Bedfordshire

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A midland county of England, bounded by the counties of Northamptonshire, Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, and Buckinghamshire. Greatest length, North and South, 30 miles; greatest breadth, East and West, 20 miles; area The population of Bedfordshire is around 514,700. It covers an area of 473 sq miles (1,225 sq km). It is often abbreviated to Beds. The county seat is Bedford.

In Bedfordshire there are the popular towns of Bedford and Luton.

Geography

The land is mostly flat, varied in the South by a spur of the Chiltern Hills, and in the Northwest by a range of chalk hills. The chief river is the Great Ouse, with its tributary the River Ivel.

Industry

The main industry is agriculture. The land is very fertile with more than four fifths of the area under cultivation. The main products are cereals, especially wheat, and the raising of livestock. There are many market gardens producing food for London. Bedford, Luton, and Dunstable are the chief centres of population and are manufacturing towns producing cars, hats, electrical and precision instruments.

History

Settlement in Bedfordshire is very ancient. In the early Bronze Age (c. 1800 BC) the Beaker people, immigrants from the eastern Mediterranean with a highly developed culture, settled in the Ouse valley. Roman settlement (1st-5th centuries AD) was concentrated in the south of the county, with Dunstable (Roman Durocobrivae) as an important route centre. After the Roman withdrawal the area was settled by invading Anglo-Saxons and Danes; Bedford itself was founded by Danes. The shire was first mentioned as a political unit in 1010 and has survived virtually unchanged within its present boundaries. The outstanding architectural masterpiece of the county is Woburn Abbey, seat of the dukes of Bedford. The present structure dates from 1747 and is surrounded by a magnificent park of 3,000 acres (1,200 hectares). A second house of special distinction is Luton Hoo, near Luton, designed by Robert Adam in 1762; both it and Woburn are open to the public.

Bedfordshire County Flag