Humber

The Humber is a large tidal estuary in northern England. It starts at Trent Falls at the confluence of the River Ouse and the River Trent; it then passes the junction with the Market Weighton Canal[?] on the north shore, the junction with the River Ancholme on the south shore; past North Ferriby[?] and South Ferriby[?], under the Humber Bridge and past Barton-upon-Humber[?] and then into the North Sea at Spurn.

In the Anglo-Saxon period, it was a major boundary, separating Northumbria from the southern kingdoms. Indeed the name Northumbria simply indicates the area North of the Humber. It currently forms the boundary between the East Riding of Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire between Faxfleet[?] and Spurn Head.

Two fortifications were built in the mouth of the river in 1914, the Humber Forts.

(brief factoids, please expand)

• the Romans forded it
• Humber Bridge c. 1980

Humber was also the name of a make of British car, which disappeared after mergers in the 1960s.