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Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand.
#63
Tying Boudicca to the burning at Silchester seems at best fanciful, at worst, a cynical use of the "B" word to garner media attention, which certainly seemed to be the case with the piece on "Digging for Britain".

The obvious weakness of Websters case for Mancetter has given licence for all and sundry to speculate at both a strategic and tactical level regarding the campaign (we do it here well enough). This is fun but is not good history or science, it's a pub game. There are currently a number of candidates on the table, each of which has an advocate who is prepared to make a case, but of all these sites lie in a relatively tight cluster along Watling Street, with the exception of Appleby's "Arbury Banks", however, even that site is within what one could describe as a core area (as is Dunstable Downs).

The western hypothisis, as far as I can tell, is just a strategic speculation which is not site based and has no advocate prepared to name or describe a specific site. As a theory, it may have gained some currency as an alternative to the Watling Street area simply due to the frustration at Mancetter, and there being no credible Watling Street site at the time of Fuentes writing, and no one was prepared to look systematically at Watling Street. If Silchester is to make these claims credibly, a bit/lot more rigor is going to be required. This is significant for archaeology.

The weakness of the Webster case also exposes a potential weakness/credibility gap in the profession of archaeology for site interpretation and prospection. Most of the current advocates are not archaeologists, they are individuals who do not recognise archaeology's exclusivity in this field they are given encouragement by what passes for process in Websters work and it's persistent repetition by "historians". So the credibility of archaeology and some archaeologists is at stake when the "B" word is trotted out potentially to garner media attention, or write books or appear on the media trotting out the Mancetter dogma, or worse still stating the site can probably never be found/proven due to it being "picked clean" an excuse I've heard applied to both Mancetter and Cuttle Mill.

If the site is ever located, there will be a lot of very positive outcomes for archaeology and some archaeologists. However the site will have been under some archaeologists/historians noses for a considerable period and they will potentially feel a bit miffed that they missed it. Hind sight is a bitch and every County, District and village in middle England has a clutch of dedicated archaeologist/historians, professional and amateur, the real site is inevitably under the feet of some of them. There may therefore be a vested interest in some parts in not finding/authenticating the site;

i) to keep egg off professional faces,
ii)loose the ability to play the "B" card when you want to sex up some burning layers.

So, Silchester and Thames Valley champions, can you find a site and interpret it and publish it to the extent that the Watling Street guys have? until then it would appear to be a minority sideshow. I didn't mean to end with a challenge, but why not?
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Messages In This Thread
Re: Calling all armchair generals! - by Ensifer - 03-11-2010, 03:13 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by John1 - 01-06-2012, 04:14 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 02-18-2012, 06:26 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 02-19-2012, 12:02 AM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 02-19-2012, 02:50 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 02-19-2012, 05:40 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 02-19-2012, 11:26 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-24-2012, 05:11 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-24-2012, 09:42 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-24-2012, 10:10 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-25-2012, 03:11 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-25-2012, 03:25 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-25-2012, 08:36 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-26-2012, 02:57 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 04-27-2012, 01:50 PM
Re: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Steve Kaye - 08-05-2012, 02:24 PM
Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by antiochus - 11-07-2014, 02:18 PM
Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by antiochus - 11-08-2014, 01:50 AM
Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by antiochus - 11-11-2014, 02:03 AM
Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by antiochus - 11-18-2014, 07:54 AM
Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by antiochus - 11-20-2014, 02:37 AM
Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by antiochus - 11-25-2014, 08:29 AM

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