Thomas Hardy

When Thomas Hardy created the concept of a fictional Wessex, it consisted merely of the small area of Dorset in which Hardy grew up; by the time Thomas Hardy wrote Jude the Obscure, the boundaries had extended to include all of Dorset, Wiltshire, Somerset, Devon, Hampshire, much of Berkshire, and some of Oxfordshire, with Oxfordshire's most north-easterly point being Oxford (renamed "Christminster" in the novel).