of struggles against the invaders. These relics are especially abundant in the vale of Aylesbury, probably at this time one of the richest and best protected of the Saxon settlements. The Chiltern district, on the other hand, is said to have been an impassable forest infested by hordes of robbers and wild beasts. In the reign of Edward the Confessor, Leofstan, 12th abbot of St Albans, cut down large tracts of wood in this district and granted the manor of Hamstead (Herts) to a valiant knight and two fellow-soldiers on condition that they should check the depredations of the robbers. The same reason led at an early period to the appointment of a steward of the Chiltern Hundreds, and this office being continued long after the necessity for it had ceased to exist, gradually became the sinecure it is to-day. The district was not finally disforested until the reign of James I.
At the time of the Norman invasion Buckinghamshire was probably included in the earldom of Leofwine, son of Godwin, and the support which it lent him at the battle of Hastings was punished by sweeping confiscations after the Conquest. The proximity of Buckinghamshire to London caused it to be involved in most of the great national events of the ensuing centuries. During the war between King John and his barons William Mauduit held Hanslape Castle against the king, until in 1216 it was captured and demolished by Falkes de Bréauté. The county was visited severely by the Black Death, and Winslow was one of many districts which were almost entirely depopulated. In the civil war Buckinghamshire was one of the first counties to join in an association for mutual defence on the side of the parliament, which had important garrisons at Aylesbury, Brill and elsewhere. Newport Pagnell was for a short time garrisoned by the royalist troops, and in 1644 the king fixed his headquarters at Buckingham.
The shire of Buckingham originated with the division of Mercia in the reign of Edward the Elder, and was probably formed by the aggregation of pre-existing hundreds round the county town, a fact which explains the curious irregularities of the boundary line. The eighteen hundreds of the Domesday survey have now been reduced to eight, of which the three Chiltern hundreds, Desborough, Burnham and Stoke, are unaltered in extent as well as in name. The remainder have been formed each by the union of three of the ancient hundreds, and Aylesbury is still designated “the three hundreds of Aylesbury.” All, except Newport and Buckingham, retain the names of Domesday hundreds, and the shire has altered little on its outer lines since the survey. Until the time of Queen Elizabeth Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire had a common sheriff. The shire court of the former county was held at Aylesbury.
The ecclesiastical history of Buckinghamshire is not easy to trace, as there is no local chronicler, but the earliest churches were probably subject to the West Saxon see of Dorchester, and when after the Conquest the bishop’s stool was transferred to Lincoln no change of jurisdiction ensued. After the dissolution of the monasteries it was proposed to form a new diocese to include Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire, but the project was abandoned, and both remained in the Lincoln diocese until 1837, when the latter was transferred to Oxford. The arch-deaconry was probably founded towards the close of the 11th century by Bishop Rémy, and the subdivision into rural deaneries followed shortly after. A dean of Thornborough is mentioned in the 12th century, and in the taxation of Nicholas IV. eight deaneries are given, comprising 186 parishes. In 1855 the deaneries were reconstructed and made eighteen in number.
On the redistribution of estates after the Conquest only two Englishmen continued to retain estates of any importance, and the chief landowners at this date were Walter Giffard, first earl of Buckingham, and Odo, bishop of Bayeux. Few of the great Buckinghamshire estates, however, remained with the same proprietors for any length of time. Many became annexed by religious establishments, while others reverted to the crown and were disposed of by various grants. The family of Hampden alone claim to have held the estate from which the name is derived in an unbroken line from Saxon times.
Buckinghamshire has always ranked as an agricultural rather than a manufacturing county, and has long been famed for its corn and cattle. Fuller mentions the vale of Aylesbury as producing the biggest bodied sheep in England, and “Buckinghamshire bread and beef” is an old proverb. Lace-making, first introduced into this county by the Fleming refugees from the Alva persecution, became a very profitable industry. The monopolies of James I. considerably injured this trade, and in 1623 a petition was addressed to the high sheriff of Buckinghamshire representing the distress of the people owing to the decay of bone lace-making. Newport Pagnell and Olney were especially famous for their lace, and the parish of Hanslape is said to have made an annual profit of £8000 to £9000 from lace manufacture. The straw-plait industry was introduced in the reign of George I., and formerly gave employment to a large number of the population.
The county was first represented in parliament by two members in 1290. The representation increased as the towns acquired representative rights, until in 1603 the county with its boroughs made a total return of fourteen members. By the Reform Act of 1832 this was reduced to eleven, and by the Redistribution of Seats Act of 1885 the boroughs were deprived of representation and the county returned three members for three divisions.
Antiquities.—Buckinghamshire contains no ecclesiastical buildings of the first rank. Monastic remains are scanty, but two former abbeys may be noted. At Medmenham, on the Thames above Marlow, there are fragments, incorporated into a residence, of a Cistercian abbey founded in 1201; which became notorious in the middle of the 18th century as the meeting-place of a convivial club called the “Franciscans” after its founder, Sir Francis Dashwood, afterwards Lord le Despencer (1708–1781), and also known as the “Hell-Fire Club,” of which John Wilkes, Bubb Dodington and other political notorieties were members. The motto of the club, fay ce que voudras (do what you will), inscribed on a doorway at the abbey, was borrowed from Rabelais’ description of the abbey of Thelema in Gargantua. The remains of the Augustinian Notley Abbey (1162), incorporated with a farm-house, deserve mention rather for their picturesque situation by the river Thame than for their architectural value. Turning to churches, there is workmanship considered to be of pre-Norman date in Wing church, in the neighbourhood of Leighton Buzzard, including a polygonal apse and crypt. Stewkley church, in the same locality, shows the finest Norman work in the county; the building is almost wholly of the later part of this period, and the ornamentation is very rich. The Early English work of Chetwode and Haddenham churches, both in the west of the county, is noteworthy; especially in the first, which, as it stands, is the eastern part of a priory church of Augustinians (1244). Good specimens of the Decorated style are not wanting, though none is of special note; but the county contains three fine examples of Perpendicular architecture in Eton College chapel and the churches of Maids Moreton to the north, and Hillesden to the south, of Buckingham. Ancient domestic architecture is chiefly confined to a few country houses, of which Chequers Court, dating from the close of the 16th century, is of interest not only from the architectural standpoint but from its beautiful situation high among the Chiltern Hills between Prince’s Risborough and Wendover, and from a remarkable collection of relics of Oliver Cromwell, preserved here as a consequence of the marriage, in 1664, of John Russell, a grandson of the Protector, into the family to which the house then belonged. The manor-house of Hampden, among the hills east of Prince’s Risborough, was for many generations the abode of the family of that name, and is still in the possession of descendants of John Hampden, who fell at the battle of Chalgrove in 1643, and is buried in Hampden church. Fine county seats are numerous—there may be mentioned Stowe (Buckingham), formerly the seat of the dukes of Buckingham; Cliveden and Hedsor, two among the many beautifully situated mansions by the bank of the Thames; and Claydon House in the west of the county. Among the Chiltern Hills, also, there are several
