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Wasn't York originally a Viking outpost?
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York was there long before the Vikings came. It was an important provincial Roman city, known by them as Eboracum, but settlement on the site goes back further even than they. The Anglo-Saxon Northumbrians knew the settlement as Eoforwīc. There are some etymological details on
Wikupedia. The Vikings captured the city in 866, after which it became the centre of a Norse kingdom that existed until 954. After the last king, Erik Bloodaxe, was killed at the battle of Stainmore, the kingdom was gradually absorbed into the Wessex hegemony.
Eiríksmál , a poem commissioned by his wife, records Eirík's arrival in Valhalla.
I was interested to read about fostering in Celtic sources, but it's an important theme in many of the early cultures of Europe. The sources in which it is particularly evident are the Icelandic sagas, in which many of the characters are fostered by followers of their parents. The political uses are evident in the fact that Hákon, king of Norway was officially foster-son to Athelstan of Wessex; and in
Laxdæla Saga he is described as 'Athelstan's Fosterling'.
The social convention seems to have been to send one's children to be fostered further down the social spectrum. I would suggest that Tolkien is more likely to have been drawing on Icelandic sources than Celtic ones, although I don't doubt that he could easily have known both. The important point is that fostering was an important means of perpetuating family alliances and personal loyalty. That Tolkien used such a theme is not surprising at all.