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In 1525, the Reivers had become such a nuisance that the then Archbishop of Glasgow, Gavin Dunbar, put a curse upon all the reivers of the borderlands. The curse has often been called the “mother of all curses” and was more than 1000 words long. It was read aloud from
pulpits of churches throughout the border region.
“I curse their head and all the hairs of their head; I curse their face, their brain (innermost thoughts), their mouth, their nose, their tongue, their teeth, their forehead, their shoulders, their breast, their heart, their stomach, their back, their womb, their arms, their legs, their hands, their feet, and every part of their body, from the top of their head to the soles of their feet, before and behind, within and without.”
”I curse them going and I curse them riding; I curse them standing and I curse them sitting; I curse them eating and I curse them drinking; I curse them rising, and I curse them lying; I curse them at home, I curse them away from home; I curse them within the house, I curse them outside of the house; I curse their wives, their children, and their servants who participate in their deeds. I (bring ill wishes upon) their crops, their cattle, their wool, their sheep, their horses, their swine, their geese, their hens, and all their livestock. I (bring ill wishes upon) their halls, their
The Cursing Stone, which sits on the Millennium pathway, is a monumental chunk of inscribed granite which has been inscribed with an extract of a medieval curse. It was installed at Carlisle’s Tullie House Museum in 2001. The museum has been linked to nearby Carlisle Castle by a new underground pathway: the Millennium Subway which has been sandblasted with the surnames of the descendants of the Border Reiver families. If you enlarge the photo above, you will see the name THOMSON inscribed on the floor to the right of the stone.
