BOUDICA. Friends,I think some of you are not familiar with this historical character called BOUDICA-as not much writings are avaible on this character. I managed to collect some datas of BOUDICA from some old books and so I decided to share the same with you. Hope some of you will like it. There was a tribe in the eastern BRITAIN called the CELTIC TRIBE in 40—60 A.D. Their kingdom was known as ICENI. In60A.D. their king died leaving no male heirs --only a widow and two teenage daughters. Now ICENI was loyal supporter of the ROMANS, who invaded Britain about 15 years earlier. As a result ICENI enjoyed privilages like limited autonomy of ROME—which the Romans generally rwarded the nations supporting them. The king of ICENY GAVE A PART OF HIS KINGDOM TO THE Romans on free lease. Nero was the emperor of ROME at that time. DECIANUS CATUS, was the Imperial Representative of ROME in the ICENI kingdom. But he was a very greedy and mean person. When he found ICENI leader less after the death of the king—he started raising extra money from the subjects in the name of giving protection and also confiscated much of their lands. The king’s widow was unhappy for this and took the throne for herself and immediately asserted her right not to be mistreated. As a ruler of an independent tribe she refused to pay or to plunder her land. DECIANUS was furious.He ordered his soldiers to strip and flog BOUDICA. The orders were carried out. But the Roman soldiers added fuel to the fire by gang raping the two young daughters of BOUDICA in her presence. No boy knows what happened to the daughters afterwards. But their mother BOUDICA became an avenging fury. From that day she devoted her life to lead her people in a terrible crusade of revenge against the foreign oppressors. ICENI followed her into revolt without any question. She must have had a very forceful personality.She also motivated several neighbouring tribes and they also joned hands with her. By the end of winter BOUDICA raised a huge army comprising of 100,000 soldires.and the rebels marched to the eastern population centers which were full of Roman settlers.Inflamed by their majestic leader, ICENI and their allies vowed to sweep all before them as bloodily as possible,to bun, to savage and to take no prisoners. BOUDICA chose her timing well as the military commander of BRITAIN—PAULINUS And half of his troops were engaged in a campaign far off to the west. In an angry of fire and slaughter all the three towns were invaded and totally destroyed by the rebellious army of BOUDICA. ROMAN garrisons were not the only targets. BOUDICA declared that no one willing to live peacefully with her was to be spared.. The historian-CASSIUS DIO WRITES,--“BOUDICA’S followers hung up naked the noblest and most distinguished women and then cut off their breasts and sewed them to their mouths to make the victim appear to be eating them and then impaled the women on sharp skewers.-----The death toll in the 3 towns has been estimated as about 70,ooo. And DECIANUS CATUS, whose greed and cruelty sparked the flame of rebellion had to flee to the continent to save his life. In the mean time PAULINUS and his men rushed back to LONDON to stop the uprising.. And here BOUDICA made her blunder. Overconfident with her victory and also underestimating PAULINUS as her army was 5 times bigger than that of PAULINUS She thought she could wipe out the ROMANS by meeting the enemy in the battlefield. Her courage was very high but PAULINUS was an experienced general in command of crack troops. But BOUDICA knew nothing of advanced military technique and her army was illequiped,illtrained and also ill organized .PAULINUS very cleverly made the army of BOUDICA to come through a narrow pass and he was waiting on the other side of the pass with his well trained army. As CASSIUSDIO describes ,”She was huge in frame, terrifying of aspect and with a harsh voice, A great mass of bright red hair fell to her knees .She wore a greatly twisted golden necklace and a tunic of many colours .Now she grasped a spear to strike fear to all who watched her.” But the ROMANS were not afraid of her. PAULINUS’S men threw volley of javelins into the air. Then another volley and then the Wellarmed and well shielded Romans with their short swords charged. Before long the rebel force began stemped as there was little chance to retreat. The rebels were routed. The ROMANS slew men ,women children ,but the courageous queen survived. Historian CASSIUS DIO SAY THAT BOUDICA DIED OF SICKNESS. But more reliable historian TACTIUS say that BOUDICA poisioned herself to escape the insult humiliation ,torture and punishment at the hands of the ROMAN ENEMIES --------------------------------------------------------------------. . - ( BOUDICA sometime remind me of our heroine MULA-GABHORU, who jumped in battle field to avenge the death of her husband but ultimately she was killed by the soldiers of TURBOK.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Nov 2014 02:28:28 +0000
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