I frankly don’t even feel Scotland is part of Britain either!!

Hehe Loren.

Freedom for England I say, especially when we in England are being run by an unellected Scotsman called Gordon Brown.

Seriously, this sounds like a great bash coming up. I hope you enjoy your visit. But be warned. June is usually a wet month in Scotland so I hope you bring your brolly with you.

England is much nicer at that time of year. Boom boom.

The name Britain is derived from the Latin name Britannia. The Latin term derives from the Greek forms Prettanike or Brettaniai, which originally referred to a collection of islands with individual names, including Albion, the oldest known name for Great Britain. The name was first recorded by the ancient Greek Pytheas around 320 BC.

Ptolemy also used the name Mikra Brettania when describing what is now known as Ireland,

So as you can see, the word Britain has been used to describe all the islands for thousands of years. Well before your time I believe.

)

The organisation is called Big Cats In Britain, because that is what they mainly research. The majority of the members live in England, Scotland and Wales. However there are two members who research sightings in Ireland, along with a handful of members who cover sightings in Europe, Australia, New Zealand and the USA.

Are we now to change the organisation’s name to Big Cats In Britain, Ireland, Belguim, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Australia, New Zealand and USA, just for you.

Somehow I don’t think many people who enjoy putting in the web address http://www.bigcatsinbritainirelandbelguimfrancegermanyitalyspainnetherlandsaustralianewzealandandusa.org, and I don’t think the BCIBIBFGISNANZUSA quite rolls off the tongue either.

99.999999999% of the British population know what is meant by the name. I think that’s good enough.

Ireland and Britain are two different geographical islands- anybody who disputes that has merged geography and politics, and has got the former wrong. I don’t care about anybody’s political sensibilities, only about accuracy and cryptozoology being taken seriously- and that is not facilitated by people confusing the issue and misusing the word Britain in the title of this supposedly academic and scientific discussion, which detracts from any serious work that might be done by this organisation.

Yes, PLEASE let’s keep the politics out of this.

Let’s stick to the discipline of Cryptozoology and reports, please.

The Irish sea proves no boundary to these animals, it is man that brings them across! And if you look at the website, our books etc. you will see that we do distinguish between names and often say Big Cats in Britain & Ireland.

Yours is one side, we get emails from the other side telling is to take off the Shamrock, do not use the Irish flag etc. etc. Politics is one thing we will not submit to here.

Well said Highland Tiger, whoever you are

I have my own political views, but I certainly will not be using them in this subject.

HighlandTiger, your point about cats ignoring the boundaries of man would be more valid if the boundary in question weren’t the Irish Sea, my good fellow, as it’s the work of forces greater than us.

Éire is simply the Gaelic for Ireland, and refers to the whole island. But if you want to include either the 6 counties of Northern Ireland or the whole island of Ireland for accuracy’s sake the name would need to change to Big Cats in Britain and Ireland, for example.

I’d be interested to know which specific counties of Ireland these felines were confining themselves to, and why, though.

Whilst us humans like to designate differences to certain parcels of land, the cats themselves take no notice of borders and jingoism, and happily wander wherever they wish.

Hence the reason that several big cats released a few years ago when Northern Ireland caught up with getting a Dangerous wild animals act, (unlike Eire who still don’t have one), are currently wandering the border area of the two countries.

I know that the BCIB deliberated long and hard with regards to how they depicted both Northern Ireland and Eire on the website, and it was decided that they would be included on the same section, after all, the cats have no interest in the politics of man.