again it broke, and so on.

In Russia, this expression became popular during the Crimean War, when Britain, which was a coalition of countries (Austria, Prussia and Russia), took the side of its former enemies (France) against Russia.

Today, the ironic meaning has long been lost, and the expression "foggy Albion" has, rather, a high style, which gives the Kingdom of Great Britain a special poetry.