436                           THE COUNTIES OF MARYLAND

the Vpper and Lower House of this Assembly That that part of the Province
of Maryland on the west side of the Bay of Chessopeack over against the Isle
of Kent formerly called by the name of Providence, by the Inhabitants there
resideing and inhabiting this yeare shall from henceforth bee erected into a
Shire or County, by the name of Annarundell County, And by that name
hereafter to bee ever called.

This act is Chapter 7, Acts of Assembly for 1650, and may be found
in Maryland Archives, volume i, p. 292. It is of particular interest in
relation to the subject of this present paper since as Bozman¹¹ says
" this is the first act of assembly, and indeed almost the only legislative
provision, for the erecting of any county within the province." The
latter part of his statement is hardly correct.

The territory of the present Calvert County was laid off the same
year, and at a later time disputes arose owing to the position of the
counties on the roll call referring to the dates of their erection as to the
relative positions of Calvert and Anne Arundel counties. By a vote of
the House of Delegates in 1671 it was decided that Anne Arundel County
was older than Calvert which had come into existence originally as (old)
Charles County, through the initiative of the Lord Proprietary.

Anne Arundel County, bearing as it did, the names of Lady Anne
Arundel, wife of Cecilius, Lord Baltimore, a strict Catholic, was not
unaffected by the Puritan revolution in Maryland. In October, 1654,¹²
by an ordinance of the Puritan Commissioners the southern boundary
of the County was made at " Mr. Maishes Creek Commonly called oyster
Creek " shown by old land records, in the contest of 1824, to be the same
as Fishing Creek and the name was changed to Providence. In 1656,
by the quieting of the Province this act was revoked and all laws were
supposed to stand as they did in 1654. The name of Anne Arundel was
restored, but the inhabitants seemed to retain the definition of the
boundary line of October, 1654, for the limits of Anne Arundel and Cal-
vert counties.

The next modification of the territorial limits of Anne Arundel County
arose from the erection of Baltimore County, probably in the year 1659,

¹¹ Bozman, vol. ii, p. 393, ef. ante p. 424.

¹² Chapter 5, Acts of 1654.