A History of Britain covers the history of the British Isles from pre-historic times to the death of Queen Elizabeth I. The book is split into seven manageable chunks:
- Pre-history to King Alfred
- The arrival of the vikings to the Norman conquest
- The Plantagenets up to the Magna Carta
- The relationships of the first three King Edwards with Wales, Scotland and Ireland
- The Black Death and its impact on England up to the time of Richard III
- The Tudors and the Reformation
- Queen Elizabeth I
Although the book is called A History of Britain, it really should have been called A History of England. Aside from chapter 4, entitled Aliens and Natives, there’s little mention of the other countries that make up the United Kingdom. Mary, Queen of Scots, gets reasonable coverage, but she was a notable figure during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. If the other countries, particularly Scotland, had been given fuller coverage the book would have been at least 50% longer.
A History of Britain is the book that accompanied the BBC tv series of that name. It’s a reasonable introduction to the history of England, although not all of English history gets the same depth of coverage. There’s a comprehensive bibliography at the back, arranged according to the chapters for anybody who wants to explore a particular historical period in more depth.
If you want to learn about the early history of England, A History of Britain is OK as far as it goes. If you want to know about the histories of Wales, Scotland or Ireland, I would recommend looking for books on those countries.
