4 ‘Freedom: The Pursuit of Liberty’ is about the fight for individual freedom and the development of British democracy.
5 ‘Ingenuity: Britain’s Innovations’ lists some of the nation’s most important scientific, cultural and social changes.
So why choose these fifty things in particular? The events in this book are not the only fifty things you need to know about British history. They are what I, and the producers of the television series, think are fifty of the most important things. Some people will say that we should have excluded some and included others. That’s fine: history is not a perfect science and the differing judgements of individuals are just one of the things that make it interesting. ‘History,’ as the historian Hugh Trevor-Roper said, ‘is too subtle a process to be firmly seized or summarily decided.’
This book is meant for everyone who is interested in history but is frightened of the fog. The ‘Fifty Things’ it describes will, I hope, provide a clear picture of the most important events in British history and how they fit together to create the nation we live in today.
| 3100–2200 BC | Stonehenge |
| 43 AD | The Roman invasion of Britain |
| 597 | Saint Augustine Arrives in Britain |
| 871 | Alfred the Great Becomes King of Wessex |
| 1066 | The Battle of Hastings |
| 1215 | Signing of Magna Carta |
| 1381 | The Peasants’ Revolt |
| 1387 | Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales |
| 1415 | The Battle of Agincourt |
| 1485 | The Battle of Bosworth |
| 1536 | The Dissolution of the Monasteries |
| 1564 | The Birth of William Shakespeare |
| 1577–1580 | Sir Francis Drake and the Circumnavigation of the Globe |
| 1588 | The Spanish Armada |
| 1605 | The Gunpowder Plot |
| 1611 | The Authorised Version of the Bible is published |
| 1620 | The Voyage of the Pilgrim Fathers |
| 1645 | The Battle of Naseby |
| 1649 | The Execution of Charles I |
| 1688–1689 | The Glorious Revolution and the Bill of Rights |
| 1694 | The Foundation of the Bank of England |
| 1704 | The Battle of Blenheim |
| 1707 | The Act of Union |
| 1711–1720 | The South Sea Bubble |
| 1714 | The Longitude Act |
| 1721 | Sir Robert Walpole Becomes Prime Minister |
| 1757 | The Battle of Plassey |
| 1769 | James Watt Patents his Steam Engine Condenser |
| 1776 | Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations is published |
| 1781 | The Surrender of the British Army at Yorktown, Virginia |
| 1805 | The Battle of Trafalgar |
| 1815 | The Battle of Waterloo |
| 1829 | The Metropolitan Police Act |
| 1832 | The Great Reform Act |
| 1833 | The Abolition of Slavery |
| 1842 | The Afghanistan Massacre |
| 1855 | The Discovery of the Victoria Falls by David Livingstone |
| 1859 | Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species is published |
| 1863 | The Football Association publishes ‘The Laws of Football’ |
| 1886 | The Irish Home Rule Bill |
| 1903 | The Foundation of the Women’s Social and Political Union |
| 1916 | The Battle of the Somme |
| 1927 | The Foundation of the British Broadcasting Corporation |
| 1930 | Frank Whittle Designs the First Turbo Jet Engine |
| 1940 | The Battle of Britain |
| 1947 | The Partition of India |
| 1948 |
The Arrival
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