A number of assassination attempts were made on the Protestant King James I, notably the Main Plot and Bye Plots of 1603, and most famously, on 5th November 1605, the Gunpowder Plot, by a group of Catholic conspirators, led by Guy Fawkes, which was stoked up and served as further fuel for antipathy in England to the Catholic faith.

The First English Civil War broke out in 1642, largely as a result of an ongoing series of conflicts between the then King, Charles I, and Parliament. The defeat of the Royalist army by the New Model Army of Parliament at the Battle of Naseby in June 1645 effectively destroyed the King's armies. The King fled to Scotland but was handed over to the English Parliament for money by the Scots. He escaped and the Second English Civil War began, although it was to be only a short conflict, with Parliament quickly securing the country. The capture and subsequent trial of Charles I led to his execution by beheading in January 1649 at Whitehall Gate in London. The monarchy was abolished and Oliver Cromwell became the Lord Protector. After he died, his son Richard Cromwell acceeded him as Lord Protector, but soon abdicated. The monarchy was restored in 1660, after England entered a period of anarchy, with King Charles II returning to London.

In 1664/65 England was swept by a visitation of the Great Plague, and then, in 1666, London, the timbered capital city of England, was swept by the Great Fire of London, which raged for 5 days, destroying approximately 15,000 buildings.

In 1689, the Dutch Protestant William of Orange, William III replaced the Catholic King James II. This became known as the Glorious Revolution or 'Bloodless Revolution'. However, in Scotland and Ireland, Catholics loyal to James II were not so content, and a series of bloody uprisings resulted. These Jacobite Rebellions continued until the mid-18th century.

The union of Scotland with England in the Act of Union 1707, saw Scotland 'united' with England and Wales (Wales had already been assimilated in the Act of Union 1536 by Henry VIII). This was no process of harmonisation, for Scotland had effectively capitulated to English economic pressure after the failure of the Darién scheme. This process was lubricated in the Scottish parliament by the self-interested political manoeuverings of the English puppets, John Campbell, the 2nd Duke of Argyll and James Douglas, 2nd Duke of Queensberry. (NB: After the 1707 Act, the histories of Great Britain and England overlap heavily. Since England was the dominant hegemony, it is assumed for the purposes of this article that the two are largely coterminous.)

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