In which English county did J.K. Rowling grow up near the Forest of Dean?

J.K. Rowling grew up near the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire.

Rowling spent part of her childhood in Tutshill, a village in Gloucestershire close to the Welsh border and the Forest of Dean. Her family moved there when she was young, and the surrounding landscape later became associated with the imaginative settings of her childhood. She attended Wyedean School and College in nearby Sedbury.

The Forest of Dean is a historic woodland region in western Gloucestershire. Rowling has described the area as important to her early life, although the Harry Potter books are not a direct fictional map of the county. The family had previously lived in Yate, near Bristol, where Rowling was born.

Readers sometimes confuse Gloucestershire with nearby Wales because Tutshill lies close to the border. The village itself is in England, while Chepstow, across the River Wye, is in Wales. This cross-border setting is one reason both places appear in accounts of Rowling’s upbringing.