Britain by the 16th century, the Renaissance in culture and sciences.
The English Renaissance was a cultural and artistic movement in England dating from the early 16th century to the early 17th century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that many cultural historians believe originated in northern Italy in the 14th century. This era in English cultural history is sometimes referred to as "the age of Shakespeare" or "the Elizabethan era", the first period in English and British history to be named after a reigning monarch. Poets such as Edmund Spenser and John Milton produced works that demonstrated an increased interest in understanding English Christian beliefs, such as the allegorical representation of the Tudor Dynasty in The Faerie Queen and the retelling of mankind’s fall from paradise in Paradise Lost; playwrights, such as Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare, composed theatrical representations of the English take on life, death, and history. Nearing the end of the Tudor Dynasty, philosophers like Sir Thomas More and Sir Francis Bacon published their own ideas about humanity and the aspects of a perfect society, pushing the limits of metacognition at that time. England came closer to reaching modern science with the Baconian Method, a forerunner of the Scientific Method. Marie Boas Hall coined the term Scientific Renaissance to designate the early phase of the Scientific Revolution. More recently, Peter Dear has argued for a two-phase model of early modern science: a Scientific Renaissance of the 15th and 16th centuries, focused on the restoration of the natural knowledge of the ancients; and a Scientific Revolution of the 17th century, when scientists shifted from recovery to innovation.
The great Empire: Britain in the 17th century.
In 1603, King James VI of Scotland ascended to the English throne and in 1604 negotiated the Treaty of London, ending hostilities with Spain. Now at peace with its main rival, English attention shifted from preying on other nations' colonial infrastructure to the business of establishing its own overseas colonies. The British Empire began to take shape during the early 17th century, with the English settlement of North America and the smaller islands of the Caribbean, and the establishment of a private company, the English East India Company, to trade with Asia. This period, until the loss of the Thirteen Colonies after the American War of Independence towards the end of the 18th century, has subsequently been referred to as the "First British Empire". The Caribbean initially provided England's most important and lucrative colonies, but not before several attempts at colonisation failed. An attempt to establish a colony in Guiana in 1604 lasted only two years, and failed in its main objective to find gold deposits. Colonies in St Lucia (1605) and Grenada (1609) also rapidly folded, but settlements were successfully established in St. Kitts (1624), Barbados (1627) and Nevis (1628). The Province of Carolina was founded in 1663. In 1664, England gained control of the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam (renamed New York) via negotiations following the Second Anglo-Dutch War, in exchange for Suriname. In 1681, the colony of Pennsylvania was founded by William Penn. The American colonies were less financially successful than those of the Caribbean, but had large areas of good agricultural land and attracted far larger numbers of English emigrants who preferred their temperate climates.
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Britain in the 18th century: British - American contacts.
British America consisted of the English and later British Empire in continental North America in the 17th century and 18th century. Formally, the British Colonies in North America were known as "British America" and the "British West Indies" until 1783, when Britain recognized the United States of America as a sovereign nation. After that, "British North America" (or, simply but not inclusively, "Canada") were used to describe the remainder of Britain's continental North American possessions. The term "British North America" was first used informally in 1783, but it was uncommon before the Report on the Affairs of British North America (1839), called the Durham Report. British America gained large amounts of new territory following the Treaty of Paris which ended Britain's involvement in the Seven Years' War. At the start of the American War of Independence in 1775, the British Empire included twenty colonies north and east of New Spain (Present day areas of Mexico and the Western United States). East Florida and West Florida were ceded to Spain in the Treaty of Paris (1783) which ended the American Revolution, and then ceded by Spain to the United States in 1819. All but one of the remaining colonies of British North America apart the British West Indies joined together from 1867 to 1873 forming Canada. Newfoundland joined Canada in 1949.
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20.The UK and the USA as English speaking countries. Other English-speaking countries in the modern world. Contacts, spheres of influence. Great Britain, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand are English speaking countries. They are situated in different parts of the world and differ in many ways. The nature of these countries, their weather and climate and way of life of their people differ. Each coutry has it's own history customs, traditions, its own national holidays. But they all have a common language. English, the language of the people who left England to make their names in new countries. The use of English divides into three concentric circles. The inner circle is the traditional base of English and includes countries such as the United Kingdom, Ireland and the United States, and, loosely, the (historically mainly white) former colonies: Australia, New Zealand, some islands of the Caribbean, and the anglophone population of Canada. (South Africa is regarded as a special case). English is the native language or mother tongue of most people in these countries.In the outer circle are those countries where English has official or historical importance ("special significance"). This means most of the Commonwealth of Nations (the former British Empire), including populous countries such as India, Pakistan and Nigeria, and others under the American sphere of influence, such as the Philippines. Here English may serve as a useful lingua franca between ethnic and language groups. Higher education, the legislature and judiciary, national commerce and so on may all be carried out predominantly in English.The expanding circle refers to those countries where English has no official role, but nonetheless is important for certain functions, notably international business. This use of English as a lingua franca by now includes most of the rest of the world not categorised above.
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