NORTH WARWICKSHIRE

borough (district), administrative and historic county of Warwickshire, central England. It is a largely rural borough adjoining the West Midlands metropolitan county northeast of Birmingham and northwest of Coventry. Central North Warwickshire occupies a 500-foot- (150-metre-) high upland, which is mostly coextensive with a section of the Warwickshire coalfield extending through the borough for 16 miles (26 km) in a north-south direction. Assorted cereal crops and livestock are raised in the borough. There are industries producing boots, shoes, hats, and knitwear in the old market town of Atherstone, the administrative centre, in the east. Many inhabitants of the borough work in nearby urban areas, including Birmingham and Coventry. The southern portion of North Warwickshire is part of what is sometimes called George Eliot country; Arbury Hall, south of the borough boundary, is where the Victorian novelist lived as a child. Among the borough's towns (parishes) are Coleshill and Kingsbury in the west and Polesworth in the north. Area 110 square miles (284 square km). Pop. (1998 est.) 61,900.