Boadicea's husband, Prasutagus, was king of the Iceni (in what is now Norfolk) as a client under Roman control.
When Prasutagus died with no male heir, he left his private wealth to his two daughters and to the emperor Nero, trusting thereby to win imperial protection for his family. Instead, the Romans annexed his kingdom, humiliated his family, and plundered the chief tribesmen. While the provincial governor Suetonius Paulinus was absent in 60 AD, Boadicea raised a rebellion throughout East Anglia. The insurgents burned Camulodunum (Colchester), Verulamium, the mart of Londinium (London), and several military posts; massacred (according to Tacitus) 70,000 Romans and pro-Roman Britons; and cut to pieces the Roman 9th Legion. Paulinus met the Britons at a point thought to be near present-day Fenny Stratford on Watling Street and in a desperate battle regained the province. Boadicea took poison or died of shock. |