A History of Britain

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a country situated in the British Isles, which is a union make up of four countries: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, including

several overseas territories. It’s said that: to study the history of Britain is to learn a story about how a country was conquered and had been combined. However, I would like to divide the history of Britain into three parts, which not only about how the Britain was formed, but also what have had great influence in the Britain along the historical river.

The first part is about the ancient Britain. The origin of the English history is acknowledged known as the roman invasion of 55BC. It was under the charge of Julius Caesar when the first roman invasion took place, and in AD43, a well-planned and much larger invasion came again. England was influenced by the roman so strongly that even nowadays you can feel that deeply in England. After nearly 400 years, the Roman Empire was tired to manage the issue of England because of the difficulties closer to their country.The Roman

occupation of Britain lasted nearly 400 years with a great impact. They brought Christianity to England, developed a system of well-paved roads etc. But with the aggravation of the slave rebellion, Rome Empire was fading. Thus they finally left Britain by 410 AD to defend Roman.

In mid-5century a new wave of invaders, Jutes, Saxons and Angles came to Britain. In 449, the Jutes led by Hengist arrived and conquered Kent in southeast of England. Afterwards, the others also set up many kingdoms, which were called Heptarchy. In 829 finally Wessex won the overlordship of all the rest and Elbert, the king of Wessex, became the king.

To their safety, Danish Viking raids were a great threat by this time. Therefore, Wessex combined the other kingdoms against the Vikings and then the king of Wessex, Alfred who called Alfred the Great later reached a friendly agreement with the Vikings in 879. Unfortunately, at the beginning of 11 century, Danish made a comeback and successfully dominated the island, and king of Denmark, Knut the Great became king of England. England remained under Danish rule until 1066 thth

when William the Conqueror took back Britain by

defeating the Viking’s last raids.

It was this invasion established the language

which now is known as Old English. After hundreds years later, the king of Wessex, Alfred the great, unified and stabilized the country with his successors.

The second part refers to the feudalism age. The feudalism which based on the land had occurred under the Anglo-Saxon kings, for the purpose of his power consolidation. Before Henry II, the king’s power was limited by the barony and the Church. It was Henry II, who succeeds in reversing the power back from the barony and the Church to the monarchical state.

After that, England virtually became a part of

Normandy France and Feudalism which is a feudal system that was based on the ownership of land, was established. In that way, the king was able to centralize society in his own person. Though the Normandy conquest played a positive role to consolidate the feudal society and determined the whole course of English history and development, it ultimately failed to overcome the royal family. During that time, it broke out three Crusades,

which is a long series of wars between Christians and Muslims.

In June 191215, King John of England was forced to accept a rather crude the Magna carta that was to

protect the interests of the feudal lords. Due to the document the king was declined his regalities and had to gain his income from other methods, mainly by

expansion. It caused the further class contradiction and therefore promoted the establishment of English Parliament. What’s more, in order to gain a stronghold and massive wealth in Europe by conquering France, the Hundred Years War between France and England was bitter, which were a series of sieges and naval battles

interspersed with truces and uneasy peace. The war was started in May 1337 when King Philip Ⅵ of France

attempted to confiscate the English territories in the duchy of Aquitaine. It ended in July 1453 when the France finally expelled the English from the continents ( except for Calais ).

In the late spring of 1348, the Black Death whose causative agent was the Rat Flea arrived in England. It is estimated to have killed 25 million people in two th

or three years, which to some extent, came to an end of the Hundred Years War. Due to the Black Death, the policy become more and more critical to the laborer.

A series of revolts were rising, and the most influence one is Wat Tyler’s revolt. The serf became a free farmer or a wage laborer finally after 1381.

The hundred years’ war, spanned from 1337 to 1453, destroyed the feudal nobility and brought about a new social order and brought the England’s status as a power to an end which led the English to expand their power at sea. Two years later, there was a series of dynastic civil wars for the English throne between the house of Lancaster and York.

In the late spring of 1348, the Black Death whose causative agent was the Rat Flea arrived in England. It is estimated to have killed 25 million people in two or three years, which to some extent, came to an end of the Hundred Years War. Due to the Black Death, the policy become more and more critical to the laborer.

A series of revolts were rising, and the most influence one is Wat Tyler’s revolt. The serf became a free farmer or a wage laborer finally after 1381.

The war of the Roses were a series of civil wars fought in medieval England from 1455 to 1487 between the House of Lancaster and the House of York. After a marriage between the two houses, the Tudor Dynasty was built. English feudal history came to an end, and a new era of English history began.

The Tudors was an important transition from feudal society to capitalist society in England with the reformation fever. King Henry Ⅷ broke away from

mainstream Christianity and reformed the church into Protestant, which had been promoted by Martin Luther. After the death of King Henry Ⅷ, his daughter

ElizabethⅠsucceeded him on the throne. Under her rule, Renaissance that the humanists like Thomas More and Shakespeare voiced the human aspirations from freedom and equality and against the tyranny of feudal rule, developed to the vertex. Besides, the Spanish was

defeated, the first step of colonialism was done etc.

Since ElizabethⅠwas childless the throne was passed onto her cousin, JamesⅠin 1603. He was also the king of Scotland, and that became the first union between England and Scotland. It is the beginning of the Stuart

Dynasty.

In 1485, the Lancastrian Henry Tudor defeat the king Richard II and founded the House of Tudor which enabling the England to assert autonomy and

independence for themselves for nearly a century,

bringing England’s turbulent medieval period to an end.

When it turns to the question: Who turned the

England from a medieval backwater to a powerful

renaissance state in the coming centuries and who

establish a tradition of strong rule with a sense of law and justice? The answer is Henry VII, whose son separating the English Church from Rome and get Wales and Ireland incorporated into England. After a decade’s trembling, Elizabeth I came into power and restored a sort of order to the realm. Much of Elizabeth's

success was in balancing the interests of the Puritans and Catholics, reducing the power of the old nobility effectively and reached farther than ever before in trade and adventure outside the England. It’s also on her state when the English conquered the Spain and become the supremacy over the sea.

The third part is about the modern history of the Britain .It is universally acknowledged that the

origination of the modern history of the Britain is the industrial revolution. The Britain adopted the new devices and effective methods which brought by a series of favorable conditions. After that, much of the agricultural workforce was uprooted from the

countryside and moved into large urban centers of production, as the steam-based production factories could undercut the traditional cottage industries. And this formed the emerging middle class and the age-old aristocracy class basically. As the power expanded, the great Britain gain a great victory in the European and gained recognition as the imperial power in Europe, commanding superior sea forces and controlling vast trading relationship. At the meantime, late Georgian Britain resolves the issue of Ireland, and signed The Act of Union of 1800 which create the new stage: “the united kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland”.

In British history, Queen Victoria who made

significant changes on varying from culture, political, economic to industrial and scientific had the longest

reign. It was during the Victoria period that full effects of industrializations were most felt and the great exhibition of 1851 was held. Also, the Victoria era marked the apex of the Britain Empire attained through constant wars and colonial consolidation worldwide.

The First World War, broke up in June 1914, change the British society greatly, after what the Britain lost it’s position of the world’s leading shipping nation and, economically, suffered a heavy loss that was yet to be made up in many years to come. On the contrary, the conscription broke up the social class in certain way and, the women had played their part in the factories during the war and get full equality with men later in 1928. After a temporary post-war boom, the whole British were led to the great depression which results in the World War II. Thanks to the inspiration from Prime Minister Winston Churchill, the Britain stands in the European indomitably. At last, the World War II was finally over in 1945, with the victory of the allies, of which Britain was a member.

There were three superpowers in the world after

World War II—the United States, UK and the Soviet Union. As the 1950s progressed, the UK had lost its place as superpower and could no longer maintain its large empire, which led to the decolonization and a

withdrawal from almost all of its colonies by 1970. All about this reflect on the social is that the youth expressed dissent and appeared to rejected all

restrains in behaviors, dress and entertainment.

When the time of high employment as

deindustrialization came, Margaret Thatcher, the first female prime minister of Britain, came into power and carried out the ruthless privatization policies. The UK victory of Argentina over the flatlands islands elevated Thatcher’s image. After the difficult 1970s and ‘80s, the Britain comes to a period of continuous economic growth. In 1997, tony Blair became prime minister in landslide victory for labor. Thanks to Blair’s effort, there is sustained economic growth and stability peace in Northern Ireland. He is the only labor prime minister to win three consecutive elections. But Blair stepped down as prime minister in 2007 because

of his decision of following the United States in the war of Afghanistan and Iraq and was succeed by the chancellor of exchequer, Gordon brown.