Europe · The early medieval west
Kingdom of England
drawn on the map AD 936–1017, 1046–1071, 1210–1652, 1662–1708
The Kingdom of England was a sovereign state from 927, when Æthelstan united the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and conquered Viking York; the Latin style Rex Anglorum ("King of the English") was first used of him in a charter of 928. (Alfred had earlier adopted "King of the Anglo-Saxons" c. 886.)
- Shown on the map
- AD 936–1017, 1046–1071, 1210–1652, 1662–1708 (4 periods)
- Peak area
- 345k km²
- Region
- Europe
Creation and span
The Kingdom of England was a sovereign state from 927, when Æthelstan united the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and conquered Viking York; the Latin style Rex Anglorum ("King of the English") was first used of him in a charter of 928. (Alfred had earlier adopted "King of the Anglo-Saxons" c. 886.) The gathering at Eamont Bridge on 12 July 927, at which British rulers recognised Æthelstan, is a conventional foundation moment. England existed as a kingdom until the Union of 1707.
Great turning points
In 1016 England became part of Cnut the Great's North Sea Empire (with Denmark and Norway). The Norman Conquest followed the death of Edward the Confessor: William, Duke of Normandy, defeated Harold II at the Battle of Hastings (14 October 1066). The Angevin/Plantagenet period saw the sealing of Magna Carta by King John (15 June 1215). Later came the Hundred Years' War with France (1337–1453), the dynastic Wars of the Roses (1455–1487), the Tudors and the English Reformation (break with Rome, Act of Supremacy 1534), the annexation of Wales (Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542), the Union of the Crowns (1603), the English Civil War (1642–1651) and the Commonwealth/Restoration, the Glorious Revolution (1688), and finally the Acts of Union (1 May 1707) creating Great Britain.
Common questions
- What was the Kingdom of England?
- The Kingdom of England was a sovereign state from 927, when Æthelstan united the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and conquered Viking York; the Latin style Rex Anglorum ("King of the English") was first used of him in a charter of 928. (Alfred had earlier adopted "King of the Anglo-Saxons" c. 886.)
- When is the Kingdom of England shown on the map?
- The border data draws the Kingdom of England AD 936–1017, 1046–1071, 1210–1652, 1662–1708, in 4 separate periods. The source samples borders at fixed dates, so a span can begin late or run on past the end.
- How large was the Kingdom of England?
- At its greatest extent drawn on this map, the Kingdom of England covered about 345,000 km². That is the largest area the border data gives it across the years it is drawn, not necessarily its greatest extent in history.
Sources
This compendium cites its sources once for the whole document rather than per territory. Its bibliography names the English Wikipedia articles for each kingdom as the primary basis, with Encyclopædia Britannica, the World History Encyclopedia, national heritage bodies (Historic Environment Wales and Scotland, the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust), museum sources and the Dictionary of Irish Biography, read against the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Bede and the Irish annals with their own biases. The article this entry is anchored on:
- Wikipedia — Kingdom of England en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_England
This entry was last updated .
This entry was researched and drafted with AI from the sources above, and has not been reviewed by a historian. How entries are made
Text available under CC BY-SA 4.0: reuse it with a credit to The World Through Time and a link to this page. Passages drawing on the Wikipedia articles listed above are also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by their contributors.
Border geometry for the map itself comes from Cliopatria v0.12 (Seshat Global History Databank, CC-BY-4.0).
Further reading in Knowledge
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