here are three prehistoric barrows, all scheduled ancient monuments, in the parish, a long barrow and a round one near Symonds Hall farm and a round barrow on Blackquarries Hill, and a few finds have been made of worked flints and arrowheads. There is some evidence of human activity in the Roman period with finds in Tyley bottom and near Symonds Hall, but the only excavated Roman site within the parish is the Roman Villa at Wortley. The finds have been deposited at the District Museum in Stroud and should be displayed there when the new Museum opens in Stratford Park, Stroud, in 2001. The Roman Villa at Kingscote which was excavated in the 1970s is just outside the parish boundary.

The first recorded appearance of the town as such is to be found in a Saxon Royal Charter of King Edmund of Wessex, who in A.D.940 leased four hides of land in WUDETUN to the theign Edrick. The name Wudetun means the enclosure, homestead or village (tun) in or near the wood (wude). It is also known that Wudetun had a church at this time. After the Norman conquest the Domesday Book in 1086 describes Wotton under the name of Vutune as one of the 24 dependencies of the royal manor of Berkeley, ruled by the Lords of Berkeley.

The Town Crier, George Carpenter.   Photo: Anne Bishop

Jone completed her arrangements for the new borough some twenty years later when she agreed that the burgesses should submit a short list of three of themselves each year as candidates from which the lord of the manor would choose the mayor. The Mayor and twelve Aldermen of Wotton-under-Edge administered the town with the assistance of a Sergeant Mace Bearer and two Constables from 1273 until 1886. Then it had to surrender its powers to a larger authority, Dursley Rural District Council, because of its refusal to countenance a Workhouse within the parish, there being several groups of almshouses (and there was a small earlier workhouse at Potter's Pond behind the Ram Inn, where the New Life church now is). The Local Government Act of 1894 restored Parish Councils as the smallest unit of local government and in 1973/4 the Wotton-under-Edge Parish Council recovered part of its former status by becoming a Town Council with a Town Mayor elected annually as its Chairman. The fine 18^th century silver gilt mace which had been taken to Berkeley Castle for safekeeping in 1886 was returned to the town. Unfortunately the Mayor's original chain of office could not be found but Mr John Pinch designed and made a very fine silver chain with a series of emblems relating to many aspects of the town. The town possesses a Coat of Arms, the shield and crest of which indicate Wotton's past in the wool trade.

Indeed, weaving and cloth making was the main occupation of the inhabitants of Wotton from the 13^th century onwards, and much of the work was done in cottage homes. The Industrial Revolution brought an end to many of these cottage industries, with the setting up of a large number of mills along the Little Avon and its tributaries. The industry persisted through the 19^th century even after the disastrous slumps of the 1830s and 1840s. The cloth trade brought considerable prosperity to Wotton over a long period, though not devoid of troubles and even riots between weavers and clothiers. This historic past is still reflected in such names as Dyer's Brook, Loom Cottage and the Ram Inn.

Life in 15^th century Wotton was enlivened by the feud which existed between the noble families of Berkeley and de Lisle. The tension reached a climax in 1469 when Thomas Talbot, Viscount de Lisle, was killed at the nearby Battle of Nibley Green and his Manor House at Wotton sacked.

The Ram Inn, the oldest house in Wotton.   Photo: George Way

Another visible act of benevolence towards Wotton occurred in the 17^th century, when Hugh Perry, a native of the town and a merchant and Alderman of the City of London and sheriff of London in 1632, remembered his birthplace with a bequest of £300 for the building of the Almshouses which stand in Church Street, and are one of the town's architectural treasures. They were built in 1638.

It has for a long time been believed that one Stephen Hopkins was a clothier of Wortley before playing a prominent role in the sailing of the Mayflower to the New World in 1620. This claim has recently been disputed and there is evidence that he was married and his children baptised in Hursley near Winchester in Hampshire and he may have had no connexion with the Wortley Hopkins family.

The 18^th century was marked by religious revival and the establishment of the Tabernacle chapel by the Rev. Rowland Hill, M.A. In the 19^th century, Sir Isaac Pitman, 1813-1897, lived in a house still standing in Orchard Street, Wotton, and invented his system of shorthand known as Phonography in 1837. He came to Wotton from Barton-on-Humber, taught here and published his book - Stenographic Sound-Hand - in 1839, the forerunner of the shorthand used today.

Wotton's first water supply, established partly through the efforts of Hugh Perry, was provided by the Edbrook spring, still marked by a brick sink opposite the Parish Church. Later a Parish pump was established outside the Tolsey House until it was found to be contaminated. The provision, therefore, of a proper water supply in the 1880s was a major historical event in bringing Wotton into modern times.

The making of history is a continuous process, but despite growth, demolitions and rebuilding, the past of Wotton can still be traced, not only in the Parish Church but in some of the houses, shops and streets.

The Coat of Arms

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Principal Buildings