British history is long, and the entries in this A to Z cover pieces of it. This is the thread that connects them.
Before writing
People have lived in Britain for around 900,000 years, on and off through successive ice ages. Farming arrived about 4000 BC, and with it monument building — Stonehenge, Avebury, Skara Brae and thousands of barrows and stone circles. By the Iron Age, Britain was a patchwork of Celtic tribal societies with hillforts, coinage and trade links to the continent.
Rome (AD 43-410)
The Roman conquest brought roads, towns, baths and writing, and stopped at Hadrian’s Wall. When the legions left, urban life collapsed.
The Anglo-Saxons and Vikings (450-1066)
Germanic settlers established the kingdoms that became England, and gave the country its name and language. Viking invasions from 793 destroyed most of those kingdoms and left Wessex to reassemble England under Alfred and his successors.
Normans and the medieval centuries (1066-1485)
The Norman Conquest replaced the ruling class and rewired the language. What followed: Magna Carta in 1215, forcing King John to accept limits on royal power; the Black Death from 1348, killing perhaps a third to a half of the population; the Hundred Years’ War with France; and the Wars of the Roses, ending at Bosworth in 1485.
Tudors and Stuarts (1485-1714)
The Tudors broke with Rome, made England Protestant and saw off the Spanish Armada. The Stuarts brought the crowns of England and Scotland together in 1603, then civil war, the execution of Charles I in 1649, eleven years of republic under Cromwell, and the Restoration in 1660. The Glorious Revolution of 1688 established parliamentary supremacy for good, and the Act of Union with Scotland in 1707 created Great Britain.
Empire and industry (1714-1914)
The Industrial Revolution made Britain the workshop of the world. The empire expanded across North America, India, Africa, Australia and the Caribbean, built on trade, conquest and — until abolition in 1807 and 1833 — slavery. The Victorian era brought railways, reform, and enormous inequality.
The wars and after (1914-1945)
The First World War killed around 900,000 British servicemen and shattered the pre-war order. The Second left Britain victorious and bankrupt.
Modern Britain (1945-)
The post-war government built the NHS and the welfare state. The empire unwound rapidly from Indian independence in 1947. Immigration from the Commonwealth, beginning with the Empire Windrush in 1948, reshaped British society. Britain joined the European Community in 1973, and left the EU in 2020. Devolution gave Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland their own legislatures from 1999.