Bedfordshire is an English ceremonial county which lies between approximately 25 miles and 55 miles (or approximately 40 and 90 kilometres) north of central London. Anglo-Saxon Bedfordshire Early 5th century Saxon burial sites have been discovered at Kempston and Sandy, two Bedfordshire towns on the River Great Ouse and its tributary the River Ivel, as well as at Luton, in the south of the county on the River Lea (a tributary of the Thames). These sites are all in the vicinity of Roman towns, suggesting that these may have been the site of Saxon foederati employed by Romano-British inhabitants to protect their towns. A seventh century settlement at Stratton, near Biggleswade has also been found. The area may have remained part of a British enclave until the Battle of Bedcanford (Bedford) in 571, when Cuthwulf inflicted a severe defeat on the Britons and took the towns of Eynsham, Aylesbury, Benson and Limbury. This area may have coincided with the "Chilternsetna" who comprised 4,000 hides in the Tribal Hidage (compared to 7,000 for Essex). During the Heptarchy what is now Bedfordshire formed part of Mercia; by the Treaty of Wedmore it became part of the Danelaw. The Vikings of Bedford were subdued by King Edward the Elder in 915, and he built two burhs at Bedford on each side of the River Ouse. Four hundreds were formed on each side to support each burgh - Willey, Stodden, Buckelow and Barford in the north and Redbornstoke, Wixamtree, Biggleswade and Clifton in the south. The boundary to the north largely coincides with the watershed between the Nene and Ouse rivers, presumed to also be the boundary between the land of the Vikings based at Bedford and Northampton; the western boundary aligns with the Newport Hundreds, similarly laid out to support the new burh at Newport Pagnell, and the eastern boundary with the hundreds of Huntingdon. The first mention of the county comes in 1016 when King Canute "laid waste to the whole shire". Norman Bedfordshire There was no organised resistance to William the Conqueror within Bedfordshire, though the Domesday survey reveals an almost complete substitution of Norman for English landholders. Bedfordshire suffered severely in the civil war of King Stephen's reign; the great Roll of the Exchequer of 1165 proves the shire receipts had depreciated in value to two-thirds of the assessment for the Danegeld. Again the county was thrown into the First