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British Historical Context
A history of England to accompany and contextualise the genealogical history
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Headlines are in brown.
Dates are in red.
Hyperlinks to other pages are in dark blue.
References and citations are in turquoise.
Context and local history are in purple.
Geographical context is in green.
This page provides an index to pages
exploring the wider national and local context to support the genealogy. It is
generally structured as a series of timelines, to provide an easy interface
when exploring the gernealogy.
The Periods of English and British History
The
British Isles before the Norman Conquest
The
Houses of Lancaster and York
The period of
the House of Hanover
The modern period of the House of Saxe Coburg Gotha and the House of Windsor
Themes of national History
The Church and religion
Individuals
Significant events
Social History
Wider context
In Our Time Podcasts
The
following In Our Time podcasts are helpful:
The Ice Ages. See Farndale
Prehistory.
Doggerland, and the humans, plants and animals
once living on land now under the North Sea, submerged in the Stone Age. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The Bronze Age
collapse,
sudden, chaotic change around 1200 BC, mainly in the eastern Mediterranean. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The
dawn of the European Iron Age, a period of great upheaval when
technology and societies were changed forever. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The Picts. See Farndale
Prehistory.
Roman Britain. See Farndale
Prehistory.
Boudica. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The
causes and events leading to the fall of the
Roman Empire in the 5th century
and assesses the role of Christianity, the Ostrogoths, the Visigoths and the
Vandals. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The Celts. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The Druids. See Farndale
Prehistory.
Alcuin, the cleric, educator and poet from
York who put learning for its own sake at the heart of the Carolingian
Renaissance. See Alcuin of York.
King Alfred and the defeat of the Vikings at Battle
of Edington and Alfred's project to create a culture of Englishness. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The
reign of King
Athelstan,
whose military exploits united much of England, Scotland
and Wales under one ruler for the first time. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The Danelaw. See Farndale
Prehistory.
Cnut. See Farndale
Prehistory.
The Battle of
Stamford Bridge,
the decisive English victory over Viking forces which took place in September
1066. See Farndale
Prehistory.
the Domesday Book. See Domesday Book.
‘The Norman Yoke’ – the idea that the Battle of Hastings
sparked years of cruel Norman oppression for the Anglo Saxons. See Norman
Domination.
The Davidian
Revolution
and the great changes in Scotland associated with David I (c1084 to 1153), from
the founding of trading towns such as Edinburgh to new monasteries and new ways
of governing. See the Normans.
Roger Bacon, the medieval English scholar, an early
pioneer of science who became known as Doctor Mirabilis. See Culture and Writing.
Thomas Becket (c1118 to 1170). See the Plantagenets.
Eleanor of
Aquitaine
(c1122-1204), who was a ruler in her own right as well as married to the king
of France and then to the king of England. See the Plantagenets.
The Third Crusade, from death of the Holy Roman Emperor,
Frederick Barbarossa, to the famous encounter between Richard I and Saladin. See the Plantagenets.
The Knights Templar and the growth and great military and
financial strength of the famous order whose knights had a mission to protect
pilgrims in the Holy Land. See the Plantagenets.
The
Twelfth Century Renaissance.
See Culture and Writing.
Medieval
chivalry.
See the Plantagenets.
The centuries
old myth of the most romantic noble outlaw, Robin Hood and whether he was a yeoman, an
aristocrat, an anarchist or the figment of a
collective imagination. See Robin
Hood.
Magna
Carta.
See the Plantagenets.
The Battle of
Lincoln,
fought on 20 May 1217 between the forces of the boy-king Henry III, led by
William Marshal, and supporters of Louis of France. See the Plantagenets.
The Second Baron’s
War
(1264 to 1267) and Simon de Montfort's seizure of power from Henry III and his
family while supporting new, broader parliaments. See the Plantagenets.
Shakespeare and the Plantagenet plays. See the Plantagenets.
The Battle of Bannockburn of 1314, an important victory for
Scotland in its fight to win independence from England. See the Plantagenets.
Crecy, 1346. See the Plantagenets.
The Black Death. See the Black Death.
The
religious orders of the Dominicans and the Franciscans, the Blackfriars and
Greyfriars,
who were a great force for change in Catholic Europe. See the Church.
Margery Kempe (1373 to 1438) and English Mysticism,
and English mystic who went to Jerusalem and dictated her life story, said to
be the first autobiography in English. See Culture and Writing.
The Peasants’
Revolt,
1381. See the Plantagenets.
the defeat of
the French at Agincourt in 1415, and
explores the cultural legacy of this emblematic victory. See Lancaster
and York.
The
Siege of Orléans
in 1428, when Joan of Arc came to the rescue of France and routed the English
army with the help of God. See Lancaster and York.
The Wars of the
Roses,
the 15th century wars between the royal Houses of Lancaster and York, whether
they represent the breakdown of the feudal system or whether the political
instability been overstated. See Lancaster
and York.
Margaret of Anjou, Henry VI’s Queen from 1445 to 1461. See
Lancaster and York.
The
role of the
Tudor dynasty
in reshaping the British state and whether their government of England laid the
political foundations of our own age. See the Tudors.
The Field of the
Cloth of Gold
in 1520, one of the greatest and most conspicuous displays of wealth and
culture that Europe had ever seen. See the
Tudors.
Hans Holbein's role
in the Tudor Court,
painting Henry VIII as he asserted himself as supreme head of the Church during
the Reformation. See the Tudors.
Humanism. See the Church.
Henry
VIII and
the Dissolution of the Monasteries,
asking whether Henry’s policy was an act of grand larceny or the pious
destruction of a corrupt institution. See the
Tudors.
William Cecil, the 1st Baron Burghley, Elizabeth I's
powerful Secretary of State who advanced England's interests throughout her
reign. See the Tudors.
Mary Queen of Scots. See the
Tudors.
The
infamous St
Bartholomew’s Day Massacre
in 1572 when the River Seine ran red with Protestant
blood. See the Tudors.
The Spanish Armada, the fleet which attempted to invade
Elizabethan England in 1588. See the
Tudors.
The death of Queen Elizabeth I and its immediate impact, as a foreign
monarch became King in the face of plots and plague. See
the
Tudors.
Mercantilism. See Trade and Commerce.
The Divine Right of
Kings.
See the
Stuarts.
The Thirty Years
War
(1618 to 1648). See the Stuarts.
The Pilgrim Fathers and why their 1620 voyage on the
Mayflower has become iconic in the American imagination. See the Stuarts.
The Covenanters, Scottish Presbyterian pledges to
advance their beliefs in the face of episcopacy and Roman Catholicism, and
their impact across Britain and Ireland. See the
Stuarts.
The trial of
Charles I,
recounting the high drama in Westminster Hall and the ideas that led to the
execution. See the Stuarts.
The Interregnum (1649 to 1660) between
the execution of Charles I and restoration of Charles II including the impact
in Scotland and, infamously, Ireland. See the
Stuarts.
How English
republicanism
has developed from Cromwell to the present day, and
examines whether it is embedded as a sentiment deep within the culture of
England. See the Stuarts.
The Putney Debates of 1647, when factions of the New Model
Army considered a possible new constitution for England. See the Stuarts.
The
reign of Charles II and discusses whether the Restoration brought peace and prosperity to England
or was an unstable period that culminated in revolution. See the Stuarts.
The Great Fire of
London
in 1666 and how the city rose from the ashes. See the Stuarts.
Titus Oates and his
Popish Plot.
See the Stuarts.
The Glorious Revolution of 1688. See
the
Stuarts.
The Gin Craze in the 18th Century and the moves to
control it. See the Stuarts.
The Jacobite Rebellion,
the Stuart dynasty's final attempt to reclaim the throne of England. See the Hanoverians.
The East India Company.
See the Stuarts.
The South Sea Bubble, the
speculation mania in early 18th-century England which ended in the financial
ruin of many of its investors. See the Hanoverians.
The 18th and
19th century enclosure
movement which divided the British countryside both literally and
figuratively. See the Hanoverians.
The part
British thinkers played in the
Enlightenment in the 18th century. See the Stuarts.
The emergence
and impact of the
Scottish Enlightenment which was led by the philosopher David Hume and the
father of modern economics, Adam Smith. See the Stuarts.
Adam Smith's
celebrated economic treatise The
Wealth of Nations. See the Stuarts.
The pioneering
British Enlightenment thinker Mary Wollstonecraft (1759
to 1797). See the Stuarts.
The Gordon Riots of 1780,
and why a Westminster protest against 'Popery' in June
1780 led to widespread rioting across London, lethally suppressed. See the Hanoverians.
The Bluestockings, a group
of prominent women intellectuals in 18th-century England. See Women.
The Irish Rebellion of 1798,
led by the United Irishmen, who were inspired by American and French
revolutions, and the impact this had across Ireland. See the Hanoverians.
The Battle of Trafalgar
(1805). See the Hanoverians.
The 1807
Abolition of the Slave Trade, and the life of William Wilberforce. See the Hanoverians.
The War of 1812, the
conflict between America and Great Britain which is sometimes referred to as
the second American War of Independence. See the
Hanoverians.
The Great Reform Act of 1832,
a landmark in British political history. See the
Hanoverians.
The Corn Laws, cause of
one of the most explosive political debates in the 19th century. See the Hanoverians.
Chartism. See the Hanoverians.
The Industrial Revolution.
See the Industrial Revolution.
The
far-reaching consequences of the
Industrial Revolution, which brought widespread social and intellectual
change to Britain. See the Industrial
Revolution.
David Ricardo and his
argument for free trade after the Napoleonic Wars. He argued that Britain's
economy was being held back by the interests of landlords and protectionism,
and his call for free trade. See the Hanoverians.
The
Poor Laws, the 19th century legislation intended to discourage poor people
from seeking relief instead of work, with handouts replaced by the workhouse. See the Hanoverians.
Isambard Kingdom Brunel,
the Victorian engineer responsible for bridges, tunnels
and railways still in use today. See the Industrial Revolution.
The 1851 Great Exhibition,
housed in the magnificent Crystal Palace, the exhibition showcased Victorian
Britain's technical ingenuity and industrial might. See the Hanoverians.
The Great Stink of 1858
and the work of Joseph Bazalgette to fix it. See the
Hanoverians.
The Charge of the Light
Brigade. See John Farndale (FAR00337).
Charles Booth and the Labour
Survey, to discover how many people in late Victorian London were living in
poverty, and understand why. See Poverty.
The Victorian
reformer Octavia Hill,
pioneer of social housing and campaigner for public open spaces. See Home Life.
Suffragism. See Women.
The history of English national identity
and examines how the concept of the Nation State can defend itself against the
forces of globalisation.
The history of education which
examines whether its modern purpose is to teach us the nature of reality, or to
give us the tools to deal with it. See Education.
Whether we can ever predict
the future by understanding the past. What kind of lessons is it possible for
leaders, governments or people to take from history?
See Recalling
the Past.
The writing of history has
changed over time, from ancient epics to medieval hagiographies and modern
deconstructions. See Recalling
the Past.