Anglo-Scottish border

The Firth of Forth was the border between the Picto-Gaelic Kingdom of Alba and the Anglian Kingdom of Northumbria in the early 10th century. It became the first Anglo-Scottish border with the annexation of Northumbria by Anglo-Saxon England in the mid-10th century. In 973, the Scottish king Kenneth II attended the English king Edgar the Peaceful at Edgar's council in Chester. After Kenneth had reportedly done homage, Edgar rewarded Kenneth by granting him Lothian.^[1] Despite this transaction, the control of Lothian was not finally settled and the region was taken by the Scots at the Battle of Carham in 1018 and the River Tweed became the de facto Anglo-Scottish border. The Solway–Tweed line was legally established in 1237 by the Treaty of York between England and Scotland.^[2] It remains the border today, with the exception of the Debatable Lands, north of Carlisle, and a small area around Berwick-upon-Tweed, which was taken by England in 1482. Berwick was not fully annexed into England until 1746, by the Wales and Berwick Act 1746.^[3]


For centuries until the Union of the Crowns, the region on either side of the boundary was a lawless territory suffering from the repeated raids in each direction of the Border Reivers. Following the Treaty of Union 1706, ratified by the Acts of Union 1707, which united Scotland with England and Wales to form the Kingdom of Great Britain, the Border forms the boundary of the two legal systems as the treaty between Scotland and England guaranteed the continued separation of English law and Scots law.^[4] The age of marriage under Scots law is 16, while it is 18 under English law. The border settlements of Gretna Green to the west, and Coldstream and Lamberton to the east, were convenient for elopers from England who wanted to marry under Scottish laws, and marry without publicity.


The marine boundary was adjusted by the Scottish Adjacent Waters Boundaries Order 1999 so that the boundary within the territorial waters (up to the 12-mile (19 km) limit) is 90 metres (300 ft) north of the boundary for oil installations established by the Civil Jurisdiction (Offshore Activities) Order 1987.^[5] The land border is near and roughly parallel to the 420 million-year-old Iapetus Suture.

Migration[edit]

Cumbria and Northumberland have amongst the largest Scottish-born communities in the world outside Scotland. 16,628 Scottish-born people were residing in Cumbria in 2001 (3.41% of the county's population) and 11,435 Scottish-born people were residing in Northumberland (3.72% of the county's population); the overall percentage of Scottish-born people in England is 1.62%.^[26] Consequently, almost 9% of Scotland's population is English-born (459,486), with higher than average percentages of English-born people in both Dumfries & Galloway and the Scottish Borders council areas, respectively, reaching as high as 35% or higher English-born.^[27]

Media related to Border of England-Scotland at Wikimedia Commons