Talk:River Usk

Wikipedia:Verifiability#Reliable sources

I am struggling to get my head round the below fact

It is the deepest river in the British Isles at its mouth and the River Severn into which it empties has the second largest tidal range in the world after the Bay of Fundy in Canada,

1. Surely the mouth of the River Usk (just below Newport) is part of the River Severn?
2. Reference 2 (clearly a more reliable source than a tourist guide) states the Bristol Channel - not the Severn (or the Usk) has the second highest tidal range.
3. Therefore Reference 1 is factually incorrect - Period.
4. Reference 1 is verbatim of an earler Wikipage [1] - including factual inaccuracies - where did they get their information?. Where did we get our information?
5. Competing Claim
6. If the Usk holds this record should it not referenced by more than a Tourist Information (WP:RS) site/possible mirror - someone must have measured the depth. What is it?

Aatomic1 (talk) 00:03, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

In the light of the above, I suggest the article is deleted. Every single "fact" given in the text is currently unverified, so why single out the few facts that did have a reference, albeit not the best of references, for removal? Another way forward is to re-instate the deleted facts and ask for references. Which do you prefer? Why did you pick on those particular facts, rather than any of the other totally unreferenced stuff? 86.27.186.36 (talk) 10:21, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

The first step is to remove unverified claims and assertions, and stick with facts (NPOV). Why make claims unless the article is really only trying to serve as a promotional piece, or hyping the importance of the subject. If this river is really the deepest in the British Isles, then this is an important fact and would belong in the article, and should be put in. It's better to apply small corrections to overall improve the article rather than ask for the entire article to be deleted. Bardcom (talk) 10:46, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

The first step is to remove unverified claims and assertions. Well remove all the others then, otherwise I'll put the disputed ones back and tag the entire article as needing citations. 86.27.186.36 (talk) 11:10, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Seamus Heaney and uisce

I don't have access to Heaney's intro to Beowulf but does he really say that the river name comes from uisce meaning whiskey/whisky? Heaney would surely have known that whiskey/whisky derives from the words 'uisce/uisge beatha' ('water of life'). If the river name derives from this source at all, then it is simply from the first of these two words. cheers Geopersona (talk) 06:17, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out. What Heaney says is:

"...[I]n my first arts year at Queen's University, Belfast... we were lectured on the history of the English Language by Professor John Braidwood. Braidwood could not help informing us, for example, that the word 'whiskey' is the same word as the Irish and Scots Gaelic word uisce, meaning water, and that the River Usk in Britain is therefore to some extent the River Uisce (or Whiskey); and so in my mind the stream was suddenly turned into a kind of linguistic river of rivers issuing from a pristine Celto-British Land of Cockaigne....."

Etc. etc. - so, not a scholarly citation but a second-hand reference to the standard derivation of the name. I've removed it from the text here. Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:50, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, as ever Ghmyrtle - in fact a case, on the part of Heaney, of what one might consider 'poetic licence'. Its (her?) waters occasionally run the colour of the 'water of life' though equally they can run a kind of chooclate brown, an 'uisce cocoa' perhaps. cheers Geopersona (talk) 12:49, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Infobox section unhelpful

The infobox has a section 'cities' which has been populated with the names of several settlements of various size along the length of the river. Only one of these - Newport - is actually a city, the others are towns and even, in Sennybridge's case, a mere village. Either we ought to delete all but Newport or else adjust the infobox to read 'settlements' or similar. Part of a wider issue one imagines, though I've not checked. Thoughts? cheers Geopersona (talk) 19:07, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

Quite agree, it looks a bit odd. I'm sure "settlements" would do just as well, in fact for most British rivers might even be better. I see that River Severn includes Shrewsbury, River Taff has Merthyr Tydfil, Treharris and Pontypridd, while River Wye and River Monnow have none. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:22, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

The answer, I think, is to use {{Template:Infobox river}} rather than {{Template:Geobox}}. Ghmyrtle (talk) 21:48, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

And indeed the River Lugg brings to our attention the 'cities' of Hope under Dinmore and Llangynllo, so a wider problem indeed! How do we fix this - I'm not sure how to install the template you suggest Ghmyrtle. thanks Geopersona (talk) 06:44, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

I'll try to get back to it next week if I have time, and remember - real life in the way (!), so I may need to be reminded! Ghmyrtle (talk) 16:58, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

I note that we still refer to the 'cities' of Sennybridge etc in the template box! Those more versed than me in the use of templates might perhaps be able to provide a useful fix for that. cheers Geopersona (talk) 11:15, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

I've had a go at it Geopersona. Cheers!
— | Gareth Griffith-Jones |The Welsh | Buzzard| — 12:18, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

The problem is that the word "city" means different things to people in different countries. Newport is indeed a city in UK terms, but (to me) it looks odd for it to be the only settlement named. I suggest leaving that parameter completely empty. I've looked at the other template - it seems unnecessarily complicated. Ghmyrtle (talk) 12:37, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Just what I thought. I agree; the information is in the Lead.
— | Gareth Griffith-Jones |The Welsh | Buzzard| — 12:43, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

I have a fix for the 'city' problem, which I have applied to the Lugg and the Taff. Jokulhlaup (talk) 16:28, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

The fix being to replace "cities" with "settlements". That's OK, perhaps, for some short rivers, but less appropriate for longer rivers like the Usk. Personally, I'd prefer "Towns and villages", or perhaps "Notable settlements", but "Settlements" might be workable for the time being. Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:28, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

The word 'settlement' can be changed to any phrase needed, but it is a better fit than 'city' for locations in rural Wales. Jokulhlaup (talk) 17:59, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Map

I can add the same map as included in the new River Teifi Geobox, thought I would check here first. Jokulhlaup (talk) 16:28, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't think that map does the job - it contains far too much irrelevant information, and very little about the course of the river. If there is to be a map, it would need to be a new one, drawn by the experts at WP:GL/MAP. Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:31, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

OK, Thanks for responding, glad I checked first. Best of luck in getting a new map. Jokulhlaup (talk) 17:52, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Length of river

I've been researching the river for a presentation I'm doing and have come across different measurements of its length - the article currently says 102km but I saw another which reckoned on 125km (https://naturalresources.wales/media/3214/usk-management-catchment.pdf) - one that I shall insert in place of the erroneous and so far as I can see unreferenced figure currently. Quite some discrepancy. I took to measuring it myself and came up with 133.4km which I strongly believe to be less than the true figure, since I cut corners. The problem of course is perhaps mainly about the scale at which we measure - an old chestnut - same goes for coastlines. In any case it's always changing as meanders enlarge and get cut off and there's the question as to which channel to follow when it splits mid-course etc etc. I can't contribute my figure other than in this discussion because its OR but I do flag up a warning in such matters. Note too that the area of the catchment is given as 1358sq km in a scanned doc from the 1990s and accompanied by a map of what looks correct as the Usk catchment 'proper' but that for administrative purposes, NRW includes various watercourses on the Gwent Levels draining directly to the sea within their 'Usk catchment'. cheers Geopersona (talk) 11:04, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Tricky. I'm pretty sure none of the watercourses on the Caldicot Levels drain into the Usk, but on the other side the Peterstone Gout does. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:56, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

I was forgetting Julian's Gout (ST 33450 84116) and Julian's Pill which drain Julian's Reen to the west of Nash . Martinevans123 (talk) 09:29, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

I discover that the Welsh Academy Encyclopaedia of Wales offers up (on page 904) a figure of 137km for the river, closer to what I believe to be the true figure. Geopersona (talk) 20:03, 12 February 2024 (UTC)