Looking further back, he suggested that it included the counties in which, since the Tudor period, it has been possible for civil servants and politicians to have their country homes and still be able to travel into London without excessive delay when they were needed.

Charles Davenant, in An Essay upon Ways and Means of Supplying the War, wrote, "The Eleven Home Counties, which are thought in Land Taxes to pay more than their proportion, viz.

"[4] Later definitions have tended to be more narrow and Bacon's Large Scale Atlas of London and Suburbs (revised edition c. 1912) includes Berkshire, Buckingham, Essex, Hertford, Kent, Middlesex and Surrey in the "maps of the home counties".

[14] In fiction, the character of Margot Leadbetter in the BBC sitcom The Good Life, set in Surbiton, formerly in Surrey, has been described by The Spectator as "a Home Counties Conservative to her fingertips".

[17] The home counties are some of the wealthiest in Britain with the towns of Virginia Water, Esher and Weybridge, all in Surrey, ranked in one 2019 survey as having some of the highest average house prices in the country.