"In the first place, history offers a storehouse of information about how people and societies behave. Understanding the operations of people and societies is difficult, though a number of disciplines make the attempt. How can we evaluate war if the nation is at peace—unless we use historical materials? How can we understand genius, the influence of technological innovation, or the role that beliefs play in shaping family life, if we don't use what we know about experiences in the past? The past causes the present, and so the future. Any time we try to know why something happened—whether a shift in political party dominance in the American Congress, a major change in the teenage suicide rate, or a war in the Balkans or the Middle East—we have to look for factors that took shape earlier. Only through studying history can we grasp how things change; only through history can we begin to comprehend the factors that cause change; and only through history can we understand what elements of an institution or a society persist despite change.
British history
Prehistoric Britain (500 BC – 100 BC). In the Bronze Age Beaker pottery appears in England along with flat axes and burial practices of inhumation. Beaker techniques brought to Britain the skill of refining metal. Around 2,150 BC smiths had discovered how to make bronze by mixing copper with a small amount of tin. With this discovery, the Bronze Age arrived in Britain. Over the next thousand years, bronze gradually replaced stone as the main material for tool and weapon making. The Celts were an group of tribal societies in Bronze Age, Iron Age and Medieval Europe who spoke Celtic languages and had a similar culture. Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument located in the England . Stonehenge is composed of a circular setting of large standing stones set within earthworks. Stonehenge was produced by a culture that left no written records. Many aspects of Stonehenge remain subject to debate. A number of myths surround the stones.
Roman Britain (55 – 410 BC) – Roman Britain, referred to by the Romans as Britannia, was the part of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire. Before the Roman invasion, begun in AD 43, Iron Age Britain already had established cultural and economic links with Continental Europe, but the Roman invaders introduced new developments in agriculture, urbanisation, industry and architecture. the first significant campaign of conquest began in the reign of the Emperor Claudius. The Romans demarcated the northern border of Britannia with Hadrian's Wall(a defensive fortification in Roman Britain. Begun during the rule of emperor Hadrian).Celts were pagans. However, under Roman rule the Britons continued to worship native Celtic deities, but often conflated with their Roman equivalents. It is not clear when or how Christianity came to Britain. Archaeological evidence for Christian communities begins to appear in the 3rd and 4th centuries.
The Anglo Saxons and the Vikings (5th – 11th century) Anglo-Saxon England is the period of the history lasting from the end of Roman occupation until the Norman conquest of England in 1066 by William the Conqueror. Until the 9th century Anglo-Saxon England was dominated by the Heptarchy. Facing the threat of Viking invasions, the House of Wessex became dominant during the 9th century, under the rule of Alfred the Great. Alfred successfully defended his kingdom against the Viking attempt at conquest. Edward the Confessor was one of the last Anglo-Saxon. He restored the rule of the House of Wessex after the period of Danish rule. When Edward died in 1066 he was succeeded by Harold Godwinson, who was defeated and killed in the same year by the Normans under William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings.So William became the first norman king of England."