Boadicea

Boadicea, the wife of Prasutagus, king of the ancient British tribe, the Iceni, whose territories lay on the E. coast. Her husband, on his death-bed (60 A.D.). left his property to her and his two daughters jointly with the Emperor Nero. The Romans, however, seized all, and when Boadicea complained, scourged her publicly, whilst the daughters were outraged. This infamy roused the Britons, and they found a courageous leader in the queen. Roman soldiers and colonists were being massacred freely, and there was every prospect of the whole province being lost to the empire, when Suetonius Paulinus landed with an army from Mona (62 A.D.), and in the district between Colchester (Camalodunum) and London defeated the queen, who soon afterwards poisoned herself. The story preserved by Tacitus and Dio Cassius furnished Cowper with a theme for a spirited poem.