Continental Europe, also referred to as mainland Europe or simply the Continent (particularly by the British, Balearic and Canary Spaniards, Icelanders and other European island nations plus peninsular Scandinavians), is the continent of Europe, explicitly excluding European islands.
The most common definition of continental Europe excludes Cyprus, Iceland, Ireland, Malta and the United Kingdom and its dependencies. Most definitions of Continental Europe extend the boundaries of the continent to its standard boundaries, the Ural Mountains, Ural River, Caspian Sea and the Caucasus Mountains.
Read more about Continental Europe: Use in The United Kingdom, Scandinavia, Mediterranean and Other Atlantic Islands
Famous quotes containing the word europe:
“That land is like an Eagle, whose young gaze
Feeds on the noontide beam, whose golden plume
Floats moveless on the storm, and in the blaze
Of sunrise gleams when Earth is wrapped in gloom;
An epitaph of glory for the tomb
Of murdered Europe may thy fame be made,
Great People! as the sands shalt thou become;
Thy growth is swift as morn, when night must fade;
The multitudinous Earth shall sleep beneath thy shade.”
—Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)