Preceded only by faraway Greenland (2.130.800 sq. km, 822.706 sq. mi.) and nearby New Guinea (785.753 sq. km, 303.381 sq. mi.), Borneo is the third-largest island in the world (748.168 sq. km, 288.869 sq. mi.) That’s a somewhat surprising accolade for this low-key South East Asian island with an institutionally split personality.
The two main British Isles are a bit further down the list of largest islands. Great Britain (218.595 sq. km, 84.400 sq. mi.) still is the eighth-largest
Ireland (81.638 sq. km, 31.521 sq. mi.), i.e. the Republic plus Ulster (the British-governed northern part) is the world’s 20th-largest island,
19th-century naturalist and explorer Alfred Russel Wallace included this map in his
The Malay Archipelago, comparing the size of the British Isles with that of Borneo to give them an idea of the vastness of the place. The British Isles are shown in their normal projection (north up) while Borneo is tilted (east up) to provide better shelter for the British Isles
clipped from: strangemaps.wordpress.com 