Terling (pronounced Ter-ling[2][3]) is a village and civil parish in the county of Essex, England, between Braintree to the north, Chelmsford to the south-west and Witham to the east.

According to a Saxon document dated 627 AD, about seven hundred acres of land was occupied in the Terling and Fairstead area.

Terling is named in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Tarlinga,[4] giving the approximate population as one hundred and twenty five.

During the thirteenth century successive Bishops of Norwich acquired land in the Parish, by 1238 known as Tarlinges,[5] and the remains of the foundations of their palace exist to the west of All Saints’ Church.

Arable farming and sheep rearing were the basis of the village economy in the sixteenth century.

On the West side of the river there is a cricket pitch, tennis courts, swimming pool and playground.