History
The hamlet of Blackley was mentioned in the Domesday Book. The name derives from the Anglo-Saxon Blæclēah = "dark wood" or "dark clearing". In the 13th and 14th centuries Blackley was referred to as Blakeley or Blakelegh, a spelling that is consistent with the local pronunciation.
By the Middle Ages, Blackley had become a park belonging to the lords of Manchester. Its value in 1282 was recorded as £6 13s 4d, a sum approximately equivalent in buying power to £3,500 today.
The lords of Manchester leased the land from time to time. In 1473 John Byron held the leases on Blackley village, Blackley field, and Pillingworth fields at an annual rent of £33 6s 8d. The Byron family continued to hold the land until the beginning of the 17th century when Blackley was sold in parcels to a number of landowners.
By the middle of the 17th century Blackley was a village of just 107 inhabitants. Blackley today is hardly recognisable as the same rural area that it had been at the start of the 19th century. Now only local place names like Meadows School, Plant Hill or French Barn Lane hint at its rural past.
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