Chapter 6: The Last of the Romans

In Chapter 5, The Story of Boadicea, the Romans seized the wealth of the dead king of the Iceni and treated his queen, Boadicea, and her daughters cruelly. Boadicea called on the Britons to rise up and drive the Romans out, and with the queen herself leading them they destroyed Camulodunum, Londinium, and Verulamium. At last the better-armed Roman soldiers defeated the Britons, and the great queen chose death rather than fall again into the hands of the Romans.

• parchment: a writing material made from animal skin
• obedience: the act of obeying and doing as told
• woad: a plant that makes a blue dye
• tidings: a piece of news or information

This is a Kindred Thicket Revised Edition. Factual and historical errors are corrected and dated wording is put right, and these notes tell you plainly what we changed and what we left as Marshall wrote it.

• About this sectionThroughout this section we brought Marshall’s British spellings to American English, keeping the original spelling inside quoted material. Punctuation, readability and grammar may also be adjusted. Where offensive or outdated terminology or descriptions were present in Marshall’s original text, with the exception of direct period quotations, we have made minimal revisions.
• Kindred Thicket Revised Edition UpdatesIn the original text, Marshall makes a sweeping statement that, before Agricola’s time, Britain had no schools, teachers, or books, and that no one in Britain could read or write. Pre-Roman Britain was not wholly illiterate. We have accounts of Druids using Greek letters, as well as archaeological evidence of styli (writing implements) from before the Roman conquest. Furthermore, Agricola was not promoting public education; he encouraged Roman education to the sons of elite British families. We revised the text to remove the overstatement.
• In the original text, Marshall briefly mentions a wall built by “Antonine” before describing Hadrian’s Wall later in the chapter. The historical sequence is as follows: Agricola’s forts came first, followed by Hadrian’s Wall, and then the Antonine Wall. The standard modern name of the emperor who ordered the construction of the Antonine Wall is Antoninus Pius. We revised the text accordingly.
• Marshall describes some Britons as wearing no clothes and coloring their skin with woad, and presents their education as limited to fishing, hunting, and killing. We revised this portrayal to avoid giving the impression that these descriptions represented British life generally. Although ancient writers such as Herodian describe nakedness and body coloring among some northern Britons, others, such as Julius Caesar, describe clothing as well as body coloring. Archaeological evidence shows that Iron Age communities wore clothing, farmed crops, raised animals, and practiced crafts including weaving, pottery-making, and metalworking. The identification of the body pigment as woad also remains uncertain.
• In the original text, Marshall says that the word "druid" was derived from king named "Druis". The likely root of the word points to "oak" or "to know". We revised the text accordingly.
• Marshall stated flatly that the Druids killed human beings in their sacrifices. It is important to understand that this account comes from Roman writers, who may have had political and military reasons to portray the peoples they conquered as barbaric. We revised the text accordingly.
• Marshall states that the Roman emperor ruling over Britain killed and tortured Christians who worshipped God and Jesus Christ. The statement implies this also occurred on British soil. The Great Persecution was decreed by the emperor Diocletian, but Britain was then governed by Constantius Chlorus, who enforced the edicts only minimally. Other rulers persecuted Christians far more severely in their own territories. After Constantius died in 306, Britain passed to his son Constantine, who favored Christians. We revised the text accordingly.
• Teacher's Notes“keep back the wild Picts and Scots, or people of the north”Marshall calls the northern Britons "Picts and Scots", however, those names were not yet in use. They were known to the Romans of Agricola’s time as Caledonians and other tribes. “Picts” first appears in Roman sources in the late third century, while “Scots” originally referred to Irish Gaels. Both terms were applied to peoples in northern Britain later.
• “This emperor was jealous of Agricola”Marshall is referring to Emperor Domitian, who ruled from AD 81 to 96. Domitian recalled Agricola from Britain around AD 84–85. Tacitus, Agricola’s son-in-law, says Domitian was jealous of Agricola’s success. Modern historians suggest the recall may instead have been due to the cost of the campaigns and their failure to secure lasting territorial gains.
• “from the Tyne to the Solway”The continuous rampart built from the Wallsend on the Tyne Estuary to Bowness on the Firth of Solway is known as Hadrian's Wall.
• “Gradually the Druids disappeared”Marshall's text may suggest that the Druids were cleanly replaced by Christianity. History is not quite so tidy. Roman authorities had already suppressed the Druids during the conquest of Britain. Christianity spread later under Roman rule and was established in Britain by the fourth century. Still later, missionaries such as Augustine, who arrived in 597, worked to convert the pagan Anglo-Saxons.

• Julius Agricola: The Roman general sent to govern Britain.
• Vespasian: The Roman emperor who sent Agricola.
• Hadrian: The Roman emperor who built Hadrian's Wall.
• The Picts and Scots: The peoples of the north, beyond Rome's walls.
• The Druids: The priests of the ancient Britons.
• The Britons: The people of the island under Roman rule.
• Rome: The capital of the Roman Empire.