Eventually the first settlers they would have expanded their hunting and agricultural activities along that area of riverbank later followed by the Stourbridge to Wolverhampton road. This in itself formed part of the route from Worcester to Lichfield, a principle medieval artery linking two vital ecclesiastic and economic centres. Local religious houses would have consolidated this. Meanwhile, the higher land to the East, now occupied by the vast modern housing estates of Amblecote Bank and Withymoor, whilst poorer pasture, was recognised by later generations as a veritable treasure store of minerals, especially coal and clay.
 
The Domesday Book gives a clue to the origin of Amblecote’s name. This, at least in its Domesday form, is probably Saxon, though whether it was (as is sometime claimed) derived from an individual named Amela or Hemele, whose ‘cot’ or dwelling was situated here, is far from established fact. Indeed England’s other, more famous ‘Amble’ - Ambleside in Cumbria - is allegedly derived from the word ámelar meaning a river, whilst there is a stream in Suffolk anciently named Amalburna (coincidentally also a tributary of a river Stour) which points to Celtic origins. Given that the principle feature of ancient Amblecote would have been the Stour and the streams running into it (even Ancient Britons kept their feet dry if possible), a watery origin for the name may well be a possibility. We shall probably never know the real answer.

Whilst on the subject of place names, Amblecote, in common with most English localities, abounds with ancient, obscure and (despite the claims of scholars) largely indecipherable names. Coalbournbook for example may mean the border (bourn) marked by the cold (coal or cole) stream (brook); or it may not. Indeed cole is one of the most ancient words in the English language, perhaps even associated with prehistoric track makers, though of course in the Amblecote context it might simply be referring to the mineral coal. Withymoor probably means the moor where the willows (wythies) grow, or maybe the moor of the vipers, or the weathered (exposed) moor, or for those who prefer their history romantic, the moor of the soothsayer. On the other hand if the modern ‘Withymoor’ is adapted from ‘Whitmoor’ as is the spelling on the Ordinance Survey Map of 1834, then it may well mean ‘white moor’. Even further back in time a map of 1796 names the general area ‘Wormwood Bank’ – possibly a reference to the plant Artemisia absinthium, long used as a herbal cure for worm infestation, and as an hallucinogenic additive (now banned) to alcoholic drinks!