Clophill has two hamlets, Beadlow and Cainhoe. A third, Moddry  or Moddri is given in the records of Beaulieu Priory before 1146 and may be spurious. Cainhoe is first recorded in the Domesday Book at Chainehou and Cainou, the name meaning "Cæga's spur of land".

Cainhoe Castle remains as a prominent earthwork on the north side of the road from Clophill to Shefford. It was the seat of the Barony of Cainhoe which, under Nigel de Albini owned lands in Husborne Crawley, Tingrith, Harlington, Marston Moretaine, Millbrook, Ampthill, Southill, Maulden, Silsoe, Pulloxhill, Streatley, Milton Ernest, Carlton, Radwell,  Turvey, Wyboston, Holme (Biggleswade), Harrowden, Clifton, Henlow and Arlesey as well as Clophill and Cainhoe. with some outlying property in Buckinghamshire, Warwickshire and Leicestershire. It is possible that the castle was built on the site of an Anglo-Saxon hall or other settlement site. A series of fishponds lies north of the castle and west there are earthworks to the west of the castle and it seems likely that this was the hall described in 1272 when Simon de Albini's possession were divided between his three sister: "the hall of Kaynho with porch, chamber, cellar towards the east, with bakehouse, dovecote and garden westwards to the ditch of the marsh, the ditch which encloses the court…a ditch extends from the well to the bridge of Baybrugg, thence a ditch near the causeway…to the bottom of the old ditch…fishpond called Walebeck….houses of stone and lime…"

Other than the impressive earthworks of the castle Cainhoe today is little more than a scatter of farms and it seems as though this was probably always the case. The Domesday Book recorded just three villagers (who would have been men it is probably necessary to multiply this figure by at least four to account for their dependents). It seems as though the area round the castle was known as Great or Upper Cainhoe by the 13th century with Little Cainhoe being in Flitton parish near Silsoe [L323 and 332].