Anglobilia all about England

England's History : Early History to 1066

Early History

Archaeological evidence indicates that southern England was colonised by humans long before the rest of the British Isles due its more hospitable climate between and during the various ice ages of the distant past. The first historical mention of the region is from the Massaliote Periplus a sailing manual for merchants thought to date to the sixth century BC although cultural and trade links with the continent had existed for millennia prior to this.

Enjoy learning the history of England?  Read about computer history and see how far our technology has come.  Learn everything from baseball history to how medicine was discovered.

The Romans 55BC - 410AD

The Britons were significant players in continental politics and supported their allies in Gaul militarily during the Gallic Wars with the Roman Republic. This prompted the Romans to invade and subdue the island, first with Julius Caesar's raid in 55 BC, and then the Emperor Claudius' conquest in the following century. The whole southern part of the island — roughly corresponding to modern day England and Wales — became a prosperous part of the Roman Empire.

Invasions 410 - 1066

In the wake of the Romans, who abandoned the south of the island by 410 in order to concentrate on more pressing difficulties closer to home, what is now England was progressively settled by successive, and often complementary waves of Germanic tribesmen. Among them were the Angles, Saxons and Jutes together with undoubtedly large numbers of Frisians and Ripuarian Franks who had been partly displaced on mainland Europe. Increasingly the Romano-British population was assimilated, a process enabled due to a lack of clear unity by the native inhabitants against a unified armed foe, and the culture pushed westwards and northwards. The settlement of England is known as the Saxon Conquest or the Anglo-Saxon.

In the decisive Battle of Deorham, in 577, the native people of Southern Britain were separated into the West Welsh (Cornwall and Devon) and the Welsh by the advancing Saxons.

Beginning with the raid in 793 on the monastery at Lindisfarne, Vikings made many raids on England.

The Saxons founded a settlement beside the River Sheaf, which was called Scafield or Escafeld (later to become Sheffield in South Yorkshire) and it was at Dore (now a suburb of the modern city) that Egbert of Wessex received the submission of Eanred of Northumbria in 829 and so became the first Saxon overlord of all England.

Having started with plundering raids, the Vikings later began to settle in England and trade, eventually ruling the Danelaw from the late 9th century. There are many traces of Vikings in England today, for instance many words in the English language; the similarity of Old English and Old Norse led to much borrowing. One Viking settlement was in York (which they called Jorvik).

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the Wikipedia articles "History of England" and "England".