Scottish Borders

Scottish Borders is the name of a county in the south-east of Scotland, comprising the traditional counties of Berwickshire, Peeblesshire, Roxburghshire and Selkirkshire, which merged in 1975 to form Borders Region (renamed Scottish Borders in the 1990s). The administrative centre is Newtown St. Boswells; major centres include Coldstream, Duns, Galashiels, Hawick, Jedburgh, Kelso, Melrose, Peebles and Selkirk. Although Scottish Borders is considered to be in the Lowlands of Scotland, the terrain is largely rugged and hilly, with large areas of forest. The exception to this is the flat and fertile arable district of The Merse, north of Coldstream. The upland terrain (for sheep grazing) and the availability of swift-flowing streams (to power mills) led to the development of an important woolen textiles industry in the Borders. Some of this survives: Hawick has working textile mills. However, in most of the border towns the mills are redundant or have found other uses.