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The earliest inhabitants of the Thornbury area were of the Neolithic and Bronze age cultures. No established sites have been found in the near locality, but finds include a polished flint axe and a barbed and tanged arrowhead near Marlwood School. The Roman presence is indicated by coins found during building works at sites including the Armstrong Hall and police station where Roman pottery was also recovered. No buildings have been unearthed and it has been suggested that the area was occupied by farmers living in timber buildings and supplying produce to the Roman garrison at Gloucester.

Before the Norman Conquest, Thornbury was held by Earl Brictic, a Saxon thane who also owned Sodbury and extensive estates elsewhere in the area. At that time it was a village, no more than a collection of thatch and daub huts surrounded by fields.

Brictic incurred the displeasure of a noble lady called Maud by somewhat ungallantly refusing to marry her. She later married William the Conqueror and, as Queen Maud, proved that ‘Hell hast no fury’ by arranging for Brictic’s estate to be confiscated by the crown and for him to be thrown into Winchester Prison where he subsequently died.

In Norman time, therefore, the manor of Thornbury with the village and its newly built church passed into Royal hands. After Queen Maud died, William Rufus gave the manor to Fitzhamon for services rendered in Glamorgan and at the same time the parish church was granted to the Abbot of Tewkesbury, who collected tithes from Thornbury and appointed its vicars up to the time of the Dissolution. The manor throughout the years passed variously by marriage and royal patronage into the De Clare, Stafford and Howard families. It was Edward Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, who built Thornbury Castle and the Howard family who last used it as a residence.

By the 13th Century Thornbury was sufficiently important to become a Borough and it retained that status up to 1883 until when the town was administered by a Mayor and 12 Aldermen. Some of the Borough property from those days, including an oak coffer dated 1615 containing municipal scales and weights and measures, passed into the custody of Thornbury Town Trust and is now held by the Town Council.

For further information on the history of Thornbury visit Thornbury Museum in Chapel Street. History of Thornbury