Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• Norðtun late10th S 11th

• Nortuna 1108×14 Reg

• Nortun 1333 Riev

• Norton' (iuxta Herdewyk) 1183 BB c.1320

• Nortona, Northon' iuxta Herdewyc 1183 BB c.1382

• Norton' 1228 FF 1247 Ct c.1275(p)etfreqto1419 Spec c.1290 Ann c.1320,1361 Ct 1367 Halm 1382 Hatf 1406 Pont

• Nortone 1235×6 Ass 1333,1372 GD 1587 Wills

• Northon' 1314 RPD

• Nortona 1333 Riev

• Nortonne 1359 Spec

• Norton 1197 Pipe 1283(p),1304–5 Bek 1322 Spec 1342 IPM 1343 Wills 1347 GD 1350 Rot 1360 GT 1366,1368,1374 Halm 1372 GD 1382 Hatf 1385 Rot 1408,1409 Lang

Etymology

'Northern settlement, village or estate', OE  norð, tūn. It seems likely that in earliest times Norton and Stockton were part of a single adminstrative unit; Ulfketel's grant of the estate to St Cuthbert c.994 mid sace ⁊ mid socne 'with rights of jurisdiction' included Stockton (Edmund Craster, 'The Patrimony of St Cuthbert', EHR 69 (1954), 177–99 at p. 193). Norton was the northern vill and the ecclesiastical centre with parish church, Stockton the lord's vill (represented subsequently by the bishop of Durham's castle) with the cattle or stock farm.