BOADICEA  , strictly BOUDICcA, a

British queen in the time of the emperor Nero . Her husband Prasutagus ruled the Icenl (in what is now Norfolk) as an autonomous prince under Roman suzerainty . On his death (A.D . 6,i) without male heir, his dominions were annexed, and the annexation was carried out brutally . He had by his will divided his private wealth between his two daughters and Nero, trusting thereby to win imperial favour for his family . Instead, his wife was scourged (doubtless for resisting the annexation), his daughters outraged, his chief tribesmen plundered . The proud, fierce queen and her people rose, and not alone . With them rose half Britain, enraged, for other causes, at Roman rule . Roman taxation and conscription lay heavy on the province; in addition, the Roman government had just revoked financial concessions made a few years earlier, and L . Annaeus Seneca, who combined the parts of a moralist and a money-lender, had abruptly recalled large loans made from his private wealth to British chiefs . A favourable chance for revolt was provided by the absence of the governor-general, Suetonius Paulinus, and most of his troops in North Wales and Anglesey . All south-east Britain joined the movement .

Paulinus rushed back without waiting for his troops, but he could do nothing alone . The Britons burnt the Roman municipalities of Verulam and

Colchester, the mart of London, and several military posts, massacred " over 70,000 " Romans and Britons friendly to Rome, and almost annihilated the Ninth Legion marching from Lincoln to the rescue . At last Paulinus, who seems to have rejoined his army, met the Britons in the field . The site of the battle is unknown . One writer has put it at Chester; others at London, where King's Cross had once a narrow escape of being christened Boadicea's Cross, and actually for many years bore the name of Battle Bridge, in supposed reference to this battle . Probably, however, it was on Watling Street, between London and Chester . In a desperate soldiers' battle Rome regained the province . Boadicea took poison; thousands of Britons fell in the fight or were hunted down in the ensuing guerrilla . Finally, Rome adopted a kindlier policy, and Britain became quiet . But the scantiness of Romano-British remains in Norfolk may be due to the severity with which the Iceni were crushed . See Tacitus, Annals, xiv . ; Agric. xv.; Dio lxii .

The name Boudicca seems to mean in

Celtic much the same as Victoria . (F . J .