Gloucestershire
[key], county, 1,025 sq mi (2,655 sq km), W central England. The county
seat is Gloucester.
Administratively, the county is divided into six districts: Forest of Dean,
Stroud, Gloucester, Tewkesbury, Cheltenham, and Cotswold. South
Gloucestershire is an administratively independent unitary authority. In the
eastern part of the county are the Cotswold Hills, devoted largely to dairy
and crop farming; in the center is the fertile valley of the Severn River,
devoted to dairy farming (Gloucester cheese) and sheep raising; and in the
west, on the Welsh border, are the Wye valley and the Forest of Dean, also
with sheep raising. Manufacturing (aircraft, engineering, paper, and tobacco
products) is centered in Gloucester and Cheltenham. Cirencester and Gloucester
were centers of Roman road networks. The region became part of the
Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia. In the
Middle Ages the Cotswolds provided wool for an important wool trade in the
county.
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