Scotland

At its union with England, Scotland retained

• its own legal system (based on principles of civil law rather than common law),
• its own educational system (with far higher literacy rates than elsewhere in Britain, and a proud claim to be "the first country in the world with universal education"),
• a separate established church (the Church of Scotland),
• and its own aristocracy and gentry.

All this was accompanied by all the heraldry and symbolism of legal, academic, ecclesiastical and noble life.

Scotland is more sparsely inhabited than England, but contains a number of impressive cities. The largest is Glasgow, a major centre of industry and ship-building in the 19th century, "the second city of the Empire", with all the social problems attendant on industrialization and postwar industrial decline.

Edinburgh, Scotland's capital, is a centre of administration, law, banking, learning and culture.

Aberdeen, anciently important in North Sea shipping and fisheries, and a minor centre of 19th-century industry, became the energy capital of the U.K., and to some extent of Europe, after the discovery of North Sea oil.

Geographically and culturally, the Highlands of Scotland are set apart from the Lowlands. Much of the romantic imagery of glens, lochs, castles, crofts, kilts, bagpipes, etc. derives from the Scottish Highlands.