The Reiver
The Border revier, in modern terms, could be described as a small-holder or gentleman farmer, but he was also a professional cattle rustler. He was a fighting man, a guerrilla soldier of great resource to whom the arts of theft, raid, tracking and ambush were second nature. He was also often a gangster organised on highly professional lines, who had perfected the protection racket three centuries before Chicago was built. The border reivier came from every class, and from both sides of the England/Scotland border.
The Border country
The Border country was divided for administrative purposed into three Marches - East, Middle and West - with a boundary for the English and Scottish side of each March. Each of the six marches had a governing officer known as a Warden, appointed by their respective governments. The warden's duties were to defend the frontier against invasion from the opposite realm in wartime, and in peace to put down crime and co-operate with the Wardens across the Border for the maintenance of law and order. The wardens tended to be either locals or too far from home to be accountable and the majority were susceptible to corruption. With reckless thieving and violence, keeping the peace seemed a hopeless task and corruption and adversity was rife. Only the English warden's complaints have survived in the records. They describe the place as "ungovernable". In one memorandum of 1579 a warden attempted to list the reasons for the increasing deterioration of the English Marches.
It lists:
Private English feuds
Scottish spoils
The long peace, which led to the neglect of horses and weapons
Dishonest Scottish wardens
and blackmail
The debatable land
The debatable land was an area 20 miles long by 8 miles wide between the realms of Scotland and England that belonged to neither crown. In practice it was a no mans land, with its own 'laws', which in practice, were virtually impossible to impose. The clans who lived there were notoriously mercurial in their political allegiances and the debatable land was known to be "English at its pleasure and Scottish at its will". The border clans were outsiders in every sense of the word. By their lawlessness but also socially and politically. The people who lived in this area were detached from the crown realms of England and Scotland. As a result they were a mercurial lot, who would change their allegiance between countries to suit their own ends and swap alliances between clans within the border territories if it would provide dividends. Scot pillaged Scot, Englishman robbed Englishman just as readily as they raided across the border frontier. Feuds were just as deadly between families on the same side of the border as those from opposite sides. | 
