Properly speaking, the history of the Royal Navy began in 1546 with the establishment of the "Navy Royal" by HenryVIII. This became the Parliamentary Navy during the period of the Commonwealth with the modern incarnation of Royal Navy established in 1660 following the Restoration of King CharlesII to the throne. The English navy began operating together with the much smaller Royal Scots Navy at the time of the Union of the Crowns under JamesI in 1603 but only formally merged in 1707 at the establishment of the united Kingdom of Great Britain.
The history of the English navy can be traced back much further, however. levies of ships allowed seaborne invasions by at least the 7th century and naval battles occurred against invading Vikings in the 9th. Following the 11th-century Norman Conquest, naval expenses were initially avoided but the 1204 loss of Normandy made control of the Channel much more essential. Early fleets were borrowed from the kingdom's merchants and fishers, particularly at the Cinque Ports, assembled as needed and then dispersed. King John began maintaining a number of large ships in the king's own name and the Cinque Port wardens developed into admirals, permanent officers ready to levy and command fleets and provided legal jurisdiction over England's seas and coasts. A full standing navy took shape during the 16th century and finally became a regular establishment during the tumults of the 17th.
Early medieval England
Early English kingdoms (to 927) Some evidence of English ship construction in the Anglo-Saxon period is available from the boat burials at Snape (about 550) and Sutton Hoo (about 625), though warships would probably have been larger than the vessels interred there. There is little evidence of the naval activities of the English kingdoms before the mid-9th century, but King Edwin of Northumbria (616/7–633/4) conquered the Isle of Man and Anglesey, and another King of Northumbria, Ecgfrith, sent a military expedition to Gaelic Ireland in 684.
The threat from Vikings increased significantly in the early 9th century, and invasions became a serious menace from about 835. In 851 an unprecedentedly large force of Danes invaded southern England, carried on about 350 ships. Campaigning inland, this force was decisively defeated by King Æthelwulf of Wessex at the Battle of Aclea, but a naval action was also won by Æthelwulf's son Æthelstan and Ealdorman Ealhere at Sandwich, Kent, capturing nine ships.
The Danish Great Army, which conquered about half of England during its campaigns in 865–879, operated largely by land and no naval operations against it by the English kingdoms are recorded. However, in the following years a number of clashes are recorded between Viking raiders and the forces of Alfred the Great, the last remaining English king. These included a victory over four ships by a squadron led by the king himself in 882, and operations against the Danes of East Anglia in 884, which saw an entire Danish squadron of sixteen ships captured by an English force, which was then itself defeated on its way home by another fleet. In 896 Alfred had a number of new ships built to his own design, "nearly twice as long as the others, some having 60 oars, some even more", to counter raids along the south coast. A clash in the Solent later that year saw nine of his new ships defeat six Danish ships.
United England (927–1066) Naval operations are glimpsed again in 934, when King Æthelstan, now ruler of all England, invaded Scotland with a combined sea and land force. Under King Edgar (959–975) the kings of Scotland, of Cumbria and of four other kingdoms would regularly swear to be King Edgar's faithful allies by land and sea.
The renewal of serious Viking attacks in the reign of Æthelred the Unready led to a general muster of ships at London in 992 against the fleet of Olaf Tryggvason, but amid confusion and alleged treachery the English fleet suffered heavy losses. In 1008, Æthelred ordered a new programme of naval construction, under which one warship was to be provided for every 310 hides of land in the kingdom. In 1009 the king took the new fleet out to Sandwich, Kent to guard against the threat of invasion (this port, near the junction of the North Sea and the English Channel and lying within the sheltered offshore anchorage of the Downs, appears frequently in the sources for this period as a position where fleets were stationed on guard). However, this deployment ended in disaster due to internal dissension. Accusations against the great Sussex thegn Wulfnoth (probably the father of Godwin, later Earl of Wessex) led to his flight from the fleet with 20 ships manned by his supporters. A force of 80 ships sent after him was wrecked by a storm and the beached ships burnt by Wulfnoth, after which the remainder of the fleet dispersed in confusion.
English naval forces were supplemented by Scandinavian mercenaries. Directly after the fiasco of 1009 a new invasion force led by the Danish warlord Thorkell the Tall began a devastating campaign in England. When the attackers were finally bought off and dispersed in 1012, Thorkell entered Æthelred's service with 45 ships. When the King of Denmark Swein Forkbeard conquered England in 1013, the fleet remained loyal to Æthelred after the rest of the kingdom had submitted to the invader. Swein's death in 1014 led to Æthelred's brief return to power, but in 1015–16 England was again conquered by Swein's son Cnut, whose invasion force had been joined by 40 ship-loads of Danish mercenaries who defected from Æthelred's service. Having secured the throne, Cnut dismissed the bulk of his fleet, but maintained a standing force of 40 ships, funded by national taxation. In 1025 Cnut led an Anglo-Danish fleet to campaign against his enemies in Scandinavia, and in 1028 he conquered Norway with a force including 50 English ships. The standing fleet was in time reduced to 16 ships, but increased again after Cnut's son Harthacnut brought a fleet from Denmark to claim the throne in 1040.
The early years of Edward the Confessor's reign saw a series of large naval operations under the king's own command, including in 1045 the deployment at Sandwich of a particularly big fleet to guard against an expected invasion from Norway, and a blockade of Flanders in 1049, in support of a land campaign by the German Emperor Henry III. In 1050 Edward reduced the standing force, then numbering 14 ships, to five. After a political crisis in 1051 saw Earl Godwin and his sons driven into exile, Edward sent out a force of 40 ships to Sandwich to guard against their return. However Godwin, returning with ships from Flanders, eluded them, and he and his son Harold, coming from Ireland, gathered a powerful fleet from the ("boatmen") of the Earldom of Wessex. With this fleet and an army also gathered from Wessex, Godwin came to London and confronted the king, who was supported by an army and a fleet of 50 ships. The crisis ended with the negotiated reinstatement of Godwin and his sons to their former possessions and power.
In 1063 Earl Harold Godwinson led a fleet to Wales against Gruffydd ap Llywelyn of Gwynedd, while his brother Tostig invaded by land. Harold put Gruffydd to flight and destroyed his fleet and his residence at Rhuddlan, defeats which led to Gruffydd's murder by his own people in order to end the war. King Edward installed Gruffydd's half-brothers in his place, and they swore to serve him "on water and on land", suggesting that England's native naval forces could be supplemented by tributary contingents from neighbouring dependent territories as well as by foreign mercenaries.
In 1066, following Edward's death and his own election as king, Harold assembled a powerful army and fleet in the Solent to guard against the invasion being prepared by William of Normandy. However, having waited all summer without the Normans appearing, their provisions were exhausted and Harold was forced to dismiss them; many of the ships were wrecked on the way back to London. William was then able to cross unopposed.
High medieval England
House of Normandy (1066–1135)
English naval power appears to have initially declined as a result of the Norman Conquest. Following the Battle of Hastings, the Norman navy that brought over William the Conqueror seemingly disappeared from records, possibly due to William receiving all of those ships from feudal obligations or because of some sort of leasing agreement which lasted only for the duration of the enterprise. There is no evidence that William adopted or kept the Anglo-Saxon ship mustering system, known as the ("ship levy"). Hardly noted after 1066, it appears that the Normans let the languish so that by 1086, when Domesday Book was completed, it had apparently ceased to exist.
According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, in 1068, Harold Godwinson's sons Godwin and Edmund conducted a "raiding-ship army" which came from Ireland, raiding across the region and to the townships of Bristol and Somerset. In the following year of 1069, they returned with a bigger fleet which they sailed up the River Taw before being beaten back by a local earl near Devon. However, this made explicitly clear that the newly conquered England under Norman rule, in effect, ceded the Irish Sea to the Irish, the Vikings of Dublin, and other Norwegians. Besides ceding away the Irish Sea, the Normans also ceded the North Sea, a major area where Nordic peoples travelled. In 1069, this lack of naval presence in the North Sea allowed for the invasion and ravaging of England by Jarl Osborn (brother of King Svein Estridsson) and his sons Harald, Cnut, and Bjorn. In addition to the ravaging of the English townships of Dover, Sandwich, Ipswich, and Norwich, the Danes connected with the (crown prince) Edgar and rebels in Northumbria. William chased Edgar and the rebels to Scotland, but could not defeat the Danes, causing him to resort to the old Anglo-Saxon practice of paying them off.
Though William the Conqueror caused a massive decline in English naval practices, he did occasionally assemble small fleets of ships, but only for limited activities. Most of these limited actions also did not involve direct combat at sea. An example of this was when the rebellious Anglo-Saxon Earl Morcar and his ally Bishop Æthelwine of Durham sought refuge on the Isle of Ely in 1071. According to Florence of Worcester reported, "The king [William the Conqueror] hearing of this, blocked up every outlet on the eastern side by means of boatmen [], and caused a bridge two miles long to be constructed on the western side." The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle also confirms these events. Though William used ships for blockading purposes and for important strategic engagements, his infrequent use of an established navy promoted a damaging practice of infrequent maritime operations, which his successors would practice on a frequent basis.
Upon the death of the conqueror in 1087, his realm was split between his elder son Robert, who received Normandy, and his younger son William, who received England. Robert attempted to claim England after the great barons, led by Odo of Bayeux, offered him the crown. The English king besieged Robert's allies at Pevensey and completely defeated Robert's fleet. This combined with other failures led to the defeat of Robert's invasion. At the death of William II in 1100 in a hunting accident, the conqueror's youngest son Henry seized the English throne, but in February 1101 Robert began preparing another invasion of England with the help of Ranulf Flambard, and assembled a fleet at Tréport. Ranulf managed to buy off Henry's butsecarls who manned the fleet sent to defeat Robert's invasion, allowing for an uncontested landing in England at Portsmouth. Although, Robert and Henry agreed to the Treaty of Alton, allowing Henry to maintain his kingdom despite the failure of his fleet.
House of Anjou (1154–1216)