Unit 11 County

A county is generally a sub-unit of regional self-government within a larger jurisdiction. Originally, in continental Europe, a county was the land under the jurisdiction of a count. Counts are called earls in post-Celtic Britain and Ireland the term is from Old Norse jarl and was introduced by the Vikings but there is no correlation between counties and earldoms. Rather, county, from French comt, was simply used by the Normans after 1066 to replace the native English term scir Modern English shire, as the Anglo-Saxon system of Shires was unique and thus hard for the Norman invaders to comprehend so they resorted to calling them Counties. A shire was an administrative division of an Anglo-Saxon kingdom (Wessex, Mercia, East Anglia, etc.), usually named after its administrative centre: for example, Gloucester, in Gloucestershire; Worcester, in Worcestershire; etc. or originate from these forms of names. Thus, whereas the word comt denoted a sovereign jurisdiction in the original French, the English county denotes a subdivision of a sovereign jurisdiction. The UK is divided into a number of metropolitan and nonmetropolitan counties. There are also ceremonial counties which group small non-metropolitan counties into geographic areas broadly based on the historic counties of England. The metropolitan and nonmetropolitan counties had replaced in 1974 a system of administrative counties and county boroughs which were introduced in 1889. Most non-metropolitan counties in England are run by county councils and divided into non-metropolitan districts, each with its own council. Local authorities in the UK are usually responsible for running education, emergency services, planning, transport, social services, and a number of other functions. An administrative subdivision of Romania is called jude (plural: judee), name derived from jude, a mayor and judge of a city (akin to English judge; both are derived from Latin) Presently Romania is subdivided into 41 counties led by a county seat and the capital, Bucharest, having a separate status. (After Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia)
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 Vocabulary
akin = nrudit() be run (v.) = a fi condus count = conte county borough = ora independent administrativ cu peste 50.000 locuitori county council = consiliu districtual earldom = pmnturi stpnite de un earl (rang nobil de categoria a III-a, ntre marchiz i vice-conte) emergency service = serviciu de urgen hard to comprehend = greu de neles judge = judector kingdom = regat mayor = primar originally = iniial (adv.) originate (v.) = a-i avea originea planning = urbanism rather = mai degrab replace (v.) = a nlocui resort (v.) = a recurge la run (v.) = a conduce self-government = auto-guvernare shire = comitat, departament, district, jude whereas = n timp ce, pe cnd

Exercises
1. Answer the following. What is a county? What was a county originally in continental Europe? What was the word county used by the Normans to? What does the English county denote? What is a (non)metropolitan county? What is a ceremonial county? What is a historic county? What is an administrative county?
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2. Match the following. 1. county 2. county agent a. a county seat b. a fair usually held every year at the same location in a county, especially for the competitive showing of livestock and farm products c. a government employee who serves as a consultant and adviser in a chiefly rural county on such matters as agriculture, education, and home economics d. a town or city that is the administrative centre of its county e. an administrative subdivision of a state in the US; a territorial division exercising administrative, judicial, and political functions in the UK and Ireland; the people living in a county f. the domain of a count palatine in England or Ireland g. throughout a whole county

3. county fair 4. county palatine

5. county seat

6. county town 7. countywide

3. Group the following words referring to a region (a part of a country, or a part of the earth), as in the model. Antarctica arctic county district equatorial hemisphere land prefecture province region state territorial territory tropics
Words referring to a particular region of the earth a region of a country region or a country

Antarctica 4. Define the words under 3, as in the model below. Antarctica Antarctica is a continent lying chiefly within the Antarctic Circle and asymmetrically centred on the South Pole.
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5. Find errors in the text below. County Councils are very large employers with a great variety of functions including education (schols and youth services), social services, highways, fire and rescue services, libraries, waste disposal, consumer services and town and country planing. Until the 1990s they also ran Colleges of Further Education and the Careers Services. That decade also saw the privatisation of some traditional services, such as highways maintenance, cleaning and schol meals. In 2009, a further change to the status of some County Councils is expected to take place. Folowing invitations from central government in 2007, a number of County Councils and their asociated districts examined ways in which local government provision could be rationalised, mainly in the form of abolishing the existing County and District councils and establishing one-tier authorities for all or parts of these existing counties. As a result, the status of some of these (mainly) more rural counties wil change. Some, such as Shropshire, North Yorkshire, Wiltshire and Northumberland will reform to one council providing al services. It is expected these wil drop the word county from their titles, such as already exists with Herefordshire Council. Others, such as Bedfordshire, wil see more than one unitary council established within the boundaries of the abolished County Council. Not al counties that submited plans were sucesful. Somerset, for example, wil retain the existing County Council and District Councils. It is believed that a survey conducted acros the county revealed reform to be unpopular, and the Government refused to sanction change as a result. Many County Councils wil remain unchanged, particularly in the heavily populated parts of England such as the south east. 6. Make sentences of your own with the following. Use a dictionary for the phrases you are not familiar with. administrative county ceremonial county countywide war dry county historic county metropolitan county non metropolitan county wet county an entire county county agent county borough county council county fair county government county jail county line county palatine county seat county town found at locations countywide in the county
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7. Put the verbs between brackets in the Simple Past, Past Perfect or Past Perfect Continuous. How long (he, work) on his sculpture when he finally (finish) it? For at least one year. How long (your father, smoke) when he (decide) to quit smoking? For more than twenty years. Betty was reading when her parents (come) home from work. She (read) for two hours. She (read) fifty pages. Bill (wait) for his girlfriend for half an hour when she finally (show up) By the time Mrs. Adams (reach) the store, she (forget) what she wanted to buy. By the time Mrs. Dobbs (retire) , she (work) for 35 years. By the time we (get) to the movie theatre, the movie (already, begin) First the weather (be) fine. Later it (start) to rain. Then we (decide) to go back home. I (see) Karen yesterday. She (tell) me she (just, come) back from her vacation. It (be) midnight. I (study) for five hours. No wonder I (be) tired. Jane (design) herself a summer dress yesterday. She (never, design) clothes for herself before. The ground (be) wet because it (rain) for several hours. The party was a great success. Cathy (feel) happier than she (ever, feel) before. The telephone (ring) for almost a minute when I (get) into the room. I wondered why nobody (answer) it. When Betty (take) her driving test, she (take) driving lessons for two months.

8. Turn the following cardinal numbers into ordinal numbers and put them down in written form, as in the model. 2 second 15 fifteenth 2 15 81 5 20 1 28 102 13 53 100 3
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9. Make sentences of your own with the following numerals, as in the model. a dozen She bought a dozen pens for the office. a couple a dozen a score by hundreds three score 10. Choose the proper ending from below. He arrived in Budapest / last Tuesday / at the head of a delegation He did the work alone / on Saturday / at home I go with my family / every summer / to the seaside I studied the book on page 29 / last night / carefully That man comes to on time / every day / to work The Smiths will be for three weeks / in Greece / next summer Their parcel came by special delivery / this morning / to us They flew by plane / to England / on a rainy morning They met him on Monday / at Janes house / by accident Were you yesterday / with us / at the meeting Yours friends ran quickly / a minute ago / down the street

Lets Laugh!
Seems a guy was driving for hours through desolate country when he passed a farmhouse, and before he could react, a cat ran out in front of him and splat!!! ... he flattened the cat. Out of kindness and consideration, he stopped, turned around and drove back to the farmhouse to notify the occupants. When the housewife came to the door, said he, Pardon me madam, but I just ran over a cat in front of your house, and assumed that it must belong to you. I know this might be hard to hear, but I wanted to let you know instead of just driving off.... Not so fast, says she. How do you know it was our cat? Could you describe him? What does he look like? The man promptly flopped down on the ground, and said He looks like that as he gave his best shot at a dead cat impression. Oh no, you horrible man, she replied. I meant, what did he look like before you hit him?
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At that, the man got up, covered his eyes with both hands and screamed Agggghhhhhhhhhh !!!!!!

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