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Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand.
So much for the dead thread, pushing 30k views......

Could this be sufficiently reliable to warrant a field trip, possible to the top 10 locations?

As part of the debate I've "field tripped" to most of the credible sites, they are all so close they can be picked up in a day. Steve looks in on us occasionally so I don't want to speak out of turn, but I understand he may well be re-working his GIS project. I believe he is altering his variables, maybe to reflect some of the comments on here and at Warwick concerning the volume of water required to keep a force in the field and the total quantum of combatants on both sides. My personal view is that in a field campaign it would be hard if not impossible to be secure on the variables Steve is using, however it would be a really useful tool in pinpointing permanent settlement sites and routes.

An overall strategic view would put large negative points against his western candidates, out of range for the Iceni, and no strategic value for the Romans to defend their gains in the North West or strike at the undefended Iceni heartland.

Every tv show I see about the 8th Army has stressed how they coped in the Western Desert in WW2 on a canteen of water a day, so 9 litres per man for Paulinus still seems way over the top considering it wasn't even a siege position, merely a camp. So the real water consumption may well have been so low that, as a locational criteria, it would be close to irrelavent, this is a major pitfall for Steves process. Water courses are probably more significant as transport/navigation routes in this context.

If you take Steve's slope criteria the only candidate site that passes muster is CS, but CS isn't even in his long list due to distance from water.

I think the GIS process may throw up some new candidates but the current process of "identify a site and test it" seems the only realistic way forward. Mancetter has been tested archaeologically and there has been "no evidence of a battle", Paulerspury has been detectored with no evidence and the bodies were C14'd to Anglo Saxon so no proof or reinforcement of theory found there. Dunstable was subject to detector and literature searches last year and I assume this is ongoing in 2014. I have heard of no finds of note yet, but nothing has been published so there may be something there. I know of no formal plans to test CS yet, but I think that would be the process that would need to be followed, going down the list to eliminate candidates. So the GIS methodolgy has value in identifying new candidates as we move down the list eliminating sites we will need new candidates to eliminate. Oh hang on a minute no we won't as CS will be proven as soon as the first turf is turned :-P

re ditches and sticks, that's exactly what Paulinus deployeds at CS as the triple ditch at the Larches, killed off all chariot and mounted approaches to the heart of the Roman complex. :evil:

strangely comforting to have the thread back Sick
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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 John1 - 06-30-2014, 09:51 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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