Fingest

Fingest is a village in Buckinghamshire, England. It is in the Chiltern Hills near the border with Oxfordshire. It is about six miles WSW of High Wycombe. It lies in the civil parish of Hambleden.

Fingest

St Bartholomew’s Church Fingest
Fingest
Location within Buckinghamshire
OS grid referenceSU777912
Civil parish
Unitary authority
Ceremonial county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townHenley-on-Thames
Postcode districtRG9
Dialling code01491
PoliceThames Valley
FireBuckinghamshire
AmbulanceSouth Central
UK Parliament

The village name of Fingest comes from the Anglo Saxon name Thinghurst, meaning 'wooded hill where assemblies are made'. In the 16th century the name is recorded as Thingest and then Fingest.[1] Although the early name is the etymological root of both 'Tinghurst' and 'Fingest', the latter doesn't follow the former by any normal linguistic line.

The ancient parish of Fingest included Cadmore End to the north of the village, which became a separate ecclesiastical parish in 1852.[2]

The manor of Fingest anciently belonged to St Albans Abbey. In 1163 it was given to the bishop of Lincoln. The ghost of Henry Burghersh, 14th-century Bishop of Lincoln, is reputed to haunt the area.[3] After this time it was used as the country residence for the Lincoln diocese until 1547 when it was seized by the Crown. It was then given two years later to the Duke of Somerset who exchanged it with a property belonging to Wells Cathedral.[2] The manor is now privately owned.

The civil parish of Fingest, originally based on the ecclesiastical parish, was enlarged in 1934 by adding land from the parishes of West Wycombe, Great Marlow and Hambleden. As a result, Lane End became the largest settlement in the parish, and the parish was renamed Fingest and Lane End in 1937.[4] In the 1980s the civil parish was abolished. The larger part became the parish of Lane End, and the village of Fingest was added to Hambleden parish.

Scenes of the period drama The Monuments Men were shot in Fingest in May 2013.

Church

The parish church of St Bartholomew's dates from the early Norman period. It has an unusual tower, with a double vaulted roof. The church is a Grade I listed building.[5]

References
  1. Watts, Victor, ed. (2010), "Fingest", The Cambridge Dictionary of English Place-Names, Cambridge University Press
  2. William Page, ed. (1925). "Parishes: Fingest". A History of the County of Buckingham: Volume 3. Institute of Historical Research. Retrieved 11 July 2011.
  3. "Green Man of Fingest - Mysterious Britain & Ireland". Mysterious Britain & Ireland. Archived from the original on 12 December 2010. Retrieved 29 August 2014.
  4. Vision of Britain website Archived 28 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  5. Historic England. "Church of St Bartholomew (1125708)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 17 May 2020.

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