England

On 9 May 1386, England and Portugal ratified the Treaty of Windsor, beginning the oldest diplomatic alliance still in force. Six centuries later, it was still working - helping to win the Second World War.

On 11 April 1689, William III and Mary II were crowned as joint sovereigns of Britain. The Glorious Revolution that put them there is one of history's rarest things: a constitutional order that reformed itself without first destroying itself.

On 23 March 1540, Waltham Abbey surrendered to Henry VIII's commissioners - the last of England's nearly 900 monasteries to fall. Five years of institutional seizure, centuries of religious life, ended with a signature and a pension.

On 2 February 1626, Charles I was crowned at Westminster Abbey. His reign ended on a scaffold — and began the slow, violent invention of parliamentary democracy.