1. Which paragraph gives the following information? (1) – (8)
a) The process of uniting of all the countries members of the United Kingdom took centuries and involved armed struggle.
b) Scotland and Ireland remained separate kingdoms even after England and Wales were united.
c) The sense of common identity of the four nations didn’t exist at this period of time.
d) The national anthem was composed and the national flag was created.
e) The king of Scotland and England was the same person.
f) Ireland was divided in two parts by an Anglo-Irish treaty.
g) Scotland lost her independence as a result of the Act of Union.
h) Ireland was merged to the Kingdom of Great Britain.
2. Answer the questions using the information from the text.
Which of the names is of Roman origin?
Which of the words originates from the name of the nation invader?
Which of the names originally referred to two different kingdoms ruled by the same monarch?
Which of the names changed three times from 1707 to 1922?
3. Fill in the gaps with the dates and time periods from the text.
from 1801 up until 1652 |
in 1801 |
up until the 17th century |
in 1603 |
during the Tudor times |
until 1652 |
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of 1921 |
1. _______________ there had been four ‘countries’ in the British Isles.
2. _______________ England and Scotland shared the same king.
3. In 1543, _______________, England and Wales were united as one country.
4. A second Act of Union was passed ______________.
5. The whole of Ireland was united with Great Britain ______________.
6. It wasn’t _________________ that England and Scotland were united together by Oliver Cromwell.
7. The Anglo-Irish treaty ________________ removed mainland Ireland from the United Kingdom.
Text 3 time for reading
National flag is an important symbol for every nation and state. What do you know about the British flag? What does it look like? Think over the questions above and check your answers after reading the text.
The union jack
The Union Flag*, popularly known as the Union Jack, is the national flag of the United Kingdom. It is the British flag, a flag containing three other flags.
It is called the Union Flag because it symbolizes the administrative union of the countries of the United Kingdom. It is made up of the individual flags of three of the Kingdom's countries all united under one Sovereign - the countries of England, of Scotland and of Northern Ireland (since 1921 only Northern Ireland has been part of the United Kingdom). As Wales was not a kingdom but a principality it could not be included on the flag.
The Union Jack is made up of three crosses. The upright red cross is the cross of St George, the patron saint of England. The white diagonal cross (with the arms going into the corners) is the cross of St Andrew, the patron saint of Scotland. The red diagonal cross is the cross of St Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland. St David is the patron saint of Wales. The national anthem of the United Kingdom is 'God Save the Queen'.
____________
*Union Flag (Union Jack) – «Юнион Джек» - королевский штандарт, который Великобритания использует в качестве национального флага.
DID YOU GET IT?
1. Fill in the worksheet using the information from the text.
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England |
Scotland |
Northern Ireland |
patron saint |
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colour and type of the cross |
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