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Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand.
Renatus wrote:

The Britons would have perceived it to be a place where wealth could be found for the taking.....again, we do not know if Decianus emptied the coffers before leaving but the Britons would not have known that either.


I do agree with both these points.

It does however raise an issue about the relative definition of wealth. The wealth of any tribe would have had to have been based in the land that they were able to hold. Without land they were in fact tenants. So to my way of thinking the real riches lay in the land where future wealth could be generated from. I think that they would guard this first.

Renatus wrote:

......I wondered about that myself. However, we do not know how long the rebellion had been brewing before it burst out into open revolt. Clearly, the inhabitants of Colchester had sufficient warning to get a plea for assistance to Decianus and for him to send 200, admittedly poorly armed, troops in response.

I, like you, expect that some resistance had been building for a period of time for the inhabitants of Colchester to send for troops from London to have been there before the Brythons attacked.

It would also seem logical for messages to have been sent to the Ninth Legion headquarters as well and probably Cerealis would have sent them onto Seutonius Paulinus.

As Cerealis was the local commander in charge of the Eastern part of the Province it seems that he felt that the situation was serious enough to take with him a force strong enough to protect Colchester or even disuade the tribes from attacking.

Renatus wrote;

Probably, reports of the impending revolt were sent to Paulinus at the same time, either directly or relayed to him by Cerealis, and he may have been well on his way down Watling Street when news of the fall of Colchester reached him.

I don’t think the timeline fits. Tacitus suggests that the news of the rebellion reached SP in Anglesey. In that case it is likely that it took at least a day to have got there from Cerealis.

So if SP had left 1 day after he had the message (and that would have been pretty tight timing) Cerealis would have already left Longthorpe on the day after he got the message.

Cerealis was possibly ambushed as he was travelling possibly into the 2nd day of the journey and SP would have travelled around 30 miles maximum.

You state that:

It seems evident from Tacitus’ account that Colchester had fallen before Cerealis and the Ninth had arrived on the scene and that the rebels had turned to meet them. This would have further delayed their departure for London

Even if the Ninth wasn’t ambushed and arrived at Colchester on the 3rd day and was beaten in a pitched battle this would not have delayed the Brythons very long.

Colchester would have been lost and the Ninth destroyed by the time SP had travelled 50 miles – 200 to go to London – another 8 days at least and probably more and that is at the most optimistic.

Renatus wrote:

I doubt that the revolt was as planned and co-ordinated as you would like it to be. Tacitus has a telling description of it: (in the Loeb translation) “ . . . the enemy neither took captive nor sold into captivity; there was none of the other commerce of war; he was hasty with slaughter and the gibbet, with arson and the cross, as though his day of reckoning must come, but only after he had snatched his revenge in the interval.

Although you state:

This suggests more of a rampage than an ordered advance and contains the implication that the Britons knew the consequences of not pressing home their advantage while they had the opportunity.

It of course be applied to SPs response in the aftermath ofthe main battle that led to his recall.

Renatus wrote:

I don’t understand. I was not suggesting that Paulinus would wait for the Britons to come to him, except to the extent that he had to wait for reinforcements before advancing himself.

My apologies – I misunderstood you.

Renatus wrote:

I do not recognise the quotation, unless it is a very free translation of the passage about abandoning London, which you have referred to. Can you give a reference?

It is a translation that I picked up as follows:

At that place he meant to fix the feat of war; but reflecting on the scanty numbers of his little army, and the fatal rashness of Cerealis, he resolved to quit the station, and, by giving up one post, secure the rest of the province.

Or

Uncertain whether he should choose it as a seat of war, as he looked round on his scanty force of soldiers, and remembered with what a serious warning the rashness of Petilius had been punished, he resolved to save the province at the cost of a single town.

but as you can see the idea was to give up London to save the the country for the Romans.. therefore SP had a plan! - allegedly...

Renatus wrote:

His account of the battle also makes it look all too easy. Dio’s hard-fought battle is probably nearer the truth. Given the discrepancy in numbers, it may well have been what the Duke of Wellington might have called “a damn’d close-run thing.”


I have a problem with Dio's version of events re the battle because of breaking the force into 3 - which would give 3500 per group which is really too small....

BUT I think that it was a close run thing with most of the dead being the baggage train...

Kind Regards - Deryk
Deryk
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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 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 Deryk - 10-03-2012, 02:35 AM
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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