Selkirk Common Riding

As a spectacle, Selkirk Common Riding, is of the ‘must-see’ variety. In June the Royal and Ancient Burgh stages the largest cavalcade of horses and riders in Europe as it celebrates its history and traditions. The annual Riding of the Marches, continues the tradition of those who rode around the town’s boundaries through the centuries checking for encroachments by neighbouring landowners, but, more poignantly, it brings alive the legend of Fletcher, the Town Clerk, returning after the disastrous Battle of Flodden Field, and holding aloft a captured flag to indicate that all the other Selkirk men had perished.

After the band of the Fifes and Drums have paraded the town – at four ‘clock in the morning! – Selkirk Silver Band proceed round the old town and then the young standard bearer – the latest in Fetcher’s line – mounts his horse to lead followers round the marches. When everyone has returned to the Market Square the Royal Burgh Standard and the flags of the various organisations are ceremonially cast, there is a minute’s silence, and then the playing of the Liltin, which is a version of if the Flo’ers o’ the Forest.

And so, on that evocative summer morning, the past, the present and the future are brought timelessly together.