This is a list of wars involving the Kingdom of England before the creation of the Kingdom of Great Britain by the Acts of Union 1707. For dates after 1708, see List of wars involving the United Kingdom.
*e.g. a treaty or peace without a clear result, status quo ante bellum , result of civil or internal conflict, result unknown or indecisive, inconclusive
Start | End | Name of conflict | Belligerents | Outcome | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
England & allies | England's opposition | ||||
927 | 937 | Æthelstan's invasion of Scotland | England Deheubarth Gwynedd Kingdom of Gwent | Scotland Norse-Gaels Kingdom of Strathclyde Kingdom of Dublin | Stalemate |
946 | 954 | Northumbria's war of independence | England Earl of Bamburgh | Northumbria | Victory
|
1016 | 1016 | Cnut the Great's invasion of England | England | Kingdom of Denmark Cnut the Great | Defeat
|
1026 | 1026 | Battle of Helgeå | Kingdom of England | Sweden Norway | Victory
|
1066 | 1066 | Battle of Stamford Bridge | England | Kingdom of Norway | Victory
|
1066 | 1066 | Battle of Hastings | England | Duchy of Normandy William of Normandy | Defeat
|
1067 | 1081 | Norman invasion of Wales | England | Welsh kingdoms | Defeat
|
1075 | 1075 | Revolt of the Earls | William I of England | Three earls | Internal Conflict, William was Victorious
|
1096 | 1099 | First Crusade | England Holy Roman Empire Kingdom of France Duchy of Apulia Byzantine Empire | Great Seljuq Empire Danishmends Fatimid Caliphate Almoravids | Victory
|
Start | End | Name of conflict | Belligerents | Outcome | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
England & allies | England's opposition | ||||
1145 | 1149 | Second Crusade | England (Holy land Crusade) Kingdom of Jerusalem (Holy land Crusade) Kingdom of France (Iberian and Holy Land Crusade) Holy Roman Empire (Wendish and Holy Land Crusade) Kingdom of Portugal (Iberian Crusade) Castile (Iberian Crusade) County of Barcelona (Iberian Crusade) León (Iberian Crusade) Byzantine Empire (Holy land Crusade) Kingdom of Denmark (Wendish Crusade) Duchy of Poland (Wendish Crusade) Kingdom of Sicily (Holy land Crusade) | Sultanate of Rum (Holy Land Crusade) Almoravids (Iberian Crusade) Almohads (Iberian Crusade) Zengids (Holy Land Crusade) Abbasids (Holy Land Crusade) Fatimids (Holy Land Crusade) Obotrite Confederacy (Wendish Crusade) | Partial Crusader Victory
|
1189 | 1192 | Third Crusade | England Kingdom of Jerusalem France Holy Roman Empire | Ayyubids Zengids Sultanate of Rum Byzantine Empire | Partial Crusader victory |
Start | End | Name of conflict | Belligerents | Outcome | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
England & allies | England's opposition | ||||
1470 | 1474 | Anglo-Hanseatic War | England | Hanseatic League | Defeat, Hanseatic victory |
1496 | 1498 | Italian War of 1494–1498 (1494–1498) | League of Venice: Papal States | Kingdom of France | Victory
|
Start | End | Name of conflict | Belligerents | Outcome | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
England & allies | England's opposition | ||||
1602 | 1661 | Dutch-Portuguese War (1602–1661) | Dutch Republic England (until 1640) Johor Sultanate Kingdom of Kandy Kingdom of Kongo Kingdom of Ndongo | Kingdom of Portugal Crown of Castile (until 1640) Kingdom of Cochin Potiguara Tupis | Stalemate
|
1625 | 1630 | Anglo-Spanish War (1625–1630) | England Support: | Spain | Status quo ante bellum
|
1627 | 1629 | Anglo-French War (1627–1629) | England | France | Status quo ante bellum |
1640 | 1668 | Portuguese Restoration War | Kingdom of Portugal France England | Crown of Spain | Victory
|
1652 | 1654 | First Anglo-Dutch War | Commonwealth of England | Dutch Republic | Victory |
1654 | 1660 | Anglo-Spanish War (1654–1660) | Commonwealth of England France (1657–59) | Spain Royalists of the British Isles | Victory |
1661 | 1665 | Dano-Dutch War | England Denmark–Norway | Dutch Republic | Victory
|
1665 | 1667 | Second Anglo-Dutch War | England Bishopric of Münster | Dutch Republic Denmark France | Defeat
|
1672 | 1674 | Third Anglo-Dutch War | England France Bishopric of Münster Electorate of Cologne | Dutch Republic Denmark-Norway | Status quo ante bellum
|
1672 | 1678 | Franco-Dutch War | England (1672–74) France | England (1678) Dutch Republic | Major French territorial gains
|
1686 | 1690 | Anglo-Mughal War | England East India Company | Mughal Empire | Defeat
|
1687 | 1688 | Anglo-Siamese War | England East India Company | Kingdom of Ayutthaya (Siam) (Unauthorised piracy by English sailors under Siamese employ) • English defectors | Inconclusive English factory rejected from Siam, after minor naval action, along with massacre in the aftermath: the war was not pursued. In 1688, a coup forced the closure of all official European trade in Siam for 150 years except for the Dutch. |
1688 | 1697 | Nine Years' War | Grand Alliance : Dutch Republic England Holy Roman Empire Spanish Empire Duchy of Savoy Swedish Empire (until 1691) Scotland | France Jacobites | Treaty of Ryswick
|
Start | End | Name of conflict | Belligerents | Outcome | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
England & allies | England's opposition | ||||
1700 | 1721 | The Great Northern War (1700–1721) | England (until 1707) Great Britain (from 1707) | Tsardom of Russia Cossack Hetmanate | Inconclusive for England
Russian Allied victory:
|
1701 | 1714 | War of the Spanish Succession | England (until 1707) Great Britain (from 1707) Austrian monarchy Dutch Republic Holy Roman Empire Piedmont-Savoy Prussia Habsburg Spain Kingdom of Portugal | France Spanish monarchy Bavaria (~1704) Cologne Mantua (~1708) | Victory
|
Start | End | Name of conflict | Belligerents | Outcome | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
English Government | Rebels | ||||
1069 | 1070 | Harrying of the North | William I of England | House of Wessex | Internal Conflict, William was Victorious An uprising which started 4 years after the Norman Conquest. Edgar Ætheling, the grandson of Edmund Ironside and the last notable heir to the House of Wessex, fought with the support of the King of Denmark Sweyn II, Anglo-Saxons, and Anglo-Scandinavians. It ended in defeat for the Anglo-Saxons & Anglo-Scandinavians. William the Conqueror paid Sweyn and his Danish fleet to go home, but the remaining rebels refused to meet him in battle, and he decided to starve them out by laying waste to the northern shires using scorched earth tactics. The Norman campaign to reconquer Northern England resulted in a genocide against the people living there. |
1070 | 1071 | Ely Rebellion | William I of England | King of Denmark Sweyn II Hereward the Wake Morcar Bishop Aethelwine of Durham | Internal Conflict, William Victorius An anti-Norman insurrection centred on the Isle of Ely. The Danish king Sweyn Estrithson sent a small army to try to establish a camp on the Isle of Ely. The Isle became a refuge for Anglo-Saxon forces under Earl Morcar, Bishop Aethelwine of Durham and Hereward the Wake in 1071. [4] The area was taken by William the Conqueror only after a prolonged struggle. [5] |
1088 | 1088 | Rebellion of 1088 | England William Rufus | Duchy of Normandy Robert Curthose | Internal Conflict, William Rufus Victorius |
1135 | 1154 | The Anarchy | Supporters of Stephen of Blois | Supporters of Empress Matilda and Henry Curtmantle | Civil War
|
1173 | 1174 | Revolt of 1173–74 | English royalists | English rebels Kingdom of France Kingdom of Scotland County of Flanders County of Boulogne Duchy of Brittany | Internal Conflict
|
1215 | 1217 | First Barons' War | England | Rebel Barons France | Civil War, Angevinian victory
|
1264 | 1267 | Second Barons' War | English royalists | Rebel barons | Civil War, Royalist victory
|
1264 | 1267 | Welsh Uprising (1282) | English royalists | Dafydd ap Gruffydd | Internal Conflict, Royalist victory |
1321 | 1322 | Despenser War | England | Contrariants Supported by: Kingdom of Scotland | Civil War, Decisive Royal victory
|
1326 | 1326 | Invasion of England (1326) | Royal government Edward II ( POW ) | Contrariants Supported by: | Civil War, Contrariants' victory Continuation of the Despenser War. Isabella of France, and her lover, Roger Mortimers invasion led to:
|
1381 | 1381 | Peasants' Revolt | Royal government | Rebel forces | Internal Conflict, Royal government victorious
|
1400 | 1415 | Glyndŵr Rising Part of the Hundred Years' War | England | Welsh rebels Kingdom of France | Internal Conflict, Total English victory |
1455 | 1485 | Wars of the Roses | House of York Supported by: | House of Lancaster House of Tudor Supported by: | Civil War, Victory for the House of Lancaster and their allies
|
1497 | 1497 | Cornish Rebellion of 1497 | England | Cornish rebels | Internal Conflict, English victory |
1549 | 1549 | Prayer Book Rebellion | England Edward VI | Southwestern Catholic Rebels Sir Humphrey Arundell | Internal Conflict, Edwardian victory
|
1639 | 1651 | Wars of the Three Kingdoms | Royalists | Parliamentarians Scottish Covenanters | Civil War, Parliamentarian victory Bishops' Wars (1639)
Second Bishops' War (1640)
First English Civil War (1642–46)
Irish Confederate Wars (1642–48)
Scotland in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms (1644–47)
Second English Civil War (1648)
Cromwellian conquest of Ireland (1649)
Third English Civil War (1650–1652)
|
1685 | 1685 | Monmouth Rebellion | Royal army of James II | Rebel army of Duke of Monmouth | Internal Conflict, Victory for James II |
1688 | 1689 | Glorious Revolution | James II | William of Orange Dutch military forces British military forces | Internal Conflict
|
1689 | 1746 | Jacobite Rebellions | England (until 1707) Great Britain (from 1707) | Jacobites | Civil War, Royalist victory in England, Scotland and Ireland
|
The territory today known as England became inhabited more than 800,000 years ago, as the discovery of stone tools and footprints at Happisburgh in Norfolk have indicated. The earliest evidence for early modern humans in Northwestern Europe, a jawbone discovered in Devon at Kents Cavern in 1927, was re-dated in 2011 to between 41,000 and 44,000 years old. Continuous human habitation in England dates to around 13,000 years ago, at the end of the Last Glacial Period. The region has numerous remains from the Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age, such as Stonehenge and Avebury. In the Iron Age, all of Britain south of the Firth of Forth was inhabited by the Celtic people known as the Britons, including some Belgic tribes in the south east. In AD 43 the Roman conquest of Britain began; the Romans maintained control of their province of Britannia until the early 5th century.
Henry VII, also known as Henry Tudor, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizure of the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death in 1509. He was the first monarch of the House of Tudor.
The House of Tudor was an English and Welsh dynasty that held the throne of England from 1485 to 1603. They descended from the Tudors of Penmynydd, a Welsh noble family, and Catherine of Valois. The Tudor monarchs ruled the Kingdom of England and the Lordship of Ireland for 118 years with five monarchs: Henry VII, Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I. The Tudors succeeded the House of Plantagenet as rulers of the Kingdom of England, and were succeeded by the Scottish House of Stuart. The first Tudor monarch, Henry VII, descended through his mother from the House of Beaufort, a legitimised branch of the English royal House of Lancaster, a cadet house of the Plantagenets. The Tudor family rose to power and started the Tudor period in the wake of the Wars of the Roses (1455–1487), which left the main House of Lancaster extinct in the male line.
The Battle of Stoke Field, which took place at East Stoke, Nottinghamshire, on 16 June 1487, may be considered the last battle of the Wars of the Roses, since it was the last major engagement between contenders for the throne whose claims derived from descent from the houses of Lancaster and York. The Battle of Bosworth Field, two years previously, had established Henry VII on the throne, ending the last period of Yorkist rule and initiating that of the Tudors. The Battle of Stoke Field was the decisive engagement in an attempt by leading Ricardian Yorkists to unseat the King in favour of the pretender Lambert Simnel.
The House of Lancaster was a cadet branch of the royal House of Plantagenet. The first house was created when King Henry III of England created the Earldom of Lancaster—from which the house was named—for his second son Edmund Crouchback in 1267. Edmund had already been created Earl of Leicester in 1265 and was granted the lands and privileges of Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester, after de Montfort's death and attainder at the end of the Second Barons' War. When Edmund's son Thomas, 2nd Earl of Lancaster, inherited his father-in-law's estates and title of Earl of Lincoln he became at a stroke the most powerful nobleman in England, with lands throughout the kingdom and the ability to raise vast private armies to wield power at national and local levels. This brought him—and Henry, his younger brother—into conflict with their cousin King Edward II, leading to Thomas's execution. Henry inherited Thomas's titles and he and his son, who was also called Henry, gave loyal service to Edward's son King Edward III.
The Kingdom of Ireland was a dependent territory of England and then of Great Britain from 1542 to the end of 1800. It was ruled by the monarchs of England and then of Great Britain, and was administered from Dublin Castle by a viceroy appointed by the English king: the Lord Deputy of Ireland. Aside from brief periods, the state was dominated by the Protestant English minority. The Protestant Church of Ireland was the state church. The Parliament of Ireland was composed of Anglo-Irish nobles. From 1661, the administration controlled an Irish army. Although styled a kingdom, for most of its history it was, de facto, an English dependency. This status was enshrined in Poynings' Law and in the Declaratory Act 1719.
Arthur, Prince of Wales, was the eldest son of King Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York, and an older brother to the future King Henry VIII. He was Duke of Cornwall from birth, and he was created Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester in 1489. As the heir apparent of his father, Arthur was viewed by contemporaries as the great hope of the newly established House of Tudor. His mother was the daughter of the Yorkist king, Edward IV, and his birth cemented the union between the House of Lancaster and the House of York.
The Kingdom of England was a sovereign state on the island of Great Britain from the early tenth century, when it was unified from various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, until 1 May 1707, when it united with Scotland to form the Kingdom of Great Britain, which would later become the United Kingdom. The Kingdom of England was among the most powerful states in Europe during the medieval and early modern periods.
The Wars of the Three Kingdoms were a series of conflicts fought between 1639 and 1653 in the kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland, then separate entities in a personal union under Charles I. They include the 1639 to 1640 Bishops' Wars, the First and Second English Civil Wars, the Irish Confederate Wars, the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland and the Anglo-Scottish War of 1650–1652. They resulted in the execution of Charles I, the abolition of monarchy, and founding of the Commonwealth of England, a unitary state which controlled the British Isles until the Stuart Restoration in 1660.
Early modern Britain is the history of the island of Great Britain roughly corresponding to the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries. Major historical events in early modern British history include numerous wars, especially with France, along with the English Renaissance, the English Reformation and Scottish Reformation, the English Civil War, the Restoration of Charles II, the Glorious Revolution, the Treaty of Union, the Scottish Enlightenment and the formation and the collapse of the First British Empire.
In England and Wales, the Tudor period occurred between 1485 and 1603, including the Elizabethan era during the reign of Elizabeth I (1558–1603). The Tudor period coincides with the dynasty of the House of Tudor in England, which began with the reign of Henry VII. Under the Tudor dynasty, art, architecture, trade, exploration, and commerce flourished. Historian John Guy (1988) argued that "England was economically healthier, more expensive, and more optimistic under the Tudors" than at any time since the Roman occupation.
The Anglo-Scottish Wars comprise the various battles which continued to be fought between the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland from the time of the Wars of Independence in the early 14th century through to the latter years of the 16th century.
The 1583 Throckmorton Plot was one of a series of attempts by English Roman Catholics to depose Elizabeth I of England and replace her with Mary, Queen of Scots, then held under house arrest in England. The alleged objective was to facilitate a Spanish invasion of England, assassinate Elizabeth, and put Mary on the English throne.
The military history of England and Wales deals with the period prior to the creation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707.(for the period after 1707, see Military history of the United Kingdom)
The Hundred Years' War was a conflict between the kingdoms of England and France and a civil war in France during the Late Middle Ages. It emerged from feudal disputes over the Duchy of Aquitaine and was triggered by a claim to the French throne made by Edward III of England. The war grew into a broader military, economic, and political struggle involving factions from across Western Europe, fuelled by emerging nationalism on both sides. The periodisation of the war typically charts it as taking place over 116 years. However, it was an intermittent conflict which was frequently interrupted by external factors, such as the Black Death, and several years of truces.
Invasions of the British Isles have occurred several times throughout their history. The British Isles have been subject to several waves of invasion and settlement since humans began inhabiting the region approximately 900,000 years ago during the Paleolithic. Notable invasions of the British Isles including the Roman conquest of Britain, Viking expansion, the Norman Conquest, the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland and the Glorious Revolution.
The Wars of the Roses, known at the time and in following centuries as the Civil Wars, were a series of civil wars fought over control of the English throne from 1455 to 1487. The wars were fought between supporters of the House of Lancaster and House of York, two rival cadet branches of the royal House of Plantagenet. The conflict resulted in the end of Lancaster's male line in 1471, leaving the Tudor family to inherit their claim to the throne through the female line. Conflict was largely brought to an end upon the union of the two houses through marriage, creating the Tudor dynasty that would subsequently rule England.
The Malus Intercursus was a commercial treaty signed in April 1506 by King Henry VII of England and Duke Philip IV of Burgundy. The treaty was signed while Philip was stranded in England, after surviving a shipwreck.