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Claiming his right to the English throne, William, duke of Normandy, invades England at Pevensey on Britain's southeast coast. His subsequent defeat of King Harold II at the Battle of Hastings marked the beginning of a new era in British history.
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Muslim conquest of Spain brought paper making to Europe. Both Spain and Italy claim to be the first to manufacture paper in Europe. One of the first paper mills in Europe was in Xativa, Spain. The first wire mold for making paper is identified in Spain dating to 1150.
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The 1215 charter required King John of England to proclaim certain liberties and accept that his will was not arbitrary, for example by explicitly accepting that no "freeman" (in the sense of non-serf) could be punished except through the law of the land, a right which is still in existence today.
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The crusading movement came to an end by the close of the thirteenth century. The emperor Frederick II for a short time recovered Jerusalem by a treaty, but in 1244 A.D. the Holy City became again a possession of the Moslems. They have never since relinquished it.
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The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, peaking in Europe between 1348 and 1350. Although there were several competing theories as to the etiology of the Black Death, it has been conclusively proven via analysis of ancient DNA from victims in northern and southern Europe that the pathogen responsible is the Yersinia pestis bacterium.
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In the earliest sources, Robin Hood is a yeoman, but he was often later portrayed as an aristocrat wrongfully dispossessed of his lands and made into an outlaw by an unscrupulous sheriff.
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The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer at the end of the 14th century. The tales (mostly written in verse although some are in prose) are presented as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together on a journey from Southwark to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral.
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The Wars of the Roses were a series of dynastic wars fought between supporters of two rival branches of the royal House of Plantagenet: the houses of Lancaster and York (whose heraldic symbols were the "red" and the "white" rose, respectively) for the throne of England. They were fought in several sporadic episodes between 1455 and 1485, although there was related fighting both before and after this period.
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Le Morte d'Arthur (originally spelled Le Morte Darthur, Middle French for "the death of Arthur") is a compilation by Sir Thomas Malory of Romance tales about the legendary King Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot, and the Knights of the Round Table. The book interprets existing French and English stories about these figures, with some of Malory's own original material (the Gareth story).
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Henry won the throne when he defeated Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field. He was the last king of England to win his throne on the field of battle. He was successful in restoring the power and stability of the English monarchy after the political upheavals of the Wars of the Roses.
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The final victory went to a relatively remote Lancastrian claimant, Henry Tudor, who defeated the last Yorkist king Richard III and married Edward IV's daughter Elizabeth of York to unite the two houses. The House of Tudor subsequently ruled England and Wales for 117 years.
