Caratatcus<\/h3>\n<\/div>
Caratacus of the powerful Catuvellauni tribe had the time of his life giving the invading Roman army a monumental run-around.<\/p>\n
In AD 43 when the emperor Claudius\u2019 troops landed in Britain, Caratacus<\/a> was one of the surviving sons of the deceased king Cunobelinus. Caratacus and his brother Togodumnus led the British resistance from the tribal heartlands directly north of the Thames, and fought against the Romans in battle \u2013 probably on the Medway in Kent \u2013 which they lost. Soon after, Togodumnus was dead, and Caratacus was left on his own.<\/p>\n But Caratacus refused to kowtow to the enemy. He spurned the idea of becoming a \u2018client king\u2019 and ruling his tribe for the Romans. Instead, he took the war west and headed for the Silures tribe in what is now south Wales.<\/p>\n Caratacus managed the remarkable feat for a British tribal leader of organising other tribes under his leadership. He pulled back further into the impenetrable hills and valleys of western Britain and secured a stronghold on high ground. However, in AD 50, the Romans arrived for battle and overwhelmed the Britons with their firepower. Caratacus fled north for sanctuary with Queen Cartimandua of the Brigantes, but she handed him over to the enemy. Caratacus was pardoned by Claudius and pensioned off in ignominious retirement in Rome.<\/p>\n <\/p><\/div> Boudica of the Iceni has always been the most famous rebel of Roman Britain<\/a>. Her husband was Prasutagus, a tribal ruler who agreed to become a client king of the Romans and thus hold onto his kingdom. But when he died in AD 60, Roman officials moved in to steal his estate, flogging Boudica<\/a> and raping the couple\u2019s daughters. Seeking vengeance, Boudica went to war, rounding up her tribe and the aggrieved neighbouring Trinovantes. Catching the Roman army and the governor Suetonius Paulinus by surprise (he was in Mona, now Anglesey, wiping out the druids who had organised\u00a0the local resistance to the Roman conquest), Boudica burst out of East Anglia. She destroyed three Roman towns (Colchester, London and St Albans) before Paulinus eventually caught up and defeated her.<\/p>\n The trouble is that we only have two Roman accounts of Boudica, and they were both written long after the events. Neither Tacitus nor Dio had ever seen her. They wrote her up as the complete opposite of the effete and decadent emperor Nero, and were not even certain how she died (either \u2018sickness\u2019 or \u2018suicide\u2019).<\/p>\n The sad truth is that Boudica \u2013 no matter how she is depicted today \u2013 had nothing to offer\u00a0the Britons except disorder and starvation. No wonder, then, that lowland Britain never rose again.<\/p>\n \u00a0 When the Romans invaded in AD 43, rulers of several British tribes decided that their long-term interests would be better served with Roman backing. Among these was Cartimandua, ruling queen of the Brigantes tribe in northern England, and her husband and consort, Venutius.<\/p>\n In AD 51, Cartimandua, who had come to power around the time of the Roman invasion, handed Caratacus, leader of the Catuvellauni tribe \u2013 who had fled to her for refuge \u2013 to Emperor Claudius. Venutius seems to have been onside, at least until this point, but then the couple split.<\/p>\n Bumped up by Roman subsidies, Cartimandua became increasingly self- important and Venutius and his supporters took exception to this. But the real insult came when the Brigantian queen began\u00a0an affair with her armourer, Vellocatus. Cartimandua\u2019s regime went into meltdown, while Venutius rounded up ever more support from the Brigantes, who began to turn against their overmighty queen.<\/p>\n Venutius was now a rebel by default, and in AD 69 the Roman governor Bolanus had to extract Cartimandua from the tribe before she was killed; his forces fought Venutius several times before they got her to safety. But Venutius had only a short time to enjoy his success. In AD 71, a new governor called Cerealis arrived, and within a few years Brigantian territory had been absorbed into the Roman province. And Venutius? He disappeared without trace, as did Cartimandua. Carausius rose from total obscurity through the ranks of the Roman army to be given command of the Roman fleet in Britain in the AD 280s. He was charged with clearing the waters of seaborne raiders from northern Europe who plagued the coasts of Britain and Gaul. Carausius was an extraordinarily complex man. In AD 286 or 287 he declared himself emperor in Britain, riding a crest of popularity for his success. But the legitimate emperors, Diocletian and Maximian, believed Carausius had simply waited for the raiders to attack the settlements, before then helping himself to their loot. They were simply astounded by Carausius\u2019 audacity, and even more stunned when he claimed to be their imperial colleague, issuing a coin with a portrait of all three and the legend \u2018Carausius and his Brothers\u2019.<\/p>\n But Carausius went a step further. He issued Carausius declared himself emperor in the late third century AD and even minted his own coins. In reality, he was a naval general, with no claim to rule\u00a0the best-quality silver coins for generations, which \u2013 in Roman terms \u2013 were synonymous with legitimacy. And he even had the chutzpah to claim that he was in the process of restoring the \u2018Golden Age of Augustan Rome\u2019 (albeit in Britain), quoting from Virgil to prove it.<\/p>\n It couldn\u2019t last, and it didn\u2019t. In AD 293 he was murdered in a coup and replaced by his finance minister, Allectus, who was then killed by an imperial army sent over the Channel.Join us for a new podcast series examining what happened in Britain as Roman influence waned<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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<\/div><\/div> <\/div> <\/section>Boudica<\/h3>\n<\/div>
Venutius<\/h3>\n<\/div>
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<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>Carausius<\/h3>\n<\/div>