i thought rutland was the smallest county!
Now theres a good question!! The isle of Wight is thought to be the smallest county - when the tide is IN and Rutland when the tide is out!
(from the QI forums)
As has already been noted, the problem with anything relying on the word "county" is that there are at least five definitions of that word. One may define a county in England as:
i. A county as normally construed before 1890 (traditional county).
ii. A county within the terms of the Local Government Act 1888 (administrative county). These come in two flavours: County Boroughs (places such as Bristol, Kingston upon Hull, etc) and Shire Counties (not a term with any legal meaning, but normally used to mean counties which are not County Boroughs).
iii. A county within the terms of the Local Government Act 1972 (metropolitan or non-metropolitan county; because that's a rather long term, it's often abbreviated to "1974 county").
iv. That area under the control of a county council, and not being a unitary authority as per the Local Government Act 1992 as amended (county council area).
v. That area under the auspices of a Lord Lieutenant as per the Lieutenancies Act 1997 (ceremonial county).
Now, a small correction to something I claimed (via suze) earlier is needed. The Isle of Wight is in fact a county council area. It functions much like a unitary authority since there are no district councils beneath it, but technically it's a county council. The same structure is due to be introduced for Cornwall, Durham, North Yorkshire, Shropshire and Wiltshire in 2009; the district councils in those areas are to be abolished.
Under definition i., the smallest county is Rutland, followed by Middlesex. Isle of Wight is not a county under this definition; it forms part of the County of Southampton (not officially called Hampshire until 1959).
Under definition iii., the Isle of Wight is the smallest county, followed by Cleveland. Rutland is not a county under this definition.
Under definition iv., the Isle of Wight is the smallest county, followed by Bedfordshire. Rutland is not a county under this definition.
Under definition v., City of London is the smallest county, followed by City and County of Bristol. Rutland and the Isle of Wight are both counties under this definition, but rather larger ones.
That leaves definition ii.
Ah yes, definition ii. There had not been such things as county councils until the Local Government Act 1888 introduced them. The list of county councils created was not identical to the then understanding of what was a county.
At the same time it introduced county boroughs, and there is an argument which says that these should be considered as counties also. If so, then the smallest was either the County Corporate of the City of Canterbury or the County Borough of Devonport. However, they were not for the most part perceived as counties, and so I think that they can be disregarded here. We must also disregard the City of London and the Isles of Scilly; both of these had bodies which functioned as though they were county councils but were explicitly stated not to be.
There were fifty county councils created under the 1888 Act, and these are often referred to as the "administrative counties". Isle of Wight and Rutland were both administrative counties; in the case of the Isle of Wight this was the first time it had been regarded as a county in its own right. But the two were the third and fourth smallest administrative counties.
The two smaller were the County of London (that area which now has London postcodes, excluding the City of London) and the Soke of Peterborough. It's just about possible to exclude both of these as special cases, but only by doing so can we come to the answer as presented.
Furthermore, if we exclude the Soke of Peterborough as being in reality a part of Northamptonshire, then we may have to exclude Rutland as well. It too was a Soke, and was until the Middle Ages considered to be an isolated part of Nottinghamshire.
However ... I'm determined that we are not to have a Corby on our hands. I therefore suggest a definition vi.
"Areas which are popularly perceived as being counties"
That's absolutely fine as far as Rutland is concerned, but it worries me a bit re the Isle of Wight. As indeed Stephen hinted at on the show, is popular perception that the Isle of Wight "belongs to" Hampshire?
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