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This article is about the personification of Great Britain. For other meanings of Britannia see Britannia (disambiguation) Britannia was originally the Latin name that the Roman Empire gave to the southern part of the island of Great Britain , and has become a National Personification of the United Kingdom . ROMAN PERIOD At the height of Roman Britain , the Empire included all of Britannia (first invaded by Julius Caesar in 55 BC ), which was bordered by Hadrian's Wall , close to today's border between England and Scotland . To the Romans northern Britain was known as Caledonia . A southern part of what is now known as Scotland was occupied by the Romans for a brief period by the end of the Roman reign, keeping in place the Picts to the north of the Antonine Wall . The island of Great Britain has never been completely conquered, even in Roman days. People living in the Roman province of Britannia were called Britanni. Ireland was a separate region, which was never conquered by the Romans; it was called Hibernia . There was no Britannia in Celtic Mythology , and the land of Britain was not personified by any early known Latin poet. The Emperor Claudius paid a visit while Britain was being pacified and was honoured with the Agnomen ''Britannicus'' as if he were the conqueror, but Britannia remained a place, not a female personification of the land, until she appeared on coins issued under Hadrian , which introduced a female figure labelled BRITANNIA. Typical of the Romans, Britannia was soon personified as a . BRITISH REVIVAL , United Kingdom ]] Britannia remained the Latin name for Great Britain , but after the Fall Of The Roman Empire it had lost most symbolic meaning until the rise of British influence and later, the British Empire , which at the height of its power ruled a quarter of both the world's people and the world's landmass. As British power and influence rose in the 1700s , and after the unification of the Kingdoms of England (which included Wales ) and Scotland in 1603 upon the death of Queen Elizabeth I and succession of her Scottish cousin, James VI Of Scotland (or James I of England), Britannia became a more and more important symbol and a strong rallying point among Britons. British power, which depended on the supremacy of its , the national animal of England . Another change was that she was no longer bare breasted, due to the prudishness of Victorian society. In the Renaissance tradition, Britannia came to be viewed as the personification of Britain , in imagery that was developed during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I . When James I came to the throne, some elaborate pageants were staged. One pageant performed on the streets of London in 1605 was described in Anthony Munday's ''Triumphs of Reunited Britannia'': ''On a mount triangular, as the island of Britain itself is described to be, we seat in the supreme place, under the shape of a fair and beautiful nymph, Britannia herself...'' coin.]] Britannia first appeared on the Farthing in 1672 , followed by the Halfpenny later the same year; the model used, then and later, was Charles II 's mistress, the Duchess Of Richmond . She then appeared on the Penny coin between 1797 and 1970 , and on the 50 Pence coin since 1969 . When the Bank Of England was granted a charter in 1694 , the directors decided within days that the device for their official seal should represent 'Brittannia sitting on looking on a Bank of Mony' (sic). Perhaps the best analogy is that Britannia is to the United Kingdom and the British Empire as Lady Liberty is to the United States Of America . Like Lady Liberty, Britannia became a very potent and more common figure in times of war. During the 1990s a new term, Cool Britannia (a pun on the poem ' Rule Britannia ' by James Thomson - 1748 , and the song adapted from it, which is often used as an unofficial National Anthem ), was used to describe the contemporary United Kingdom. The phrase referred to the fashionable London , Glasgow , Cardiff and Manchester scenes, with a new generation of pop groups and style magazines, successful young fashion designers, and a surge of new restaurants and hotels. Cool Britannia represented mid-90's Britain as a fashionable place to be. NAMESAKES Today Britannia lives on in British symbols and British patriotism such as:
Other uses:
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