List Of Sovereign States By Date Of Formation
Below is a list of sovereign states and their formation dates, sorted by continent. This list includes only the 195 sovereign states currently in existence; it does not include former sovereign states. For proposed states or various indigenous nations which consider themselves still under occupation, see list of active autonomist and secessionist movements. Micronations are not included in this list.
Nation-building is a long evolutionary process. It is therefore practically impossible to come up with a single date for a nation's "birth". However, most nations have accepted some dates in their respective histories as their symbolic starting points. This is usually done more for nationalistic propaganda than for scientific reasons. For many ancient and medieval nations these starting points are usually the dates when a nation was mentioned in a written document for the first time or simply a date from their national mythology. In Europe, this often coincides with the ruler's conversion to Christianity. For post-colonial nations, starting with the United States, the beginning of statehood is usually considered to be the date when independence was declared, granted and/or recognised.
Independence dates for widely recognised states, earlier than 1919, should be treated with caution, since prior to the founding of the League of Nations, there was no international body to recognise nationhood, and independence had no meaning beyond mutual recognition of de facto sovereigns (the role of the League of Nations was effectively taken over by the United Nations after the Second World War). See also: disputed territories.
The situation is further complicated by the confusion between two terms commonly used as synonym: nation (generally considered an ethnic or cultural grouping) and state (an independent political entity). Taking this into account a declaration of being the "oldest country" in the world is not fruitful and will inevitably be disputed. The following list contains the formation dates of countries with a short description of those events. For a more detailed description of a country's formation and history please see the main article for each country.
Read more about List Of Sovereign States By Date Of Formation: Sortable List
Famous quotes containing the words list of, list, sovereign, states, date and/or formation:
“The advice of their elders to young men is very apt to be as unreal as a list of the hundred best books.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935)
“Lovers, forget your love,
And list to the love of these,
She a window flower,
And he a winter breeze.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“My maiden Isabel,
Reflaring rosabel.
The fragrant camomel;
The ruddy rosary,
The sovereign rosemary,
The pretty strawberry;
The columbine, the nept,
The jelofer well set,
The proper violet:”
—John Skelton (1460?–1529)
“By intervening in the Vietnamese struggle the United States was attempting to fit its global strategies into a world of hillocks and hamlets, to reduce its majestic concerns for the containment of communism and the security of the Free World to a dimension where governments rose and fell as a result of arguments between two colonels’ wives.”
—Frances Fitzgerald (b. 1940)
“Modern tourist guides have helped raised tourist expectations. And they have provided the natives—from Kaiser Wilhelm down to the villagers of Chichacestenango—with a detailed and itemized list of what is expected of them and when. These are the up-to- date scripts for actors on the tourists’ stage.”
—Daniel J. Boorstin (b. 1914)
“It is because the body is a machine that education is possible. Education is the formation of habits, a superinducing of an artificial organisation upon the natural organisation of the body.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895)