Boudica was a Celtic Icenic tribal queen who organized a revolt against Roman invaders. Prasutagus, the Iceni tribe’s king, was given permission to rule as a nominally independent ally of Rome. Prasutagus designated his two daughters and the Roman emperor as joint heirs in his testament, but after his passing, his property was seized and his kingdom annexed. While Cassius Dio mentioned that earlier regal offerings were taken and the Roman financiers called in their debts, which caused the insurrection, Tacitus wrote that Roman soldiers beat Boudica and sexually assaulted her daughters. Boudica first demolished Camulodunum (modern-day Colchester), a symbol of Roman control that had a temple to the former Emperor Claudius, by uniting various rebellious tribes, notably the Iceni and Trinovantes. After destroying the trade towns of Londinium (modern-day London) and Verulamium (modern-day St. Albans), her soldiers were ultimately routed at the Battle of Watling Street by a Roman army under the command of Gaius Suetonius Paulinus. According to some historians, Boudica poisoned herself to death in order to avoid being caught, but other sources claim that she died of disease.
Early Childhood & Life
Very little is known about Boudica’s early years, and what little is known comes from the records left behind by the Roman statesman and historian Cassius Dio and the ancient Roman senator Tacitus. According to legend, Boudica was born in Camulodunum, Britain, in the year 30 AD.
She reportedly had similar warrior training to other Celtic women. She received instruction in various fighting styles and weaponry used.
Tacitus and Cassius Dio both asserted that Boudica was a royal family member. Dio described her as being extremely tall with thick, long, reddish-brown hair that hung below her waist. She was described by Dio as having a rough, loud voice and a piercing gaze that made one feel as though they were being stabbed. He claimed that she consistently sported a vibrant tunic, a flowing tartan cloak fastened with a brooch, and a sizable golden torc around her neck.
Situations that Led to the Uprising
Through her union with Prasutagus, king of the British Celtic tribe Iceni in the first century AD, Boudica became queen of the Iceni. The tribe lived in the region that roughly corresponds to the modern county of Norfolk in East Anglia, England.
Prasutagus either became king after the suppression of an Iceni uprising in 47 AD, or he was one of the 11 kings who submitted to Roman Emperor Claudius when the Roman conquest of Britain began in 43 AD.
The Iceni tribe joined Rome as an ally, and Prasutagus was given permission to rule his kingdom even though he was only ostensibly independent. Tacitus believed that the king’s inclusion of the Roman Emperor and his two daughters in his will as co-heirs was an act of reverence on his part to guarantee the safety of his household and realm.
Prasutagus lived a long and happy life, according to Tacitus, but the Romans, who eventually overran the kingdom and plunder it, disobeyed his wishes and took the lands of prominent Iceni men. Tacitus also stated that Boudica’s daughters were raped while she was being flogged by Roman soldiers. These events, according to Tacitus, sparked the insurrection.
Cassius Dio, however, made a different argument that sparked the uprising. He attributed a portion of the insurrection to the “rapacity” of Catus Decianus, the procurator of Roman Britain in AD 60 or 61, who seized funds that Claudius had granted to prominent Britons and declared them debts that had to be repaid with interest.
The second reason cited by Dio was the coercive loan given to the recalcitrant Britons by Roman financier and philosopher Seneca the Younger after Claudius’ conquest of Britain in an effort to obtain a good rate of interest, and then the sudden callback all at once and use of coercive means to get them.
It is still unclear who despatched the centurions to pillage the realm and what their names were. Additionally, it is unknown if the measures in question were authorized by the period’s British governor, Gaius Suetonius Paulinus, who was at the time engaged in combat in North Wales.
The Boudica-Led Uprising
In AD 60 or 61, the Iceni tribes, together with their neighbors the Trinovantes and others, mounted a revolt when Paulinus was preoccupied launching an assault on the island of Mona (modern-day Anglesey). Boudica was chosen as their leader.
Tacitus claims that the queen spoke to her soldiers and declared that she was not seeking vengeance as a lady descended from a noble family but rather as one of the people for the loss of her freedom, the beating of her body, and the rape of her daughters. She added that the males could decide to live in slavery and that this is a woman’s determination to either succeed or perish.
The first city that Boudica’s army attacked was Camulodunum, which had once been Trinovantian’s capital but had by that point transformed into a Roman colony. There was built a temple for the former emperor Claudius at the expense of the natives, who had been oppressed by the residing Roman soldiers. Even though the Roman inhabitants requested reinforcements, Catus Decianus, the procurator at the time, provided only 200 auxiliary troops. The rebels were successful in razing Camulodunum, which was later revealed by archaeologists to have been the result of deliberate destruction.
As the besieged colonia was approached by Quintus Petillius Cerialis’ troops, who were in command of the Legio IX Hispana (Ninth Iberian Legion) at the time, they suffered a terrible defeat at the hands of Boudica’s army in the Battle of Camulodunum. Around 80% of the Roman foot soldiers were killed, and the only ones to escape to a nearby fort were Cerialis and the cavalry.
As soon as Suetonius learned that Camulodunum had fallen, he hurried to Londinium, the army of Boudica’s next target, and marched via the Roman road known as Watling Street. Following the Roman conquest in 43 AD, Londinium was established, and the new community eventually became a thriving commercial hub.
However, Suetonius believed that his army would be outnumbered by the rebels if it attempted to defend Londinium. As a result, he made the decision to sacrifice the city in order to rescue the province and issued an evacuation order. The army of Boudica dutifully demolished the city.
The town of Verulamium was the next rebel target; it met the same fate as Camulodunum and Londinium. As a result of these assaults, an estimated 70,000–80,000 Romans and British citizens were thought to have died in these three locations.
Battle of Watling Street and the Putsch’s Demise
Suetonius gathered forces of about 10,000 soldiers, including some detachments of the XX Valeria Victrix and other auxiliaries available aside from Legio XIV Gemina that was under his command, as Boudica’s army continued their onslaught on Verulamium. Even though they were vastly outnumbered compared to the rebel forces, which Dio estimates to have been over 2, 30,000 at the time, the Romans resisted under Suetonius.
The combat took place in a defile at an unknown location, possibly somewhere along the Roman road that is now known as Watling Street in the West Midlands. Despite the considerable number of Britons, Boudica was unable to deploy more forces than the Romans at any given time due to the field’s narrowness.
Because of their sophisticated weapons, strategies, and discipline, the Romans were adept at engaging in open battle; in contrast, the Britons lacked adaptability and open-field strategies. The Romans advanced in wedge formations, slicing through the British defenses and slaughtering thousands of people. Because they had held their own families in a ring of wagons on the outskirts of the battlefield, the British attempted to flee but were thwarted.
The Romans won the battle handily, putting an end to the southern half of Britain’s resistance to Roman authority up until 410 AD. According to Tacitus, over 80,000 Britons perished in comparison to just 400 Romans.
Demise and Legacy of Boudica
Tacitus did not mention Boudica’s suicide in his book “De vita Iulii Agricolae” (The Life of Agricola), which was published in 98 AD. However, in his other book, “Ab excessu divi Augusti” (Annals), published in 117 AD, he claimed that the Queen poisoned herself to death. Dio claims that Boudica passed away from illness and was given a lavish funeral. Nothing is known about her daughters’ eventual fate according to historical sources.
Although there is no concrete evidence, it is believed that Boudica was buried in the King’s Cross station in London between platforms 9 and 10. She appeared in various literary works, such as Raphael Holinshed’s “Chronicles” (1577), Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher’s “Bonduca” (1610), and William Cowper’s “Boadicea, an ode” (1782). She inspired the naming of other ships.
Her name appears in several sources under many names, including Bunduca, Voadicia, Boadicea, and Boudicca.
The London County Council erected “Boadicea and Her Daughters,” a cast bronze sculpture of Boudica on her war chariot, on a pedestal on the Victoria Embankment in London in June 1902. Between 1856 and 1883, English sculptor and engineer Thomas Thornycroft created a full-size model of it, which was later bronze cast.
In Cardiff, Wales, UK, on October 27, 1916, David Lloyd George unveiled her statue in The Marble Hall at Cardiff City Hall.
Estimated net worth
The estimated net worth of Boudica is about $1 million.