The first written reference to Woking occurs in a letter from Pope Constantine, written in about 710. It's a letter to the monastery in what is now Peterborough and it covers two other monasteries, both dedicated to St. Peter, in Bermondsey and in Woking (then known by its Saxon name, Wocchingas). What's more, it still exists!
...his privilege for the monasteries of Bermondsey and Woking (ibid., 276) may be genuine.
[From Pope Constantine - Original Catholic Encyclopedia]
That monastery no longer exists, but it was pretty much where Woking still is now.
The site of the monastery is probably where St. Peter's Old Woking now stands and the original Saxon church is presumed to have been destroyed at the time of the sacking of Chertsey Abbey by the Danes in 871.
[From St Dunstan's - Home]
Still, 710, not bad. A lot of people seem to think that Woking is something of a recent invention, dating back to the arrival of the railway, but it has ancient roots. so there.
[posted with ecto]
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