boudicca82

Other cultural references

2007-03-03T11:57:00.001-08:00

There have been scattered reports that the restless spirit of Boudica has been seen in the county of Lincolnshire. These reports, dating back to the mid-19th century, claim Boudica rides her chariot, heading for some unknown destination, and many a traveller and motorist have claimed to have seen her. There has been some debate as to how long this has been going on. Some say that the queen's restless spirit has been appearing since her death, while other suggest that the revival of interest in Boudica's story in the 19th century might have summoned her spirit back to our world. As with all reports of ghostly activity, it is up to the individual to decide whether they are true or not.[28]

There is also a long-lived urban myth that she is buried under Platform 8, 9 or 10 of King's Cross railway station in London.[1] This originates from the village of Battle Bridge (previously on the station's site), which was said to be the site of her last battle, suicide and burial. This is now accepted as a fiction and a hoax, whose origins can be traced back to Lewis Spence's book 'Boadicea - Warrior Queen of the Britons (1937) (where it is given but unevidenced)[29] or earlier.[30] It is now thought that Battle Bridge was a corruption of 'Broad Ford Bridge'. Other such legends place her burial on Parliament Hill, Hampstead or in Suffolk.

In 2003, an LTR retrotransposon from the genome of the human blood fluke Schistosoma mansoni was named Boudicca.[31]

In the Ghosts of Albion series of web animations and books, created by Amber Benson and Christopher Golden, Boudica (called Bodicea in this instance) is represented as a ghost defender of Albion.

In 2005 Boudicca and the Belgic revolt was added to the board game Britannia after twenty years, having been omitted from the original edition. The Boudica spelling had been suggested during development, but traditionalism prevailed.

In 2006, Fred. Olsen Cruise Lines announced their newest ship, entering service in early 2006, would be named Boudicca.

Indian queen Rani Lakshmibai is sometimes referred to as the Boudica of India.

Book 9 in Tom Clancy's Net Force Explorers series, Private Lives, features a character named Bodicea, who claims that her mother named her after the legendary queen.

In Greg Weisman's Gargoyles franchise, Boudicca is the name of a gargoyle beast that is part of the Avalon Clan.

Boudica's name

2007-03-03T11:46:00.000-08:00

Until the late 20th century, Boudica was known as Boadicea, which is probably derived from a mistranscription when a manuscript of Tacitus was copied in the Middle Ages. Her name takes many forms in various manuscripts – Boadicea and Boudicea in Tacitus; Βουδουικα, Βουνδουικα, and Βοδουικα in Dio – but was almost certainly originally Boudicca or Boudica, derived from the Celtic word *bouda, victory (proto-celtic *boudīko "victorious") (cf. Irish bua, Buaidheach, Welsh buddug). The name is attested in inscriptions as "Boudica" in Lusitania, "Boudiga" in Bordeaux and "Bodicca" in Britain.

Based on later development of Welsh and Irish, Kenneth Jackson concludes that the correct spelling of the name is Boudica, pronounced /bɒʊˈdiːka:/, although it is mispronounced by many as /ˈbuːdɪkə/.[

Background

2007-03-02T11:47:00.000-08:00

Tacitus and Dio agree that Boudica was of royal descent. Dio says that she was "possessed of greater intelligence than often belongs to women", that she was tall, had long red hair down to her hips, a harsh voice and a piercing glare, and habitually wore a large golden necklace (perhaps a torc), a many-coloured tunic and a thick cloak fastened by a brooch.

Location of modern Norfolk, once inhabited by the Iceni.Her husband, Prasutagus, was the king of Iceni, who inhabited roughly what is now Norfolk. They were initially not part of the territory under direct Roman control, having voluntarily allied themselves to Rome following Claudius's conquest of 43. They were protective of their independence and had revolted in 47 when the then-governor, Publius Ostorius Scapula, threatened to disarm them.[5] Prasutagus lived a long life of conspicuous wealth, and, hoping to preserve his line, made the Roman emperor co-heir to his kingdom along with his two daughters.

It was normal Roman practice to allow allied kingdoms their independence only for the lifetime of their client king, who would agree to leave his kingdom to Rome in his will: the provinces of Bithynia[6] and Galatia,[7] for example, were incorporated into the Empire in just this way. Roman law also allowed inheritance only through the male line. So when Prasutagus died his attempts to preserve his line were ignored and his kingdom was annexed as if it had been conquered. Lands and property were confiscated and nobles treated like slaves. According to Tacitus, Boudica was flogged and her daughters raped. Dio Cassius says that Roman financiers, including Seneca the Younger, chose this point to call in their loans. Tacitus does not mention this, but does single out the procurator, Catus Decianus, for criticism for his "avarice". Prasutagus, it seems, had lived well on borrowed Roman money, and on his death his subjects had become liable for the debt.

Boudica's uprising

2007-03-01T11:47:00.000-08:00

In 60 or 61, while the current governor, Gaius Suetonius Paulinus, was leading a campaign against the island of Mona (modern Anglesey) in north Wales, which was a refuge for British rebels and a stronghold of the druids, the Iceni conspired with their neighbours the Trinovantes, amongst others, to revolt. Boudica was chosen as their leader. According to Tacitus, they drew inspiration from the example of Arminius, the prince of the Cherusci who had driven the Romans out of Germany in AD 9, and their own ancestors who had driven Julius Caesar from Britain.[8] Dio says that at the outset Boudica employed a form of divination, releasing a hare from the folds of her dress and interpreting the direction it ran, and invoked Andraste, a British goddess of victory. It is perhaps significant that Boudica's own name means "victory" (see above).

A statue of Emperor ClaudiusThe rebels' first target was Camulodunum (Colchester), the former Trinovantian capital and now a Roman colonia. The Roman veterans who had been settled there mistreated the locals, and a temple to the former emperor Claudius had been erected there at local expense, making the city a focus for resentment. Its inhabitants sought reinforcements from the procurator, Catus Decianus, but he sent only two hundred auxiliary troops. Boudica's army fell on the poorly defended city and destroyed it, besieging the last defenders in the temple for two days before it fell. The future governor Quintus Petillius Cerialis, then commanding the Legio IX Hispana, attempted to relieve the city, but his forces were routed. His infantry was wiped out: only the commander and some of his cavalry escaped. Catus Decianus fled to Gaul.

When news of the rebellion reached him, Suetonius hurried along Watling Street through hostile territory to Londinium (London). Londinium was a relatively new town, founded after the conquest of 43, but had grown to be a thriving commercial centre with a population of travellers, traders, and probably Roman officials. Suetonius considered giving battle there, but considering his lack of numbers and chastened by Petillius's defeat, decided to sacrifice the city to save the province. Londinium was abandoned to the rebels, who burnt it down, slaughtering anyone who had not evacuated with Suetonius. Archaeology shows a thick red layer of burnt debris covering coins and pottery dating before 60 within the bounds of the Roman city.[9] Verulamium (St Albans) was next to be destroyed.

In the three cities destroyed, between seventy and eighty thousand people are said to have been killed. Tacitus says the Britons had no interest in taking or selling prisoners, only in slaughter by gibbet, fire or cross. Dio's account gives more prurient detail: that the noblest women were impaled on spikes and had their breasts cut off and sewn to their mouths, "to the accompaniment of sacrifices, banquets, and wanton behaviour" in sacred places, particularly the groves of Andraste.

Romans rally

2007-02-28T11:48:00.000-08:00

Suetonius regrouped with the XIV Gemina, some vexillationes (detachments) of the XX Valeria Victrix, and any available auxiliaries. The prefect of Legio II Augusta, Poenius Postumus, ignored the call, but nonetheless the governor was able to call on almost ten thousand men. He took a stand at an unidentified location, probably in the West Midlands somewhere along the Roman road now known as Watling Street, in a defile with a wood behind him. But his men were heavily outnumbered. Dio says that, even if they were lined up one deep, they would not have extended the length of Boudica's line: by now the rebel forces numbered 230,000.

Boudica exhorted her troops from her chariot, her daughters beside her. Tacitus gives her a short speech in which she presents herself not as an aristocrat avenging her lost wealth, but as an ordinary person, avenging her lost freedom, her battered body and the abused chastity of her daughters. Their cause was just, and the gods were on their side; the one legion that had dared to face them had been destroyed. She, a woman, was resolved to win or die; if the men wanted to live in slavery, that was their choice.

However, the unmaneuverability of the British forces, combined with lack of open-field tactics to command these numbers, put them at a disadvantage to the Romans, who were skilled at open combat due to their superior equipment and discipline, and the narrowness of the field meant that Boudica could only put forth as many troops as the Romans could at a given time. First, the Romans stood their ground and used waves of javelins to kill thousands of Britons who were rushing toward the Roman lines. The Roman soldiers, who had now used up their javelins, were then able to engage Boudica's second wave in the open. As the phalanx advanced in a wedge formation, the Britons attempted to flee, but were impeded by the presence of their own families, whom they had stationed in a ring of wagons at the edge of the battlefield, and were slaughtered.[10] Tacitus reports that "according to one report almost eighty thousand Britons fell" compared with only four hundred Romans. According to Tacitus, Boudica poisoned herself; Dio says she fell sick and died, and was given a lavish burial.

Postumus, on hearing of the Roman victory, fell on his sword. Catus Decianus, who had fled to Gaul, was replaced by Gaius Julius Alpinus Classicianus. Suetonius conducted punitive operations, but criticism by Classicianus led to an investigation headed by Nero's freedman Polyclitus. Suetonius was removed as governor, replaced by the more conciliatory Publius Petronius Turpilianus. The historian Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus tells us the crisis had almost persuaded Nero to abandon Britain.[

Location of her defeat

2007-02-03T11:49:00.000-08:00

The location of Boudica's defeat is unknown. Most historians favour a site in the West Midlands, somewhere along the Roman road now known as Watling Street. Kevin K. Carroll suggests a site close to High Cross in Leicestershire, on the junction of Watling Street and the Fosse Way, which would have allowed the Legio II Augusta, based at Exeter, to rendezvous with the rest of Suetonius's forces. Manduessedum (Mancetter), near the modern day town of Atherstone in Warwickshire, has also been suggested.[13] More recently a new discovery of Roman artifacts in Kings Norton close to Metchley Camp has suggested another possibility.

Historical sources

2007-01-03T11:50:00.000-08:00

Tacitus, the most important Roman historian of this period, took a particular interest in Britain as Gnaeus Julius Agricola, his father-in-law and the subject of his first book, served there three times. Agricola was a military tribune under Suetonius Paulinus, which almost certainly gave Tacitus an eyewitness source for Boudica's revolt.

Cassius Dio's account is only known from an epitome, and his sources are uncertain. He is generally agreed to have based his account on that of Tacitus, but he simplifies the sequence of events and adds details, such as the calling in of loans, that Tacitus does not mention.

It is possible that Gildas, in his 6th century polemic De Excidio Britanniae, alludes to Boudica in his typically oblique fashion as a "treacherous lioness", although his general lack of knowledge about the real history of the Roman conquest of Britain makes this far from certain

History and literature

2006-12-03T11:50:00.000-08:00

By the Middle Ages Boudica was forgotten. She makes no appearance in Bede, the Historia Brittonum, the Mabinogion or Geoffrey of Monmouth's History of the Kings of Britain. But the rediscovery of the works of Tacitus during the Renaissance allowed Polydore Virgil to reintroduce her into British history as "Voadicea" in 1534. Raphael Holinshed also included her story in his Chronicles (1577), based on Tacitus and Dio, and inspired Shakespeare's younger contemporaries Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher to write a play, Bonduca, in 1610. William Cowper wrote a popular poem, Boadicea, an ode, in 1782.

It was in the Victorian era that Boudica's fame took on legendary proportions. Queen Victoria was seen as her "namesake". Victoria's Poet Laureate, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, wrote a poem, Boadicea, and ships were named after her. A great bronze statue of Boudica in her war chariot (furnished with scythes after Persian fashion), together with her daughters, was commissioned by Prince Albert and executed by Thomas Thornycroft. It was completed in 1905 and stands next to Westminster Bridge and the Houses of Parliament, with the following lines from Cowper's poem, referring to the British Empire:

Regions Caesar never knew
Thy posterity shall sway.
Ironically, the great anti-imperialist rebel was now identified with the head of the British Empire

Boudica

2006-11-27T10:36:00.000-08:00

Boudica (also Boudicca, formerly better known as Boadicea) (d. 60/61) was a queen of the Brythonic Celtic Iceni people of Norfolk in Eastern Britain who led a major uprising of the tribes against the occupying forces of the Roman Empire. Upon the death of her husband Prasutagus, the Romans annexed his kingdom and brutally humiliated Boudica and her daughters, spurring her leadership of the revolt.

In 60 or 61, while governor Gaius Suetonius Paulinus was leading a campaign on the island of Anglesey in north Wales, Boudica led the Iceni, along with the Trinovantes and others, in a rebellion which destroyed the former Trinovantian capital and Roman colonia of Camulodunum (Colchester), and routed the Roman Legio IX Hispana under Quintus Petillius Cerialis. Boudica's army then burned to the ground the twenty-year-old settlement of Londinium (London) and destroyed Verulamium (St Albans), killing an estimated 70,000-80,000 people. Roman emperor Nero briefly considered withdrawing Roman forces from the island, but ultimately Boudica was defeated at the Battle of Watling Street by the heavily outnumbered forces of governor Suetonius.

The chronicles of these events, as recorded by the historians Tacitus and Dio Cassius[2], were rediscovered during the Renaissance and led to a resurgence of Boudica's legendary fame during the Victorian era, when Queen Victoria was portrayed as her "namesake". Boudica has since remained an important cultural symbol in the United Kingdom.

Fiction

2006-11-03T11:52:00.000-08:00

Boudica's story is the subject of several novels:

Mary Mackie 'The People of the Horse' (W H Allen 1987, ISBN 0-491-03307-9)
J. F. Broxholme (a pseudonym of Duncan Kyle), The War Queen (1967, ISBN 0-09-001160-0)
Rosemary Sutcliff, Song for a Dark Queen, a 1978 historical novel for children,
Manda Scott's series of novels, Dreaming the Eagle (2003), Dreaming the Bull (2004), Dreaming the Hound (2005) and Dreaming the Serpent Spear (2006)
Joyce Doré's Hemlock, (2002, ISBN 1-898030-19-7) in which Boudica and her two daughters are taken to Rome, before Nero, who makes her drink hemlock. Doré claims to be a psychic and to have based the book on her conversations with the historical characters.
Alan Gold's Warrior Queen (2005)
Boudica is referred to in other works of fiction, including:

In Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre (1847), Mr. Rochester asks Jane if the wedding carriage will be suitable to make the future Lady Rochester look like Queen Boadicea.
The Harry Turtledove novel, Ruled Britannia, features a world where the Spanish Armada succeeded in taking over England. Ten years after the fact, Shakespeare is recruited by a band of rebels to write a play that would stir the English to rebel against Spain. The subject of the play is Boudica.
In Alice Borchardt's Tales of Guinevere series, Guinevere is a direct descendent, on her mother's side, of Boudica.
Commodore Jack Aubrey commands a frigate named Boadicea in The Mauritius Command, a book in Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey–Maturin series.
Poet Adrienne Rich refers to "the terrible breasts / of Boadicea beneath flat foxes' heads and orchids" in her poem, "Snapshots of a daughter-in-law".

Documentaries

2006-10-03T11:53:00.001-07:00

Boudica and her revolt have been the subject of numerous documentaries, including:

Warrior Women episode 5, Discovery Channel, hosted by Lucy Lawless
History Bites: "Xena's Evil Sister".
Warrior Queen Boudica (2006), History International Channel
Battlefield Britain (2004) BBC

Fictionalisations

2006-10-03T11:53:00.000-07:00

Boudica has been the subject of two feature films, 1928's Boadicea, starring Phyllis Nielson-Terry, and 2003's Boudica (Warrior Queen in the USA), a UK TV film written by Andrew Davies and starring Alex Kingston as Boudica. A new film is planned for release in 2008 entitled Warrior, written by Brian Klugman and Lee Sternthal, directed by Gavin O'Connor, and produced by Mel Gibson.[23] A British TV series, Warrior Queen, was made by Thames Television in 1978 starring Sian Phillips as Boudica and Nigel Hawthorne as Catus Decianus.

Boudica was a character in an episode of the third season of Xena: Warrior Princess, called The Deliverer, where she was played by Jennifer Ward-Lealand.

Other references

2006-09-13T11:54:00.000-07:00

She was mentioned during the NCIS episode "Bloodbath". In the BBC sitcom The Vicar of Dibley, the first name of the main character, Geraldine Granger, is at one stage said to be Boadicea (Geraldine is her middle name).

In the 1980s children's television show Alvin and the Chipmunks there is a character called Boudikat, who appears in the episode "Romancing Miss Stone" from the third season. Boudikat is an aggressive feline creature, who constantly gets in the way of David Seville's attempts to Romance Miss Stone, with hilarious consequences. According to Roland Rivron, a leading expert on 80's cartoons, the Boudikat and thus Boudica were the inspiration for the legendary ThunderCats .

Comics

2006-08-03T11:55:00.000-07:00

The Sláine series in the British comic 2000 AD included two runs, entitled "Demon Killer" and "Queen of Witches" (1993-1994), written by Pat Mills and illustrated by Glenn Fabry and Dermot Power, which featured a free interpretation of Boudica's story.

The 1990's comic book series Witchblade saw Boudicca as one of the original wielders of the Witchblade.

In the 1990s, DC Comics' Green Lantern Corps included a member named Boodikka, portrayed as a fierce female warrior.

In Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell's graphic novel From Hell, William Gull considers Boudica's defeat as the final defeat of female power by patriarchy.

Boudicca, Queen of the Iceni, led a revolt against the Roman military in AD 60-61

2006-07-07T23:35:00.000-07:00

The Iceni were a Celtic tribe living in Norfolk and Suffolk in eastern Britain. Due to flourishing trade across the English Channel with the Roman empire, their merchants and rulers prospered, issuing their own coinage between about 65 BC and AD 61. Near the end of this period, following the Roman invasion of Britain under Claudius in AD 43, king Prasutagus (AD 50-60) became a rich and powerful client of the Romans. After his death, however, the Roman administrators in Britain made the Iceni a subject population.

Fig.1: Iceni silver coin from hoard, AD 61 (photo: Athena Review).

Boudicca, widow of Prasutagus, now became queen of the Iceni. After she and her two daughters were subjected to grave humiliations by the Romans, she led a revolt of the Iceni and several other tribes which lasted for several months in 60-61. The Boudiccan forces burned and destoyed the three major towns of Londinium (London), Verulamium (St. Albans), and Camulodunum (Colchester), killing many thousands of citizens.

The revolt was eventually suppressed in AD 61 by the Roman military governor, Suetonius Paullinus. The story is told in the Annals of Tacitus, written about AD 110-120. Tacitus had a special interest in Britain because his father-in-law, Agricola, became governor of the Province in AD 77-85 after a successful military campaign in Wales and the north. This campaign, together with some details on the native Celtic tribes, is described in the book Agricola by Tacitus, written in AD 98.

The silver Iceni coin shown above was buried in a hoard along with hundreds of similar coins during the Boudiccan revolt. These were minted in great quantities in order to finance the rebellion. After their defeat in AD 61, the Iceni were resettled in a civitas capital at Caistor-by-Norwich (also called Caistor St.Edmunds), located along the River Tas. The site may be visited today, along with related exhibits at the Norwich Museum.

Description by Tacitus of the Rebellion of Boudicca (AD 60-61)

Chapter 29. [Military campaign in Wales.]

During the consulship of Lucius Caesennius Paetus and Publius Petronius Turpilianus [AD 60-61], a dreadful calamity befell the army in Britain. Aulus Didius, as has been mentioned, aimed at no extension of territory, content with maintaining the conquests already made. Veranius, who succeeded him, did little more: he made a few incursions into the country of the Silures, and was hindered by death from prosecuting the war with vigour. He had been respected, during his life, for the severity of his manners; in his end, the mark fell off, and his last will discovered the low ambition of a servile flatterer, who, in those moments, could offer incense to Nero, and add, with vain ostentation, that if he lived two years, it was his design to make the whole island obedient to the authority of the prince.

Paulinus Suetonius succeeded to the command; an officer of distinguished merit. To be compared with Corbulo was his ambition. His military talents gave him pretensions, and the voice of the people, who never leave exalted merit without a rival, raised him to the highest eminence. By subduing the mutinous spirit of the Britons he hoped to equal the brilliant success of Corbulo in Armenia. With this view, he resolved to subdue the isle of Mona; a place in habited by a warlike people, and a common refuge for all the discontented Britons. In order to facilitate his approach to a difficult and deceitful shore, he ordered a number of flat-bottomed boats to be constructed. In these he wafted over the infantry, while the cavalry, partly by fording over the shallows, and partly by swimming their horses, advanced to gain a footing on the island.

Chapter 30. [The Druids at Mona Island]

On the opposite shore stood the Britons, close embodied, and prepared for action. Women were seen running through the ranks in wild disorder; their apparel funeral; their hair loose to the wind, in their hands flaming torches, and their whole appearance resembling the frantic rage of the Furies. The Druids were ranged in order, with hands uplifted, invoking the gods, and pouring forth horrible imprecations. The novelty of the fight struck the Romans with awe and terror. They stood in stupid amazement, as if their limbs were benumbed, riveted to one spot, a mark for the enemy. The exhortations of the general diffused new vigour through the ranks, and the men, by mutual reproaches, inflamed each other to deeds of valour. They felt the disgrace of yielding to a troop of women, and a band of fanatic priests; they advanced their standards, and rushed on to the attack with impetuous fury.

The Britons perished in the flames, which they themselves had kindled. The island fell, and a garrison was established to retain it in subjection. The religious groves, dedicated to superstition and barbarous rites, were levelled to the ground. In those recesses, the natives [stained] their altars with the blood of their prisoners, and in the entrails of men explored the will of the gods. While Suetonius was employed in making his arrangements to secure the island, he received intelligence that Britain had revolted, and that the whole province was up in arms.

Chapter 31. [Causes of Boudicca's revolt.]

Prasutagus, the late king of the Icenians, in the course of a long reign had amassed considerable wealth. By his will he left the whole to his two daughters and the emperor in equal shares, conceiving, by that stroke of policy, that he should provide at once for the tranquility of his kingdom and his family.

The event was otherwise. His dominions were ravaged by the centurions; the slaves pillaged his house, and his effects were seized as lawful plunder. His wife, Boudicca, was disgraced with cruel stripes; her daughters were ravished, and the most illustrious of the Icenians were, by force, deprived of the positions which had been transmitted to them by their ancestors. The whole country was considered as a legacy bequeathed to the plunderers. The relations of the deceased king were reduced to slavery.

Exasperated by their acts of violence, and dreading worse calamities, the Icenians had recourse to arms. The Trinobantians joined in the revolt. The neighboring states, not as yet taught to crouch in bondage, pledged themselves, in secret councils, to stand forth in the cause of liberty. What chiefly fired their indignation was the conduct of the veterans, lately planted as a colony at Camulodunum. These men treated the Britons with cruelty and oppression; they drove the natives from their habitations, and calling them by the [shameful] names of slaves and captives, added insult to their tyranny. In these acts of oppression, the veterans were supported by the common soldiers; a set of men, by their habits of life, trained to licentiousness, and, in their turn, expecting to reap the same advantages. The temple built in honour of Claudius was another cause of discontent. In the eye of the Britons it seemed the citadel of eternal slavery. The priests, appointed to officiate at the altars, with a pretended zeal for religion, devoured the whole substance of the country. To over-run a colony, which lay quite naked and exposed, without a single fortification to defend it, did not appear to the incensed and angry Britons an enterprise that threatened either danger or difficulty. The fact was, the Roman generals attended to improvements to taste and elegance, but neglected the useful. They embellished the province, and took no care to defend it.

Chapter 32. [Omens and early Roman setbacks at Camulodunum.]

While the Britons were preparing to throw off the yoke, the statue of victory, erected at Camulodunum, fell from its base, without any apparent cause, and lay extended on the ground with its face averted, as if the goddess yielded to the enemies of Rome. Women in restless ecstasy rushed among the people, and with frantic screams denounced impending ruin. In the council-chamber of the Romans hideous clamours were heard in a foreign accent; savage howlings filled the theatre, and near the mouth of the Thames the image of a colony in ruins was seen in the transparent water; the sea was purpled with blood, and, at the tide of ebb, the figures of human bodies were traced in the sand. By these appearances the Romans were sunk in despair, while the Britons anticipated a glorious victory. Suetonius, in the meantime, was detained in the isle of Mona. In this alarming crisis, the veterans sent to Catus Decianus, the procurator of the province, for a reinforcement. Two hundred men, and those not completely armed, were all that officer could spare. The colony had but a handful of soldiers. Their temple was strongly fortified, and there they hoped to make a stand. But even for the defense of that place no measures were concerted. Secret enemies mixed in all their deliberations. No fosse was made; no palisade thrown up; nor were the women, and such as were disabled by age or infirmity, sent out of the garrison. Unguarded and unprepared, they were taken by surprise, and, in the moment of profound peace, overpowered by the Barbarians in one general assault. The colony was laid waste with fire and sword.

The temple held out, but, after a siege of two days, was taken by storm. Petilius Cerealis, who commanded the ninth legion, marched to the relief of the place. The Britons, flushed with success, advanced to give him battle. The legion was put to the rout, and the infantry cut to pieces. Cerealis escaped with the cavalry to his entrenchments. Catus Decianus, the procurator of the province, alarmed at the scene of carnage which he beheld on every side, and further dreading the indignation of a people, whom by rapine and oppression he had driven to despair, betook himself to flight, and crossed over into Gaul.

Chapter 33. [Suetonius abandons London to the Boudiccan forces.]

Suetonius, undismayed by this disaster, marched through the heart of the country as far as London; a place not dignified with the name of a colony, but the chief residence of merchants, and the great mart of trade and commerce. At that place he meant to fix the feat of war; but reflecting on the scanty numbers of his little army, and the fatal rashness of Cerealis, he resolved to quit the station, and, by giving up one post, secure the rest of the province. Neither supplications, nor the tears of the inhabitants could induce him to change his plan. The signal for the march was given. All who chose to follow his banners were taken under his protection. Of all who, on account of their advanced age, the weakness of their sex, of the attractions of the situation, thought proper to remain behind, not one escaped the rage of the Barbarians. The inhabitants of Verulamium, a municipal town, were in like manner put to the sword. The genius of a savage people leads them always in quest of plunder; and, accordingly, the Britons left behind them all places of strength. Wherever they expected feeble resistance, and considerable booty, there they were sure to attack with the fiercest rage. Military skill was not the talent of Barbarians. The number massacred in the places which have been mentioned, amounted to no less than seventy thousand, all citizens or allies of Rome. To make prisoners, and reserve them for slavery, or to exchange them, was not in the idea of a people, who despised all the laws of war. The halter and the gibbet, slaughter and defoliation, fire and sword, were the marks of savage valour. Aware that vengeance would overtake them, they were resolved to make sure of their revenge, and glut themselves with the blood of their enemies.

Chapter 34. [Suetonius prepares to counterattack.]

The fourteenth legion, with the veterans of the twentieth, and the auxiliaries from the adjacent stations, having joined Suetonius, his army amounted to little less than ten thousand men. Thus reinforced, he resolved, without loss of time, to bring on a decisive action. For this purpose he chose a spot encircled with woods, narrow at the entrance, and sheltered in the rear by a thick forest. In that situation he had no fear of an ambush. The enemy, he knew, had no approach but in front. An open plain lay before him. He drew up his men in the following order: the legions in close array formed the center; the light armed troops were stationed at hand to serve as occasion might require: the cavalry took post in the wings. The Britons brought into the field an incredible multitude. They formed no regular line of battle. Detached parties and loose battalions displayed their numbers, in frantic transport bounding with exultation, and so sure of victory, that they placed their wives in wagons at the extremity of the plain, where they might survey the scene of action, and behold the wonders of British valour.

Boudicca, in a [chariot], with her two daughters before her, drove through the ranks. She harangued the different nations in their turn: "This," she said, "is not the first time that the Britons have been led to battle by a woman. But now she did not come to boast the pride of a long line of ancestry, nor even to recover her kingdom and the plundered wealth of her family. She took the field, like the meanest among them, to assert the cause of public liberty, and to seek revenge for her body seamed with ignominious stripes, and her two daughters infamously ravished. From the pride and arrogance of the Romans nothing is sacred; all are subject to violation; the old endure the scourge, and the virgins are deflowered. But the vindictive gods are now at hand. A Roman legion dared to face the warlike Britons: with their lives they paid for their rashness; those who survived the carnage of that day, lie poorly hid behind their entrenchments, meditating nothing but how to save themselves by an ignominious flight. From the din of preparation, and the shouts of the British army, the Romans, even now, shrink back with terror. What will be their case when the assault begins? Look round, and view your numbers. Behold the proud display of warlike spirits, and consider the motives for which we draw the avenging sword. On this spot we must either conquer, or die with glory. There is no alternative. Though a woman, my resolution is fixed: the men, if they please, may survive with infamy, and live in bondage."

Chapter 36. [Suetonius meanwhile addresses his army.]

Suetonius, in a moment of such importance, did not remain silent. He expected every thing from the valour of his men, and yet urged every topic that could inspire and animate them to the attack. "Despise," he said, "the savage uproar, the yells and shouts of undisciplined Barbarians. In that mixed multitude, the women out-number the men. Void of spirit, unprovided with arms, they are not soldiers who come to offer battle; they are bastards, runaways, the refuse of your swords, who have often fled before you, and will again betake themselves to flight when they see the conqueror flaming in the ranks of war. In all engagements it is the valour of a few that turns the fortune of the day. It will be your immortal glory, that with a scanty number you can equal the exploits of a great and powerful army. Keep your ranks; discharge your javelins; rush forward to a close attack; bear down all with your bucklers, and hew a passage with your swords. Pursue the vanquished, and never think of spoil and plunder. Conquer, and victory gives you everything."

This speech was received with warlike acclamations. The soldiers burned with impatience for the onset, the veterans brandished their javelins, and the ranks displayed such an intrepid countenance, that Suetonius, anticipating the victory, gave the signal for the charge.

Chapter 37. [The decisive battle.]

The engagement began. The Roman legion presented a close embodied line. The narrow defile gave them the shelter of a rampart. The Britons advanced with ferocity, and discharged their darts at random. In that instant, the Romans rushed forward in the form of a wedge. The auxiliaries followed with equal ardour. The cavalry, at the same time, bore down upon the enemy, and, with their pikes, overpowered all who dared to make a stand. The Britons betook themselves to flight, but their waggons in the rear obstructed their passage. A dreadful slaughter followed. Neither sex nor age was spared. The cattle, falling in one promiscuous carnage, added to the heaps of slain. The glory of the day was equal to the most splendid victory of ancient times. According to some writers, not less than eighty thousand Britons were put to the sword. The Romans lost about four hundred men, and the wounded did not exceed that number. Boudicca, by a dose of poison, [ended] her life. Poenius Postumius, the Prefect in the camp of the second legion, as soon as he heard of the brave exploits of the fourteenth and twentieth legions, felt the disgrace of having, in disobedience to the orders of his general, robbed the soldiers under his command of their share in so complete a victory. Stung with remorse, he fell upon his sword, and expired on the spot.

[The translation from Latin is adapted from Arthur Murphy (Works of Tacitus, 1794).]

Music

2006-07-03T11:56:00.000-07:00

The Irish singer/songwriter Enya produced a song called "Boadicea" on her 1992 album The Celts. This track was first sampled by Scarface as the intro to his 1993 release The World is Yours. Later, it was most famously sampled by the rap group The Fugees for their single "Ready or Not" (from 1996's The Score), and most recently by Mario Winans (featuring Sean "P. Diddy" Combs) on his song "I Don't Wanna Know" (2004). The track was also used in the soundtrack of the film Sleepwalkers.

Scottish singer/songwriter Steve McDonald composed a biographical song called "Boadicea" on his 1997 album Stone of Destiny, detailing her life and tragic death.

British rock band The Libertines refer to "Queen Boadicea" in their song "The Good Old Days", indicating a belief that her spirit still lives on in Britons today.

The British metal band Bal-Sagoth have written a song entitled "Blood Slakes the Sand at the Circus Maximus" (found on the band's album Battle Magic) which features an Iceni Warrior of Boudica's uprising being captured and brought back to Rome. Her name (always spelled "Boudicca") returns in the song "When Rides the Scion of the Storms" of the same album.

Faith and the Muse produced a song, "Boudiccea" for their most recent album, Burning Season. The song suggests that Boudiccea may have committed suicide by falling on her sword.

The Song, "Boadicea" appears on the album "Eternal Women", which is a compilation of songs to 11 famous women by Dutch Singer, Petra Berger.