Hertfordshire has a storied past, but there's plenty of facts about the county that people don't know.
Here are five facts about Hertfordshire you probably haven't heard of.
1 - Links to the founding fathers of America
George Washington, the first ever president of the United States of America, could actually trace his family lineage back to Hertfordshire.
In 1630, Rev Lawrence Washington visited Tring's Pendley Manor - a Grade II-listed manor which dates back more than 1,000 years - and it was here he met Amphyllis Twigden.
The pair fell in love, married and had a son named John, who in 1656, went on a trading voyage to Virginia and despite his intentions never returned to Tring.
He instead stayed in Virginia, and his great grandson George Washington would go on to write his name into the history books, becoming the first president in 1789.
Amphyllis was buried in the graveyard of Tring’s Church of St Peter & St Paul, while the family home was located in Frogmore Street.
More than 150 years before Washington became president, another Hertfordshire resident was writing his name into American folklore.
Samuel Stone was born in Hertford in 1602, and in 1633 he and Thomas Hooker sailed across the Atlantic on the Griffin, arriving in Boston that September.
Three years later, the pair would set out from New Towne - now Cambridge, Massachusetts - with their congregation to establish a new colony.
They made peace with the local Native Americans and renamed the town they called Saukiog to Hartford in honour of Stone's hometown.
2 - Hot cross bun were created in St Albans
A favourite Easter-time treat for many across the UK, but did you know the hot cross bun is believed to have first originated from St Albans?
It is believed that in the 14th century, a monk at St Albans Abbey created the spiced buns, marking them with a cross to hand out to the poor on Good Friday.
You may have been more aware of this fact is the original name, Alban Buns, has stuck.
3 - Hertfordshire was once home to Parliament
In 1563, with London gripped by the deadly plague, Queen Elizabeth I made the decision to pack up Parliament and move it out of the capital.
She chose Hertford Castle, where she had spent a large part of her childhood, as the new location.
Parliament Square was given its name to recognise this piece of history, while Queens Road takes its name Elizabeth's love of climbing the hill from the castle to enjoy the view from a vantage point now known as Queen's Bench.
4 - Royals have been born in Hertfordshire
Queen Elizabeth I isn't the only royal with Hertfordshire links as plenty have actually been born in the county.
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Probably the most famous is The Queen Mother, whose 1900 birth was registered in St Paul's Walden Bury near Hitchin, although some believe she was actually born in the back of a horse-drawn ambulance on the way to a London hospital.
In 1941, Prince William of Gloucester was born at Lady Carnarvon Nursing Home in Hadley Common, then in Hertfordshire.
The eldest son of Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester, and Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester, he was a grandson of George V.
In the 1960s, he worked in Commonwealth Office with postings in Nigeria and Japan making his just the second British royal to work in the civil service, but he died in 1972 at the age of just 30 in a plane crash.
The first royal born in Hertfordshire was Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York, who was born on June 5, 1341 at Kings Langley Palace.
The founder of the house of York, Edmund would spend most of his life in military service before dying in 1402 at the age of 61.
5 - The inspiration for iconic literature
Hertfordshire film and television heritage is well known, but it has also featured as the inspiration for a number of iconic literary works.
In Oscar Wilde's play, The Importance of Being Earnest, the country estate of Jack Worthing is located in Hertfordshire, while Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is set in Hertfordshire.
Mr Jarndyce's Bleak House in the Charles Dickens novel Bleak House is near St Albans, and the home in E. M. Forster's novel Howards End was based on Rooks Nest House near Stevenage.
Between 1936 and 1940, George Orwell lived in Wallington, which was used as the inspiration for Animal Farm.
