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Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand.
Quote: It seems that this is again down to interpretation. (Also it might be useful if we were both using the same translation)


Tacitus:

“The temple held out, but, after a siege of two days, was taken by storm. Petilius Cerealis, who commanded the ninth legion, marched to the relief of the place. The Britons, flushed with success, advanced to give him battle. The legion was put to the rout, and the infantry cut to pieces.”

Or Tacitus

“The victorious enemy met Petilius Cerialis, commander of the ninth legion, as he was coming to the rescue, routed his troops, and destroyed all his infantry. Cerialis escaped with some cavalry into the camp, and was saved by its fortifications.”
Better still that we work from the Latin and make as literal a translation as possible. This minimizes the danger of our interpretations being influenced by any glosses or bias on the part of the translator.

In this case, the Latin reads as follows:

templum, in quo se miles conglobaverat, biduo obsessum expugnatumque. et victor Britannus Petilio Ceriali, legato legionis nonae, in subsidium adventati obvius, fudit legionem, et quod peditum interfecit: Cerialis cum equitibus evasit in castra et munimentis defensus est.

This translates literally as:

‘The temple, in which the soldier had gathered himself, [was] besieged for two days and taken by storm. And the victorious Briton, with Petilius Cerialis, legate of the Ninth Legion, pressing forward in relief, meeting [him] routed the legion and slew those who were infantry: Cerialis with the cavalry escaped into a camp and was protected by the ramparts.’



Quote:The interesting point is the reference to “Cerialis escaped with some cavalry into the camp, and was saved by its fortifications.”

Which camp was this? Was it near Colchester? In my interpretation it would have been Wixoe or perhaps Great Chesterford.
This is a mystery. I am sure that I have read one interpretation that suggested that he was pursued right back to his base fortress, which seems nonsense to me. Castra is plural, which implies a camp, rather than a fort. I am not sure of the nature of the sites that you mention. I have thought that Cerialis made it back to his last marching camp and that the rampart and ditch had not been slighted, so would provide some protection. It is possible that the Britons did not actually pursue him that far and that the idea that the rampart protected him is simply rhetoric. Alternatively, it is likely that any pursuing force would have been cavalry only and, if it did follow him as far as the camp, it may be that he actually outnumbered it at that point, so it did not press home an attack on the camp.



Quote:I think that you have taken a concept out of context. You are correct in that I said the quickest route home for the Iceni from London was via Braughing and it is. In this case however I am saying that Boudica’s other army went to St Albans instead of going to London via the Icknield way. This would also have had the effect of cutting off SP if he had gone up Watling Street. (Boudica of course in this scenario is advancing on London with the Trinovantes)

The other point is that if SP left to the West and the Brythons followed him towards Staines who burned St Albans?
I was assuming that Boudica’s “other army”, when released from the necessity of defending the homeland, would proceed to London to join the main horde. What is your precise suggestion? That it travelled along the Icknield Way to Dunstable and then down Watling Street to St. Albans or, perhaps, that it branched off the Icknield Way direct to St. Albans, thereby cutting out Watling Street altogether? What was its objective? Specifically to attack Verulamium or was that merely incidental to some other purpose?

Who burned St. Albans? It could have been a local rising. It could have been the local tribe eliminating Roman influence within its territory before joining the revolt. It could have been a breakaway group from the main horde. There are several possibilities.



Quote:This does not seem to fit with your previous arguments. For your previous timescales to work and for SP to arrive in London before the Brythons you have consistently said that the “Horde” travelled at around 5 miles every two days.

If SP left with his refugees they would have travelled at least 10 miles per day. We understand from Tacitus that the Brythons destroyed London and this would have delayed them for at least 2 days. SP would have been far away by the time the Brythons left London and would increase the distance between them as time went on.

I believe that what both historians imply is that instead of stopping at London as SP expected they continued to follow him. This is in fact what you have maintained that London had the riches and food to satisfy the Brythons.
I have never suggested that the horde travelled at a rate of five miles per two days; that was Nathan. I said that oxen travel at a rate of 2 m.p.h. and work for a maximum of five hours a day. That said, it is strange that Paulinus was not able to outstrip the rebels. It is possible that he only just got out of London in time and that the Britons did not waste as much time as he hoped in plundering the town. Even so, he should still have been able to maintain a distance between them. I wonder if there is something that we are not being told.


Quote:Tacitus

“The fourteenth legion, with the veterans of the twentieth, and the auxiliaries from the
adjacent stations, having joined Suetonius, his army amounted to little less than ten
thousand men. Thus reinforced, he resolved, without loss of time, to bring on a decisive action.”

Tacitus particularly relies on the point that the Fourteenth was reinforced by veterans of the Twentieth and the auxiliaries and because he had a bigger army he had the men to fight the Brythons.
Goodness knows where you got this translation. The Latin reads:

Iam Suetonio quarta decima legio cum vexillariis vicesimanis et [e] proximis auxiliares, decem ferme milia armatorum, erant, cum omittere cunctationem et congredi acie parat.

A literal translation would be:

‘At this time with Suetonius were the Fourteenth Legion with the veterans of the Twentieth and auxiliaries from the nearest [forts], almost ten thousand troops, when he decided to abandon delay and engage in battle.’

Apart from the auxiliaries, who appear to be recent additions to the force and whose numbers we do not know, there is nothing to suggest that Paulinus had been significantly reinforced.




Quote:But all our scenarios, I think, rely to some degree on a level of long-distance strategic coordination. With the rebellion erupting in East Anglia, would it be so difficult for Paulinus to order Cerialis to move towards Colchester and the Second (or whatever was available of their strength) to march on London and wait there until he arrived?
Perhaps I was over-interpreting the concept of a three-pronged attack. It is certainly possible to order that forces rendezvous at a particular point. It was the thought of three forces homing in on the rebel band from three different directions and all arriving at the right spot at the right time that caused me concern.




Quote:With so much hinging on a single word, I think Michael's strategy of going back to original latin is the best option here. Tacitus says 'the victorious Briton' - so the same people as conquered Colchester defeated Cerialis. Unless the singular refers to 'the victorious British people', perhaps? :-|
Thank you. General translations are fine for getting the basic story but, if you need to consider detail, you have to go back to the Latin (I wonder if you can still get old-fashioned cribs like Brodie’s Classical Translations, which should, in theory, be closer to the original). One of Deryk’s translations above is a case in point. The simple victor becomes ‘flushed with success’. (Strictly speaking, victor and Britannus are nouns in apposition, ‘the victor Briton’, but my dictionary considers that, in such circumstances, ‘victorious’ is acceptable.)



Quote: We're assumed that Cerialis was too rash to build marching camps in his advance against an enemy in the field! If he did (and it was usual practice, after all), then the camp in question could have been his own fortification.
Great minds think alike!



Quote: Incidentally - question for Michael, returning slightly to the original purpose of this thread: you've mentioned that you favour a site to the west of London, but east of Silchester. So did I, at one point, but lengthy scanning of OS and terrain maps all along the route of the Portway failed to turn up any locations that match the topography as described in Tacitus. There's Virginia Water, but the ground is wet and covered in streams, and a place east of Crowthorne, but it's very tenuous. Can you find an alternative? ;-)
Can you recommend a decent physical map in which the contour lines are not obscured by development?



Quote:Barossa? RMAS training ground...
Do you have a map or is it top secret?
Michael King Macdona

And do as adversaries do in law, -
Strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends.
(The Taming of the Shrew: Act 1, Scene 2)
Reply


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 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
Calling all armchair generals! Boudica\'s Last Stand. - by Renatus - 11-02-2012, 05:04 PM

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