BADMINTON or GREAT BADMINTON, village in the Cotswold Hills, Gloucestershire, England, 1 oo m. W. of London by the Great Western railway (direct line to south Wales) . Here is Badminton House, the seat of the dukes of Beaufort, standing in a park some ten miles in circumference. The manor of Bad minton was acquired in 1608 from Nicholas Boteler (to whose family it had belonged for several centuries) by Thomas, Vis count Somerset (d. 165o or 1651), 3rd son of Edward, 4th earl of Worcester, and was given by his daughter and heiress Elizabeth to Henry Somerset, 3rd marquess of Worcester and 1st duke of Beaufort (1629-99), who built the present mansion (1682) on the site of the old manor house. Population of parish (1921) 388.