Boudica - Infinite Women

Born: 30, United Kingdom
Died: 61 (circa)
Country most active: United Kingdom
Also known as: Boadicea, Boudicca, Boudicea, Buddug

The following is excerpted from Woman: Her Position, Influence and Achievement Throughout the Civilized World. Designed and Arranged by William C. King. Published in 1900 by The King-Richardson Co. Copyright 1903 The King-Richardson Co.

Boadicea was wife of Prasutagas, king of the Iceni, a tribe of eastern Britain.
It is the old story, ever repeated, of imperial rapacity and cruelty. The Romans had invaded Britain on the pretext that they helped the Gauls. King Prasutagas, in order to appease the emperor and protect his family, left half of his great fortune to Nero and the remainder to his wife and daughters. The Roman officers, on the pretext that Boadicea had concealed a part of the property, seized the whole. The queen
protested against such high-handed proceedings. The officers in revenge caused her to be stripped and scourged and her daughters were given to the soldiers. This treatment, worse than death, roused the queen and people to desperation. She assembled the Britons and with spear in hand and the passionate and pathetic eloquence of wronged womanhood, recounted their sufferings at the hands of the Romans and called upon them to repel the invaders. Boadicea led the attack in person and the Romans, seventy thousand in number, were slaughtered. The noble queen and her daughters had been avenged.
The Roman general, who had been absent from the first battle, returned with ten thousand soldiers and for a time shut himself up in London in doubt whether to give battle to the vast host who followed the queen. At length he came forth. Boadicea in her chariot, accompanied by her daughter, urged the Britons to conquer or die. “Is it not much better to fall honorably in defense of liberty, than be again exposed to the outrages of the Romans? Such at least is my resolution; as for you men, you may, if you please, live and be slaves!”
The result was a total defeat and dreadful slaughter of the brave Britons. Eighty thousand were left dead on the field. The queen died, either of despair or poison, in 62, looking for the prophecy of the Druid priest to be fulfilled, “ Rome shall perish—write that word in the blood that she has spilt; —perish, hopeless and abhorred, deep in ruin as in guilt.”

The following is excerpted from “400 Outstanding Women of the World and the Costumology of Their Time” by Minna Moscherosch Schmidt, published in 1933.

Boadicea was the wife of Prasutagus, king of the Iceni, a people occupying the district which now forms the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. The Iceni were a powerful and war-like race who, however, had come to terms with the Romans as early as the time of Caesar. About the year 50 the harsh policy of the propraetor, Ostorius, led to a revolt headed by the Iceni. This insurrection was speedily quelled and the Iceni were reduced once more to the rank of tributaries, Prasutagus being permitted to retain his former position as king, or possibly, as has been suggested, being now set over the Iceni by the Romans. Prasutagus, a man of great wealth, died about the year 60 bequeathing his property to the Roman Emperor jointly with his daughters, hoping by this means to secure his kingdom and family from molestation. These precautions had, however, a contrary effect; the will was made by Roman officials a pretext for regarding the whole property as their spoil. Boadicea, the widow of Prasutagus, was flogged and members of the family, other than her daughters, were treated as slaves or deprived of their ancestral property. Roused to desperation by such treatment and fearing worse in the future.
The Iceni, under the leadership of their Queen, Boadicea, headed a revolt in which they were joined by the Trinobantes. The Romans were massacred in great numbers. But Boadicea’s triumph was of short duration. The Roman Governor returned with his small army and preparations were made for battle. Boadicea, accompanied by her daughters, drove in her chariot through the lines of her army reminding them of the wrongs which they had endured at the hands of the Romans and inciting them to revenge. The Roman Governor encouraged his men in a different manner, exhorting them not to fear multitudes consisting of more women than men. The battle was quickly decided. The Roman Governor inflicted an overwhelming defeat upon his opponents, who outnumbered him twenty times. Eighty thousand Britons were killed, the Roman loss being only four hundred; while Boadicea in despair at the crushing nature of her defeat, destroyed her life by poison. This battle put an end to the revolt and finally established the Roman supremacy in Britain.

The following is excerpted from “Female Warriors: Memorials of Female Valour and Heroism, from the Mythological Ages to the Present Era,” by Ellen C. Clayton (Mrs. Needham), published in 1879 and shared online by Project Gutenberg.

The next female sovereign who defied Rome on the battle-field was of a very different stamp from Cleopatra, or even Candace. This was Boadicea, the “British Warrior Queen,” the story of whose wrongs and bravery was for centuries a favourite subject with poets. Her name, which has been variously written Boadicea, Boudicea, Bonduca, Vonduca, Voadicea, or Woda, signified “the Woman of the Sword,” and in the ancient British or Welsh language is equivalent to Victoria. She was the daughter of Cadalla, King of the Brigantes; and, through her mother, Europeia, daughter of Evanus, King of Scotland, she claimed descent from the kings of Troy and the Ptolemies of Egypt.
Boadicea’s career was a sad and a stormy one from first to last. At an early age she was compelled by her step-mother, the wicked, ambitious, Cartismandua, to marry Arviragus, son of that queen by her first husband, King Cymbeline. Arviragus was King of the Iceni, who possessed a great part of Essex, Norfolk, and Cambridgeshire. They are said by Tacitus to have been a rich and powerful nation.[54] After the queen had presented her lord with a son and two daughters, the Emperor Claudius came to Britain. Arviragus, having suffered several defeats, was compelled to divorce Boadicea, and marry Gwenissa, the emperor’s daughter. A general insurrection of the Britons was the result; and the natives, led at first by the famous Caractacus, brother of Boadicea, and ultimately joined by Arviragus himself, were defeated again and again by the Romans. Weary at last of the never-ending struggle, Arviragus and Boadicea accepted very humiliating terms from Vespasian, and were permitted to retain their dominions.
Towards the close of his life Arviragus appears, for some unexplained reason, to have changed his name to Prasutagus. Dreading the rapacity of the Romans, he thought to secure their protection for Boadicea and her two daughters (her son died long before), by making the emperor Nero joint-heir to his dominions. He died A.D. 61. Scarcely had he ceased to breathe, when Catus, the Roman procurator, who commanded in the absence of Suetonius Paulinus, Governor of Britain, annexed the country of the Iceni, seized the personal effects of the deceased monarch, treated all his relations as prisoners of war, despoiled the wealthier Iceni, imposed heavy taxes upon the poor, and demanded from Boadicea the payment of large sums which her father, Cadalla,[55] had bestowed upon the Romans. Unable to pay, the queen was publicly whipped, and her daughters were treated even more shamefully.
Burning for revenge, Boadicea raised the standard of revolt. She was soon joined by patriots from all parts of Britain. Eighty thousand men, headed by the queen, rushed down like wild beasts on the colonies of Camulodunum (Malden), Colchester, and Verulam (St. Alban’s), putting to death, in the first-named city, with every torture they could devise, more than seventy thousand persons of every age and sex.
Shortly after the destruction of Camulodunum, Boadicea was joined by her brother Corbred, king of Scots. Together they marched to the attack on Colchester. Petilius Cerialis, the conqueror of Batavia, marched out from Verulam at the head of the ninth legion to oppose the victorious Britons. He had lately received from Germany reinforcements, amounting to eight auxiliary cohorts of one thousand horse. A furious battle ensued, resulting in the total defeat of the Romans. Upwards of six thousand Romans and three thousand confederate Britons (their allies) were slain.
Petilius fled with his broken cohorts—for, it is said, not even one foot-soldier escaped the carnage—to his entrenched camp. Catus Decianus, the procurator, was severely wounded in the engagement,[56] and, struck with terror, he continued his precipitate flight over sea into Gaul.
Suetonius Paulinus, absent at the time on that expedition which concluded with the massacre of the Druids in Mona (the Isle of Anglesea), hastened back to South Britain. With ten thousand men, he entered London; but, despite the prayers of the people, he deserted it at once, and encamped at a short distance north of the city. Scarcely had he departed, when Boadicea marched directly on London, captured it after a slight resistance, and put the inhabitants to the sword.
For some time Suetonius was afraid to venture on a battle against a victorious queen commanding a force so immeasurably superior to his own, amounting, according to Tacitus, to one hundred thousand, while Dio Cassius raises the number as high as two hundred and thirty thousand; while the Romans could muster scarcely ten thousand. At last an engagement took place on a wild spot, guarded in the rear by a dense forest.
Before the battle, Boadicea passed up and down in her chariot, exhorting the warriors to avenge her wrongs and those of her daughters. Dio Cassius has described the British Queen, as she appeared on that memorable day. She was a woman of lofty stature, with a noble, severe expression, and a dazzlingly fair complexion, remarkable[57] even amongst the British women, who were famous for the whiteness of their skin. Her long yellow hair, floating in the wind, reached almost to the ground. She wore a tunic of various colours, hanging in folds, and over this was a shorter one, confined at the waist by a chain of gold. Round her alabaster neck was a magnificent “torques,” or collar of twisted gold-wire. Her hands and arms were uncovered, save for the rings and bracelets which adorned them. A large British mantle surmounted, but did not conceal the rest of her attire.
Suetonius on his side used all his powers of oratory to excite the Romans to do their best, telling them to “despise the savage uproar, the shouts and yells of undisciplined barbarians,” amongst whom, he said, “the women out-numbered the men.”
The battle was long and obstinately contested; but the steady order of the iron legions triumphed over the savage onslaught of the Britons. The latter were routed with terrible slaughter, leaving, Tacitus says, upwards of eighty thousand dead on the field. The Romans lost only five hundred. “The glory won on this day,” adds Tacitus, “was equal to that of the most renowned victories of the ancient Romans.”
The exact scene of this engagement has been[58] variously placed by different writers. Some decide that Battle-Bridge, King’s Cross, marks the spot; while by others it has been settled as identical with the ancient camp called Ambresbury Banks, near Epping. Some even place it at Winchester.
Boadicea, rather than let herself be taken alive, put an end to her own existence by poison. She was afterwards interred with due honours by her faithful adherents.
The two daughters of Boadicea, completely armed, fought most valiantly in the battle; and even during the rout of their countrymen they strove wildly for victory. At last they were made prisoners, and brought into the presence of Suetonius, who expressed deep sympathy for them, and spoke with indignation of their oppressors.
The elder princess, by the intervention of Suetonius, was married, some months later, to Marius, also styled Westmer, son of Arviragus and Gwenissa. This prince was acknowledged by the Romans as King of the Iceni, over whom he ruled for many years. His son Coel was the father of Lucius, the first Christian king of Britain. Boadicea, the younger daughter, inherited not only her mother’s name, but her bold, dauntless spirit, and her relentless hatred of the Romans. Marius, fearing her influence over the Iceni, banished her from his court. She raised a formidable army of Brigantes[59] and Picts, and sailed to Galloway, which was occupied by the Romans. Marching in the dead of the night, she fell on the encampment of the foe and slew several hundred men. The entire Roman army would probably have been put to the sword had not Petilius, the general, ordered his men to light torches. The Britons were driven off, and next morning Boadicea was attacked and defeated in her own camp.
Next day Boadicea marched to Epiake, the Roman head-quarters in that district, and setting it on fire, destroyed the garrison. Shortly after this she was captured in an ambuscade. It is said by some that the young princess, expecting a horrible death, followed the example of her mother, and took poison. Others, however, declare that she was brought alive into the presence of the Roman commander, who interrogated her respecting the object of her invasion, when Boadicea, making a spirited answer, was slain by his guards.

The following is excerpted from A Cyclopædia of Female Biography, published 1857 by Groomsbridge and Sons and edited by Henry Gardiner Adams.

BOADICEA, A British Queen in the time of Nero, wife, first of Arvinagus, and afterwards of Prasatagas, King of the Iceni, that is, Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridge, and Huntingdonshire. Prasatagas, in order to secure the friendship and protection of Nero for his wife and family, left the emperor and his daughters co-heirs. The Roman officers, availing themselves of a privilege so replete with mischief, seized upon all his effects in their master’s name. Boadicea strongly remonstrated against these unjust proceedings, and being a woman of high spirit, she resented her ill usage in such terms, that the officers, in revenge, caused her to be publicly scourged, and violated her daughters. Boadicea assembled the Britons, and standing on a rising ground, her loose robes and long hair floating in the wind, a spear in her hand, her majestic features animated with a desire for vengeance, she reminded her people, in a strain of pathetic eloquence, of the wrongs they had endured from the invaders, and exhorted them to instant revolt. While speaking, she permitted a hare, which she had kept concealed about her person, to escape among the crowd. The Britons, exulting, hailed the omen, and the public indignation was such, that all the island, excepting London, agreed to rise in rebellion.
Boadicea put herself at the head of the popular army, and earnestly exhorted them to take advantage of the absence of the Roman General, Paulinus, then in the Isle of Man, by putting their foreign oppressors to the sword. The Britons readily embraced the proposal, and so violent was the rage of the exasperated people, that not a single Roman of any age, or either sex, within their reach, escaped; no less than seventy thousand perished.
Paulinus, suddenly returning, marched against the revolting Britons, who had an army of one hundred thousand, or, according to Dion Cassius, two hundred and thirty thousand strong, under the conduct of Boadicea and her General, Venutius. The noble person of Boadicea, large, fair, and dignified, with her undaunted courage, had gained for her the entire confidence of the people, and they were impatient for the engagement with Paulinus, whose army consisted of only ten thousand men. Notwithstanding this disparity of numbers, however, the discipline and valour of the Roman cohorts proved too much for their barbarous adversaries, who, at the first attack, fell into disorder, and precipitately fled; the baggage and wagons in which their families were placed, obstructing their flight, a total defeat and dreadful carnage ensued. Eighty thousand Britons were left on the field. Boadicea escaped falling into the hands of the enemy, but, unable to survive this terrible disappointment, she fell a victim either to despair or poison. The battle was fought in the year 61.

The following is excerpted from the Dictionary of National Biography, originally published between 1885 and 1900, by Smith, Elder & Co. It was written by Arthur Miller.

BOADICEA (d. 62) was the wife of Prasutagus, king of the Iceni or Eceni, a people occupying the district which now forms the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. The Iceni were a powerful and warlike race, who, however, had come to terms with the Romans as early as the time of Cæsar. About the year 50 the harsh policy of the proprætor Ostorius led to a revolt, headed by the Iceni; but this insurrection was speedily quelled, and the Iceni were reduced once more to the rank of tributaries, Prasutagus being permitted to retain his former position as king, or possibly, as has been suggested, being now set over the Iceni by the Romans. Prasutagus, a man of great wealth, died about the year 60, bequeathing his property to the Roman emperor jointly with his daughters, hoping by this means to secure his kingdom and family from molestation. These precautions had, however, a contrary effect; the will was made by the Roman officials a pretext for regarding the whole property as their spoil. Boadicea, the widow of Prasutagus, was flogged, her daughters outraged, and other members of the family were treated as slaves, or deprived of their ancestral property. Roused to desperation by such treatment and fearing worse in the future, the Iceni, under the leadership of their queen Boadicea, headed a revolt, in which they were joined by the Trinobantes, a people occupying what are now the counties of Essex and Middlesex, in whose midst was the Roman colony of Camulodunum (Colchester), where a body of Roman veterans kept the native inhabitants in subjection by a system of terrorism. Taking advantage of the absence of Suetonius Paullinus, the Roman governor, in the island of Mona (Anglesey), the Iceni and their allies broke into open revolt. Camulodunum was taken and destroyed, and the temple of Claudius, which was considered to be in a peculiar degree a monument of the British humiliation, was stormed, and after a siege of two days so completely demolished that its site is undiscoverable at the present day. The devastation quickly spread far and wide. Suetonius hastened up to Londinium, collecting soldiers on his march, but did not yet feel sufficiently strong to encounter his enemies, and was forced to leave Londinium, which, as well as Verulamium, soon shared the fate of Camulodunum. The Romans were massacred in great numbers, seventy thousand according to Tacitus having been put to death, none being spared to be kept or sold as slaves. But Boadicea’s triumph was of short duration. Suetonius succeeded in gaining a position in a narrow valley where it was impossible for the Britons to employ their tactics of outflanking. Tacitus gives a picturesque account of the preparations for battle on both sides. Boadicea, accompanied by her daughters, drove in her chariot through the lines of her army, reminding them of the wrongs which they had endured at the hands of the Romans, and of the mortal insults to which she and her daughters had been subjected, and inciting them to revenge. Suetonius encouraged his men in a different fashion, exhorting them not to fear multitudes consisting more of women than of men. The battle was quickly decided. Suetonius, with a force of not more than ten thousand men, inflicted an overwhelming defeat upon twenty times the number of his opponents. Eighty thousand Britons were killed, the Roman loss being only four hundred; while Boadicea, in despair at the crushing nature of her defeat, destroyed her life by poison. This battle completely put an end to the revolt and finally established the Roman supremacy in Britain.
The form of the name Boadicea which is here adopted as being sanctioned by long popular usage is without authority. The more correct form is probably Boudicca or Bodicca, which, along with the masculine Bodiccius, are found in Roman inscriptions. These names are presumed to be connected with the Welsh budd, advantage (Irish búaid, victory), Welsh buddugol, victorious; so that as a proper name Boudicca may be considered equivalent to Victoria.