British military history

British military history is a long and varied topic, extending from the prehistoric and ancient historic period, through the Roman invasions of Julius Cæsar and Claudius and subsequent Roman occupation; warfare in the Mediaeval period, including the invasions of the Saxons and the Vikings in the Dark Ages, the Norman Conquest, and wars against France; through the Early Modern period, wars against Spain and France, and the English Civil War, and the beginnings of the colonial British Empire in India, the USA and Canada; and into the Modern period with the wars of Marlborough and against Napoleon, the Crimean War and into the 20th century with the Boer War, World War I and World War II, the Cold War the Korean War; and, most recently, the Falklands War and military operations in the Balkans and the Middle East.

List of British military encounters

Viking invasions (793–1066)
- Raid on Lindisfarne (793)
- Campaign of Alfred the Great (871–899)
  - Battle of Edington (878)
- Battle of Cannington (878)
- Battle of Stamford Bridge (1066)
Norman Conquest (1066)
- Battle of Hastings (1066) – last successful invasion of the British Isles by a foreign force
Rebellion of 1088
Revolt of 1173–1174
Third Crusade (1189)
Welsh Uprising of 1211
Battle of Bouvines (1214) – loss of Normandy
First Barons' War (1215–1217)
Second Barons' War (1264–1267)
Welsh Uprising of 1282
Wars of Scottish Independence (1296–1333)
Hundred Years' War (1337 to 1453)
- Battle of Agincourt (1415)
Wars of the Roses (1455–1485)
- Battle of Bosworth Field (1485) – Richard III was the last British king to die in combat

Italian Wars (1494 – 1559)
Loss of Calais (1558) – then England's last continental possession
Eighty Years' War (1598–1648)
- Spanish Armada (1588)
Wars of the Three Kingdoms (1639–1651)
- Bishops' Wars (1639–1640)
- English Civil War (1642–1651)
- Scottish Civil War (1644–1645)
- Cromwellian conquest of Ireland (1649)
First Anglo-Dutch War (1652–1654)
Anglo-Spanish War (1654–1660)
Second Anglo-Dutch War (1665–1667)
War of Devolution (1667–1668)
Third Anglo-Dutch War (1672–1674)
King Philip's War (1675–1676)
Monmouth Rebellion (1685)
- Battle of Sedgemoor (1685)
War of the Grand Alliance (or King William's War) (1688–1697)
Jacobite Rebellions (1689–1746)
- Battle of Preston (1715)
- Clifton Moor, near Penrith (1745) – last battle on English soil
- Battle of Culloden (1746) – last battle on the British mainland
Battle of the Boyne (1690) – last battle between two rival claimants for the throne
War of the Spanish Succession (1702–1713)
- Queen Anne's War (1702–1713)
War of Jenkins' Ear (1739–1742)
War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748)
Seven Years' War (1756–1763) – the first "world war"
Fourth Anglo-Dutch War (1780–1784)