Uley
| Uley | |
|---|---|
 Uley
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| Uley shown within Gloucestershire | |
| Population | 1,151 (2011) |
| OS grid reference | ST790984 |
| District | |
| Shire county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | Dursley |
| Postcode district | GL11 |
| Dialling code | 01453 |
| Police | Gloucestershire |
| Fire | Gloucestershire |
| Ambulance | South Western |
| EU Parliament | South West England |
| UK Parliament | |
Uley /ˈjuːli/ is a village in the county of Gloucestershire, England. It is situated in a wooded valley in the Cotswold escarpment, on the B4066 road between Dursley and Stroud. The population is around 1,100, but was much greater during the early years of the industrial revolution, when the village was renowned for producing blue cloth. The placename (recorded as Euuelege in the Domesday Book) probably signifies 'clearing in a yew wood'.
The Romans built a temple at West Hill, near Uley, on the site of an earlier prehistoric shrine. Following the laying of a water main pipe there in 1976, many discoveries were made including numerous Roman writing tablets or lead curse tablets from the temple area. These writing tablets appear often to relate to theft, and here the mention of animals and farm implements is a regular theme. There is an ongoing, online project to catalogue all those found at West Hill. Other remains from this temple, including a fine stone head of Mercury, can now be seen in the British Museum. There were significant Roman villas nearby at Frocester, Kingscote, and Woodchester, and there is a little-known Roman villa beneath Cam Peak on the road into Dursley.
St Giles's Church near the village green was designed by the 19th-century architect Samuel Sanders Teulon. His building replaced an earlier church dating back to Norman times, which had in its turn replaced a Saxon church. The nearby church of the Holy Cross at Owlpen also has Saxon origins: the church there was rebuilt in 1828 by Samuel Manning and enlarged and decorated in 1876 by James Piers St Aubyn. There were also non-conformist chapels at South St and Whitecourt until the early 1970s.
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