Banbury cheese

Once one of the town's most prestigious exports, and nationally famous, the production of the cheese went into decline by the 18th century, and was eventually forgotten.

Banbury cheeses first appear in the historical record in 1430, when fourteen were sent to John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford, among supplies for France.

It was given as a gift to several significant figures, including Thomas Cromwell (1533 and 1538), Sir Joseph Williamson (1677), and Horace Walpole (1768).

[4] According to the Victoria County History, "in the sixteenth century the name of Banbury at once brought to the mind of the hearer the famous cheeses".

[1][7] Records from 1600 show twenty-one residences in the parish of Cropredy, four miles north of Banbury, were cheese-makers.

[4][8] The production of Banbury cheese declined into the 18th century; Edward Chamberlayne in 1700, Daniel Defoe in 1727, and Richard Pococke in 1756 were among the last to comment on it.

[10] Local historian Martin Thomas has speculated that the late-18th-century inclosure acts were responsible for the decline in the production of the cheese.

[3][7] Jones' Good Huswifes Handmaid (1594) described it with a keen, sharp flavour; Defoe described it as soft and rich; and Camden described it as creamy.

A variant is found as early as 1538, when James Dyer reported that a judge in the Court of Common Pleas pithily "compared the case to a Banbury cheese, which is worth little when the parings are cut off.

[13] A similar insult is made in Jack Dunn's Entertainment (1601): "Put off your clothes and you are like a Banbury cheese—nothing but paring".