Torksey

Torksey, Lincolnshire

Torksey, in the Lawress Wapentake of Lincolnshire, is a difficult name. The second element is Old English eg ‘an island, dry ground in fen, raised land in wet area’, but the first element, though apparently a personal name, is hard to interpret. The most plausible suggestion is that it is the Old English male personal name Turoc.

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 872 records that Her nam se here winter setle. æt Turces ige ‘And it [the Great Heathen Army] took winter-quarters at Torksey in Lindsey, and then the Mercians made peace with the host’. Recent excavations and other archaeological finds at Torksey are helping to build up our understanding of what that here was and what it did during the winter of 872-3.

 

Ascribed Culture

Collection

Viking Names

Keywords

Great_army, Lincolnshire, place-name, Torksey, Viking, Winter_camp

Further information

This object is related to Torksey, Lincolnshire.
Find out about Torksey, Lincolnshire.

References

Dawn Hadley et al., ‘The winter camp of the Viking Great Army, AD 872–3, Torksey, Lincolnshire’, The Antiquaries’ Journal 96 (2016), 23-67.

Kenneth Cameron and John Insley, The Place-Names of Lincolnshire VII.  Volume LXXXV. English Place-Name Society (2010), pp. 122-6.

G.N. Garmonsway trans. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. London: J.M. Dent and Sons London (1972), p. 72.

Charles Plummer and John Earle eds. Two of the Saxon Chronicles Parallel. Volume I. Oxford: The Clarendon Press (1892), p. 72.

 

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