Visit and the surrounding villages and stay in bed & breakfast accommodation:
The name Buckinghamshire is Anglo Saxon: it means The shire or district (scire) of Bucca's home. Bucca was an Anglo-Saxon landowner. Buckinghamshire has had this name since about the 12th century but the county had been in existence as an area of the kingdom of Mercia (585–919).
Some of the county's settlements date back at least as far as 1500 B.C, for example Aylesbury. Many places that still have their Brythonic (Celtic) names for example Penn and Wendover. There are pre-Roman earthworks all over the county including that of the legendary kings of the Britons, Cunobelinus.
The Roman influence on Buckinghamshire is felt in the Roman roads: Watling Street, Akeman Street and the Icknield Way. However the modern geography of the county is largely as it was in the Anglo-Saxon period. The wealth in the county was notable when the Domesday Survey was taken in 1086: Buckinghamshire was subdivided into 18 hundreds at this time. These later reduced to eight — Aylesbury, Ashendon, Buckingham, Burnham, Cottesloe, Desborough, Newport and Stoke.
William the Conqueror annexed most of the manors and ancient hunts including Bernwood Forest, Whaddon Chase and Princes Risborough. King Henry VIII followed this example by annexing a third of the county. Henry VIII appointed Aylesbury to be the county town over Buckingham.
In the English Civil War (1642–1649) Buckinghamshire was mostly Parliamentarian and the Parliamentarian hero, John Hampden, was from Buckinghamshire. He helped defend Aylesbury in battle in 1642.
In 1682 William Penn, who lived at Penn, founded Bucks County, Pennsylvania with other Quakers from Buckinghamshire. Bucks County, Pennsylvania has places named after Buckinghamshire towns including, Buckingham, Chalfont, Wycombe and Soulbury.
The Industrial Revolution and the arrival of the railway had its effect: Wolverton, now part of Milton Keynes, became a national centre for railway carriage construction; furniture and paper industries took hold especially in High Wycombe.
Mass urbanisation of parts of county took place in the 20th century, which saw the formation of the new towns of Milton Keynes and Slough and the transfer of the latter to Berkshire.
Today the expression 'leafy Buckinghamshire' epitomises the idyllic rural landscape of Edwardian fiction and led to the county's popularity amongst commuters for London.
Towns in the historic bounds of Buckinghamshire that after various local government reorganisations are no longer administered as part of it:
- Eton and Slough (to Berkshire)
- Linslade (to Bedfordshire)
- Milton Keynes (including Wolverton, Stony Stratford, Bletchley and Fenny Stratford)
- Newport Pagnell
Famous residents, past and present, and their place of residence:
- Nancy Astor, Cliveden, politician and society hostess
- Cilla Black, Denham, television presenter
- Enid Blyton, Bourne End and Beaconsfield, writer
- Anne Boleyn, Wendover, monarch
- Melanie Brown, Little Marlow, musician
- John Craven, Princes Risborough, television presenter
- Peter Carington, Bledlow, politician
- Tess Daly, Fulmer
- Benjamin Disraeli, Hughenden Manor, politician
- Iain Duncan Smith, Swanbourne, politician
- Ian Dury, Wingrave, musician
- Edward the Confessor, Brill, King of England
- T.S. Eliot, Marlow, writer
- Frederick, Cliveden, Prince of Wales
- Noel Gallagher, Little Chalfont, musician
- Sir John Gielgud, Wotton Underwood, actor
- Martin Grech, Aylesbury, musician
- John Hampden, Great Hampden, politician
- David Jason, Ellesborough, actor
- Jerome K. Jerome, Marlow, writer
- Angelina Jolie, Fulmer, actress
- Howard Jones, High Wycombe, musician
- Jason "Jay" Kay, Horsenden, musician and frontman of Jamiroquai
- John Laurie, Chalfont St Peter, actor
- John Mills, Denham, actor
- John Milton, Chalfont St Giles, writer
- Mike Oldfield, Little Chalfont, musician
- Ozzy Osbourne, Chalfont St Peter, musician
- Saint Osyth, Quarrendon
- John Otway, Aylesbury, musician
- William Penn, politician
- Terry Pratchett, Beaconsfield, writer
- Pauline Quirke, Beaconsfield, actress
- Tim Rice, Amersham, lyricist
- Andy Riley, Aylesbury, writer, is from
- Archibald Primrose, Mentmore, Prime Minister
- Rothschild family, bankers, had houses in Mentmore, Eythrope, Ascott, Halton, Aston Clinton, and Waddesdon
- Tiny Rowland, Hedsor, businessman
- Mary Shelley, Marlow, writer
- Percy Bysshe Shelley, Marlow, writer
- Simon Standage, High Wycombe, baroque violinist
- Jackie Stewart, Ellesborough, racing driver
- Edgar Wallace, Bourne End, writer and journalist
- Edmund Waller, Amersham, poet
- Roger of Wendover, chronicler
- Terry Wogan, Taplow, radio and TV broadcaster
- John Wyclif, Ludgershall, theologian
Have you decided to visit or the surrounding villages? Please look above for somewhere to stay in:
- a bed and breakfast (a B&B or b and b)
- a guesthouse
- a hotel (or motel)
- a self-catering establishment, or
- other accommodation