Female Warriors of History

BOUDICCA OF THE CELTS

Boudicca, famous among female warriors, heroine of Celtic Britain, driven by revenge for her daughters' rape, to destroy a Roman city. There is something of the warrior in all of us, especially when it comes to our children. We haven't gone through so much bringing them into the world and raising them, only to let someone damage their lives and try to destroy them. It's as dangerous to get between a woman and her children as it is to keep a she bear from her cubs. Boudicca, standing out among female Celtic warriors, was a she bear protecting her cubs.

Standing before Big Ben in London, this chariot with a furious spear waving woman, is none other than Boudicca. Her daughters cower behind her on the chariot as she races to war, fearing to ever leave them out of her sight. Tall, and slim, with waist length long red hair, she was an imposing figure even without the weapons. She was described as more intelligent than other women of her day.

Queen Boudicca, also spelt Boudica and Boadicea, was married to King Prasutagus of what we now call Norfolk. He surely knew he had a female warrior by his side and must've encouraged her training. It's sad when a man won't let his wife take up weapons, and also when a wife holds her husband back from training by complaining he doesn't spend enough time with her. Successful long lasting marriages are the ones where partners let each other be who God made them to be and each has freedom to develop skills the other might not have or want.

King Prasutagus was trapped in a political juggling act in Roman occupied Britain. he made various agreements with the Romans in the hope of keeping life as stable as possible. One of them was to bequeath some of his lands to them. he hoped this would be enough for them to leave the rest of his lands to his wife and children when he died.

It was not to be. When he died, the Romans took all the land, stripped his wife and flogged her.

Being a female warrior at heart, she had probably made a fuss about the takeover. Then the Romans raped her daughters. That really did it. Boudicca, now chieftainess of the Iceni, led them and other Celtic tribes into battle for revenge and revolted against the Romans with all the fury of the she bear.

The Celts, led by a raging, weapon waving female warrior on a chariot, destroyed their capitol.

"It is not as a noble, but as one of the people that I am avenging lost freedom?" she cried, as she whipped up the army into a frenzy against the Romans, her daughters, huddling behind her on the back of the chariot.

This went on for some time. Then, in AD 60, Governor Gaius Seutonius Paulinus defeated her. He was leading a campaign against what we now know as North Wales, a refuge for British rebels and stronghold of the Druids. He had better weapons - that's the way it goes in war. He wiped out her army and it is largely held that she poisoned herself to avoid capture.

So now, she stands in that chariot in front of Big Ben, proclaiming freedom to Britain and reminding her people they should not stand for a takeover of their way of life and liberty by anyone. Who is listening to the female warriors of the past .... I wonder?

REFERENCES
wikipedia
BBC history
caeraustralis
kids encyclopaedia
women's history

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