1291 · 14th–15th centuries The family that gave the town its nameRod, ktorý dal mestu meno

In 1291 the place is recorded as Tornallya, and a man called Boluk was given permission to fortify a rock here. His descendants took the name Tornallyay and held the place for centuries — the town's Slovak name comes straight from theirs. It was not a castle in the Spiš sense, with great walls and a garrison, but the family's fortified seat mattered enough that the county held its assemblies in it. In the Middle Ages the settlement was divided into an Upper and a Lower Tornaľa, and that division is still readable in the shape of the town.Roku 1291 sa miesto zapisuje ako Tornallya a istý Boluk vtedy dostal povolenie opevniť tu skalu. Jeho potomkovia prijali meno Tornallyayovci a držali toto panstvo po stáročia — slovenský názov mesta pochádza priamo od nich. Nebol to hrad v spišskom zmysle, s mohutnými múrmi a posádkou, no rodové opevnené sídlo bolo dosť významné na to, aby sa v ňom schádzala stoličná kongregácia. V stredoveku sa osada delila na Vyšnú a Nižnú Tornaľu a v pôdoryse mesta to vidno dodnes.