Talk:Terraced houses in the United Kingdom

A fact from Terraced houses in the United Kingdom appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 13 December 2015 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that since 1858, all new streets containing terraced houses in the United Kingdom have been at least 36 feet (11 m) wide?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2015/December. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Terraced houses in the United Kingdom.

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Scotland?

This article completely ignores Scotland! Should we change the name of the article, so it just refers to England and Wales only? Scotland, of course, has extensive terracing, for example in Edinburgh's New Town. Klein zach 16:34, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I think nobody's written that bit of the article yet. (As the quality scale says, a C-class article "is substantial, but is still missing important content"). Grab some sources that talk about it (and, say, the pre-war housing in Glasgow slums while you're at it) and write away. Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 18:08, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

"overcrowding in the mid-20th century was a key trigger for the Troubles"

"The Bogside in Derry is composed mainly of traditional Victorian terraces and their overcrowding in the mid-20th century was a key trigger for the Troubles". Is that a reasonable claim? The cited source (a Lonely Planet guidebook - surely there as better sources for both the causes of the Troubles, and the significance of terraced housing) doesn't actually claim that the overcrowding was a trigger for the troubles ("The Bogside ... had become an overcrowded ghetto of poverty and unemployment, a focus for the emerging civil rights movement and a hotbed of nationalist discontent"). I know that discrimination in the provision of housing was one of the issues that the civil rights movement was campaigning over, but I think its a big step from that to say that "overcrowding was a key triggers for the Troubles". Iapetus (talk) 10:45, 25 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I recall learning about the Troubles at school, and Catholic discrimination leading to overcrowding was a key issue in sparking off the civil rioting in the late 1960s. I'm trying to think who's a good expert on this to see if they have any authoritative book sources. The Troubles in Derry repeats this claim (which is probably how this article got it), but that's unsourced. In fact, that article is terrible, contentious information like that should not allowed to sit on Wikipedia without any evidence it is neutral and correct. Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 10:56, 25 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Odd claim / non-sequiter

"Despite their association with the working class and Victorian Britain, terraced houses remain popular". Why "despite"? Why should either of those associations mean they wouldn't be popular? The sentence isn't supported by the following citation either. I recommend deleting everything before the comma. Iapetus (talk) 11:00, 25 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Well, what do you think terraced houses are associated with? The nouveau riche? The petite borgeoise? I don't think you could really call it original research to join together the widespread use of terraces in the late 19th / early 20th century with their continued popularity. Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 11:04, 25 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

"Terraced"

Iggerant Yankee here...why are they called "terraced"? —valereee (talk) 16:02, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Valereee, No idea really, but that's what I've heard them being called for as long as I can remember; the first house I lived in was a terrace before my parents "upgraded" to a detached. Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 16:10, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I wonder if it refers to the agricultural technique that turns hillsides into stairsteps to allow for farming in hilly terrain? Maybe it has something to do with these row houses doing the same thing -- that is, they march up or down a slope, with each house being a few feet above or below the houses on either side. While being built it probably does look like that. And it wouldn't be shocking that houses of this period would refer to that agricultural technique, which may have looked pretty remarkable to colonial-era travellers. Or maybe I'm just doing OR. :D —valereee (talk) 16:20, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Valereee, I don't think it's got anything to do with the farming term, I think it's just evolution of English. I think the US calls them "row houses", but land is so much cheaper and more widely available over there, so you still get detached houses even in less well-off areas that would have tower blocks and old deteriorating terraces over here. Because they became popular for the masses in the mid 19th century, well after the UK and US went their separate ways, that's why the term isn't too well-understood on one side of "the pond". Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 16:33, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Fortunately there is the OED. "Terraced" as an adjective points to "terrace" as an adjectival noun. Delightfully, the first citation is to Jane Austen, I believein the context of speculative builders of the newly fashionable seaside bathing resorts.

Of a house: cf. terrace house n. at terrace n. Compounds 2.

terrace house n. one of a row of usually similar houses joined by party-walls.

1817 J. Austen Sanditon in Minor Wks. (1954) x. 413 They were in one of the Terrace Houses.

Draft additions March 2007

A terraced house.

1854 Times 19 July 9/2 If a few rows of terraces, more or less, were placed upon it [sc. Hampstead-heath], no possible injury could accrue to the health-seekers.

--Carbon Caryatid (talk) 14:14, 24 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

It's probably based on terra - Latin for land. There's suggestion it was applied to building in 12c. Old French with terrasse "platform (built on or supported by a mound of earth)" https://www.etymonline.com/word/terrace Willswikiacc (talk) 09:04, 14 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]