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Abstract
In 55 B.C. Julius Caesar crossed into Britain and was immediately engaged in a unique style of warfare. The Iron Age Britons used sturdy and fast two-horse chariots to respond to Roman invasion. This article looks at the tactics of and analyzes aspects of the battle chariot. It assesses the capabilities of the people who fielded the chariot and the means used to sustain their resources and gauge their capabilities. Drawing on both classical and archaeological sources, this article presents a fuller account of Caesar's two trips to Britain in 55-54 B.C. and the British warfare he encountered.
Julius Caesar's commentaries on his invasions of Britain in 55 and 54 B.C. describe successful tactics in response to this particular Roman invasion that stand at a time when the tribal armies of Gaul fell before the Roman military juggernaut. The tribes in southern Britain executed a style of war characterised by hit-and-run tactics, conducted from the highly mobile war chariot, which enabled the Britons to avoid a decisive battle. This article will discuss how the Britons responded to Caesar's invasions, and assess their tactics in 54 B.C. It win focus on four points. First, it will survey the classical sources and the archaeological evidence about the chariot. Second, it will examine the chariot, the charioteers, and the horses, considering such aspects as training, and the role of the chariot in battle. Third, it will gauge the movement of British forces around the campaign theatre and the logistical implications of these movements. Last, it will discuss the British tactics in comparison to Roman tactics while considering the British military context. This article will finish with some examples of British tactics drawn from Caesar's commentaries.
The Sources and the Evidence
An issue facing researchers on ancient Celtic warfare is the reliability of those accounts by Roman or Greek historians, geographers, and even participants who campaigned against Celtic peoples. Poseidonios (ca. 135-51 B.C.), who has been regarded as "the most important and influential source on the Celts writing before Caesar," allegedly composed an ethnographic account on the Celtic peoples north of the Alps.1 Unfortunately Poseidonios's work remains only in fragments gleaned from later classical writers who drew information from him.2 The geographer Strabo, for example, wrote on...