ABSTRACT
The earliest documentary references to salmon fishing on the River Tweed date from medieval times, though the spoils of the river had long been exploited when the first charters granting fishing rights were drawn up. The river’s fame amongst fishermen and anglers is of course enshrined also in oral tradition: it is by no means a wild speculation that an unbroken thread of local lore about the best lies for fish—in both senses of the ambiguity—links the first hunters with their bone fish-spears and hooks to the present generation of anglers equipped with variable drag spinning-reels and rods of fibreglass. But the historical documentation of the Tweed salmon fisheries displays less continuity, partly through the loss of some of the older monastic and burgh records. As often happens, even those records which have survived tell us little about the fishing gear and techniques which were actually used. In a document of 1509, however, there are references to the right of free burgesses of Berwick to fish at the river mouth between Candlemas and Michaelmas day with long nets, short nets and ring nets. Anyone who infringed this right was liable to forfeit his coble and net and also to be fined the sum of 6s. 8d. Freemen were not allowed to hire either Scotsmen or bondservants to fish on their behalf: the right was a personal one.
