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Town in South Yorkshire, England

Wath can be traced to Norman times. It appears in the 1086 Domesday Book as Wad and Waith. It remained for some centuries a rural settlement astride the junction of the old Doncaster–Barnsley and Rotherham–Pontefract roads, the latter a branch of Ryknield Street. North of the town was a ford across the River Dearne. The name has been linked to the Latin vadum The town received a royal charter in 1312–1313 entitling it to a weekly Tuesday market and an annual two day fair, but these were soon discontinued. The market was revived in 1814. Until local government reorganisation in 1974, Wath was in the historic county of the West Riding of Yorkshire. Until the mid 19th century the town had a racecourse of regional importance, linked to the estate at nearby Wentworth. This fell into disuse, but traces of it can be seen between Wath and Swinton and it is remembered in street names. There was a pottery at Newhill, close to deposits of clay, but it was overshadowed by the nearby Rockingham Pottery in Swinton. About the turn of the 19th century, the poet and newspaper editor James Montgomery, resident at the time, called it "the Queen of Villages". This rural character changed rapidly in the 19th and 20th centuries, as coal mining developed. Much of the canal line has since been used for roads, one of them called Biscay Way. on a small leafy green, with Wath Hall, the Montgomery Hall and a campus of the Dearne Valley College. The several town centre pubs include a branch of Wetherspoons and Wath Tap, Rotherham's first micro pub specialising in locally brewed real ale. From 1892 to 1974 Wath Hall served as the local seat of government for Wath upon Dearne. Today Wath is still emerging from the coal industry collapse, although jobs and some low level affluence have returned. After a hiatus between the clearing of former colliery land and recent redevelopment, when the area felt rather rural, the construction of large distribution centres to the north of the town is restoring an industrial feel, but without the pollution issues of coal. Several distribution warehouses for the clothing chain Next have opened. Much new housing is being built on reclaimed land. Wath Festival, held round the early May bank holiday, is a folk and acoustic music and arts festival founded by members of the Wath Morris Dancing Team in 1972. It has grown to host known names on the folk, acoustic and world music scene. While festival events occur across the town, most larger concerts are held at the Montgomery Hall Theatre and Community Venue. Those appearing have included Dougie MacLean, Fairport Convention, Martin Simpson, John Tams, Frances Black, John McCusker, Stacey Earle and Eddi Reader. The festival marked its 40th anniversary in 2012. Wath won Village Festival Of The Year in the 2013 FATEA Awards. The festival has been a supporter of young artists such as Lucy Ward, and Greg Russell & Ciaran Algar. It has also hosted the Wath Festival Young Performers' Award, founded by the Sheffield based musician Charlie Barker in 2011, who handed it over to a festival committee in 2014. Winners have included Luke Hirst & Sarah Smout, Sunjay, Rose Redd and Hannah Cumming. The event includes dancing by local morris and sword dancing groups, street performances, workshops, children's events and a Saturday morning parade from Montgomery Hall through Montgomery Square and back to St James's Church, for a traditional throwing of bread buns from the parish church tower. Local schools, organisations and local Labour MP John Healey have joined in festival activities. The RSPB's Old Moor nature reserve lies a mile to the north west of the town. It occupies a "flash", where mining induced subsidence of land close to a river has created wetlands.

Wath Athletic F. C. served the community from the 1880s to the Second World War, playing in the Midland League and reaching the 1st Round of the FA Cup in 1926. No senior team has represented the settlement since the 1950s, and Wath remains one of the largest places in Yorkshire without one. However, it has a Rugby Union team that plays in the Yorkshire Division 2.

The four primary schools for ages 3–11 are Our Lady and St Joseph's Catholic Primary, Wath Central Primary, Wath C of E Primary and Wath Victoria Primary. The two secondary schools are Saint Pius X Catholic High School (for ages 11–16 ) and the larger Wath Academy, which has a sixth form and covers 11–18 year olds. Both take students from a wider area. Wath (Park Road) Secondary Modern School closed in 1963. A large further education college, Dearne Valley College, based in Wath, has a main campus at Manvers and a smaller one near the town centre.

Local news and television programmes is provided by BBC Yorkshire and ITV Yorkshire. Television signals are received from the Emley Moor TV transmitter. Local radio stations are BBC Radio Sheffield, Greatest Hits Radio Yorkshire (formerly Dearne FM), Heart Yorkshire, Capital Yorkshire, Hallam FM and Rockingham Radio, a community based station which broadcast from the town. The town is served by the local newspaper, Rotherham Advertiser.

Wath upon Dearne bus station in Montgomery Road in the town centre provides the main public transport hub. It has four bus stands on an otherwise pedestrianised section of Montgomery Road, next to Montgomery Square, High Street and the Wath upon Dearne Community Library. The bus station's one way system down Montgomery Road is accessed from the B6097 Biscay Way to the north and feeds buses out into Church Street to the south. The land is owned by the local council, Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council, not the South Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive. As such, it is not listed as an official SYPTE Interchange, despite its relative size, and it lacks a ticket office, waiting room and toilet facilities.