Early history

The first settlement in the area was a little further north, around an open field system at Tenchlee or Tenelea (ten clearings). This medieval settlement has completely disappeared, but some of the private enterprise farms and estates which grew up in the area survived into modern times, even if only in name sometimes. Huyon Hall and Broom Hall were moated sites. The Fox family bought the farm belonging to the atte Holies in the fifteenth century, and the name Fox Hollies resulted from that association. The Acock family acquired Notings Land, an estate out near today's city boundary. The earliest known reference to Acocks Green is in the Yardley Parish Register of 1604. In 1626 Acocks Green House and other estates were given by Richard Acock to his son as a wedding gift.

This 17th century reference to Acocks Green is therefore not to today's 'Green' but to an area about a quarter of a mile further out on the Warwick Road.

Near this house were two inns: the Spread Eagle and the Dolphin. Stage coaches stopped at the Dolphin, and in 1725 the Warwick Road was turnpiked and a tollgate placed across the road there. In the last years of the eighteenth century the Birmingham to Warwick Canal was cut across the area, and wharves opened at Stockfield Road and Yardley Road. Tiles, brick, sand and gravel were exported, and coal and Welsh slate were imported. With increased prosperity came the rebuilding of farms and the construction of large residences, but it was a later period which saw the transformation of Acocks Green from a rural backwater into a bustling suburb.