-41 AD- Gaius Suetonius Paulinus- governor of the province of Mauretania and the first Roman commander to lead troops across the Atlas Mountains (mountain range located in modern-day Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia).
-54 AD- Emperor Claudius dies (or was he murdered? Hmm...) replaced by his adopted son, Nero (although more likely than not it was his mother, Agrippina (the Younger), who was really calling the shots!).
-During this time in Britannia Aulus Didius Gallus was governor, spending most of his efforts trying to quell rebellions in the lands occupied by Roman forces.
-57 AD- in the North, the Brigantes continued to raise hell, although they were also fighting each other too because they were divided.
-One faction was led by the Brigantes king Venutius, the other was led by his wife (!), Queen Cartimandua.
-The tension finally came to a head when Cartimandua captured and imprisoned Venutius' side of the family.
-Because of this, Venutius' kingdom erupted into civil war. Venutius took up Caratacus' banner in order to continue the fight against Rome, but also added the queen and her allies to his list of enemies (this was probably due to Cartimandua's treatment of Caratacus).
-However, up until this time Venutius had just been quarreling with Cartimandua. So, why did he decide to declare war on Rome and bring them into the mix?
-It's possible he did this because he didn't have a large-enough force to support his side so he tried to get more anti-Roman factions (like the Silures (occupied modern-day Wales)) to his side in order to boost his numbers.
-As a result of Venutius' attacks against Cartimandua's forces, Cartimandua reached out to Governor Didius for Roman military support.
-However, Governor Didius most likely didn't want to get involved, as his priority (or orders from Rome) was containment, not invasion. Plus, the Brigantes served as a nice buffer between Roman-occupied Britannia and the wild hordes to the north (modern-day Scotland).
-So, Didius sent troops to the region to support Cartimandua (and also expand Rome's reach, of course). The Roman forces arrived to find that the land was being ravaged by civil war.
-Because of Rome's involvement, of course, Cartimandua's forces were now much larger than Venutius', and Venutius and his resistance had to go underground.
-Eventually, Cartimandua also got a new dude to be her lover and king- Vellocatus (former squire to Venutius).
-This was an interesting choice because he was a servant and of common birth, so I'm sure the Brigantes nobility were thrilled to have a commoner as their new king.
-Thus, because of this (in addition to Venutius' continued attacks), Cartimandua was forced to rely more and more on Roman support.
-Meanwhile, back in Rome, Emperor Nero was faced wit ha tough decision- shit was getting so bad in Britannia that it probably would have otherwise been a wise decision to pull out, but he couldn't because this would have undermined all the progress that Emperor Claudius had made with conquering the region! What to do??
-Nero decides to recall Didius back to Rome. Didius is then replaced as governor of Britannia by a general named Quintus Veranius, who would actually go on to do a pretty good job in pacifying the new province by implementing new, aggressive military strategies.
-Apparently, upon returning to Rome Didius was made fun of by the senator/historian Tacitus.
-Also during this time, Rome and its Britannic allies pushed hard against the Silures in order to finally crush them once and for all.
-How was Rome able to get these armies of natives to fight against each other?
-One way was the promise of Roman citizenship- if you were a non-citizen but fought for Rome for 25 years, then you could become a Roman citizen!
-Because of this, things weren't looking too good for the resistance.
-Why was Rome having such a hard time pacifying this new province?
-One problem was that Britannia had like 23 different tribes, each with their own territory and shit, and they also typically didn't get along with each other.
-As is the same as the rest of human history, it's really hard to conquer a bunch of different people who don't like each other and then attempt to unify them under one (foreign) banner.
-Rome had the most control in the south of the island, so that's where they decided to focus all of their attention (in terms of administration, development, and exporting Roman culture).
-The north and the west of the island, however, were completely different stories of course, and were always having problems in terms of rebellion and shit.
-How did the Romans settle the region and make it more "Romanized"?
-They would typically send in their forces to pacify the area and then set up a fort. Naturally, after this trade and commerce would spring up around the forts in order to cater to the needs of the Roman soldiers.
-Eventually, once there was no longer a need for the Roman fort to still be there, the Romans would allow for the locals to do with it what they wished (usually resulting in its demolition in order to free up more land for the settlement), and by this point the town would be pretty Romanized in terms of culture, it would essentially just another Roman town in the vast Roman Empire!
-These new Roman towns in Britannia were different from the traditional Britannic towns that dotted the island.
-The smaller Roman towns in Britannia may have had more in common with the traditional settlements of the island, but the larger Roman towns were usually rectangular in shape, well-organized and fortified, featured streets in a grid, and were designed to be as "Roman" as possible in terms of architecture and culture.
-Unfortunately for the Romans, they always had a difficult time persuading the local nobility to live in these cities, as the nobility preferred to live in their rural estates and away from the hordes of commoners in the city. Plus, many of these families had probably lived in these estates for decades (if not centuries!), so it wouldn't be expected for them to want to abandon their estates and luxurious ways of life just so they could go live in the nearby city with all the riff-raff!
-The Romans desperately wanted the aristocracy to live in cities, of course, as they knew that commoners would want to follow the nobility if the nobility were doing it (whether it be living in cities, accepting and promoting or encouraging Roman fashion, religion, culture, etc.). If the Romans could just get the nobles into these new Roman cities, it would make these cities seem more legit!
-The Romans tried to attract these nobles by enticing them with cool shit like novel goods (wine, oil, etc.) and innovations (such as the hypocaust (Ancient Roman central heating), public baths, etc.). This kind of worked, too, but the nobility still would insist on living at least part-time in their rural estates (depending on the season)).
-Once the Romans got Britons to accept their rule, they encouraged them to continue doing this by offering citizenship to citizens (which came with a ton of benefits and made life under the Romans just easier in general).
-Another fun fact- the Romans didn't have to try too hard to get the Britons to speak Latin, as they actually may have known some of the language (or at least were aware of its existence) prior to the Claudian invasions of Britannia (as indicated by certain Briton coins and other archaeological/historical evidence).
-Of course, as Rome's grip on power in southern Britannia strengthened, the use of Latin spread throughout the island.
-In fact, it's been argued that the Latin spoke by Britons was actually a more "pure" version of the language compared to the kind of Latin that was spoken in Rome. Perhaps that was because the Britons were taught Latin usually in formal educational settings (instead of it being just a native tongue (and thus prone to all sorts of "corruption" (slang, bad grammar, etc.)).
-However, not all of the Britons were down with the Romans or being Romanized, of course.
-One of the most hardcore anti-Roman forces were the Silures (of modern-day Wales).
-Because of this, they soon found themselves fighting off Roman forces (commanded by Suetonius).
-Suetonius was especially brutal and methodical in his subjugation of the Silures. By the time the Roman forces reached the west coast of the island they had already begun to make plans to attack the island of Mona (modern-day Anglesey), a stronghold for both the druids and Briton refugees who were still resistant to the Roman occupation. Mona was also a main source for food (such as grain) for this anti-Roman resistance.
-This resulted in a great battle. Ultimately, the Romans were victorious, and they ended up slaughtering the island's inhabitants.
-Although it seemed as if this was the last of Briton resistance in the south, there were soon reports of a massive rebellion in the east! This particular rebellion was being led by a warrior-queen known as Boudica.
-It's also important to remember that during this time, the west still wasn't quite pacified. Still, Suetonius knew that he had no choice but to quietly withdraw his forces from the west and quell Boudica's rebellion in the east ASAP!
