Farnley is a village

Village

A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet with the population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand , Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods, such as the West Village in Manhattan, New...

 and civil parish in the Harrogate

Harrogate (borough)

Harrogate is a local government district and borough of North Yorkshire, England. Its council is based in the town of Harrogate but it also includes surrounding towns and villages...

 district of North Yorkshire

North Yorkshire

North Yorkshire is a non-metropolitan or shire county located in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England, and a ceremonial county primarily in that region but partly in North East England. Created in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972 it covers an area of , making it the largest...

, England, near Otley

Otley

-Transport:The main roads through the town are the A660 to the south east, which connects Otley to Bramhope, Adel and Leeds city centre, and the A65 to the west, which goes to Ilkley and Skipton. The A6038 heads to Guiseley, Shipley and Bradford, connecting with the A65...

, West Yorkshire

West Yorkshire

West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972....

. The name "Farnley" indicates that the village was first established in an area heavy with fern

Fern

A fern is any one of a group of about 12,000 species of plants belonging to the botanical group known as Pteridophyta. Unlike mosses, they have xylem and phloem . They have stems, leaves, and roots like other vascular plants...

s. It is mentioned in the 1086 Domesday Book

Domesday Book

Domesday Book , now held at The National Archives, Kew, Richmond upon Thames in South West London, is the record of the great survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086...

 as Fernelai and Fernelie.

To the north of the village lies Farnley Hall

Farnley Hall (North Yorkshire)

Farnley Hall is a stately home in Farnley, North Yorkshire, England. It is located near Otley. The original early seventeenth century house was added to in the 1780s by John Carr, who also designed Harewood House...

, a stately home

Stately home

A stately home is a "great country house". It is thus a palatial great house or in some cases an updated castle, located in the British Isles, mostly built between the mid-16th century and the early part of the 20th century, as well as converted abbeys and other church property...

 built by John Carr. The house has a rich history, being associated with names such as Fairfax

Edward Fairfax

Edward Fairfax was a translator, the natural son of Sir Thomas Fairfax the elder, of Denton in Yorkshire, and thus a half-brother of Sir Thomas Fairfax.Fairfax lived at New Hall, Fewston...

 , Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell was an English military and political leader who overthrew the English monarchy and temporarily turned England into a republican Commonwealth, and served as Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland....

, and Turner

J. M. W. Turner

Joseph Mallord William Turner RA was an English Romantic landscape painter, watercolourist and printmaker. Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting...

 . A selection of Turner's works from the Farnley Hall collection were sold in 1890 for £25,000.

The primary school in Farnley is occasionally used as a location for filming the soap opera

Soap opera

A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...

 Emmerdale

Emmerdale

Emmerdale, is a long-running British soap opera set in Emmerdale , a fictional village in the Yorkshire Dales. Created by Kevin Laffan, Emmerdale was first broadcast on 16 October 1972...

.

When found as a surname the most popular is Fearnley; other surnames related to the area are Farnely, Farnley and Fernleigh.