Hope is a village of great antiquity lending its name to the Hope Valley, which stretches for about six miles with Castleton at one end and Hathersage at the other. There is evidence that Hope has been extremely significant in the region throughout its long history. The village is mentioned in the Doomsday book, of 1086, as having both a priest and a church, the only place in north Derbyshire to have such status at the time. St. Peters Church, opposite the Old Hall, dates from around the 13th Century.

The parish of Hope covered two thirds of the Royal Hunting Forest of north Derbyshire and was one of the largest parishes in the country. From earlier times there are traces of a Roman fort at Brough, just to the east of the village. Its Roman name Navio was later replaced with the Old English word for fort, Brough. Many ancient relics from the site can be seen in Buxton museum. It is thought that the fort was probably built to protect Roman lead mining interests in the Peak District.

The village is built on the crossroads of the A625, Sheffield to Chapel-en-le-Frith road, and the B6049 that runs northward from Tideswell to Edale. This minor road closely follows the route of the old Portway, which was an ancient trading route used by Jaggers, a local term for men driving packhorses carrying salt and other goods from Cheshire. Names like Saltergate Lane and Jaggers Lane probably originate from this period.