Do five rivers really meet here?

I’m not going to make myself popular with this question.
Salisbury has a lot invested in the “Five Rivers” tag. But after reading the phrase “where five rivers meet” once too often in a book, I thought it was time to be Curious.

Here they are:

With the Wylye joining 3 miles upstream, the Bourne 1 mile downstream and the Ebble joining 3 miles downstream of Salisbury, I guess the phrase “where two rivers meet” isn’t quite so distinctive.

Anyway, it is important if you live here to be able to name all the rivers, and the trick is to know that they go in alphabetical order clockwise from the top: Avon, Bourne, Ebble, Nadder, Wylye.

And you will know that the word Avon means river and the word Bourne also means river, so the confluence of the Avon and the Bourne is truly where two rivers meet.

If you are still questing after the phrase “where five rivers meet” then you may want to see the post on some Lighter Reading.