It's funny, because I'm pretty sure that in most European countries, the term "English/Englishmen" is used to refer to Brits in general. In France, we say "les Anglais" (the Englishmen), to designate the general population of Britain ; quite sure it's the same in Italian, Spanish or German. Of course, if there's a need to be more specific, then we'll use the correct designation (Scot, Welsh, etc). However, in French, we would use Irish for both Northern and Southern Irish, always because of the geography (it's the same island)
It means that in the european collective conscience Englishmen=Brits, I know that is the ultimate heresy here...
Out of curiosity do the French ever refer to us as perfidious Albion?
Absolutely, you can often read this expression in (serious) newspapers: "La perfide Albion", when journalists want to mock England or when there is tension or a competitive situation between France and Britain. Although, since the Brexit referendum, I did not ear or read the expression at all.
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfide_Albion
The French version of the wikipedia article (a lot different than the English one) gives many reasons to justify this expression ...
The French seem to love to hate us English
So Cristobal - I know you have Grande Bretagne and Royaume Uni - but are you saying there is no French word for Britons?
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