In our interview with Richard Hingley, we chat all about his new book Conquering The Ocean: The Roman Invasion of Britain. What's the book about? It's about the Roman conquest of Britain, but that takes some explaining because I suppose in the mind of the public, sometimes the Roman conquest is quite a short term thing, you know, perhaps it occurs over a few years, in reality, it goes on for a long period of time. And really, the first significant episode is when Julius Caesar comes to Britain. Now Julius Caesar, who's campaigning in Gaul, which is largely modern-day France, and he decides to go over the ocean to Britain in 55 and 54 BCE. He travels twice with armed forces, but he doesn't actually conquer anything. He ends up leaving again with some agreements with leading peoples in Britain, and they have to pay Rome tribute, but he doesn't actually conquer anything.

— FROM THE BACK OF THE BOOK —

Why did Julius Caesar come to Britain? His own account suggests that he invaded to quell a resistance of Gallic sympathizers in the region of modern-day Kent -- but there must have been personal and divine aspirations behind the expeditions in 55 and 54 BCE. To the ancients, the Ocean was a body of water that circumscribed the known world, separating places like Britain from terra cognita, and no one, not even Alexander the Great, had crossed it. While Caesar came and saw, he did not conquer. In the words of the historian Tacitus, "he revealed, rather than bequeathed, Britain to Rome." For the next five hundred years, Caesar's revelation was Rome's remotest imperial bequest.

Conquering the Ocean provides a new narrative of the Roman conquest of Britain, from the two campaigns of Caesar up until the construction of Hadrian's Wall across the Tyne-Solway isthmus during the 120s CE. Much of the ancient literary record portrays this period as a long march of Roman progress but recent archaeological discoveries reveal that there existed a strong resistance in Britain, Boudica's short lived revolt being the most celebrated of them, and that Roman success was by no means inevitable. Richard Hingley here draws upon an impressive array of new information from archaeological research and recent scholarship on the classical sources to provide a balanced picture of the military activities and strategies that led to the conquest and subjugation of Britain. Conquering the Ocean is the fullest picture to date of a chapter in Roman military history that continues to captivate the public.

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https://www.worldhistory.org/books/0190937416

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— CHAPTERS —

0:00 Introduction

0:39 What is the book all about?

8:47 Why did you decide to write this book?

17:17 What did you find the most interesting when researching the book?

24:28 What do you think people should really know about the conquering of Britain?

— WANT TO KNOW MORE? —

Roman Britain https://www.worldhistory.org/Roman_Britain/

Claudius https://www.worldhistory.org/claudius/

Julius Caesar https://www.worldhistory.org/Julius_Caesar/

Hadrian's Wall https://www.worldhistory.org/Hadrians_Wall/

Legions of Britain https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1753/legions-of-britain/

— ATTRIBUTIONS —

The music used in this recording is the intellectual copyright of Michael Levy, a prolific composer for the recreated lyres of antiquity, and used with the creator's permission. Michael Levy's music is available to stream at all the major digital music platforms. Find out more on:

https://www.ancientlyre.com

https://open.spotify.com/artist/7Dx2vFEg8DmOJ5YCRm4A5v?si=emacIH9CRieFNGXRUyJ9

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJ1X6F7lGMEadnNETSzTv8A

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