History
the tradition of common riding dates back to the 13th and 14th centuries, during the continual land border wars both with England and against other clans. It was a tribal custom to plunder and thieve cattle, known as reiving (the ancient Celtic word for robbing), and commonplace amongst the major Borders families. In these lawless and battle-strewn times, it became the practise of the day for the local lord to appoint a leading townsperson, who would then ride the clan's boundaries, or "marches", to protect their common lands and prevent encroachment by neighbouring landlords and their peoples.
Long after they ceased to be essential, the ridings continued in commemoration of local legend, history and tradition.
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“The foregoing generations beheld God and nature face to face; we, through their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to the universe? Why should not we have a poetry and philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a religion by revelation to us, and not the history of theirs?”
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