Definition of British Empire

They say that a British humorous weekly from the early 20th century explained the Empire for two basic reasons: weather and the feeding of the British Isles, which took residents there to look for places with better weather, and better food ...

If the Roman Empire was the most influential ancient empire, the British Empire is the structure geopolitics most important of the contemporary age.

We define the British Empire as the territories directly controlled by the British Crown from the 16th century to 1949.

At its peak, the British Empire comprised one-fifth (20%) of the entire territory worldwide, and a quarter (25%) of the entire population of the world.

Their dominions extended by all the continents, with the regions of the Indian subcontinent, almost all East Africa, Australia, and Canada, like most emblematic zones.

The British Empire is the "father" of many nations today, many of which are grouped under the Commonwealth, a number of former British colony countries (and some that are not). went but requested their membership, such as Mozambique, a former Portuguese colony) which, in total, represent nearly 2,000 million people, almost a third of the world's population current.

The British Empire is also the explanation of why English is currently a lingua franca to communicate with almost anyone in virtually any part of the world, and why Anglo-Saxon culture is so well known and influential throughout the world.

We must not forget that the great world power today (the United States) was at the time one of the territories belonging to the Empire. British (not in its present extension, but much smaller) and, therefore, its genesis owes also to Great Britain, its political model and its culture.

Leaving aside the jokes of lucid British humor, the creation of the Empire is explained by the British will to trade, and the interests to protect the overseas trade routes opened by them with respect to their competitors.

These competitors were mainly Spanish and Dutch, although the British, in achieving their empire, competed with other nations.

Although previous monarchs already made their moves to establish an overseas empire, it was with Elizabeth I (whose reign runs from 1559 to 1603) that the Kingdom of England launched into a politics expansionist, which included seizing the territories of the British Isles, possessions in Europe, and exploring the rest of the world in search of distant overseas possessions.

The exploration and settlement in the American continent, with names as iconic as those of Francis Drake or John Hawkins, took center stage, which made the British enter the fray with the Spanish people.

The armed confrontations between both countries were numerous, and despite the greater dimension at that time of the Empire Spanish, and the theoretical superiority of their weapons, the British first balanced the scales to overcome their enemy later.

Since the 16th century, the British Empire had set foot on India, along with other European powers such as Portugal, Holland and France, But it was the British who, playing their cards well through political alliances, managed to seize almost the entirety of the subcontinent.

India would be considered as "the jewel" of the British Empire.

However, a national sentiment led to a struggle of the Indians against the British from the middle of the 19th century until they achieved their independence in 1949 at the hands of Mahatma Gandhi.

On the American continent, the Seven Years' War consolidated British power in the northern part at the expense of France.

The Napoleonic Wars (1799-1815) cemented the power that Great Britain would enjoy in Europe and in the world until World War I staggered it, and World War II topped it definitely.

Not that that power didn't exist before, but it was minor. To stand as the winner before an army (the French revolutionary) and a soldier (Napoleon) who had proved almost invincible, gave a prestige to Great Britain, to which many states were indebted Europeans.

Previously, the British Empire had experienced the emancipation of a part of its American colonies, which would form the United States.

With what was called to be the superpower of the 20th century, the British maintained a hate relationship at first (the conflict independence and the war of 1812, including the burning of Washington) and love much later.

South Africa was another source of conflict, this one with the Boers, Dutch settlers who opposed the British rule of the areas richest in diamonds and other materials.

Also famous is the "game of chess" that the British started with the Russian Empire in Asia to dominate more territory and close the possibilities to the other.

It is in this context that the intervention British in Afghanistan. As a curious note, from that time come the British Lee Enfield rifles that, even today - and being weapons that were already veteran during World War II - are used by some men in the country.

The beginning of the end of the British Empire came with the result of World War II.

Although it may seem paradoxical, the victory of the Empire, together with the other allied countries, sealed the end of its colonial period.

The why is very simple: Great Britain and the other Allied contenders fought and won for an ideal of freedom... How could that freedom contemplate dominion over colonies? It was incongruous.

After the war, and until the 70s, Great Britain had to decolonize, that is, the empire was lost.

However, the inheritance That he left this, both culturally and materially, is not negligible, and the aforementioned Commonwealth is a good example of this.

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Themes in British Empire