This collection of poems rooted in the wild and beautiful lands that lie between England and Scotland describes a traditionally lawless area whose inhabitants owed allegiance first to kin and laird and then to the authorities in London or Edinburgh. Recording a violent, clannish world of fierce hatreds and passionate loyalties, the ballads tell vivid tales of raids, feuds and betrayals, romances and acts of revenge.

James Reed is the author of Walter Scott: Landscape and Locality.