A large area in the north-east of England. For hundreds of years it was one county — the biggest in England — but for local government it is now split into North, East, South and West Yorkshire. People still say "Yorkshire" for the whole area anyway, because to them it is one place, not four. It has two very different faces. One is industrial: big cities like Leeds, Sheffield and Bradford, built on steel, wool and cloth, with coal mines all around them (the mines are almost all closed now, and that closing is still a sore subject for older people there). The other face is empty and beautiful: the North York Moors and the Yorkshire Dales, wide open hills with stone walls and sheep. Two things you should know beyond the map. First, people from Yorkshire are famously proud of it — more like being from a small country than from a county, and they will tell you within five minutes of meeting you. There is an old half-joke that a Yorkshireman is blunt, careful with money, and says what he thinks; Yorkshire people say it about themselves, half boasting. Second, the word is used before other nouns for things that come from there and are famous: Yorkshire pudding (a puffy baked batter eaten with roast beef — not a sweet dessert, so the name misleads learners), Yorkshire terrier, Yorkshire tea. In those, "Yorkshire" behaves like an adjective, though it is really just the place name doing the work. You will also hear "a Yorkshire accent", which most British people can recognise instantly.