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Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand.
(08-11-2019, 07:35 PM)John1 Wrote: For the "woods" to be sufficiently impenetrable for light infantry... I am inclined to think the best candidate is Willow Carr...  for the entire perimeter at CS in the Nene tributary valleys which surround the ridge.

Yes, this is a good suggestion, and I know you've made it several times. We would have to wonder whether this 'wood' was intended to be an entirely impenetrable barrier, or just a way of controlling the tactical space by restricting easy approaches - as we've discussed before, Paulinus would be using the landscape wherever he happened to be, rather than ranging all over the map searching for the perfect location.
 
Also we could wonder whether Tacitus's a tergo silva clausum would describe willow scrub in valleys surrounding a ridge which in turn surrounded the 'defile' - it might, but it's a stretch.

But all of us are to some extent creatively interpreting the literary description to suit our favoured sites.


(08-11-2019, 07:35 PM)John1 Wrote: Both Tring and Dunstable... very open woodland of Oak or Beech with plenty of space for infantry.

Yes, mostly the famous Chiltern beechwood. It was apparently growing on the saddle where Tring railway station currently stands, though, so all the valley areas were not under arable cultivation.

Beech does indeed tend to be very open woodland, which isn't ideal, although there are tracts of hawthorn and blackthorn scrub around there that would have presented more of an obstacle. More generally, it would have made any outflanking descent of the escarpment from the Chiltern ridges to the plain to the north west that bit more tricky. Coppiced woodland untended for a while can become quite dense too - there are pockets of it close to New Ground even today, I think.
Nathan Ross
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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 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
RE: Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand. - by Nathan Ross - 08-11-2019, 08:40 PM

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