Counties. The UK is divided into counties for local government. A county is controlled by a county council, but plenty of large cities now have their own city council. Most counties end with 'shire', such as Warwickshire (named after Warwick), Oxfordshire (named after Oxford) and Leicestershire (named after Leicester), but plenty don't, such as Kent, Essex and Cumbria.
Shire and county originally meant much the same thing, shire being a Saxon word and county coming in with the Normans. However, the in the modern world there are differing meanings of 'county' depending on whether you are talking geographically or administratively.
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