page_title: Diocese of Lincoln
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Diocese of Lincoln / History
caption_attribution_description: English: A map from Phillips' new historical atlas (1920)
context_page_description: The Diocese of Lincoln forms part of the Province of Canterbury in England. The present diocese covers the ceremonial county of Lincolnshire.
context_section_description: The diocese traces its roots in an unbroken line to the Pre-Reformation Diocese of Leicester, founded in 679. The see of Leicester was translated to Dorchester in the late 9th century, before taking in the territory of the Diocese of Lindsey and being translated to Lincoln. The diocese was then the largest in England, extending from the River Thames to the Humber Estuary. In 1072, Remigius de Fécamp, bishop under William the Conqueror, moved the see to Lincoln, although the Bishops of Lincoln retained significant landholdings within Oxfordshire. Because of this historic link, for a long time Banbury remained a peculiar of the Bishop of Lincoln. The modern diocese remains notoriously extensive, having been reportedly referred to by Bob Hardy, Bishop of Lincoln, as "2,000 square miles of bugger all" in 2002.
  The dioceses of Oxford and Peterborough were created in 1541 out of parts of the diocese, which left the diocese with two disconnected fragments, north and south.  In 1837 the southern part was transferred to other dioceses:  Bedfordshire and Huntingdonshire to the Diocese of Ely, Hertfordshire to the Diocese of Rochester and Buckinghamshire to the Diocese of Oxford.  Also in 1837 the county of Leicestershire was transferred from Lincoln to Peterborough (and became the independent Diocese of Leicester in 1927). The Archdeaconry of Nottingham was transferred to the Lincoln diocese at the same time.
  In 1884, the Archdeaconry of Nottingham was detached to form a part of the new Diocese of Southwell.
caption: Dioceses of Henry VIII. Lincoln is the large green area, with Oxford and Peterborough marked subdivisions.
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