The Humber estuary located on the east coast of England is one of the major tidal estuaries in the UK with respect to size as well as commercial activity; the estuary is referred to as Humber since ancient times with the term 'Humbre' occurring in the Anglo Saxon period and even before in Roman times when the inlet was referred to as 'Humbri'.

There are several suppositions regarding the origin of the name and it is commonly believed that the word first was used in pre Celtic times which might connote water or river.

Another version states that the name came in to being after the legendary invader Humber the Hun who drowned in the river described in Geoffrey of Monmouth's work 'Historia Regum Britanniae' a literary work which describes British history dating from the Trojan War to the 7th century AD in a supposedly fictional manner.