Kimbles

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Great Kimble Church

The Kimbles are a group of English villages to the south of Aylesbury in the county of Buckinghamshire, sitting at the foot of the Chiltern Hills. The three villages are called Great Kimble, Little Kimble and Kimble Wick. The three villages are respectively named after "The Greater village of Cymbeline", "The Lesser village of Cymbeline", and "Cymbeline's farm".

Their name comes from Cymbeline (also known as Cunobelinus), who was King of the Catuvellauni, an ancient Celtic tribe of pre-Roman Britain. Written about by William Shakespeare in his tragedy of the same name, Cymbeline was able to successfully stave off the planned Roman invasion of Britain led by Emperor Caligula by supporting the fiercely anti-Roman Druids and offering refuge to exiled fighters from Romanised Gaul.

(Alternative derivation: The name Kimble derives from the old English words cyne, belle and means 'Royal bell-shaped hill'.)

It is believed that earthworks found on the nearby Beacon Hill that separates the Kimbles from Chequers were the foundations of a hillfort built during the reign of Cymbeline; coins bearing his name have been found in archaeological digs in the area.

The event that sparked off the English Civil War in the mid 17th century was reputed to have taken place in Saint Nicholas's church in Great Kimble. John Hampden is reported to have been in a parish meeting within the church itself when he refused to pay the ship tax that had been demanded of English parishes by King Charles I. However this claim is disputed as nearby Great Hampden has a stone cross erected on the spot where Hampden refused to pay the tax.

Medieval wallpainting inside All Saints church

Inside the medieval All Saints' Church in Little Kimble are many original wall paintings depicting scenes from the Bible and from English history. One image that has survived very clearly on the north wall of the nave is of a knight in the Crusades bearing the St George's cross.