Blackburn () is an industrial town and the administrative centre of the Blackburn with Darwen borough in Lancashire, England. The town is north of the West Pennine Moors on the southern edge of the Ribble Valley, east of Preston and north-northwest of Manchester. Blackburn is the core centre of the wider unitary authority area along with the town of Darwen. It is the second largest town (after Blackpool) in Lancashire.
At the 2011 census, Blackburn had a population of 117,963, whilst the wider borough of Blackburn with Darwen had a population of 150,030. Blackburn had a population of 117,963 in 2011, with 30.8% being people of ethnic backgrounds other than white British.
A former mill town, textiles have been produced in Blackburn since the middle of the 13th century, when wool was woven in people's houses in the domestic system. Flemish weavers who settled in the area in the 14th century helped to develop the woollen cottage industry. The most rapid period of growth and development in Blackburn's history coincided with the industrialisation and expansion of textile manufacturing.
Blackburn's textile sector fell into decline from the mid-20th century and subsequently faced similar challenges to other post-industrial northern towns, including deindustrialisation, economic deprivation and housing problems. Blackburn has had significant investment and redevelopment since 1958 through government funding and the European Regional Development Fund.
History
Toponymy
The origins of the name has been suggested that it may be a combination of the River Blakewater, and an Old English word "burn", meaning stream. Local author William Abram cited the ancient name as Blake Burne in his 1877 book, Parish of Blackburn, County of Lancaster: A History of Blackburn, Town and Parish. Abram also confirms that the region, later known as the Blackburn Hundred, was known as Blakeburneshyre. Blackburn was recorded in the Domesday Book as Blacheburne and Blacheburn in 1086. By the time of John Speed's map of 1610, the spelling of the town was Blackburn, while the region was Blackburne. There is anecdotal speculation that the name of the town may simply mean "black burn", or "black stream".
Prehistory
There is little evidence of prehistoric settlement in the Blakewater valley, in which Blackburn developed. Evidence of activity in the form of two urn burials has been discovered from the Bronze Age in the hills around Blackburn. In 1879, a cinerary urn was discovered at a tumulus at Revidge, north of the town; another was excavated in 1996 at Pleasington Cemetery, west of the town, by gravedigger Grant Higson. The presence of a sacred spring—perhaps in use during the Iron Age—provides evidence of prehistoric activity in the town centre, at All Hallows Spring on Railway Road.
Roman era
Blackburn is located where a Roman military road crossed the river Blakewater. The road linked Bremetennacum Veteranorum (Ribchester) and Mamucium (a major Roman fort that occupied Castlefield in Manchester). The route of the road passed east of Blackburn Cathedral and probably crossed the river in the Salford neighbourhood just east of the modern town centre. It is not clear whether the road predated the settlement.
George C. Miller, in his Blackburn: The Evolution of a Cotton Town, says:
The ancient military way from Mamucium (Manchester) to (Bremetennacum) (Ribchester), passing over Blacksnape, plunges on its unswerving course through Blackamoor, over the scarp at Whinney Heights, to pass across the Blakewater in the vicinity of Salford. This fact alone presents a reasonable argument for the existence of a British oppidum or walled village on the site, it being customary for such primitive communities to cluster in the vicinity of a ford or bridge.
According to William Abram (1877):