Southern England, the South and the South of England are imprecise terms used to refer to the southern counties of England bordering the English Midlands. It has a number of different interpretations of its geographic extents. The South is considered by many to be a cultural region with a distinct identity from that of the rest of England. The special cultural, political and economic characteristics of "the South" are, however, not universally agreed upon, nor are its geographical limits and stereotypes of the South mask the cultural, physical and historical differences within this region. For government purposes Southern England is divided in South West England, South East England, Greater London, and the East of England. Combined, these have a total area of 62,042 square kilometres (23,955 sq mi), and a population of 26 million.
Famous quotes containing the words southern and/or england:
“Archaeologists have uncovered six-thousand-year-old clay tablets from southern Babylonia that describe in great detail how the adults of that community found the younger generation to be insolent and disobedient.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)
“I reverently believe that the Maker who made us all makes everything in New England but the weather. I don’t know who makes that, but I think it must be raw apprentices in the weather-clerk’s factory who experiment and learn how.... In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four-and-twenty hours.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)