The name Faringdon means "fern-covered hill", and it is not difficult to see why its location appealed to its first settlers. It nestles on the slope of a hill overlooking, to the north west, the valley of the Thames and the edge of the Cotswolds, and to the south east the valley of the Ock and the Vale of White Horse.

The hill itself is now known as Folly Hill, and is famous for the peculiar looking tower built on its crown, built in 1935 and the last in a tradition of English "follies" stretching back centuries. Strangely enough, however, it was not this folly which gave it its name (it had already been called that for centuries), but the French word "follies" or leaf, again no doubt in reference to the abundant vegetation of the area. The hill was planted with trees in the 18th century.