11. The First Time Britain Left Europe
Brexit, the seemingly never-ending saga of a divorce from the European Union, is neither the first nor most chaotic time that Britain has quit Europe. An even messier separation occurred a few thousand years ago, when Britain was literally separated from Europe.
Britain was not always an island. Until quite recently in geologic terms, what is now the British Isles were just the northwestern corner of the European mainland. Jutting out a bit, kind of like how Alaska juts out of North America, that European protrusion is known today as Doggerland. Then, about 8,000 years ago, that all changed in a most dramatic way.