Hampshire

From TheBestLinks.com

Hampshire

Geography
Status:	Ceremonial & (smaller) Administrative County
Region:	South East England
Area: - Total - Admin. council - Admin. area	Ranked 9th 3,769 km² Ranked 8th 3,679 km²
Admin HQ:	Winchester
ISO 3166-2:	GB-HAM
ONS code:	24
NUTS 3:	UKJ33
Demographics
Population: - Total (2002 est.) - Density - Admin. council - Admin. pop.	Ranked 5th 1,654,802 439 / km² Ranked 3rd 1,245,108
Ethnicity:	96.7% White 1.3% S.Asian
Politics
Hampshire County Council http://www.hants.gov.uk/hcc/
Executive:	Conservative
Members of Parliament
James Arbuthnot, David Chidgey, John Denham, Sandra Gidley, Mike Hancock, Mark Hoban, Gerald Howarth, Andrew Hunter, Julian Lewis, Michael Mates, Mark Oaten, Syd Rapson, Desmond Swayne, Peter Viggers, Alan Whitehead, David Willetts, George Young
Districts
Gosport Fareham Winchester Havant East Hampshire Hart Rushmoor Basingstoke and Deane Test Valley Eastleigh New Forest Southampton (Unitary) Portsmouth (Unitary)

Hampshire is a county on the south coast of England. Its county town is Winchester. The cities of Southampton and Portsmouth were split off as separate unitary authorities in 1997, although they are still included in Hampshire for ceremonial purposes. Other towns in the county include Basingstoke, Andover, Aldershot, Farnborough and Petersfield.

Aldershot, Portsmouth, and Farnborough have strong military associations with the Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force respectively.

The county has in the past been called "Southamptonshire" and appears as such on some Victorian maps. Its name was officially changed from 'County of Southampton' to 'County of Hampshire' in 1959. The short form of the name, often used in postal addresses, is Hants. It borders on Dorset, Wiltshire, Berkshire, Surrey and West Sussex.

Hampshire County Council is based in Winchester, a historic city that was once the capital of the ancient kingdom of Wessex. Southampton and Portsmouth are both major ports. There is an international airport with its own rail station between Southampton and Eastleigh. Hampshire is a popular holiday area, with tourist attractions including its many seaside resorts, the maritime area in Portsmouth, and the motor museum at Beaulieu. The New Forest lies within the borders, as does a large chunk of the South Downs - there are plans to make both of these areas into national parks.

Table of contents

1 History

2 Cities, towns, and villages

3 Places of interest

4 External Links:

History

The county was recorded in the Domesday Book divided into 44 hundreds. These later consolidated to 37. These were Alton, Andover, Barmanstip, Barton Stacy, Basingstoke, Bedbridge, Bondsborough, Bosmere, Buddlesgate, Christchurch, Chutely, Crondal, East Mean, Evinger, Fawley, Finchdean, Fordingbridge, Hambledon, Heling, Holdsett, Kings Somborn, Kingsclear, Mansbridge, Meanstoke, Micheldever, New Forest, Odiham, Overton, Pastrow, Portsdown, Ringwood, Shelbourn, Sutton, Thorngate, Titchfield, Waltham and Wherwell.

The Isle of Wight has been for some purposes in the past treated traditionally part of Hampshire, but has been administered seperately from Hampshire for over a century, obtaining a county council of its own in 1890. The Isle of Wight became a full ceremonial county in 1974. The Island is excluded from the hundreds given above - it was traditionally divided into East Medina and West Medina hundreds. Apart from a shared police force there are now no formal administrative links between the Isle of Wight and Hampshire.

The town of Bournemouth was ceded to Dorset in the local government reorganisation of 1974.

The 2001 census gave the population of the administrative county as 1.24 million; the population including Portsmouth and Southampton was around 1.6 million.