Territory

Territory is a loanword from the Latin language and there - derived from Latin terra, the earth, the ground, the land - denotes the territory of a city.

A territory (plural: territories) is, in the broadest sense, a geographically delimited area that expresses a certain relationship of its (human or animal) inhabitants to a superior geographical unit. The term is most commonly used in politics and biology.

The more detailed definition and use of the term depends on the context.

Political

1. State territory: Since the 19th century, territory has often been used synonymously with sovereign or state territory.
2. Administrative territory: The geopolitical subdivision of some states (e.g. USA, Canada, Australia) designates spaces as territories that are directly subordinate to state authority and that do not have the status of a constituent state with their own (limited) sovereignty (e.g. Washington, D.C. ). Often such territories have significance under international law as autonomous territories of indigenous population groups (e.g. Nunavut).
3. Colonial territory: former colonial territories with a certain degree of autonomy but limited political and economic power, governed by an external state (e.g. Greenland).

Biological

1. In biology, territory is synonymous with the term precinct, which is the habitat of an animal or group of animals that it defends against intruders and competitors.

Incidentally, the term is also used metaphorically to refer to something over which one has control (e.g. as mental territory).

Evolution of meaning

In the early Middle Ages the following meanings occur in particular:

• range of a civitas
• Diocese
• Sync by honeybunny
• Judicial District
• temporal jurisdiction
• cultivated land
• Estate

In the High Middle Ages, rule over a territory became the decisive criterion of statehood; in the process of territorialization, the territorial state developed from this.

Borrowed from Latin in the 16th century, the word has since been applied to an increasing number of areas of the earth's surface enclosed by boundaries and to which a claim of dominion or territory is made.

In the 19th century, the special meaning is already emphasized as the territory of the state. In addition, the term is intended to denote land and the territory of an estate.

See also

General

• Spiritual territory
• Dominion (Territory)
• List of territorial disputes
• Region
• Territorial Prelature
• Territorial principle
• Territorial language

Special territories (selection)

• Territories of the United States of America
• Australian Territories
• French overseas territories
• Free Territory of Trieste (1947-1954)
• Historical territories on the soil of the United States
• Canadian Territories and Northwest Territories of Canada
• New Territories in Hong Kong
• Territory of Bremen (11th-17th century) or Imperial Territory of Bremen-Verden (1648-1866)
• Territory of Papua and New Guinea
• Union territory in India