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Celtic reconstruction
The Queen
Boadicea AD 60
Also called: Boudicca
Author unknown
"It is not as a woman descended
from noble ancestry, but as one of the people that I am avenging lost freedom, my
scourged body, the outraged chastity of my daughters. Roman lust has gone so far
that not our very persons, nor even age or virginity are left unpolluted."
"But heaven is on the side
of the righteous vengeance; a legion which dared to fight has perished; the rest
are hidigng themsleves in their camp, or are thinking anxiously of flight. They
will not sustain even the din and the shout of so many thousands, much less our
charge and our blows.
"If you weigh well the strength
of the armies, and the causes of the war, you will see that in this battle you must
conquer or die. This is a woman's resolve. As for the men, they may live and be
slaves!"
Queen Boadicea, of the Iceni
A reconstruction of the Iceni
village at an original site may be visited near Swaffham. It includes the fortifications,
very good explanations on tablets, the snake pit, and a chariot as used and one
as described (note the difference), but also some rather weird puppets sleeping
in hay.
The name of the Iceni lives on in the place names starting with Ick, Ik, and Ix.
Boadicea, who is thought to have
lived in a village similar to the one shown here, avenged her father's treachorous
murder and actually managed to gather several celtic tribes, raid Londinium, but
she was then killed by traitors from her own ranks, though some sources say she
committed suicide.
One of the various gravesites
of Queen Boadicea is near the Devil's Ditch in Garboldisham Heath (OS 144, TL 991820).
The round barrow is an impressive tumulus, high and covered with trees, though unfortunately
being eroded by horses' hooves and trail bikes.
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