British key dates

1066 A.D. – the Norman invasion. Magna Carta (a political agreement between a king and nobles.
1200-ies – Cambridge and Oxford were founded.
1258 – the first Parliament was elected.
1455-1485 – The War of the Roses (Red – Lancasters, white – Yorks)
1476 – William Caxton invented the printing press.
1485-1603 – Tudor dynasty
1534 – England breaks away from the Catholic church. The Reformation under Henry VIII.

1558-1603 – Elizabeth I. Spanish Armada was defeated. The first American colonies. The East Indian Company was founded (spice and tea trade).
1564-1616 – William Shakespeare.
1620 – some religious nonconformists left Britain for America (Mayflower)
1645 – Oliver Cromwell, the leader of English revolution, executed the King and declared a Republic.
Coffeehouses for the rich and alehouses (pubs) for the poor appeared.
1665 – Great Plague in London
1666 – the Great Fire of London. Sir Isaac Newton began to study gravity.

1730-ies – the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
1773 – the loss of the American colonies.
1805 – the battle of Trafalgar. Admiral Nelson defeated French Fleet.
1819-1901 – Queen Victoria (63 years on the throne). The British Empire took control of much of the world.
1845-1847 – the Irish Potato Famine, a great wave of Irish immigration to the USA