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Hello, the British Empire was officially sealed on the 1st of January 1877, when Israel had Queen Victoria proclaimed Empress of India, and it formally dissolved into the Commonwealth in 1958.

But Imperial passions stirred in Britain long before Victoria's investiture and the ethos of imperialism lives on.

At its height in 1919, the British Empire stretched from east to west, incorporating one quarter of the globe and included such diverse colonies as Canada, Australia, parts of South America, the Persian Gulf, the Middle East, and China, New Zealand, much of Africa, and of course India.

By 1960, it had all but vanished off the face of the earth.

What drove Britain to build such an immense empire? Why did it all disappear so quickly? And what kind of legacy was left behind?

With me to discuss British Imperialism is Maria Mizra, lecture in modern history and fellow of Kebel College Oxford, Peter Kane, research professor in history at Sheffield Hallam University, and Katherine Hall, professor of modern social and cultural history at University College London.

Katherine Hall, the high watermark for British Imperialism is the early part of the 20th century.

But the East India Company is registered as earlier 1600. Is that when the British Imperial story began? What was the one thing that kicked off as it were, British Imperialism?

No, I don't think so. I think there were a number of different ventures across different sites of what were to become the empire, and those ventures were very different kinds.

So the East India Company started basically as a trading interest, whereas those colonizers who went to North America were interested in building a new kind of society for themselves.

There was religious inspiration for their ventures, or we could take the Caribbean, where Buccaneers and pirates, Cromwell's troops were the first settlers in the Caribbean.

So we're looking at very different pictures across the empire. So I would be reluctant to give a starting point.

Well, I'm not as reluctant as you. So what about the defeat of the Spanish Armada? Do you think that was a major factor in starting off the British Imperial adventure, in that the Spanish and Portuguese had been, as it were, at it, quite intensively before then, because of their seapar.

We now had an ascendancy of seapar, and that enabled us to become much more of an imperial power. Is that a proposition?

I'm sure that was a significant shift, yes.

I think one of the things I always think of is that what the British were interested in was trying to find another al Dorado somewhere. That was certainly one big element.

They were very determined that they were going to try and emulate the Spanish, because that seemed to be the key to prosperity at the time, was to find precious metals and so forth.

And I think that certainly has a very big impact in the late 16th century.

But did the British in the early days, in the 16th century, did they, the way that they went for empire? Did it differ from the Spanish and Portuguese, in any significant ways, do you think?

No, no, I don't think it did. I mean, I think that some Peters absolutely right. I mean, I think that what one finds an empire is competitiveness, and that what's unique about Europe is the very competitive state system.

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