The Monday Photo

Also, a Tale From the Edge

This county boundary marker is in the hamlet of Biddlesden, a few miles North West of Buckingham.

This example is the cast iron “lollipop” type, thought to have been installed in the 1930s. The vertical line down the middle is the actual boundary, with “Northants” on the nearest side,and “Bucks” on the far side.

Alright, yes, I admit it; I was outside North Bucks when I took this photo!

The wall behind the marker is the parapet of a small bridge over the river Ouse. Or at least it’s called that; the river is no bigger than a small brook here and the whole bridge is barely 30 feet long. On some maps it’s even called the Great Ouse!

The boundary marker is in the middle of the bridge; it is very common that county boundaries run along the middle of a river. Miles away at Ickford on the border with Oxfordshire, the border is the river Thame; Ickford has an annual tug of war across the river with Tiddington in Oxon.

This is not the first marker I’ve seen. There’s a similar boundary marker at Woburn Sands, and there are two carved stone markers on Ickford bridge, next to the fields where the tug of war is held.

Do you know of any boundary markers in North Bucks? Let me know with a comment!