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Britain

[ brit-n ]

Phonetic (Standard)IPA

noun

Britain

/ ˈ��ɪ��ə�� /

noun

another name for Great Britain United Kingdom

Britain

Officially the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland , located on the British Isles off the western coast of the mainland ( continent ) of Europe . It comprises England , Wales , and Scotland on the island of Great Britain , and Northern Ireland on the island of Ireland . Its capital and largest city is London .

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Notes

It is one of the world's leading industrialized nations.

Most of the settlers of the American colonies were British. The colonies remained under the British crown until the American Revolutionary War .

Britain declared war on Germany in 1939. Allied with the United States and the Soviet Union , the British, under the leadership of Winston Churchill , played an important role in defeating Germany.

At the height of its imperial power in the late nineteenth century, Britain boasted colonies and possessions around the globe. ( See British Empire .)

A constitutional monarchy , Britain's government calls for the hereditary king or queen to perform mostly ceremonial functions. Parliament governs the country.

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Example Sentences

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The group's UK Director, Luke Tryl, diagnoses a "despondency or misery about the state of Britain that doesn't feel sustainable".

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A national power outage stopped play at the Madrid Open, with Britain's Jacob Fearnley among those forced off court.

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A rare positive legacy of the pandemic was the passing of the British Sign Language Act 2022, which made BSL one of the recognised languages of Great Britain.

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I was reminded of the time at the IMF in 2022 when developing country finance ministers asked me if everything was OK in Britain during the mini budget crisis of Liz Truss' government.

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This week, BBC Three's Glow Up returns, with a new set of artists competing to become Britain's next make-up star.

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