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The names by which most of the various languages of Europe refer to England follow two distinct patterns. Virtually every continental European tongue uses a name similar to "England": "Angleterre" ( French), "Anglia" ( Hungarian), "Anglija" ( Slovene), "Inghilterra" ( Italian), "Engleska" ( Serbo-Croatian) and so on. The Celtic languages of northwest Europe, by contrast, use quite different names, e.g. "Bro-Saoz" ( Breton), "Pow Sows" ( Cornish) and "Sasana" ( Irish). The explanation lies in the tribal settlement of England in the Dark Ages and the different contacts between various peoples. The ancestors of the present-day Welsh and Cornish were driven west by the invasion of the Anglo-Saxon tribes; the Celtic names for England are variants on "land of the Saxons," since the Saxons were the western-most tribal groups. By contrast, it has been suggested that the Angles' geographic position along the eastern coast of England gave them a higher international profile as traders than the inland-dwelling Saxons. (See Wiktionary for a list of non-English names for England.)
Alternative names sometimes used for England have included the slang "Blighty", from the Hindustani "bila yati" meaning "foreign"; and " Albion," an ancient name popularised by Pliny the Elder and Ptolemy in the 1st century, supposedly in reference to the white ( Latin alba) cliffs of Dover. (In its origins, however, the name applied to the whole island of Great Britain.) More poetically, England has been called "this scept'red isle...this other Eden" and "this Green and Pleasant Land", quotations respectively from the poetry of William Shakespeare (in Richard II) and William Blake ( And did those feet in ancient time).
"England" is sometimes, wrongly, used in reference to the whole United Kingdom, the entire island of Great Britain (or simply Britain), or indeed the British Isles. This usage pattern is frequently seen in documents from the USA. This is not only incorrect but can cause offence to people from other parts of the UK. Further, there are situations where, while the word "England" would be factually correct, British people would typically use the less-specific "Britain" or "The UK".
The inhabitants of England are the English. Slang terms sometimes used for them include "Sassenachs" (from the Scots Gaelic) and "Limeys" (in reference to the citrus fruits carried aboard English sailing vessels to prevent scurvy).
The English flag is St. George's cross, a thin red cross on a white field. A red cross acted as a symbol for many Crusaders in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries AD. It became associated with Saint George, and England, along with other countries and cities (such as Georgia, Milan and the Republic of Genoa) which claimed him as their patron saint, began to use his cross as a banner. It remained in national use until 1707, when the Union Flag (which English and Scottish ships had used at sea since 1606) was adopted for all purposes to unite the whole of Great Britain under a common flag.
The rose is widely recognised as the national flower of England and is used in a variety of contexts, for example as the badge of the English Rugby Union team. The Three Lions badge performs a similar role for the English national football team, having its basis in the English royal arms first used by Richard I (Richard the Lionheart) in the late twelfth century.
England does not have an official anthem of its own but Jerusalem (incorporating the Blake phrase quoted above), I vow to thee my country and Land of Hope and Glory are all widely regarded - unofficially - as English national hymns (although the last more properly refers to Great Britain, not just England). At sporting events, God Save The Queen (the national anthem for the UK as a whole) is nonetheless usually played for the England football team, although Land of Hope and Glory has been used as the English anthem at the Commonwealth Games (where the four nations in the UK face each other independently).
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