Surrey is a small and hilly county within easy reach of London. In the mid-18th century, the writer Arthur Young condemned its communications as the worst in the country. It has only become populous since around 1800. Before that it was the poorest and the most sparsely populated of the home counties, with small settlements in the river valleys. It lost large parts of its territory to London in 1880 and 1955.
Its major medieval religious foundation was the Benedictine abbey of St Peter at Chertsey, founded in 666 AD by St Erkenwald, who became Bishop of London in 675 AD. There were also Cistercians at Waverley Abbey and Augustinians at Newark Priory. Little remains of Chertsey but there are more substantial ruins at Waverley and Newark.
