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Boudica

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: British History 1500 and
before (including Roman Britain); Historical figures

   Statue of Boudica near Westminster Pier, London, with her two daughters
   upon a chariot
   Statue of Boudica near Westminster Pier, London, with her two daughters
   upon a chariot

   Boudica (also spelled 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.

   Her husband, Prasutagus, the Icenian king, who had ruled as a nominally
   independent ally of Rome, had left his kingdom jointly to his daughters
   and the Roman Emperor in his will, but when he died his will was
   ignored, possibly because the Romans, unlike the Britons, did not
   recognise daughters as heirs. The kingdom was annexed as if conquered,
   Boudica was flogged and her daughters raped, and Roman financiers
   called in their loans.

   In 60 or 61, while the Roman 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 revolt. They
   destroyed Camulodunum ( Colchester), formerly the capital of the
   Trinovantes but now a colonia (a settlement for discharged Roman
   soldiers) and the site of a temple to the former emperor Claudius,
   built and maintained at local expense, and routed a Roman legion, the
   IX Hispana, sent to relieve the settlement.

   On hearing the news, Suetonius hurried to Londinium (London), the
   twenty-year-old commercial settlement which was the rebels' next
   target, but concluding he did not have the numbers to defend it,
   evacuated and abandoned it. It was burnt to the ground, as was
   Verulamium ( St Albans). An estimated 70,000-80,000 people were killed
   in the three cities. Suetonius, meanwhile, regrouped his forces in the
   West Midlands, and despite being heavily outnumbered, defeated Boudica
   in the Battle of Watling Street. The crisis had led the emperor Nero to
   consider withdrawing Roman forces from the island, but Suetonius's
   victory secured Roman control of the province.

   The chronicles of these events, as recorded by the historians Tacitus
   and Cassius Dio, 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.

History

Boudica's name

   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

   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.
   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. 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 and Galatia, 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

   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. 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 Claudius
   A statue of Emperor Claudius

   The 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. 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

   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 Romans 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. 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

   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. More recently a new discovery of Roman artifacts
   in Kings Norton close to Metchley Camp has suggested another
   possibility.

Cultural impact

History and literature

   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 as Queen Victoria was seen to be Boudica's "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.

Fiction

   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.

Films and television

Fictionalisations

   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. 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.

Documentaries

   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

Comics

   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 1990s 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.

Music

   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.

   The famous Netherlandian soprano singer/songwriter Petra Berger
   produced an[other] song called "Boadicea" (written by G.Romita) on her
   2001 album "Eternal Woman".

   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.
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