The history of Roman Britain is peppered with revolts and conflict but the most famous is the Boudican revolt. The Boudican revolt took place during 60-61AD and nearly caused Emperor Nero to withdraw from Britain. Nero was an emperor with many problems, not least that he was running out of money for the extravagant schemes that he had developed for the engraissement of Rome.
Roman conquest of Britannia
The Romans invaded Britain, under the emperor Claudius, in 43AD. Britain was not a single kingdom but a collection of tribal kingdoms who fought against each other as much as they fought against outside aggression. Very quickly the Romans were able to defeat the Trinovantes on whose land they established their capital. Britain remained a hostile territory and the Romans used a variety of strategies to maintain and expand their territories. This ranged from clever diplomacy to outright war.
To the north of the Trinovantes lived the Iceni who were a fractured and warlike people. In 44AD they opposed Roman attempts to disarm them. After this failed revolt Prasutagus becomes their king. Prasutagus seems to have been a pro-Roman celt and the Iceni survive the invasion period as a client kingdom of the Romans. In his will he leaves half his land to the emperor and half to his daughters. This is interesting because usually a client king would leave all his property to the emperor, Prasutagus seems to have been trying to save something for his descendants to live on. Unfortunately, he was dealing with an impoverished Nero who on the Celtic king’s death sent his agents to seize the land, the gifts given by Claudius and Roman speculators called in the debts owed by the Iceni leaving the celts impoverished. When she protested, Boudica and her daughters were mistreated.
Boudican uprising
The celts are a fascinating society and what little we know about them points to them being an honour bound civilisation that believed in living a good, as they saw it, life. The Romans were not acquitting themselves very well in Britain. They mistreated the Iceni and the Trinovantes were being mistreated by the ex-roman soldiers who lived in the colony built on their lands. During 60-61AD the bulk of the Roman army was in Northwest Wales fighting the Druids and this might have been the last straw. A betrayal of a promise, the insult to Celtic royalty, abuse and taxation then the destruction of the priests of the Celtic religion sparked the Boudican revolt.
First the Iceni joined with the Trinovante and attacked Camulodunum, the Roman capital. It was destroyed and the celts moved onto Londinium which at that time was an important commercial port. The Roman Governor was able to progress down the Watling Street to the cities defence but realised that a defence of the city was impossible. Taking any civilians who were able to keep up and leaving behind those who could not he retired back up Watling Street sending messages for reinforcements. The celts destroyed Londinium and then followed the retreating Romans to bring them to battle. Their mistake was to allow the Romans to pick the battlefield and somewhere possibly in the Midlands the Romans picked a battlefield that played to their strengths and negated the strengths of celts. After the battle of Watling Street, the Romans recorded over 80,000 Celtic dead and 400 roman dead.
Aftermath
After the battle the Romans started a campaign of pacification and when reports came to Rome of the brutality even Nero was disgusted. The Governor was replaced and a campaign of romanisation brought about a transformation of British society from Celtic to Romano-British. The Romans legions were to stay in Britain until 410AD and their impact on our society is indelible. But it does make you wonder what the world would be like if the Romans had abandoned the province in 60AD…