LibGuides: British History in Credo: Norman Conquest to Restoration

General Information

English Civil War: Topic
1642–48, The conflict between King Charles I of England and a large body of his subjects, generally called the "parliamentarians".
Glorious Revolution: Topic
In English history, the events of 1688–89 that resulted in the deposition of James II and the accession of William III and Mary II to the English throne. It is also called the Bloodless Revolution.
Hundred Years' War: Topic
1337–1453, conflict between England and France. Causes Its basic cause was a dynastic quarrel that originated when the conquest of England.
Magna Carta: Topic
Or Magna Charta [Lat., = great charter], the most famous document of British constitutional history, issued by King John at Runnymede.
Reformation: Topic
Religious and political movement in 16th-century Europe to reform the Roman Catholic Church, which led to the establishment of the Protestant churches.
Renaissance: Topic
Period in European cultural history that began in Italy around 1400 and lasted there until the end of the 1500s. Elsewhere in Europe it began later, and lasted until the 1600s.
War of the Roses
From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Traditional name given to the intermittent struggle (1455–85) for the throne of England between the noble houses of York (whose badge was a white rose) and Lancaster (later associated with the red rose).

Norman Conquest (1066 - 1154)

Aethelred, or Ethelred, the Unready (c. 968-1016)
From Chambers Dictionary of World History
King of England (978/1016). The son of Edgar, he was aged about 10 when the murder of his half-brother, Edward the Martyr, placed him on the throne. In 1002 he confirmed an alliance with Normandy by marrying, as his second wife, Duke Richard's daughter Emma – the first dynastic link between the two countries. ‘Unready’ is a mistranslation of Unraed, not recorded as his nickname until after the Norman Conquest, which means ‘ill-advised’ and is a pun on his given name, Ethelred (literally, ‘good counsel’).
Battle of Hastings
From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
Battle on 14 October 1066 at which William, Duke of Normandy (William (I) the Conqueror) defeated King Harold II of England.
Battle of Stamford Bridge
From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
Battle on 25 September 1066 at Stamford Bridge, a crossing of the Derwent 14 km/9 mi northeast of York, England, at which Harold II defeated and killed Harold Hardraada, King of Norway, and Tostig, the English king's exiled brother.
Bayeux Tapestry: Topic
This so-called tapestry is in fact an embroidery that chronicles the Norman Conquest of England by William the Conqueror (William I) in 1066. It is a long, narrow strip of coarse linen, 230 ft by 20 in. (70 m by 51 cm), embroidered in worsteds of eight colors in couching and stem stitch.
Canute (c. 995-1035): Topic
king of England, Norway, and Denmark. The younger son of Sweyn of Denmark, Canute accompanied his father on the expedition of 1013 that invaded England and forced Æthelred to flee to Normandy.
Domesday Book
From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Record of a general census of England made (1085–86) by order of William I (William the Conqueror). The survey ascertained the economic resources of most of the country for purposes of more accurate taxation.
Godwin (11th Century)
From The Columbia Encyclopedia
D. 1053, earl of Wessex. He became chief adviser to King Canute, was created (c.1018) an earl, and was given great wealth and lands.
Harald Hardrada (1015-1066)
From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
King of Norway 1045-66, ruling jointly with Magnus I 1045-47. He engaged in an unsuccessful atempt to conquer Denmark 1045-62; and extended Norwegian rule in Orkney, Shetland, and the Hebrides.
Norman Conquest: Topic
Period in English history following the defeat (1066) of King Harold of England by William, duke of Normandy, who became William I of England.
William the Conquerer (1028-1087)
From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
King of England from 25 December 1066. He was the illegitimate son of Duke Robert the Devil whom he succeeded as Duke of Normandy in 1035.

Tudor Era (1485 - 1603)

Anne Boleyn (1507-1536): Topic
Second queen consort of Henry VIII and mother of Elizabeth I. She was the daughter of Sir Thomas Boleyn, later earl of Wiltshire.
Edward IV (1442-1483): Topic
King of England (1461-70; 1471-83); son of Richard, duke of York. He defeated Henry VI in the Wars of the Roses and became king (1461).
Edward VI (1537-1553): Topic
King of England (1547–53), son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour. Edward succeeded his father to the throne at the age of nine.
Elizabeth I (1533-1603): Topic
Queen of England (1558-1603); daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn.
Henry VIII (1491-1547): Topic
1491–1547, king of England (1509–47), second son and successor of Henry VII.
Mary Queen of Scots (1542-1587): Topic
(Mary Stuart), 1542–87, only child of James V of Scotland and Mary of Guise.
Mary Rose: Topic
English warship, built for Henry VIII of England, which sank off Southsea, Hampshire, on 19 July 1545, with the loss of most of the 700 on board.
Spanish Armada: Topic
Fleet sent by Philip II of Spain against England in 1588. Consisting of 130 ships, it sailed from Lisbon and carried on a running.

Notable People

Francis Bacon (1561-1626): Topic
English philosopher, politician, and writer, a founder of modern scientific research. His works include Essays (1597, revised and augmented 1612 and 1625), characterized by pith and brevity; and The Advancement of Learning (1605), a seminal work discussing scientific method.
Geoffrey Chaucer (1340-1400): Topic
English poet, noted for his narrative skill, humour, and insight, particularly in his most famous work, The Canterbury Tales.
Sir Francis Drake (1540-1596): Topic
English navigator & admiral, 1st Englishman to circumnavigate the world (1577–80).
John Evelyn (1620-1706): Topic
English diarist and author. He was a friend of the diarist Samuel Pepys, and like him remained in London during the Plague and the Great Fire of London.
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679): Topic
English political philosopher. His greatest work is the Leviathan (1651), which contains his defence of absolute sovereignty.
Samuel Pepys (1633-1703): Topic
English diarist and naval administrator. His diary, which covers the period 1660-69, is a vivid account of London life through such disasters as the Great Plague, the Fire of London, and the intrusion of the Dutch fleet up the Thames.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Topic
English dramatist and poet, b. Stratford-on-Avon. He is widely considered the greatest playwright who ever lived.

Middle Ages (1154 - 1485)

Black Death: Topic
Great epidemic of plague, mainly the bubonic variant, that ravaged Europe in the mid-14th century. Contemporary estimates that it killed between one-third and half of the population (about 75 million people) are probably accurate.
Crusades: Topic
Series of wars undertaken by European Christians between the 11th and 14th cent. to recover the Holy Land from the Muslims.
Edward I (1239-1307): Topic
King of England (1272-1307); son of Henry III. He conquered Wales (1284) but failed to subdue Scotland.
Edward II (1284-1327): Topic
King of England (1307-27); son of Edward I. He invaded Scotland but was defeated by Robert Bruce at Bannockburn (1314). He was deposed by his wife Isabella and Roger Mortimer; died in prison.
Edward, the Black Prince (1330-1376): Topic
Eldest son of Edward III of England. He was created duke of Cornwall in 1337, the first duke to be created in England.
Simon de Montfort (1208-1265): Topic
Leader of the baronial revolt against Henry III of England. He was born in France, the son of Simon de Montfort, leader of the Albigensian Crusade. After his father's death, he received the claim to the earldom of Leicester, inherited from his grandmother.

Civil War & Revolution (1603 - 1660)

Battle of Marston Moor
From Brewer's Britain and Ireland
(2 July 1644). One of the most decisive engagements in the Civil Wars, in which the Royalists under Prince Rupert and the Earl of Newcastle were defeated by the Parliamentarians under the Earl of Manchester and Lord Fairfax and their Scots allies under Lord Leven.
Charles I (1600-1649): Topic
Charles was born in Dunfermline, the son of James VI of Scotland (later James I of England) and Anne of Denmark. He suffered from childhood frailty, which meant he had to crawl on his hands and knees until the age of seven, but overcame this to become a skilled tilter and marksman.
Gunpowder Plot
From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Conspiracy to blow up the English Parliament and King James I on Nov. 5, 1605, the day set for the king to open Parliament.
Guy Fawkes (1570-1606): Topic
English conspirator in the Gunpowder Plot to blow up King James I and the members of both Houses of Parliament. Fawkes, a Roman Catholic convert, was arrested in the cellar underneath the House of Lords on 4 November 1605, tortured, and executed.
James Stuart (1688-1766): Topic
Claimant to the British throne, son of James II and Mary of Modena; called the Old Pretender. His birth, falsely rumored by Whigs at the time to be supposititious (i.e., of other parents than professed), helped to precipitate the Glorious Revolution of 1688.

Restoration & Rebellion (1660 - 1714)

Charles II (1630-1685): Topic
From Chambers Biographical Dictionary
King of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1660-85). When his father was executed in 1649, Charles was proclaimed monarch by Scotland; on arriving in Edinburgh he agreed to the Presbyterian Covenant and, despite the failure of his forces to defeat Oliver Cromwell at Dunbar, he was crowned at Scone on 1 January 1651.
Jacobites
From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Adherents of the exiled branch of the house of Stuart who sought to restore James II and his descendants to the English and Scottish thrones after the Glorious Revolution of 1688. They take their name from the Latin form (Jacobus) of the name James.
James II (1633-1701)
In The Columbia Encyclopedia
King of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1685–88); second son of Charles I, brother and successor of Charles II.
Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658): Topic
English general and statesman. A convinced Puritan, he was an effective leader of the parliamentary army in the Civil War.
Queen Anne (1665-1714)
From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Queen of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1702–7), later queen of Great Britain and Ireland (1707–14), daughter of James II and Anne Hyde; successor to William III.
Richard Cromwell (1626-1712)
From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Lord protector of England; third son of Oliver Cromwell. He was the eldest surviving son at the death of his father (Sept. 3, 1658), who had nominated him as his successor.
The Protectorate
From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
Period of English history, 1653–59, when England was ruled by a Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell (1653–58) and his son Richard Cromwell (1658–59). In 1660 Parliament invited Charles II to return, resulting in the Restoration of the British monarchy.