The site of the find was 0.5 miles (0.8 km) to the north-east of Buckden village, in an area of the Great Ouse valley about to be mined for sand and gravel.

Henry VIII sent Catherine of Aragon to Buckden Palace after the annulment of their marriage (an issue known as the King's Great Matter), from July 1533 to May 1534.

[9] On Friday 18 June 1641, "hundreds of women and boys, armed with Daggers and Javelins, in a very tumultuous and riotous Manner" entered some land at Buckden owned by the Bishop of Lincoln and "turned in a great herd of cattle".

[10] Buckden's site on the Great North Road made it a popular coaching stop in the 18th century.

In 1854, just 15 years later, Buckden was called "a quiet insignificant place compared to what it was in coaching times", with the advent of the railways.

Domesday mentions a water mill on the Great Ouse; this was rebuilt about 1850 and converted to steam power in the 1890s.

On the eastern side there are superficial deposits of alluvium (clay, silt, sand and gravel) from up to 2 million years ago in the Quaternary period.

The UK climate, defined like most of north-west Europe as temperate and oceanic, or Cfb under the Köppen climate classification system,[18] makes Eastern areas such as East Anglia drier, cooler and less windy, with greater daily and seasonal temperature variations.

Cambridgeshire has cool onshore coastal breezes further to the east, keeping it warm in summer and cold and frosty in winter.

Average annual rainfall for the UK in 1981–2010 was 1,154 millimetres (45.4 in), but Cambridgeshire is one of the driest counties with about half that amount.

The five main work sectors appear below:[25] In 2009, median household income across Cambridgeshire of £32,500 was exceeded by Buckden's £36,900.

[26] The Office for National Statistics has placed the village of Buckden in the Lower Layer Super Output Area (LSOA) called "Huntingdonshire 017C".

Buckden has some shops, including supermarkets, a post office, a pharmacy and clothiers, and over 100 private businesses based there.

Buckden Marina, built in 1963,[35] is next to the Great Ouse; originally with some 150 berths but now 240, over an area of 22 acres (8.9 hectares).

A charitable trust set up in 1958 manages the village hall and the adjacent recreation ground of some 12 acres (4.9 hectares), with four tennis courts, a children's play area, cricket and football pitches and a bowls green.

[37] Buckden is close to the A1 main road, and its primary connection to it is a roundabout at the south end of the village.

The B661 road runs west from the roundabout, giving access to Grafham Water, Great Staughton and Kimbolton.

[7] Today's nearest station is 3.5 miles (5.6 km) away at Huntingdon, where regular services run south to London and north to Peterborough and beyond.

On weekdays and Saturdays there is an hourly bus service between Huntingdon and St Neots that stops in Buckden, at the Green.

Further rebuilding and extension took place in the 15th century, including a new red-brick tower[7] of a similar design to Tattershall Castle, Lincolnshire,[40] although that of Buckden has only four storeys.

A survey in 1647 included a Great Chamber, chapel, brick tower and gatehouse, all enclosed by a moat.

Between 1914 and 1919 Buckden Towers was used as a Red Cross hospital and in the Second World War as a home for evacuees from the London blitz.

[42] The site of the original palace is designated an ancient monument and Victorian Buckden Towers as a Grade II listed building; the Inner Gatehouse, Curtain Wall and Towers of the earlier Buckden Palace are all Grade I listed buildings.

Not until the 1960s did large-scale gravel and sand extraction take place, needed for two major local construction projects: the dual carriageway of the A1 and the dam at Graham Water.

[44] Buckden Marina was built in a small disused gravel pit close to the Great Ouse.

[7] Buckden Church of England Primary School became an Academy in 2010 and operates independently of the local authority; 248 students were on the roll in 2014–2015.

The Anglican church dedicated to St Mary the Virgin is a grade I listed building consisting of a chancel with organ chamber and vestry, a nave, a west tower, north and south aisles and a porch.

The nearest, Little Barford Power Station, is 6 miles (9.7 km) from Buckden; it uses combined cycle gas turbines (CCGT) and can generate 740 MW of electricity.

3 miles (4.8 km) away at Cotton Farm near Graveley, onshore wind turbines generate a maximum of 20 MW of electricity.

The nearest hospital is Hinchingbrooke, which is 4 miles (6.4 km) from Buckden and has a range of specialities, including Accident and Emergency.