Prevaricatiin on Watling Street, the roman road (now a A5), between St Albans and Dunstable it was a major coaching job prevent on the highway from London to Birmingham, at one point having terminated 40 auberge & taphouse along its highway & a village was one of a earliest area of the Pickford transport service.

Section of the Dacorum council district (centred in Hemel Hempstead), it has Luton (01582) phone numbers & the St Albans postal code (AL3). Although historically a rural & farming vicinity these are okay, the dormitory village for Luton & the circumferent region when it too lies a short few feet away from either the M1 motorway.

A Gainsborough film The Wicked Lady was based on cases surrounding a life of Kathleen Ferrers -- a married woman of the major property owner in the area -- at Markyate Cell. Area of the film The Dirty Dozen were also filmed nigh on this text, a stockade being built in the grounds of the local school.

An additional notable preceding resident was William Cowper who was sent to boarding school here between a ages of 4 & eight years old.