2.99.23.242: This is longer, but the previous draft was a bit too 'cut and dried'

2025-10-10T21:36:26Z

This is longer, but the previous draft was a bit too 'cut and dried'

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{{Short description|Counties of England that surround London}}
{{Distinguish|Home Nations{{!}}Home Countries}}
{{For|the Saint Etienne album|Home Counties (album){{!}}''Home Counties'' (album)}}
{{Use British English|date=May 2017}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2017}}
{{Infobox settlement
| name = Home Counties
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| subdivision_name1 = {{flag|England}}
| subdivision_type2 = [[Regions of England|Region]]
| subdivision_name2 = [[East of England]] [[South East England]]
| subdivision_type3 = [[Counties of England|Counties]]
| subdivision_name3 = Usually includes:
*[[Berkshire]]
*[[Buckinghamshire]]
*[[Essex]]
*[[Hertfordshire]]
*[[Kent]]
*[[Surrey]]

Sometimes included:
*[[Bedfordshire]]
*[[Hampshire]]
*[[Oxfordshire]]
*[[East Sussex]]
*[[West Sussex]]
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[[File:Home Counties (1889 county borders).svg|thumb|300px|The former geographic counties (1889–1965) surrounding [[London]]: {{nowrap|1. [[Buckinghamshire]]}} {{nowrap|2. [[Hertfordshire]]}} {{nowrap|3. [[Essex]]}} {{nowrap|4. [[Berkshire]]}} {{nowrap|5. [[Middlesex]] (now part of [[Greater London]])}} {{nowrap|6. [[Surrey]]}} {{nowrap|7. [[Kent]]}} {{nowrap|8. [[Sussex]]}} {{nowrap|([[County of London]] shown in yellow)}}]]

The term '''home counties''' describes a number of [[counties of England|English counties]] close to London. There is no precise definition, but the counties bordering London are most likely to be described as members, namely: [[Berkshire]], [[Buckinghamshire]], [[Hertfordshire]], [[Essex]], [[Kent]] and [[Surrey]].<ref name="YouGovHC">{{cite web|url=https://yougov.co.uk/topics/arts/articles-reports/2019/10/23/which-counties-make-home-counties|title=Which counties make up the Home Counties?|publisher=YouGov|date=23 October 2019|accessdate=8 June 2021}}</ref><ref name="OED-HC">"Home Counties" in ''Oxford Dictionary of English'', [[Oxford University Press]], 2010. www.oxfordreference.com Retrieved 4 December 2013.</ref>

Other counties farther from London – [[Bedfordshire]], [[Hampshire]], [[Oxfordshire]], [[East Sussex]] and [[West Sussex]] – are sometimes also regarded as home counties,<ref name="YouGovHC"/><ref name="OED-HC"/> due to their proximity to London and connection to its regional economy.

The home counties come with a strong socio-economic stereotype, which characterises its inhabitants as comfortable, conformist middle class people.

==Origin==
The origin of the term "home counties" is uncertain. [[Marcus Crouch]], writing in 1975, thought that it derived from the Home Counties Circuit of courts that had surrounded London since at least the 18th century. Looking further back, he suggested that it included the counties in which, since the [[Tudor period]], it has been possible for civil servants and politicians to have their country homes and still be able to travel into London without excessive delay when they were needed.<ref>{{harvnb|Crouch|1975|pp=13–14}}</ref>

== Composition ==
[[File:The Home Counties Magazine Vol. I 1899 cover.jpg|thumb|''[[The Home Counties Magazine]]'', 1899, a magazine "of the "topography of London, Middlesex, Essex, Herts, Bucks, Berks, Surrey, and Kent"]]

The earliest use of the term cited in the ''[[Oxford English Dictionary]]'' is from 1695. [[Charles Davenant]], in ''An Essay upon Ways and Means of Supplying the War'', wrote, "The Eleven Home Counties, which are thought in Land Taxes to pay more than their proportion, viz. ''[[Surrey|Surry]]'' {{sic}} with ''[[Southwark]]'', ''[[Hertfordshire]]'', ''[[Bedfordshire]]'', ''[[Cambridgeshire]]'', ''[[Kent]]'', ''[[Essex]]'', ''[[Norfolk]]'', and ''[[Suffolk]]'', ''[[Berkshire|Berks]]'', ''[[Buckinghamshire|Bucks]]'', and ''[[Oxfordshire]]''."<ref>{{cite book |first=Charles |last=Davenant |author-link=Charles Davenant |title=An Essay upon Ways and Means of Supplying the War |location=London |publisher=Jacob Tonson |year=1695 |page=77 }}; quoted in {{OED|Home Counties}}</ref>

Later definitions have tended to be more narrow and ''Bacon's Large Scale Atlas of London and Suburbs'' (revised edition c. 1912) includes Berkshire, Buckingham, Essex, Hertford, Kent, Middlesex and Surrey in the "maps of the home counties".<ref>Stanford, William. (1912) (Ed.) ''Bacon's Large Scale Atlas of London and Suburbs''. London: [[George Washington Bacon]]. In Ann Sunders (Ed.) (2007) ''The A to Z of Edwardian London''. London: [[London Topographical Society]]. {{ISBN|0-902087-53-3}}</ref>

In reviewing [[S. P. B. Mais]]'s ''The Home Counties'' (Batsford [[The Face of Britain (book series)|The Face of Britain]] series, 1942), Norah Richardson noted that "the home counties" was a term in constant use but hard to define, but that Mais's definition of "the five counties around London County – Middlesex, Hertfordshire, Essex, Kent and Surrey" could not be improved upon.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Richardson |first=Norah |date=27 October 1944 |title=''The Home Counties'' by S. P. B. Mais |journal=[[Journal of the Royal Society of Arts]] |volume=92 |issue=4677 |jstor=41362144 |page=633}}</ref>

The term is sometimes understood to mean those counties which, on their borders closest to London, have been partly subsumed into London. Indeed, the former county of [[Middlesex]] has been almost wholly within London since 1965 as have parts of Kent, Hertfordshire and Surrey,<ref name=brew>{{harvnb|Brewer's|1999|p=769}}</ref> although the county continues to exist as a cultural and historic entity.{{dubious|date=October 2023}}<ref>{{Cite web |title=Celebrating the historic counties of England |url=https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/celebpinkrating-the-historic-counties-of-england/celebrating-the-historic-counties-of-england |access-date=2020-06-23 |website=GOV.UK |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=August 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=2013-04-02 |title=County Definitions |url=https://britishcountyflags.com/county-definitions/ |access-date=2020-06-23 |website=British County Flags |language=en}}</ref>

The third edition of the ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (2010) defines the term as "the English counties surrounding London, into which London has extended. They comprise chiefly Essex, Kent, Surrey, and Hertfordshire."<ref>"Home Counties" in ''Oxford Dictionary of English'', [[Oxford University Press]], 2010. www.oxfordreference.com Retrieved 4 December 2013.</ref> Parts of all of those historic counties are, since 1965, officially within London, although no part of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire or Sussex is. The county of Sussex is also wholly outside, and Berkshire almost wholly outside, the route of the [[M25 motorway]], which is often treated as an unofficial perimeter of [[Greater London]], and some definitions mention that those counties are not always included amongst the home counties,<ref>{{cite dictionary|title=Home Counties |dictionary=The Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors|location=Oxford|publisher= Oxford University Press|date= 1981| page= 180|isbn=0-19-212970-8}}</ref> or that the term has been extended to include them.<ref>{{harvnb|Brewer's|1999|p=583}}</ref>

==Inhabitants==
The home counties have been characterised as being "inhabited on the whole by 'nice', comfortable, and conformist [[middle class|middle-class people]]" (1987)<ref name=Urdang>{{harvnb|Urdang|1987|p=146}}</ref> exemplified by the county of Surrey which has been described as possessing quintessential home counties characteristics of "a comfortable plasticised commuterland with respectable villas and neatly mown lawns interspersed with patches of mild scenery".<ref>{{harvnb|Urdang|1987|p=278}}</ref> In fiction, the character of [[Margot Leadbetter]] in the BBC sitcom ''[[The Good Life (1975 TV series)|The Good Life]]'', set in [[Surbiton]], formerly in Surrey, has been described by ''[[The Spectator]]'' as "a Home Counties Conservative to her fingertips".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Cook |first=William |date=14 April 2015 |title=The Good Life – how a 70s sitcom became a Tory lodestar |url=https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2015/04/the-good-life-how-a-70s-sitcom-became-a-tory-lodestar/ |access-date=2 December 2017 |website=[[The Spectator]]}}</ref>

[[Marcus Crouch]], however, has made the point that the home counties have been more affected by [[Human migration|migration]] from within and without the United Kingdom than any other region of the country, making them the most cosmopolitan region of England and meaning that there is no typical home counties inhabitant. One result of this diversity, he argues, is that local loyalties are shallower in the home counties than in, for instance, Yorkshire or parts of Scotland where there has been less population mobility.<ref>{{harvnb|Crouch|1975|p=18}}</ref>

==Geology==
Marcus Crouch has identified one of the principal characteristics of the home counties as being a shared [[chalk|chalk geology]] that is broadly mirrored north and south of the [[Thames]].<ref>{{harvnb|Crouch|1975|pp=14–15}}</ref>

==Economy==
The home counties are some of the wealthiest in Britain with the towns of [[Virginia Water]], [[Esher]] and [[Weybridge]], all in Surrey, ranked in one 2019 survey as having some of the highest average house prices in the country.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Power |first=Gabriel |date=Feb 18, 2019 |title=The UK's Most Expensive Towns |url=https://www.theweek.co.uk/80569/the-most-expensive-uk-towns-outside-london |website=The Week}}</ref> However, a 2011 report described the perception that South East England, the official region of England in which most of the home counties are located, was universally wealthy as inaccurate and noted that 500,000 people in the region lived in areas that were within the 20% most deprived areas in the country with deprivation concentrated in coastal areas such as [[Margate]] (Kent) and [[Hastings]] (East Sussex). Significant areas of deprivation were also found in the urban areas of south [[Hampshire]] and [[Slough]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Kingston upon Thames |date=2011 |title=Deprivation and Public Sector Reliance in the South East |url=http://www.secouncils.gov.uk/upload/datas/SEEC_Deprivation_briefing_spring_2011.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151004174102/http://www.secouncils.gov.uk/upload/datas/SEEC_Deprivation_briefing_spring_2011.pdf |archive-date=2015-10-04 |publisher=[[South East England Councils]] |page=2}}</ref>

==In formal use==
[[File:Royal Mail Home Counties North postmark 2013 from Luton, Beds..jpg|thumbnail|right|"Home Counties North" [[mail centre]] (in [[Hemel Hempstead]]) franked on a letter in 2013]]
Multiple interpretations of the term have been used in legislation and by official bodies. In the twentieth century, for instance, as follows: (the table includes all the areas mentioned above):
* 1908: The [[Home Counties Division]] of the [[Territorial Force]] comprised units recruiting in [[Middlesex]], Kent, [[Surrey]] and [[Sussex]].
* 1920: The London and Home Counties Electricity District consisted of the counties of [[County of London|London]] and Middlesex; and parts of [[Berkshire]], Buckinghamshire, [[Essex]], Hertfordshire, [[Kent]] and [[Surrey]].
*1924: The [[London and Home Counties Traffic Advisory Committee]], covering the [[London Traffic Area]]: London, Middlesex, and parts of Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent, and Surrey.
*1926: The [[Home Counties (Music and Dancing) Licensing Act 1926|Home Counties (Music and Dancing) Licensing Act]] regulated activities in all parts of Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent and Surrey within 20 miles of the [[City of London]] or [[Metropolitan Borough of Westminster|City of Westminster]].
*1938: [[Green Belt (London and Home Counties) Act 1938|Green Belt (London and Home Counties) Act]] limited development in parts of Middlesex, Kent, Buckinghamshire, Surrey, Essex, Berkshire, and Hertfordshire.
*1948: The [[Home Counties Brigade]] was formed to administer the [[infantry]] regiments of the City and County of London, Kent, Middlesex, Surrey, and Sussex.
*1995: The Valuation Office rating manual defined both inner and outer home counties, with the inner home counties being defined as inside the [[M25 motorway]]. The outer home counties included Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Bedfordshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Oxfordshire, Hampshire. Parts of Dorset and Cambridgeshire were included in the outer home counties with [[Bournemouth]] and [[Cambridge]] being home counties exclaves.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.gov.uk/guidance/rating-manual-section-4-valuation-methods/part-3-practice-note-1-revaluation-1995-the-contractor-s-basis-site-values-percentage-of-building-costs|access-date=2021-07-02|title=Rating Manual section 4: valuation methods}}</ref>

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! County
! 1851 Post Office Directory<ref group="Note">1851 Post Office Directory of the Six Home Counties covered Essex, Herts, Kent, Middlesex, Surrey and Sussex.</ref>
! 1908 Home Counties Division
! 1920 London and Home Counties Electricity District
! 1924 London and Home Counties Traffic Advisory Committee
! 1926 Home Counties (Music and Dancing) Licensing Act
! 1938 Green Belt (London and Home Counties) Act
! 1948 Home Counties Brigade
! 1995 Valuation Office Rating Manual
|-
| [[Bedfordshire]]
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|{{ya}}
|-
| [[Berkshire]]
|
|
|{{ya}} (part)
|
|{{ya}}
|
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|-
| [[Buckinghamshire]]
|
|
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}}
|
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|-
| [[Cambridgeshire]]
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|{{ya}} (part)
|-
| [[Dorset]]
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|{{ya}} (part)
|-
| [[Essex]]
|{{ya}}
|
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}}
|
|
|{{ya}}
|-
|[[Hampshire]]
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|{{ya}}
|-
|[[Hertfordshire]]
|{{ya}}
|
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|
|{{ya}}
|-
| [[Kent]]
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|-
| [[Middlesex]]
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{no|''Ceremonial county dissolved in 1965''}}
|-
| [[Oxfordshire]]
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|{{ya}}
|-
|[[Surrey]]
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}} (part)
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|-
| [[Sussex]]
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|
|
|
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|{{ya}}
|}

== See also ==
* [[Bibliography of the home counties]]
* [[London commuter belt]]
* [[Metro-land]]
* [[Suburbia]]

==Notes==
{{Reflist|group=Note}}

== References ==
{{Reflist}}
===Sources===
* {{Cite book |title=[[Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable]] |date=1999 |publisher=[[Cassell (publisher)|Cassell]] |isbn=0-304-35096-6 |edition=16th |location=London |ref={{harvid|Brewer's|1999}} }}
* {{cite book|last=Crouch|first= Marcus|date=1975|title=The Home Counties|series= [[The Regions of Britain (book series)|The Regions of Britain]] series|location=London|publisher= Robert Hale|isbn=0-7091-4869-0}}
* {{cite book|last=Urdang |first=Laurence|date=1987 |title=Names & Nicknames of Places and Things|location=London |publisher=Grafton |page=146 |isbn=0-246-13246-9}}

==External links==
{{commons category|Home counties}}
*[http://abcounties.com/ The Association of British Counties]
*[https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-25652,00.html Why are the counties around London called the "Home counties"?] ''The Guardian''

{{DEFAULTSORT:Home Counties}}
[[Category:Home counties| ]]
[[Category:Counties of England]]
[[Category:Geography of London]]
[[Category:Geography of Berkshire]]
[[Category:Geography of Buckinghamshire]]
[[Category:Geography of Essex]]
[[Category:Geography of Hertfordshire]]
[[Category:Geography of Kent]]
[[Category:Geography of Surrey]]
[[Category:Geography of Sussex]]
[[Category:Greater London]]
[[Category:Southern England]]
[[Category:Vernacular geography]]

Home counties - Revision history

2.99.23.242: This is longer, but the previous draft was a bit too 'cut and dried'