We could identify three categories of solar proton events (SPE) with distinct solar origin from an analysis of direct and indirect observations during the years 1561-2016 CE spanning 42 sunspot cycles. They are (i) 10 MeV SPE whose number of occurrences closely follow the sunspot cycles (ii) 30 MeV SPE which show secular changes with peaks near Gleissberg solar cycle minima and inferred to be associated with distinct enhancements in the efficiency of the solar dynamo and (iii) those associated with Impulsive and irregular solar activity changes such as the Carrington event of September 1859. The relevance of above results for stars exhibiting cyclic and irregular activity changes will be also discussed.
