Selly Oak
Selly Oak is a suburb of south-west Birmingham, England. The area includes the neighbourhoods of Bournbrook, Selly Park and Ten Acres. The adjoining wards of Edgbaston and Harborne are to the north of the Bourn Brook, which was the former county boundary, and to the south are Weoley Castle and Bournville.
Formerly in Worcestershire, Selly Oak became part of Birmingham, and Warwickshire, in 1911. In 1974, Birmingham became part of the new West Midlands county.
A district committee serves the four wards of Selly Oak, Billesley, Bournville and Brandwood. The same wards form the Birmingham Selly Oak constituency, represented since 2024 by Alistair Carns. Selly Oak is connected to Birmingham by the Pershore Road and the Bristol Road. The Worcester and Birmingham Canal and the Birmingham Cross-City Railway Line run across the Local District Centre.
The 2001 population census recorded 25,792 people living in Selly Oak, with a population density of 4,236 people per square kilometre, as compared with 3,649 per square kilometre for the entirety Birmingham. It had 15.9% of the population consisting of ethnic minorities compared with 29.6% for Birmingham in general. As the University of Birmingham is nearby, there are many students in the area.
Toponymy
Selly Oak is recorded in the Domesday Book as Escelie. The name Selly is derived from variants of "scelf-lei" or shelf-meadow, that is, pasture land on a shelf or terrace of land, probably the glacial deposits formed after the creation and later dispersal of Lake Harrison during the Quaternary period. Another source for the name comes from the Old English 'sele' meaning a building, or a hall.History
Prehistoric
A small pit recorded in a service trench near Bournville Lane, Selly Oak produced the oldest pottery found in Birmingham so far. Twenty eight sherds, representing about five different vessels, in decorated Grooved Ware pottery of Late Neolithic date, were recovered. The Bronze Age pit found immediately adjacent to the site was also a highly important archaeological discovery, since prehistoric structures other than burnt mounds are extremely rare in Birmingham. Examples of finds in this area include:Bond Street Stone Axe ; Bourn Brook Burnt Mound ; Bourn Brook Burnt Mounds ; California, Burnt Mound ; Falconhurst Road Barbed and Tanged Arrowhead ; King's Heath/Stirchley Brook Perforated Implement, axe hammer ; Moor End Farm Burnt Mound. Northfield Relief Road pit. Ridgacre Burnt Mound, near Moor Farm ; Selly Oak Flint Flake ; Selly Park Recreation Ground Prehistoric Finds ; Shenley Lane, Northfield flint scraper ; Ten Acres Burnt Mound ; Vicarage Farm Axe Hammer. Weoley Park Road Neolithic Flint Scraper.
Roman
Metchley Fort was established c. AD 48 and occupied until c. 200 AD. Two Roman Roads appear to have met there. Ryknield or Icknield Street was laid out between Bourton-on-the-Water and Derby in the mid-to-late 1st century to serve the needs of military communication. It passed through Alcester, Selly Oak, Birmingham, and Sutton Coldfield to Wall. A little north of Birmingham it passed through the important military camp of Perry. At Bournbrook it threw off a branch called the Hadyn Way that passed through Stirchley and Lifford to Alcester. The road kept to the west of Birmingham to avoid the swamps and marshes along the course of the River Rea. The second road is generally called the Upper Saltway running north from Droitwich Spa to the Lincolnshire coast. Its route is uncertain but is generally believed to follow the line of the A38.Droitwich and Alcester were connected by the Lower Saltway. Wall was previously a Roman centre named Letocetum and it was near here that Ryknield Street crossed Watling Street, now the A5, which ran north-west from London to Wroxeter. The Staffordshire Hoard was found near here within a triangle of roads from the Roman and Anglo-Saxon periods that cannot all be dated. Possible evidence of Roman remains exist in the place names of Stirchley Street; Moor Street, near Woodgate Valley in Bartley Green; and Street Farm in Northfield where two Turnpike Roads met. Evidence of Roman activity through finds in the area include:
Allens Croft Road/Brandwood Park Road Roman Coin ; Harborne Bridge, Roman Road ; Hazelwell Street Roman Road ; Icknield Street, Walkers Heath, Roman Road ; Lodge Hill, coin of Gordian III: Roman ; Longdales Road Roman Farmstead ; Metchley Roman Forts ; Northfield Relief Road pottery ; Parsons Hill Roman occupation 0AD to 299AD ; Raddlebarn Road Roman Coin ; Selly Oak Roman Coin – commemorative coin of Constantine 1 ; Selly Park Spindle Whorl ; Stirchley Roman Coin, a gold aureus of Vespasian minted at Tarraco in the last quarter of the year 70AD ; Stocks Wood irregular Earthwork ; Tiverton Road Roman Coins – denarii ; Weoley Castle Roman Coin of Antoninianus ; Woodgate Valley Roman coin of Trajan.
Anglo-Saxon and Norman
There are two entries in Domesday Book for Selly Oak. The first entry for Selly Oak records a nuncupative will and is out of conventional order. Wulfwin had leased the manor for the term of three lives and the newly appointed Bishop of Lichfield, Robert de Limesey, used the will to challenge the loss of his land. "Wulfwin bought this manor before 1066 from the Bishop of Chester, for the lives of three men. When he was ailing and had come to the end of his life, he summoned his son, the Bishop of Li, his wife and many of his friends and said: 'Hear me, my friends, I desire that my wife hold this land which I bought from the church so long as she lives, and that after her death the church from which I received it should accept it back. Let whoever shall take it away from it be excommunicated'. The more important men of the whole County testify that this was so." The first entry records Bartley Green as an outlier, or dependency of Selly Oak, while the second entry does not include Bartley Green but records Selly Oak is held as two manors. The second entry also shows that Wibert had been replaced as sub-tenant by Robert suggesting the challenge may have been partially successful. The Bishop of Chester owned Lichfield and its members. These include Harborne, in Staffordshire until 1891, which was held by Robert.Wulfwin owned several manors which indicates he was wealthy and important, possibly an aristocrat. Indeed, he has been described as a great thegn, the son of Wigod, and the grandson of Woolgeat, the Danish Earl of Warwick. His mother was the sister of Leofric III, Earl of Mercia. The possessions that came to him by the Dano-Saxon marriage of his parents seem to have been rather extensive. In King Edward the Confessor's time Wulfwin was sheriff and through his son Turchill, who came to be Earl of Warwick, the Ardens and the Bracebridges trace their descent from the Old Saxon kings.
One of the purposes of Domesday Book was to provide a written statement of the legal owners and overlords of the land in the reallocation of territories after the conquest. William Fitz-Ansculf, from Picquigny, Picardy in France, was assigned a Barony. He made his base at the Saxon, Earl Edwin's, Dudley Castle. He and his successors were overlords of the manors of Selly Oak and Birmingham both of which had previously been owned by Wulfwin. It would appear that William Fitz Ansculf died during the First Crusade. Henry of Huntingdon in his 'History of the English People' writes that: "Then from the middle of February they besieged the castle of 'Arqah, for almost three months. Easter was celebrated there. But Anselm of Ribemont, a very brave knight, died there, struck by a stone, and William of Picardy, and many others." Successors to the Barony included the Paganel and Somery families. In 1322 when John de Somery died the barony was divided between his two sisters Margaret de Sutton and Joan de Botetourt. Joan Botetourt was awarded a twenty-third of a knights fee in Selley which was held by Geoffrey de Selley who also held Bernak in Northamptonshire, and a quarter of a fee in Northfield which was held by John de Middleton.
At the time of the Domesday survey in 1086 Birmingham was a manor in Warwickshire with less than 3,000 acres. The current Birmingham Historic Landscape Characterisation project covers a total area of 26,798 ha. Birmingham developed in the hinterland of three counties – Warwickshire, Staffordshire, and Worcestershire. Nearly 50% of this territory was formerly in either Staffordshire or Worcestershire but as the city expanded the ancient boundaries were changed in order that the area being administered came under one county authority – Warwickshire. The Saxon presence in the territory of modern Birmingham requires the inclusion of the Manors and Berewicks/Outliers mentioned in Domesday Book that are now part of the Birmingham conurbation. This is complicated by the fact that separate figures were not given for Harborne, Yardley, and King's Norton which were all attached to manors outside the area. The Birmingham Plateau had about 26 Domesday Book manors, a population of close to 2,000, with seven mills, and three priests.
Medieval
The earliest Tax Roll for Selly Oak was the Lechmere Roll of 1276–1282. Selleye and Weleye were separate from the manor of Northfield. Of the twenty households listed the person who paid the most tax was William de Valence, 1st Earl of Pembroke, who was the half-brother of Henry III and one of the wealthiest men in the kingdom.The Papal Register 1291 shows that Northfield was an Ecclesiastic Parish which was connected with Dudley Priory. In the next Tax Roll in 1327 the entries for Selly Oak and Weoley were combined with those of Northfield. This suggests a time-frame for the establishment of the Parish of Northfield.
20th century and contemporary
Two tornadoes touched down in Birmingham on 23 November 1981 as part of the record-breaking nationwide tornado outbreak on that day. The second tornado, rated as an F1/T2 tornado, touched down in Selly Oak at about 14:00 local time, causing some damage across the southern suburbs of Birmingham.In the late 20th century a road-widening scheme for the Bristol Road was carried out. Many historic buildings, including the offices of Birmingham Battery and Metal Company and the Westley Richards Gun Factory, were demolished. However, plans for a major regeneration of the area were confirmed in 2005 and a new 1.5 km stretch of road was opened in August 2011 to access the new Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham. The work has involved the construction of the Aerial aqueduct to carry the Worcester and Birmingham Canal, and a railway viaduct for the Cross-City Line. This scheme has paved the way for the enhancement of the Battery Retail Park shopping complex and a number of familiar High Street shops have opened stores.