V

BRITAIN AND GERMANY

INTRODUCTION

For most of the imperial period, Rome was preoccupied by problems in two frontier areas, the eastern, where there were almost continuous clashes with the Parthian empire, and the northwestern, where the main cause of concern was the threat posed by Germanic tribes. In the northwest, problems in Britain would sometimes eclipse those in Germany, and such was the case under Nero, when the Rhine region was relatively stable but a major crisis erupted in Britain.

BRITAIN

The great rebellion that broke out in Britain under the leadership of Boudica during Nero’s reign was an event of major significance, one of the most serious cases of internal provincial dissension to occur in the early principate. The main sources—Tacitus, Dio, and Suetonius—are in agreement on one central fact: it was a catastrophe. Tacitus calls it a “cataclysmic defeat” (Ann. 14.29.1), Suetonius a “debacle” (Ner. 39.1), and Dio a “frightful disaster” (62.1). The events are described in considerable detail by Tacitus and Dio, in accounts that seem to have drawn on different sources. Both are excellent examples of those ancient narratives where the very wealth of detail creates historical problems, and where detailed knowledge stands side by side with frustrating ignorance.

Tacitus would have had available a rich, if not impartial, source of information. His father-in-law, Julius Agricola, whose biography he wrote, served on the staff of the Roman commander Suetonius Paulinus at the time (Tac. Agr. 5.1). It is also thought likely that for the Annals, though perhaps not for the earlier Agricola, Tacitus drew directly on the memoirs of Paulinus himself. There is no reference to a specifically British memoir by Paulinus, but we do know that he wrote a chronicle of his earlier service in Mauretania, since Pliny cites him specifically for detailed information on the Atlas Mountains (Plin. HN 5.14–15).

MAP 4. Britannia

The Boudican episode highlighted the weaknesses in the Roman administration of Britannia, a Roman province since the invasion of Claudius in AD 43. These weaknesses meant that when the crisis erupted, Boudica’s appeals for help and support found a receptive audience. This crisis was aggravated by the fact that at the outset the legatus was not in the area. His absence is in itself noteworthy, and one of the most remarkable aspects of the whole episode is that the Romans seem to have been taken entirely by surprise (Tac. Ann. 14.32.2). For two years after his arrival in early 58, Suetonius Paulinus had been single-mindedly engaged in reducing the recalcitrant tribes in Wales (the name properly speaking is anachronistic in this period), essential groundwork for a campaign against Anglesey. Meanwhile, in southeast Britain, where Rome had first established itself, the Trinovantes were forced to cede more and more of their land to settlers in the colony (Colonia Victricensis) established at Camulodunum (Colchester) in 49, as those settlers forcibly took more territory than they had been originally allotted. The establishment of the imperial cult and the founding of the temple to Divus Claudius added to the financial burdens. Members of the priesthood had to pay a subscription for the honor of holding office in the cult, and since at this stage the number of candidates would have been very small, the burden would have fallen heavily on a very small number.

The incident that sparked the rebellion took place not in Colchester but well to the north. In 47, there had been an attempt under the governorship of Ostorius Scapula to disarm tribes in a wide swathe of Britain (Tac. Ann. 12.31). The main opposition had come from Iceni, in their relatively small kingdom in Norfolk and Suffolk, with its capital possibly in Thetford. They had to be subdued militarily. It was possibly at that point that the presumably pro-Roman Prasutagus was appointed as the last Icenian king, but we have no way of being certain. The sequence of events that followed the death of Prasutagus is extremely confusing. His name has been tentatively identified (Prasto) on Icenian coinage (Allen [1976]), and his historicity is not to be doubted. But Tacitus is alone in associating his death with the beginnings of the rebellion. Suetonius sees that disaster as an accidental setback and finds no fault with Nero. Dio blames financial pressures, noting that Claudius had offered subsidies to encourage Romanization and that these were treated as loans, not gifts, and were for some reason recalled. Other Romans had apparently made loans to the Britons, which no doubt encouraged the building of lavish Roman-style country houses and the like. Among these was Seneca, who had loaned an enormous sum, which was subsequently called in. It is hard to understand why this financial pressure would have affected the Iceni more seriously than other tribes, but Dio’s information may lie behind the account given by Tacitus that Prasutagus “had long enjoyed” his wealth and tried to protect it by making the emperor joint heir with his daughters. The tradition of securing at least part of one’s legacy by a substantial bequest to the emperor was by then well established.

It may be that the procurator Catus Decianus was enforcing increased taxation to cover the cost of the military activities in the province, since financial issues play a big role in the accounts of both Tacitus and Dio, but this is not proven. “Provincial” procurators served in both the imperial and senatorial/ public provinces. In the early period, they were probably looked on as essentially private agents of the emperor, responsible only for overseeing financial matters relating to the imperial properties within the provinces, with no official administrative role. But this situation gradually changed, and they assumed administrative duties; in the imperial provinces, this had perhaps happened already under Augustus. The powers and responsibilities of the procurators grew, especially from the time of Claudius, and there could be tensions between the procurator and the legatus of the province. In AD 23, a case was brought against the procurator Gnaeus Lucilius Capito for making improper and unauthorized use of troops in Asia, a public province, when he took over the soldiers that were under the proconsul’s command to enforce his own decision (Tac. Ann. 4.15.2). Tacitus stresses that, when governor of Aquitania, Agricola went out of his way to avoid quarrels with the procurators, implying that this approach was the exception rather than the rule (Tac. Agr. 9). But in the case of Britain, any increase in taxation was apparently not enough. The assets of Prasutagus and the Icenian nobility were seized through Catus Decianus’s exactions. Catus may have been acting largely on his own initiative in extracting the dues, but the incorporation of the kingdom into the province, while it had financial implications in that it would result in increased revenue, surely could not have been carried out without reference to the provincial legatus and indeed to the emperor in Rome.

The fact that no heir to the kingdom came forward to champion the rebellion might suggest that the absence of a clear successor was at the heart of the problem. It is to be noted that, according to Tacitus, Prasutagus named his daughters as his heirs and apparently did not include his wife, which might suggest caution on his part, since she may have been known for her anti-Roman views. There is no suggestion that Boudica had a right to succeed, nor is there in fact in any of the accounts the suggestion that she made such a claim. It is noteworthy that although Tacitus refers to Cartimandua of the Brigantes as “queen” (regina), as at Ann. 12.36.1 and 12.40.2, he never applies this term to Boudica (nor does Dio apply a Greek equivalent). The absence of a plausible claimant may in part explain Decianus’s actions. Also, while the conduct of the procurator may well have been impolitic, or even unethical, it can surely be assumed that it was basically rational. What is astonishing, then, is Tacitus’s claim in the Annals that Boudica was flogged and her daughters raped (Ann. 14.31.1), behavior that was not typical of Roman authorities even at their worst and not mentioned in Dio or Suetonius, nor, indeed, in Tacitus’s shorter account in Agricola. It is hard to see any legal basis for this treatment, or any political advantage, and one might suspect a degree of exaggeration on Tacitus’s part. It is possible that he overstated their ill treatment to create a contrast with the enlightened policy of Agricola.

The picture of Boudica in Tacitus’s account is not entirely negative; in places, he seems to admire her. Of course, his admiration can be selective. In Germania 45, in a different context, he notes that a German tribe, the Sithones, in being ruled by a woman, had fallen to a status lower than that of slaves. No female rulers are known in Gaul, nor is any attested in Britain in the late Iron Age before the arrival of the Romans. We know of at least two powerful British female leaders during the first century AD, Boudica and Cartimandua of the Brigantes, but it would be dangerous to draw any general conclusions about the social structure of British Iron Age society, despite Tacitus’s claim that the Britons were accustomed to female rulers (Tac. Agr. 16.1; Ann. 14.35.1). And it should be noted that Tacitus seems to contradict himself in asserting that the Brigantes revolted against Cartimandua because of the shame of being ruled by a woman (Tac. Ann. 12.40.3). He seems to refer to a second queen of the Brigantes (Tac. Agr. 31.4), since the description there does not quite fit Cartimandua, but the passage is part of the speech of Calgacus and may reflect a slight bending of the truth on his part.

The Icenian leader’s name was probably close to the form Boudica (“Victoria”), with the “i” pronounced long (Jackson [1979]). The “a” ending reflects the fact that early Celtic languages were, like Latin, inflected. The same name, Boudica, with a single “c,” is attested in an undated inscription from Lusitania (CIL 2.455), and a Bodicacia has been recently attested on a second-century AD gravestone from Cirencester in Britain (http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/35042).

The familiar form “Boadicea” seems to have resulted from misreading “u” and “c” in Tacitus’s manuscript, where the text reads Boudicca. Tacitus’s double “c” might reflect a “c” that has started to become voiced (moving toward a “g”), as in Modern Welsh buddugol = “victorious.” The form Boudig(a) is found in a dedication to a tutelary goddess of Victory in Aquitania, securely dated to AD 237 (Courteault [1921]).

Reliable figures for the deaths caused by the rebellion are impossible to ascertain. The official figure of 70,000 found in Tacitus may be exaggerated, but there can be no doubt that the totals would have been considerable, especially in the sackings of Camulodunum (Colchester), Londinium (London), and Verulamium (near modern St. Albans), where the destruction has left its trace in the archaeological record. The sources do not mention other towns, but others probably were affected: there is evidence of destruction at Venta (Winchester) in this period. Also, coin hoards, a traditional symptom of serious unrest, discovered in Norfolk, Suffolk, and Cambridgeshire, may reflect these events. The rebellion ended in a major battle and the death of Boudica—by poison according to Tacitus, by illness according to Dio (which is not, of course, totally incompatible with poison); Dio adds unconvincingly that she had a grand funeral. The battle probably took place in the midlands. Precisely where is much disputed, but a location near the fort of Mancetter is generally most favored (Webster [1993], 97, 111). Boudica’s last resting place is woven into British folklore, with an old candidate from as far north as the Prestatyn area in North Wales (under Gop Hill, a Neolithic mound) and a more recent one from as far south as King’s Cross station, London, between platforms 9 and 10. The latter originated perhaps in 1937 with Lewis Spence (Boadicea, Warrior Queen of the Britons), who placed the last battle in the King’s Cross area.

The immediate repercussion of the rebellion is described by Tacitus in very guarded language. He generally despised cautious governors and admired aggressive ones like Suetonius Paulinus, a vigorous man of military action with little interest in the notion of “hearts and minds.” He initiated a brief period of savage reprisals, although Fulford (2008) has argued, on archaeological grounds, that this retributive policy did not apply south of the Thames, where the Roman allies may have stood firm and where there was subsequent investment and development. The most important ruler here would probably have been Tiberius Cogidubnus (or Togidubnus), who, Tacitus notes, stayed loyal to Rome down to nostram memoriam (Tac. Agr. 14.1), which could mean broadly “to our own times” or specifically “to the times of which I have a recollection,” the latter of which would generally fit in nicely with the rebellion.

The procurator Catus Decianus fled to Gaul when the crisis first erupted, and his replacement Julius Classicianus found himself at odds with the policy of the legatus. He reported to Rome on the need for a period of reconciliation and lobbied for Suetonius Paulinus’s replacement. Nero sent a freedman, Polyclitus, an individual for whom Tacitus felt considerable contempt, to mediate and report to him. Polyclitus was apparently sympathetic to Classicianus’s view of the situation, but was diplomatic in the reports that were sent to Rome. Suetonius Paulinus had after all been the man of the hour, albeit an earlier hour, and had attained a huge military victory, the type of achievement much respected by Romans. His removal did not happen at first, but it seems that a face-saving way was found to redeploy him without any serious loss of prestige. It is worth noting, however, that he was apparently not in disgrace. He, or more likely his son, later held a consulship, in AD 66, and the assertion of Tacitus that Nero personally made the decision to send massive reinforcements into Britain after the final battle suggests that the strong military response was approved in Rome (Tac. Ann. 14.38.1). There is in fact some evidence that Suetonius’s victory might have been celebrated in Rome with a special donative after his return. A lead tessera has survived with NERO CAESAR on one side and PAULLINI on the other, with the symbols of Jupiter and an eagle. Nero’s eighth salutation as “Imperator” might also be related to the victory (Griffin [1976]). Suetonius Paulinus was replaced in 61 by the much less aggressive Publius Petronius Turpillianus. The medium-term effect was that the Roman advance through Britannia was held back. In the long term, it could be argued, this lull was beneficial and led to a more tactful approach of the Roman authorities in dealing with the native population. In the Flavian period in particular, there seems to have been a serious effort to encourage civitates to govern their own affairs on the Roman model.

SOURCES

Suetonius limits himself to two passing comments on the Boudican Rebellion.

Suet. Ner. 18.1. Never motivated by any wish or hope to enlarge or extend the empire, Nero even considered withdrawing the army from Britain, and only refrained from doing so because he felt ashamed at appearing to have sullied his father’s glorious achievement.1 It was only the kingdom of Pontus that he transformed into a province, when Polemo ceded it2 and also that of Cottius in the Alps when Cottius died.³

Suet. Ner. 39.1. In addition to the heinous crimes and misdeeds committed by the emperor, there were also a number of accidental setbacks. There was an epidemic in a single autumn that saw 30,000 deaths added to Libitina’s account;⁴ a debacle in Britain where two major towns were sacked, with a massacre of citizens and allies; and an ignominious reverse in the East, where legions were sent under the yoke in Armenia, and Syria was only with difficulty kept in submission.⁵

The governor of Britain, Suetonius Paulinus, is engaged in subduing the Druids on the Island of Anglesey (Mona) when the rebellion breaks out.

Tac. Agr. 14. After Veranius,⁶ Suetonius Paulinus had success for two years, during which he brought the tribes to heel and strengthened garrisons.⁷ Feeling confident from this, he attacked the island of Mona, which was the center of the rebels’ strength, and so left his rear open to enemy opportunism.⁸

Tac. Ann. 14.29.1. During the consulships of Caesennius Paetus and Petronius Turpilianus, there was a cataclysmic defeat in Britain.9 There the legate Aulus Didius had, as I noted earlier, merely held on to what he had gained,¹⁰ while his successor Veranius,¹¹ after some minor pillaging expeditions against the Silures,¹² was prevented by death from pushing ahead with his offensive. Throughout his life, Veranius was famed for his austere character, but an egotism was clearly demonstrated by the final words of his will, where, with gross flattery of Nero, he added that he would have brought the province to heel for him had he lived a further two years.

2. Paulinus Suetonius then took over the governorship of Britain.¹³ He was Corbulo’s rival in military science and in the esteem of the people (which permits nobody to be without a competitor), and he passionately wanted to match the glory of the recovery of Armenia by crushing the foe. Accordingly, he prepared for an assault on the island of Mona, home to a strong population and a haven for refugees, and he built flat-bottomed boats to counter the precarious shallows. Thus the infantry crossed; the cavalry followed through the shoals or by swimming alongside their mounts where the waters were deeper.

30.1. Facing them on the shoreline was the enemy line, a dense array of arms and men, and among them rushed women who, like furies, wore funereal clothing, had disheveled hair, and brandished torches. Around stood Druids, their hands raised to heaven, pouring out terrible curses, and the extraordinary spectacle struck such fear into the men that they presented their bodies motionless to enemy weapons, as if their limbs were paralyzed.14 2. Then, with encouragement from their commander, and urging each other not to be alarmed at a horde of fanatical women, they charged forward, mowing down those in their way and engulfing them in their own flames. 3. A garrison was then imposed on the defeated enemy, and the groves sacred to their barbarous superstitions were cut down (for they held it morally acceptable to make their altars reek with prisoners’ gore and to consult the gods with the entrails of humans). While Suetonius was thus engaged, he was brought news of a sudden uprising of the province.

British tribes give vent to their sense of grievance by joining Boudica of the Iceni in rebellion.

Tac. Agr. 15. Their fears removed by the legate’s absence, the Britons began discussing the ills of their servitude among themselves, comparing the wrongs they had suffered and exacerbating them with the construction they put on them.¹⁵ Nothing was gained by tolerance, they said; it resulted only in heavier impositions for readily putting up with them! In the past, they had one king each; now two were being imposed on them: the legate so he could wreak his fury on their lifeblood and the procurator on their possessions. Discord between these men who were set over them was deadly for their subjects, and concord was equally deadly. They have their tools—one his centurions, the other his slaves—to inflict violence and indignities indiscriminately. Nothing escapes their cupidity, nothing their lust. In battle, it is the braver man who despoils his opponent, they said, but in this case it is mostly by cowards who have no fight in them that our homes are snatched from us, our children taken off, and troop levies forced on us, as though it is only for our native land that we do not know how to die! If the Britons count their numbers, what a meager scattering of soldiers it is that has crossed to us! This was how the Germanies shook off the yoke, and yet their defense was a river, not the ocean!16 For the Britons, the reasons for war were country, wives, and parents; for the Romans, they were greed and self-indulgence. They would retreat, as the deified Julius had retreated—the Britons had only to emulate the courage of their forefathers!¹⁷ They should not be dismayed with the outcome of one or two battles either; the successful may have more gusto, but the unfortunate have greater determination. Now, too, the gods were feeling compassion for the Britons—they were keeping the Roman general away and had his army exiled on another island. The Britons were already taking what was the most difficult step in meeting to discuss the problem. And, in fact, in such deliberations, being caught was more dangerous than taking action.

Tac. Ann. 14.31. Prasutagus, king of the Iceni, famed for a wealth that he had long enjoyed, had entered in his will as his heirs the emperor and his own two daughters, thinking that such an act of obsequiousness would keep his realm and household out of harm’s way. The reverse turned out to be the case, so much so that the realm was pillaged by centurions and his household by slaves, as if they were spoils of war. Right at the start, Prasutagus’s wife, Boudica, was flogged and his daughters raped. All the leading Iceni were divested of their ancestral property, as though the Romans had been made a gift of the entire region, and the king’s relatives were dealt with as slaves.

Dio 62.1. While such children’s games were being played out in Rome, a frightful disaster occurred in Britain. Two cities were destroyed, eighty thousand Romans and allies lost their lives, and the island was lost. And all this befell them at the hands of a woman, making the occurrence particularly ignominious for them. In fact, signs from the gods forewarned them of the disaster: at night, murmuring in a foreign tongue accompanied by laughter could be heard coming from the Senate house, as well as an uproar punctuated with wailing coming from the theater, though nobody was responsible for the utterances or the moaning. Some houses were also seen underwater in the river Thames, and the sea between the island and Gaul once took on a bloody color with the incoming tide.

2. The cause of the war lay in the confiscation of monies that Claudius had given to the leading Britons. According to Decianus Catus, procurator of the island, these sums had to be surrendered. It was over this that the Britons revolted, and also because Seneca, after lending them at their request ten million sestertii, hoping for a good return in interest, later demanded payment of the whole sum together, and used force to get it.18

But it was chiefly Boudica who roused them to arms and convinced them to go to war with the Romans; she was judged fit to take on their leadership and was their commander-in-chief throughout the war. She was a woman of royal stock whose spirit was greater than a woman’s. She put an army together that was about 120,000 strong, and she climbed up on a platform made of earth in the Roman fashion. She was tall of build, with a grim appearance and a fierce look in her eyes.¹⁹ She had a harsh voice and thick, golden hair that she grew down to her buttocks. She wore a large gold torque and was dressed in a multicolored tunic and over it a thick cloak fastened with a broach.20 This was how she was always clothed. On that occasion, she was grasping a spear to strike fear into them all with this as well, and she spoke as follows:²¹

3. “You have been shown by the facts just how different freedom is from servitude. Even if some of you were earlier taken in by the tempting promises of the Romans through ignorance of which was the better option, now that you have experienced both you have discovered just how wrong you were in choosing self-inflicted despotism over your ancestral way of life, and you have learned how much better poverty with no overlord is than riches with slavery. Of all the most degrading and painful treatments possible, what have we not experienced since these men put into Britain? Have we not been stripped of most of our possessions, and all the greatest ones? Do we not pay taxes on what remains? To say nothing of all the husbandry and farming we do for them, do we not have our very bodies in bondage all year long? How much better to have been sold to other people once and for all than to bear the empty title of freedom and pay a ransom for ourselves each year! How much better to have been slaughtered and to have died outright than to be carrying around our heads with a tax on them!”

“But why did I say that? Not even death is tax-free among them! No, you are aware of how much tax we pay even for our dead. Among the rest of humanity, death sets free even those in slavery to others; only for the Romans are the dead still alive to give them income! How is it that even if none of us has money—how could we get it, and from where?—we are stripped and picked clean like men who are murdered? And why would they show moderation as time goes by if they have acted like this toward us at the start, when all men take care even of animals that are newly caught?”²²

62.6. Upon finishing her address, she used some form of divination, letting a hare run loose from her arms, and when it ran auspiciously for them the whole crowd shouted out with joy.²³ Boudica then raised a hand toward heaven and said: “I thank you, Andraste, and call to you as one woman to another.24 I am not, like Nitocris,²⁵ a ruler of Egyptians who bear burdens, nor am I, like Semiramis, a ruler of Assyrians who engage in trade (such things we have now learned from the Romans),²⁶ and certainly not a ruler of the Romans themselves, as Messalina was once, and after her Agrippina and now Nero (for while he has a man’s name he is in fact a woman, as is indicated by his singing, his lyre playing and his use of makeup). No, I am the ruler of Britons, who are not acquainted with farming or the trades but are thoroughly versed in warfare and regard everything as communal property, including children and wives, who therefore have the same fortitude as men. Such being the men and such the women that I rule over, I beseech you and request of you victory, salvation, and liberty in the face of men who are arrogant, unjust, insatiably greedy, and godless; that is, if one may use the term “men” of those who bathe in hot water, feed on fancy delicacies, drink neat wine, smear themselves with myrrh, sleep on soft beds and share them with boys (boys who are also beyond their prime, too!), and are slaves to a lyre player, and a bad one at that! …

7.1. After making such a speech, Boudica led her army against the Romans—for they were, by chance, leaderless, as their commander Paulinus had launched a campaign against the isle of Mona, which lies near Britain. Because of this, they sacked and looted two Roman cities and, as I said, caused unspeakably great bloodshed. Men captured by them suffered all manner of atrocities at their hands. 2. Their most heinous and brutal act was the following. The most noble and attractive of their female captives they hung up naked, cut off their breasts, and sowed them into their mouths so that they would appear to be eating them. After that, they impaled them on sharpened poles, which they ran lengthwise through the whole body. 3. And all this they would do amid sacrifices, banquets, and orgies, in their sacred areas and especially in the grove of Andate. This was their name for Victory, and they revered her most of all.

The first target of the rebels’ resentment is the colonia at Colchester.

Tac. Agr. 16. Spurring themselves on with these and other such arguments, they as a body opened hostilities,27 led by Boudica, a female member of the royal family (they make no distinction between the sexes in the matter of rulers). They hunted down the soldiers scattered among the forts, and after storming the strongholds overran the colonia itself, seeing it as the headquarters of their servitude.²⁸

Tac. Ann. 14.31.2. Prompted by this humiliation and the fear of worse (since they had been formally made into a province), the Iceni took up arms. They also incited the Trinovantes to join the revolt, along with other peoples who, still not broken by oppression, had committed themselves by covert intrigues to reasserting their independence—their most bitter animosity being directed toward the veterans. 3. These had recently been settled in the colony of Camulodunum and had been driving its inhabitants from their homes and throwing them off their lands, calling them “prisoners of war” and “slaves.”²⁹ The common soldiers were also abetting the lawlessness of the veterans—their way of life was similar, and they hoped for the same lack of constraint on themselves. 4. Furthermore, a temple erected to the deified Claudius lay before the natives’ eyes like a bastion of everlasting domination, and the men chosen as its priests were pouring away whole fortunes in the name of religion.30 And wiping out a colony surrounded by no fortifications did not seem a difficult undertaking—our commanders, paying more attention to aesthetics than utility, had taken too little precaution in this regard.³¹

32.1. Meanwhile, for no apparent reason, the statue of Victory in Camulodunum toppled over and turned around as though it were giving ground to an enemy. In addition, women who had been driven into a frenzy uttered prophecies that destruction was at hand. Foreign cries had been heard in their Curia, they said, and the theater had rung with wailing, while an apparition of the colony overthrown had been seen in the Thames estuary.³² In addition, the ocean had taken on a bloody hue, and the imprint of human corpses had been left behind by the ebbing tide, all of which fed the Britons’ hopes and the veterans’ fears.

2. Because Suetonius was far off, however, the veterans sought help from the procurator Catus Decianus. He sent no more than 200 improperly armed men, and there was also a small group of regulars in the town.³³ The defenders had to rely on the temple building for protection. They were also impeded by clandestine accomplices of the rebellion who were trying to sabotage their plans, with the result that they dispensed with a ditch or a rampart and failed to remove the old and the women and leave only the young men in the fighting line. Showing as little caution as if they were in the midst of peace, they were surrounded by a horde of barbarians. 3. Everything else was pillaged or burned by their onset, but the temple in which the soldiers had gathered was subjected to a two-day blockade and then taken by storm. Moreover, the triumphant Britons met Petillius Cerialis, legate of the Ninth Legion,34 who was coming to relieve the Romans, and they put his legion to flight and killed all his infantry.³⁵ Cerialis escaped to his camp with the cavalry and found protection within his fortifications. Alarmed by this disaster, and by the hostility of the province that his rapacity had driven into war, the procurator Catus crossed to Gaul.

Suetonius Paulinus moves south from North Wales to London.

Tac. Ann. 14.33.1. Suetonius, however, showing amazing determination, headed for Londinium through the midst of his enemies.³⁶ While it did not have the distinction of being designated a “colony,” the town was nevertheless much famed for its large concentration of businessmen and salable goods. There Suetonius vacillated over whether he should choose it as his base of operations, but when he considered his small numbers, and the clear evidence of the severe penalty Petillius had paid for headstrong action, he decided on saving the overall situation by sacrificing a single town. The tearful lamentations of people begging his aid could not divert him from giving the signal to move out and taking into the body of his column only those able to accompany him. All who were held back because their sex disqualified them from fighting or because they were feeble with age or had attachments to the locality were overwhelmed by the enemy. 2. The same disaster befell the town of Verulamium, because the barbarians, who reveled in plunder and were averse to hard work, bypassed strongholds and garrisoned positions to make for the military granary—rich pickings for a looter and difficult for its defenders to secure.37 It is well established that some 70,000 Roman citizens and allies lost their lives in the locations I have mentioned.³⁸ This was because the Britons did not take captives, sell them, or indulge in any other wartime trafficking but instead hastily resorted to slaughter, the gallows, burning, and crucifixion, accepting that they would face punishment but meanwhile taking revenge for it ahead of time.

Boudica meets the Romans in a final battle.

Tac. Agr. 16.1–2. Their rage in victory overlooked no sort of atrocity found among barbarians. Had Paulinus not come swiftly to the province’s aid upon hearing of the uprising, Britain would have been lost, but the fortunes of a single battle brought it back to its erstwhile obedience.

Tac. Ann. 14.34.1. Suetonius had under his command the Fourteenth Legion,³⁹ the vexillarii of the Twentieth, and some auxiliaries from the nearby settlements—a total of about 10,000 men under arms—and he now prepared to take the field, delaying no further.⁴⁰ He selected a location where there was a narrow defile and he had the cover of a wood to his rear, and he had ascertained for sure that the only enemy presence was before him, where an open plain guaranteed no fear of ambush.41 2. The legionaries therefore stood in close-ordered lines, with the light infantry deployed around them and the cavalry bunched on the wings. The troops of the Britons, by contrast, darted about in squadrons and companies all over the field in unprecedented numbers, and such was their confidence that they also brought their wives along with them to witness their victory, placing them in carts that they had set at the far edge of the plain.

35.1. Boudica rode in a chariot with her daughters before her, and as she approached each tribe, she declared that, while it was quite normal for the Britons to fight under a woman’s command, she was not on that occasion seeking vengeance for a kingdom and possessions as a woman descended from great ancestors. No, she said, she sought it as one of the people, for liberty lost, a flogging received, and the sexual abuse of her daughters. The cupidity of the Romans, she said, had reached the point of not leaving people’s bodies undefiled, or even old age, or girls’ virginity. 2. But, she added, the gods were with them to exact their just revenge. The legion that had dared to engage had been destroyed; the others were hiding in their camp or looking around for an escape. The Romans would not stand up even to the roars and shouts of so many thousands of men, much less to their charge and their sword arms! If they themselves assessed their own troop numbers and their motives for war, she said, then in that engagement they had to win—or fall. That was the decision a woman had made—let the men live on and be slaves!

36.1. Suetonius did not remain silent at such a critical juncture either. Though confident in the valor of his men, he nonetheless delivered a mixture of exhortations and pleas, urging them to pay no heed to the barbarians’ noise and empty threats—there were more women than young men visible among them, he said. Lacking fighting ability and weapons, they would immediately give ground when they recognized the arms and courage of their conquerors—so many were their past defeats! 2. Even when legions were many, he said, only a handful of men decided the outcomes of battles, and it would further redound to their glory that, small force as they were, they would win the fame of an entire army. They should just keep close order and, after discharging their javelins, continue the bloody slaughter with shield bosses and swords, and with no thought for plunder—everything would come to them when victory was won! 3. Such was the enthusiasm that followed the commander’s words, and such the eagerness with which his veterans, with their long battle experience, had made ready to hurl their javelins, that Suetonius, certain of the outcome, gave the signal for battle.

37.1. At first, the legion, not taking a step, held onto the restricted terrain for its defense, but when the enemy closed in and the legionaries had used up their well-aimed javelins on them, they burst out in wedge formation. The auxiliaries’ charge was equally spirited, and with lances leveled, the cavalry smashed through any stiff resistance they encountered. The rest of the Britons turned tail, escape being difficult because the wagons deployed around them blocked all the exits. And the troops did not refrain even from the slaughter of women, while pack animals that had been run through with spears also increased the pile of corpses.

The glory won that day was spectacular, equal to that of victories of old, for some reports put the British dead at not much below 80,000, with roughly 400 Roman soldiers killed and not many more wounded.42 Boudica ended her life with poison. 3. Poenius Postumus,⁴³ camp prefect of the Second Legion,⁴⁴ also stabbed himself with his sword when he learned of the success of the legionaries of the Fourteenth and Twentieth. He had cheated his own legion of similar glory and violated military procedure by disobeying his commander’s orders.

Dio 62.8.1. It happened that by now Paulinus had brought Mona to terms, and when he learned of the setback in Britain, he immediately sailed there from Mona. He did not wish to risk an all-out confrontation with the barbarians, as he feared their numbers and their insane rage, and he was for deferring the battle to a more favorable occasion. But since he was running short of food and the barbarians did not relax their pressure, he was obliged to face them in battle against his will.

2. Boudica had an army of some 230,000 men. She herself rode in a chariot, and she put the others in their various positions. Paulinus could not extend his line the whole length of hers (even if the men were formed up only one deep, they would not have reached so far—such was their numerical inferiority), 3. but no more would he risk engaging in a single body in case he were surrounded and cut to pieces. Instead, he divided his army into three parts, so they could fight in several places at the same time, and made each strong enough that it would be difficult to break through.45

62.12.1. After haranguing them in these and similar terms, he raised the signal to engage and the armies came together, the barbarians with a lot of shouting and with threatening battle hymns but the Romans maintaining silence and order until they came within javelin range. 2. At that point, as the enemy advanced against them at walking pace, they rushed forward on a prearranged signal and subjected them to a vigorous charge, easily breaking their ranks in the act of engagement. They were, however, surrounded by the Britons’ large numbers and were fighting on all sides at the same time.

3. The conflict was multifaceted: light infantry were hurling their weapons at light infantry; heavy infantry were grappling with heavy infantry; cavalry were engaging cavalry; and the archers of the Romans were ranged against the chariots of the barbarians. The barbarians would charge the Romans at high speed with their chariots and bowl them over, but as they were fighting without cuirasses, they were themselves driven back by the arrows. The cavalryman would bowl over the foot soldier, and the foot soldier would bring down the cavalryman. 4. A number of men in tight formation would advance against the chariots, and others would be scattered by them; some Britons would converge on the archers and throw them back, and others would protect themselves at a distance. And this was happening not just in one spot but in three areas of the field at the same time.

5. They continued the struggle for a long time, both sides fired with the same defiant spirit, but finally, later in the day, the Romans triumphed, cutting down large numbers in the battle, beside the wagons and in the woods, and taking many alive. There were also numerous fugitives who made ready to fight again. In the meantime, however, Boudica died of an illness, and her people, grieving deeply over her, gave her a very costly funeral; and now, since they were well and truly defeated, they all dispersed.

After the battle, the Britons are subjected to severe reprisals by Suetonius, who is eventually replaced.

Tac. Agr. 16.2–3. A number did still remain in arms, men who were motivated by a guilty conscience over their uprising and a personal dread of the governor, who, they feared, excellent man though he was in general, might treat those who surrendered high-handedly and avenge every injury as though it had been inflicted on him personally.46 Thus, Petronius Turpilianus was sent out, being thought a man more readily placated and all the more lenient since he was new to the outrages of the enemy.⁴⁷

Tac. Ann. 14.38.1. The entire army was then brought together and kept under canvas with a view to finishing off what remained of the war. The emperor increased its strength by dispatching two thousand legionaries from Germany, along with eight cohorts of auxiliaries and a thousand cavalry, upon the arrival of which the shortages in the ninth were made good with regular legionaries. 2. The cohorts and cavalry squadrons were placed in new winter quarters, and any tribes that had been vacillating or resisting were devastated by fire and the sword. But nothing caused the enemy as much suffering as famine: they had been negligent about sowing crops, with men of all ages being diverted to the war effort, while they assumed our provisions were going to be theirs.⁴⁸ 3. In addition, these savage tribes were all the slower in inclining toward peace because of Julius Classicianus, who had been sent out to succeed Catus.⁴⁹ Classicianus, at loggerheads with Suetonius, was undermining the national interest by his personal feuds, and he had put about the idea that they should await the arrival of a new legate who would deal humanely with those who surrendered, without an enemy’s resentment or the pride of a victor. At the same time, he was sending reports to Rome that they should expect no end to the hostilities unless a successor was found for Suetonius, whose setbacks he ascribed to bad judgment and his successes to luck.

39.1. One of the freedmen, Polyclitus, was therefore sent out to review the situation in Britain, for Nero greatly hoped that, through the man’s authority, not only would harmony be established between legate and procurator but the barbarians’ rebellious spirit might also be pacified.50 2. Polyclitus proved burdensome to Italy and Gaul with his enormous retinue, and after crossing the ocean he did not fail to cut a frightening figure for our soldiers either. But to the enemy he was a joke. The spirit of freedom still burned strongly among them, and they were as yet unacquainted with the power of the freedmen. They were also amazed that a commander and an army that had brought such a great war to an end should defer to slaves. 3. Everything was toned down in the report to the emperor, however, and Suetonius was kept in charge of operations. But after losing a few vessels on the shore and the oarsmen along with them, he was commanded to pass on his army to Petronius Turpilianus (who had now left the consulship) on the grounds that a state of war still existed. Not provoking the enemy, and unprovoked by them, Turpilianus gave his listless inaction the honorable title of “peace.”⁵¹

MAP 5. Approximate Locations of Germanic Tribes at the Time of Nero

GERMANY

The notion of the Rhine as a frontier took shape in the period when Julius Caesar incorporated the provinces of Gallia Lugdunensis, Aquitania, and, most significantly, Belgica, and thus extended the zone of Roman authority and administration up to the river. Even then, it would be misleading to think of the Rhine as a traditional border between two nations. In Caesar’s time, it did not provide a true ethnic or linguistic demarcation, since Germanic tribes had migrated from the east side (Caes. BG 2.4.2, 6.32.1) and some, such as the Menapii, had settlements on both sides of the river (Caes. BG 4.4.1–2; Strabo 4.3.4). Nor did the Romans see the Rhine as a permanent border of their empire in the northeast. Augustus aggressively sought to extend the Roman imperium as far as the river Elbe, and in the first part of his reign the area saw almost continuous campaigning under Marcus Agrippa, Nero Claudius Drusus, and Drusus’s brother, Tiberius. There was a process of Romanization east of the Rhine, and Velleius Paterculus talks of Tiberius almost reducing this part of Germany to the status of a tribute-paying province (2.97.4). These plans were brought to a calamitous halt with the disaster suffered by Quinctilius Varus in AD 9, when three legions were lost in the Teutoberg forest in what is now the Kalkriese region. This led Augustus to abandon his hopes of eastern expansion, and the west bank of the Rhine was organized as two military districts, Germania Inferior (lower) in the north and Germania Superior (upper) in the south. Eight legions were established in legionary fortresses along the west of the river under Augustus and Tiberius, four in each district, and the stretches between them were controlled by smaller auxiliary forts manned by non-Roman allied troops.

Upon Augustus’s death, his expansionist dream was revived briefly by Germanicus, who seemed once again to be raising the possibility of Roman imperium extending as far as the Elbe but who also almost came to disaster. Tiberius prudently reined him in and recalled him. For the remainder of Tiberius’s reign, the Rhine frontier was far from secure. In AD 28, the Frisii (Frisians) revolted, crucifying some of the Roman troops sent to collect taxes. The commander of Lower Germany, Lucius Apronius, with reinforcements from Upper Germany, traveled down the Rhine to Frisian territory, where he suffered a great defeat. The Romans were forced to retreat, and 900 of them, taken as exhausted prisoners, were put to death in the grove of their goddess Baduhenna. The true dimension of the disaster was kept hidden from the public. In Upper Germany, Lentulus Gaetulicus exercised a lax command, and tribes broke over the Rhine and caused major devastation in Gaul (Tac. Ann. 4. 72–74; Suet. Tib. 41).

Caligula conducted a campaign against the Germans from AD 39, but the garbled accounts in the sources make it difficult to evaluate his strategy. It seems that he carried out a number of raids at various points along the Rhine to discourage the German tribes from mounting expeditions into Gaul (as they had done during the previous reign) and thus cutting off supplies to the legions involved in the projected invasion of Britain. That this was his intention is suggested by the fact that his new appointment as commander of Upper Germany, the future emperor Galba, continued to campaign under Claudius and in AD 41 achieved the first military success of the new reign and received the ornamenta triumphalia (Suet. Galb. 8.1). Domitius Corbulo, appointed legate of Lower Germany, where he is attested in AD 47 (Tac. Ann. 11.18–20), carried out successful campaigns against the Chauci and resettled the Frisii. But Claudius cautiously ordered the garrisons on the east of the Rhine to be abandoned. The area was now stable, and Corbulo employed his troops in building a twenty-three-mile canal connecting the Rhine to the Maas. In AD 50, a plundering expedition by the Chatti in Upper Germany was suppressed by a firm and timely reaction by legate Publius Pomponius.

The Germans, along with the Parthians, preoccupied Rome for most of its imperial history, but under Nero, until his demise, a strategy of prompt and ruthless response to unrest kept the frontier reasonably secure, and military forces could be transferred from the Rhine districts to help in the dispute with Parthia (see Chapter IV). Generally, the Romans benefited from the tribal nature of German society and the inability of the Germans to coalesce under a single unified command (which also, of course, made it difficult for the Romans to establish strong alliances among them). Tacitus devotes only one small section to Germany in the surviving Neronian section of the Annals. To judge from what seems to be an oblique reference in Ann. 13.57.1, it is possible that his main source here was Pliny the Elder. According to his nephew, Pliny the Younger, the uncle undertook a history of all of Rome’s German wars in order to preserve for posterity the achievements of Livia’s son, Claudius Drusus (Plin. Ep. 3.5.4). It was earlier cited by Tacitus as the source for his account of the famous incident of Agrippina the Elder saving the bridge on the Rhine and greeting the retreating Romans (Ann. 1.69).

SOURCES

The Frisians attempt to encroach on Roman territory and are dealt with firmly.

Tac. Ann. 13.53.1. To that point, things had been quiet in Germany.⁵² This was because of the shrewdness of the commanders, who, now that triumphal insignia were commonplace, were hoping for greater glory from maintaining the peace. 2. Paulinus Pompeius and Lucius Vetus were at the head of the army at that time.⁵³ To avoid having their men idle, Pompeius completed the embankment for containing the Rhine that had been started by Drusus sixty-three years earlier, and Vetus prepared to connect the Mosella and the Arar by constructing a canal between the two.54 (The aim here was to enable merchandise that was transported by sea, and then taken up the Rhone and the Arar, to travel by way of the canal, and then the Mosella, to the Rhine, and from there to the ocean. With the difficulties of the journey removed, there could be a shipping connection between the shores of the West and those of the North.) 3. Aelius Gracilis,⁵⁵ governor of Belgica, looked on the project with envy, and he deterred Vetus from bringing his legions into another man’s province and courting popularity in Gaul.⁵⁶ The emperor, Aelius kept telling him, would find this alarming—the argument by which honorable endeavors are often blocked.

54.1. Now, because of the prolonged inactivity of the armies, a rumor arose that the legates had been stripped of their authority to lead them against an enemy. As a result, the Frisians brought their soldiers to the bank of the Rhine by way of the woods and marshes, transporting over the lakes those who were not of fighting age.⁵⁷ There, led by Verritus and Malorix, who were the rulers of the tribe (to the extent that Germans can be ruled), they settled on unoccupied lands that had been set aside for the use of the troops. 2. They established homes, seeded the fields, and were tilling the land as though it had belonged to their fathers. At that point, Dubius Avitus, who had taken over the province from Paulinus, threatened the Frisians with a violent Roman response if they did not go back to their old location, or if they did not have a request for a new site granted by the emperor.58 He thus forced Verritus and Malorix into undertaking the petition.

3. The two left for Rome, where, while waiting for Nero, who was busy with other concerns, they saw the sights usually shown to barbarians, including the theater of Pompey, which they entered in order to observe the size of the population.⁵⁹ While they were idling around there (for, being ignorant, they found no pleasure in the performances), they made inquiries about the audience in the seating area and the class distinctions there (which seats were for the knights, and where the Senate sat). They also noticed some people in foreign dress in the senators’ seats and, when they asked who they were, were told that this was an honor accorded to ambassadors of peoples who were particularly noted for their courage and their friendship with Rome.⁶⁰ The two then announced that there were no people alive superior to the Germans in combat and loyalty, and they went down and sat among the senators. 4. This was taken in good part by the onlookers, who saw in it a primitive impulse and an honorable spirit of competition.

Nero conferred Roman citizenship on both men but ordered the Frisians to leave the territory. And when they disobeyed, auxiliary horsemen were suddenly sent into their midst, and these, capturing or killing all who put up a spirited resistance, left them no alternative.

The Ampsivarii unsuccessfully try to form an alliance against the Romans.

Tac. Ann. 13.55.1. The Ampsivarii,⁶¹ a stronger tribe, took over those same lands not only through their own resources but also from having the sympathy of the neighboring peoples—they had been driven out by the Chauci62 and, now homeless, were begging only for a safe exile. They were also helped by a man called Boiocalus, who was famous among those peoples and was also loyal to us. Boiocalus declared that he had been put in irons on Arminius’s orders during the Cheruscan uprising;⁶³ that he had later served under the leadership of Tiberius and Germanicus; and that he was now further adding to his fifty years of faithful service by bringing his people under our sway. 2. And it was such a small portion of the plain, he said, serving only to have the flocks and herds of the soldiers occasionally driven into it!⁶⁴ Of course, they should hold in reserve refuges for their animals while men go hungry—but not so much as to prefer empty desert to friendly peoples! These fields once belonged to the Chamavi,⁶⁵ he continued, then to the Tubantes,⁶⁶ and after them to the Usipi.⁶⁷ As heaven had been allocated to the gods, so had the earth been granted to the race of mortals, and what was unoccupied belonged to everybody. 3. Then, looking up at the sun and invoking the other heavenly bodies, he kept asking, as though face-to-face with them, whether what they wanted to look on was empty soil. Better, he said, for them to pour the sea over it to combat these robbers of land!

56.1. Avitus was annoyed by this and replied that commands from one’s superiors must be obeyed.⁶⁸ Those gods that they were invoking had decided, he said, that judgment of what was to be given and what taken away should remain with the Romans, and the Ampsivarii should accept no arbiters other than them.

Such was Avitus’s official response to the Ampsivarii; to Boiocalus personally, he said he would grant him land in memory of their friendship. Boiocalus dismissed the offer as a bribe for his betrayal, adding: “We may be short of land to live on, but not land to die on.” And with that they parted, with bad feeling on both sides.

2. The Ampsivarii now called on the Bructeri, the Tencteri, and tribes even further afield to become their allies in the war. Avitus wrote to Curtilius Mancia, legate of the upper army,69 requesting that he cross the Rhine and appear in force to their rear, and Avitus himself led his legions into the land of the Tencteri,⁷⁰ threatening them with destruction unless they dissociated themselves from their allies’ cause. 3. And so the Tencteri withdrew, and the Bructeri now faced the same intimidation.⁷¹ When the rest also proceeded to abandon a dangerous campaign that was not their concern, the tribe of the Ampsivarii was left isolated and withdrew to the Usipi and Tubantes. Driven from their lands, too, they made for the Chatti and then the Cherusci. In their long migrations, they were regarded successively as guests, as indigents, and as enemies on foreign soil, and on that soil all their fighting men fell, while those not of military age were distributed as plunder.

War breaks out between the Hermunduri and Chatti, and the Ubii suffer a natural disaster.

Tac. Ann. 57.1. That same summer, a great battle was fought between the Hermunduri and the Chatti.⁷² Both were trying to appropriate by force a river that was a rich producer of salt and that formed the boundary between them.⁷³ In addition to their love of deciding everything by warfare, the tribes also had a deep-seated superstition that this region was particularly close to heaven and that nowhere were mortals’ prayers heard by the gods in closer proximity. (Hence, they believed, it was through divine indulgence that, in that river and those woods, the salt was produced not, as among other peoples, from the evaporation of tidal overflows but from water poured over a pile of burning trees.74 Its crystallization was thus the result of two elements that are opposites, fire and water.) 2. The war went in favor of the Hermunduri and was all the more ruinous for the Chatti in that both peoples vowed to sacrifice the enemy battle line to Mars and Mercury in the event of victory, a vow that meant the extermination of horses, men, and all living things.⁷⁵

In this case at least, the threats made by the enemy recoiled on themselves. 3. Not so with the community of the Ubians, allied to us, which was afflicted with an unforeseeable disaster.⁷⁶ Fires emanating from the earth engulfed farms, cultivated land, and villages far and wide, and were carried right to the walls of the recently established colony. They could not be extinguished, not by rainfall and not by water drawn from the river or any other source, until a number of peasants, at a loss for a remedy and angry over the calamity, began to hurl stones at them from a distance. Then, as the flames came to a halt, the peasants came closer and proceeded to drive them off like wild animals by beating them with clubs and other instruments. Finally, they stripped the clothes from their bodies and threw these on, and the dirtier and more soiled they were, the more effective they were in dousing the fires.

1 No other source repeats the suggestion that Nero contemplated withdrawing from Britain, and the issue is further complicated by the fact that Suetonius gives no indication of when the decision was supposedly made. It was at the very beginning of the reign that Nero was particularly concerned to honor Claudius’s memory, and at the beginning that the influence of his mother, who was also keen to sustain Claudius’s legacy, was at its strongest. There are thus good arguments for placing the policy decision in 54–55, during which time the legatus in Britain was Aulus Didius Gallus (on whom see Tac. Ann. 14.29). And it is certainly the case that Rome did not make aggressive progress under Didius’s stewardship. If, however, the reference to Claudius is seen as mere hypocritical posturing, the plan to withdraw could be a reaction to the Boudican rebellion (see Cappai [1992]).

2 Polemo II ruled the kingdom of Pontus on the Black Sea from AD 38 until he was obliged to give up his kingdom to the Romans in about AD 62.

3 Claudius had conferred the title of king on Marcus Julius Cottius when he enlarged Cottius’s ancestral realm in AD 44.

4 Libitina was the goddess of Funerals. The plague is possibly the one referred to also by Tacitus (Ann. 16.13.1–2) but without statistics. Suetonius refers to only two major centers being sacked; this may be explained by the fact that Verulamium had sufficient advance warning to evacuate a large portion of its population.

5 For the ignominious incident, see Chapter IV.

6 Quintus Veranius gained a considerable reputation in Lycia, where he was charged by Claudius with reducing the area to the status of a province. He spent five years there, engaging in a number of serious military campaigns, improving the road network, and setting up the provincial administration (AE 1953.251). He received the consulship in AD 49. He succeeded Aulus Didius in Britain, probably in 58, but died in office within the year.

7 Suetonius Paulinus had achieved military fame some two decades before the Boudican rebellion, when he led Roman troops in a swift march over the Atlas Mountains just before the annexation of Mauretania (Plin. HN 5.14; Dio 60.9.1). After his consulship (probably sometime before AD 45), we have no record of his career until he was made legatus of Britain in AD 58, succeeding Quintus Veranius. Although he was removed from office after the rebellion, he was not apparently in disgrace; a senator of the same name held the consulship in 66, possibly this Suetonius in a second term or his son. It is to be noted that Tacitus speaks of Suetonius Paulinus building up preexisting forts, not establishing new ones.

8 At Ann. 14.29.3, Tacitus speaks of Mona (Anglesey) as a “haven for refugees” (from Roman authority).

9 Tacitus assigns the events of the rebellion securely to AD 61 and implies that it started early in the year, before the crops were sown (Ann. 14.38.2), but there seem to be too many events to fit into one year. The first to argue that the rebellion must have begun in the previous year was Asbach (1878), and his claim has been generally accepted, notably by Syme (1958), 765. Carroll (1979) has challenged Asbach’s thesis.

10 At Ann. 12.40.1, Aulus Didius, appointed to Britain in AD 52, was criticized by Tacitus for his defensive approach (cf. Tac. Agr. 14.2). Didius was consul in 39 (AE 1973.138) and served with Claudius in Britain in 43. He was subsequently legate in Moesia, where he was awarded the ornamenta consularia for his role in establishing Cotys as king of the Bosporus. Between 49 and 52, he served as proconsul in Asia. Despite a previous energetic career, his term of office in Britain was marked by no major achievements.

11 On Veranius, see the discussion earlier in this chapter.

12 The Silures were an aggressive tribe in southeast Wales. They resisted Rome from AD 44, initially under Caratacus, and were eventually subdued in 74–76 by Frontinus. They were organized as an administrative district (civitas) in the second century, with their capital at Venta Silurum (Caerwent), and eventually became highly Romanized.

13 This is the first mention of Suetonius Paulinus in the Annals.

14 Druids were a Gallic priestly caste whose teachings spread from Gaul to Britain. They had been known to the Romans since Julius Caesar’s campaigns in Gaul. At the time of Caesar, they were a significant branch of the British and Gallic aristocracies; they were priests, teachers, and judges, responsible for the maintenance and transmission of religious and other knowledge, such as medicine. In the imperial period, increasingly severe measures were taken against them, mainly, it was asserted, because they practiced human sacrifice but presumably also because of the fear that they would be dangerous as the focus of resistance to Rome—it may be that they stirred things up in the south of Britain when under pressure from Paulinus in Wales. They were suppressed by Tiberius (Plin. HN 30.13) and Claudius (Suet. Claud. 25.5), as well as by Nero, but they were clearly not extirpated completely, since in 69––70 they are recorded as interpreting the burning of the Capitol in Rome as marking the end of Roman domination (Tac. Hist. 4.54). It is to be noted that neither Dio nor Tacitus makes any reference to support from the Druids for Boudica’s rebellion.

15 The arguments that follow are of course Tacitus’s own creation (a historical approach far more acceptable in ancient historiography than in modern). But the complaints expressed here were no doubt those familiar to his father-in-law Julius Agricola and suggest issues that Agricola might have tried to settle. Tacitus says nothing about the specific grievances stemming from the treatment of Prasutagus’s kingdom.

16 The plural “Germanies” alludes to the Germanic tribes.

17 Julius Caesar had conducted two invasions of Britain, in 55 and 54 BC, and, after receiving a nominal submission from some of the tribes, withdrew, mainly because of preoccupation with other parts of the Roman world.

18 The precise meaning of this passage is uncertain because there seems to be a problem in Dio’s manuscript, but the textual difficulty does not affect the basic information that Seneca is said to have made a huge loan and then recalled it. Beneficence of this type is known elsewhere. Nero gave 200,000 sestertii to Tiridates (Dio 63.6.5). Julius Caesar reminded Ariovistus of the considerable gifts made to him by Rome (Caes. BG 1.43.3). In AD 58, the ruthless prosecutor Publilius Suillus denounced Seneca for a number of sins, one of which was that he had sucked Italy and the provinces dry by his unscrupulous usury. In Vita Beata 17.1, Seneca notes that among the imagined criticisms of the philosopher who fails to live up to his own teachings is the question, “why do you have overseas estates (cur trans mare possides)?” Syme (1958), 762–66, is scathing about Dio’s account as a whole and argues that Tacitus was aware of the charge against Seneca but did not think it merited repetition.

19 Dio’s description of Boudica probably owes more to the Roman stereotype of the barbarian queen than to her actual appearance. Thus, Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who clashed with Augustus, was said by Strabo to be of manly appearance (and, to top it off, had only one eye [Strabo 17.1.54]). The German divinity who appeared to Nero’s great-grandfather Drusus on the eve of his death and advised him to withdraw from the Elbe was said by Dio (55.1.3) to be a huge woman. Similarly, Curtius Rufus, proconsul of Africa under Claudius (and possibly the author of The History of Alexander), received a prediction of his governorship from a woman of “superhuman size” who appeared before him in the town of Hadrumetum (Tac. Ann. 11.21.1).

20 Gold torques known from the archaeological record give some validation to Dio’s account.

21 The spear is clearly symbolic here, and may have been supposed to have talismanic powers. Florus (1.33.13–14), in describing the rebellion of Olyndicus in Spain in the middle of the second century BC, has him brandishing a silver spear that he said the gods had provided. In the end, it made him overconfident, and he was killed by a sentry’s very human spear as he confidently approached the Roman camp.

22 The repeated emphasis on financial burdens may reflect the hardships caused by the supposed recall of money by the emperor and rich Romans like Seneca.

23 The allusion to the hare may owe much to Dio’s imagination; it is reminiscent of the Roman system of divination through the flight of birds.

24 The deity invoked here appears in the manuscripts of the text as either Adraste or Andraste. She is presumably identical with Andate in the next section, whom Dio identifies with Nike (Victory), but she is not otherwise attested and may be a deity specifically of the Iceni. Jullian (1899) suggests that she is the British equivalent of Andarte of the Vocontii, a Gallic tribe, and identifies her with their goddess of Victory, but the identification is essentially speculative.

25 In Dio’s account, Boudica displays considerable knowledge of ancient history, and in the imaginative world of ancient historiography we are meant to suppose that her audience of mainly unschooled British peasants would have picked up the references. Nitocris was supposedly the first queen to exercise political power over Egypt, and was the last ruler of the Sixth Dynasty, according to the Egyptian writer Manetho. Herodotus (1.184) describes her as the ruler of Babylon and attributes major engineering works on the Euphrates to her. Her precise identity has been much debated.

26 Semiramis was the Assyrian queen Shammuramat, wife of Shamshi-Adad V. She was regent between 810 and 806 BC on behalf of her son. Many legendary stories are attached to her.

27 Tacitus exaggerates when he says “as a body.” The Iceni and Trinovantes were certainly involved, as were other tribes. But some remained loyal; this seems to be especially the case south of the Thames (see the introduction to this chapter).

28 Tacitus’s account differs here from what he says in the Annals, where the rebellion began with the attack on the colonia, which is the more plausible scenario. Without proper siege equipment, the Britons would have dissipated their energies if they had concentrated their action initially against the auxiliary forts.

29 The Trinovantes settled the area of modern Essex, north of the Thames, from the late Iron Age. Under their powerful king Cunobelinus, they dominated southern Britain. Their principal fortified town, Camulodunum, was captured in AD 43 by the Romans. A legionary base was set up there, which was abandoned before 49, when Colonia Victricensis was founded. The slaves would presumably have been on the staff of the imperial procurator, who would have had responsibility for collecting taxes.

30 The temple to the deified Claudius was supposedly decreed during his lifetime, and it is remarkable that the worship of Claudius was apparently not joined with the worship of Rome, the condition attached by Augustus during his lifetime to temples dedicated to the imperial cult ([Sen.] Apoc. 8). Colchester was clearly meant to be the official center of the imperial cult in Britain, and the temple almost certainly lay beneath the keep of the later Norman castle (Fishwick [1961], 161–64).

31 The ramparts of Camulodunum had been demolished by the departing Twentieth Legion in AD 49 and had not been replaced. The stone walls now seen at Colchester were built in the second century AD.

32 Colchester is in fact quite distant from the Thames estuary, casting doubt on the report.

33 It is not suprising that the procurator would have troops at his disposal in the absence of the legatus. Upon the death of Herod in 4 BC, the procurator of Syria, Sabinus (his full name is unknown), made use of the legion that the legate had stationed at Jerusalem and that apparently considered itself under his command. He also armed his slaves and freedmen and used them as troops. (Joseph. AJ 17.252–53; BJ 2.16–18, 40–41). There is also the case of the procurator Gnaeus Lucilius Capito, who made use of troops in the public province of Asia to enforce one of his decisions. He was subsequently deemed to have acted improperly (Tac. Ann. 4.15.2).

34 This is the first mention of Petillius Cerialis, a commander who would go on to have a distinguished career, holding the consulship in AD 70 and 74. In the civil war, he fought on the side of Vespasian (to whom he was related) and became legatus of Britain in 70 or 71, where he won acclaim for his vigorous campaigns against the Brigantes.

35 It is likely that Tacitus is mistaken in claiming that the infantry of a whole legion was eliminated. A legion comprised some 5,000 men, and the later reinforcements sent to make up for the loss numbered only 2,000. The Ninth Legion formed part of the invasion force of Britain and was stationed in Lindum (Lincoln). It was now probably broken into at least two vexillations (subdivisions), and the vexillation that Petillius brought south could well have been based at the vexillation fortress at Longthorpe near Peterborough. Hasty work there suggests a reduction of the perimeter, perhaps to accommodate the remaining cavalry after the disaster.

36 This is the earliest historical reference to London, which became an important commercial center from the beginning of the Roman presence in Britain. It was an open town without defenses or garrison.

37 Verulamium, on the south bank of the river Ver, provides a good example of the process of Romanization in a young province. It had originally been established as the capital of the Catuvellauni under their ruler Tasciovanus, father of Cunobelinus. Tacitus refers to it as a municipium, perhaps loosely; it may not have been granted the formal status of a municipium until the Flavian period, which in the hierarchy of cities meant that its residents had “Latin Rights,” with limited citizenship, a status below that enjoyed in a colonia.

38 Dio gives the figure as 80,000. It seems likely that official figures were drawn on, and the discrepancy is not significant. The allies (socii) would presumably include Romanized Britons, and there may have been a considerable number of foreign non-Romans, including merchants, traders, and the like, especially from Gaul, who may or may not be included in Dio’s figure.

39 The Fourteenth Legion (Gemina) was stationed at Mainz in Upper Germany (Tac. Ann. 1.37.3, 70.1) when it was made part of the army led by Aulus Plautius against Britain. After the initial invasion, it presumably advanced northwest through the midlands. It was eventually moved to the legionary base at Wroxeter, near what later became Shrewsbury, possibly under the governorship of Aulus Didius Gallus (AD 52–57). For its role in suppressing the Boudican rebellion, it received the new title of Martia Victrix (in place of Gemina).

40 The Twentieth Legion took part in the invasion of Britain and at the outset remained at Colchester. In AD 49, it moved to a base near Gloucester. It may well have received its title Valeria Victrix after the rebellion, since it is not attested before 60. It is worth noting that the colony at Colchester was called Colonia Victricensis (from veterans of that legion). Of course, the colonia may have been refounded and renamed after the rebellion.

41 The site of Boudica’s last battle has been the subject of much antiquarian debate (see the Introduction). The most likely spot is near Mancetter, on Watling Street, in the midlands.

42 For these statistics, Tacitus may well have drawn on his father-in-law, Agricola, who served in this campaign. The figure could also have been recorded in the memoirs of Suetonius Paulinus. The number 80,000 is suspicious, being identical to the figure given by Dio for the Roman and allied dead in the whole campaign (Dio 62.1).

43 The camp prefect, Poenius Postumus, was second in command to the legionary legate and became the actual commander of the troops in the absence of the legate, who was perhaps commanding a vexillation of the Second Legion at the time. Postumus is otherwise unknown.

44 The Second Legion (Augusta) was used in the Claudian invasion of Britain, under the command of Vespasian (Tac. Hist. 3.44), and was eventually based at Caerleon near Newport, South Wales.

45 Dio’s account depicts Paulinus as having been forced into battle with little or no control over the situation. Tacitus, who admires Paulinus, assigns him much more control over the strategy that he in the end adopted. Dio’s figure of 230,000 for the army of Boudica is clearly a major exaggeration.

46 Tacitus says nothing here about the roles of Polyclitus or Classicianus, both of whom appear in the Annals.

47 Petronius was consul in AD 61 and sent to Britain, probably in the same year. In 65, he had a role in exposing the Pisonian conspiracy and received the ornamenta consularia. In 68, Nero placed him in command of the troops assigned to counter the rebellion in Gaul, but he did not leave Italy. He was put to death by Galba.

48 Tacitus shows that the suppression of the remaining opposition after the battle took place over the winter. Since Suetonius’s successor took office immediately after the termination of his consulship in AD 61, this is a central argument for the rebellion having begun in AD 60 rather than 61.

49 The increasingly public role of the procurator within imperial provinces made it inevitable that there would be occasional tensions between Julius Classicianus and the governor. Classicianus belonged to the Germanic Treveri and would perhaps have had a better understanding of the sensitivities of subject peoples. His tombstone, erected by his wife, Julia Pacata, is preserved in the British Museum (RIB I, 12).

50 Nothing is known of the previous history of Polyclitus, but his greed is noted in Tac. Hist. 1.37.5, 2.95.2. He was left in charge at Rome, along with Helios, when Nero made his trip to Greece (Dio 63.12.3).

51 It is likely that Suetonius Paulinus was replaced because of his repressive policies and that Tacitus’s sneer at Petronius is unjustified (on Petronius, see the earlier discussion).

52 Tacitus’s last treatment of Germany went up to AD 50 (Ann. 12.28). In covering detailed military campaigns, he often violates the strict annalistic pattern. The events narrated here must have begun before the year to which these chapters strictly belong, AD 58. The activities of the Frisii may well relate to 57, and those of the Ampsivarii might have carried through to the following year, 59.

53 Aulus Paulinus Pompeius was a novus homo (in that he was the first of his line to reach the consulship), consul possibly before AD 54, and perhaps the brother of Pompeia Paulina, wife of Seneca (Tac. Ann. 15.60.4). From at least 54 to 56, he was legate of Lower Germany. In 62, he was charged by Nero with reorganizing the taxes (vectigalia publica) (Tac. Ann. 15.18.3).

Lucius Antistius Vetus was consul in AD 55 along with Nero (Tac. Ann. 13.11.1) and was legate of Upper Germany in the same year, to be removed a year later. His differences with the legate of Belgica may have contributed to his hasty removal. He was proconsul of Asia in 64–65 and committed suicide, along with his daughter and mother-in-law, to escape a guilty verdict (Tac. Ann. 16.10–11). His project was to connect the Moselle River to the Saône (Arar) and thus enable communication by river from the Mediterranean as far as the North Sea, via the Rhine and Rhone.

54 Drusus died in 9 BC, and the later work may belong to 55 AD. Vetus may have been sent to Germany in 55 upon the termination of his consulship, and his post in Rome may have been filled by a suffect consul. Tacitus (Hist. 5.19.2) mentions the destruction of the dam by Julius Civilis and implies that it was originally constructed to prevent flooding on the western (Gallic) side.

55 Aelius Gracilis is not otherwise recorded.

56 The eastern boundary of the province of Gallia Belgica was the Rhine, but the two military areas alongside the river were generally outside the province’s jurisdiction.

57 The Frisians (Frisii) were an ancient and bellicose Germanic people who occupied the North Sea coast in what is now modern Friesland, as well as much of the adjoining territory in the coastal area between the Yssel and the Ems.

58 Dubius Avitus was one of the first senators to come from Gaul, originating from Vasio (modern Vaison-la-Romaine), the hometown also of Nero’s praetorian prefect Burrus (and the historian Pompeius Trogus). After his praetorship, he served as legate of Aquitania (Plin. HN 34.47) and held the consulship in AD 56. He received command of Lower Germany in 57/58.

59 The theater of Pompey was the first built of stone in Rome, constructed on a grand scale by Pompey between 55 and 52 BC and restored several times after that.

60 Suetonius (Claud. 25.4) tells the same story but relates it to the Claudian period and identifies the ambassadors seen by the Germans as Parthians and Armenians. The privilege of a seat among those reserved for the senators in the theater orchestra had been granted to the Massilians from an early period. Augustus forbade foreign ambassadors access to the orchestra (Suet. Aug. 44.1), a prohibition that seems from this reference to have been lifted.

61 The Ampsivarii were a Germanic tribe living between the lower Ems (Amisia) and the Weser. They were not mentioned by Tacitus in his Germania. They stayed loyal to Rome after the Varan disaster in AD 9.

62 The Chauci were a powerful tribe, noted for their aggressiveness, in the area of the lower Weser.

63 The Cherusci were the tribe of Arminius, occupying the area of the middle Weser; their rebellion had led to the Varan disaster fifty years earlier, in AD 9. After the disaster, Tiberius commanded in Germany for two years and Germanicus in AD 13–16.

64 Boiocalus’s words here are bitter and ironic. He is suggesting that the area to be taken by the Romans for their animals was enormous and that they would happily use land to graze their animals while the people starved.

65 The Chamavi, perhaps a subdivision of the Marsi, lived east of the Batavians in the area of the Issel.

66 The Tubantes occupied the right bank of the north Rhine.

67 The Usipi, or Usipetes, were also from the region of the north Rhine.

68 Tacitus uses the word commotus (here “annoyed”) to describe Avitus’s reaction to the request of Boiocalus. It means that he was somehow stirred, and some assume here that he was sympathetic, but such a reaction would not be consistent with the action that he pursued.

69 Curtilius Mancia was suffect consul, probably in AD 55; he seems to have succeeded Lucius Vetus in 56, after Vetus had served for only one year. Domitia Luculla, grandmother of Marcus Aurelius, was Curtilius’s granddaughter and inherited his estate (Plin. Ep. 8.18.4).

70 The Tencteri were located on the east bank of the Rhine, perhaps in the general area of Cologne, and were noted for their horsemanship (Tac. Germ. 32.2–3).

71 The Bructeri were located in northwest Germany, in the area of the river Lippe.

72 The Hermunduri were an ancient Germanic people in the area around Thuringia and northern Bavaria, and were generally well disposed toward the Romans. The Chatti, located in the area of the upper Weser, were Rome’s most powerful German enemy in the Julio-Claudian period.

73 The river over which they disputed has been variously identified, the Werra and the Saale being the leading contenders.

74 Tacitus may here have misunderstood a process described by Pliny (HN 31.73), where evaporation was accelerated by burning wood.

75 Tacitus (Ann. 1.61.2–3) reports that Roman officers were sacrificed after the Varan disaster.

76 The Ubii were a tribe friendly to Rome, resettled from the east to the west bank of the Rhine by Agrippa in 38 BC. Their capital was the site of the later Cologne, founded in AD 50 as Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium to honor Agrippina, who had been born there. It was an unusual settlement in that the original inhabitants shared the privileges of the new settlers (Tac. Germ. 28.4; Ann. 1.57.2, 12.27.1).