THORPE:

English: habitational name from any of the numerous places in England named with the Old Norse "thorp" (the th was represented by a "thorn", an antique letter I can't copy here), meaning hamlet, village--or the Old English cognate "throp".  (Again the 'th' was written using a "thorn").

THORP:  English variant spelling of Thorpe.  Scandinavian: variant of Torp.

From: Dictionary of American Family Names, Oxford Univ Press, ISBN 0-19-508137-4. Courtesy of Ancestry.com's search tool.