Arthur's Stone is Herefordshire's oldest man-made structure. It is a chamber tomb from the Neolithic Period, and dates from some time between 37 BC. "Before we came to Gloucester we passed through the beautiful valley of Stroud, so green & hilly, but soon after Swindon, all beauty of scenery faded away." (So green and not golden.)Īmongst later suggestions are that it is named form the autumn leaves of the thickly wooded slopes, an observation also made by Paul Hawkins Fisher in his 'Notes and Recollections of Stroud' (1871) describing the Golden Valley: 'in autumn it is all a-glow with the bright golden tints of its beech leaves.' Historic AttractionsĪrthur's Stone is found just outside the village of Dorstone. On 29 September 1849, Queen Victoria travelled from Gloucester to Swindon by train and noted the name: Rudder records that a Roger Gulden held lands in the area in the Middle Ages, so it may come from his name. 'The Place Names of Gloucestershire', published in 1965 (University of Cambridge Press) assumes that the name is from the wealth that came from the industries of the valley, but there is no source for this speculation.
The first known written reference to the 'Golden Valley' is in Samuel Rudder's 1779 History of Gloucestershire, though he does not propose an origin for it, and there appears to be a reference in Issac Taylor's map dated 1777. This theory appeared in In the film 'Shadowlands (which tells the story of C S Lewis and his wife, Joy Davidman). It is said that the Normans might have heard 'Dore' or 'D'Or', or it may have come through court records with that romantic confusion. The Dore is from the Welsh language, dŵr, meaning "water". One suggestion is that the name derives from a confusion of the name of the River Dore with the French d'or, meaning 'of gold'. The valley can look golden indeed in the summer sunlight, but the name Golden Valley is unlikely to be from that source.Ī local myth has it that Queen Victoria named the valley, but the name is recorded long before.
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