I decided to continue my book and the overhaul of my old TL. Hope at least some of you remember it and that there is at least a little interest in it still:
In early May, the intrepid Roman general marched his army northwest, besieging the Catuvellauni capital. Pollio’s army quickly destroyed the city’s ramshackle wooden palisade, entering the city through the southern gate and decisively defeating the king’s royal guards, the kounii or hound troops, noted for their extensive use of viciously trained war dogs. Roman forces hastily captured the city and Cassivellaunus and his family were punctually executed as punishment for defying the Republic in the first place. Within a week, Pollio received the submission of all remaining Catuvellauni towns and he continued with his conquest of Britain by marching quickly to the west to confront the alliance of the Dumnonii, Silures and the Durotriges tribes led by the Dumnonii king, Cadyrne. Cadyrne had prepared for several months to confront the Romans upon hearing of their landing in Cantii lands and worked tediously to form an alliance of tribes along the western coast of Britain in the hope of driving Pollio back to the sea.
Pollio first met the merciless war chief in the Battle of Sorbindunum on June 4th, 711 AUC. Cadyrne had ingeniously built three treacherous layers of defensive earthworks and trenches to protect the city from the inevitable Roman advance. Cadyrne realized correctly, as did Pollio, that the rather mediocre hilltop city known as Sorbindunum held the key to the conquest of southwestern Britain. Sorbindunum, as well as being a tremendous source of revenue for local tribes due to the heavy volume of trade that flowed regularly between its gates, was also the largest city in southern Britain at the time. To leave such a large, hostile population to one’s back during a campaign would be nearly suicidal, as both sides clearly understood. Tobias, the prolific writer of Caesar’s endless wars, mentioned Pollio’s solution to Sorbindunum’s intimidating defenses by stating the following in Book Two of his Caesar Bellum:
“By now, Gaius Pollio had proven himself beyond a reasonable doubt to be one of the most daring and audacious generals of his time, more bold than even the mightiest of his contemporaries, Julius Caesar. The problem of the Sorbindunumian defenses would be one of his most strenuous challenges to date. By most accounts, and most notably that of Clitus the Red, the defenses presented a triple-threat to Pollio’s forces. First, and by far the most dangerous, was the first trench, which circumvented the entire parameter of the city. The trench was filled with large wooden spikes and was defended by a line of miniature forts manned by archers. Behind the archer towers stood the second line of Cadyrne’s ingenious earthworks. The second trench was a moat nearly seven steps deep and five paces wide. Not far behind the moat, elevated on the hills upon which the city stood, was a barricade behind which numerous javelin-wielding troops prepared to bury their weapons deep into the heart of any Roman lucky enough (or perhaps unlucky enough) to find himself past the first two lines of defense. To these adroit bulwarks, Pollio had just as clever an answer as to his method of attack. Pollio immediately ordered the construction of a large mobile wall, as tall as the first trench was wide and twenty-two feet across. The wall was complete with four sets of large wheels and boasted a defensive folding sidewall on either side. According to Clitus, the wall required nearly 100 soldiers to budge the massive structure from a static position. Pollio’s troops easily surmounted the first obstacle by simply lowering the wall upon the open trench to create a bridge. The only true resistance came from the archer towers situated beyond the pike trench. After fierce fighting, Pollio’s troops disbanded the Celtic archers and advanced to the moat with their ingeniously built war-wall. As before, Pollio’s troops deployed the wall and safely, and efficiently crossed the moat to confront Cadyrne’s shock troops on the opposite side. Only after horrendous skirmishes along the entire third defensive perimeter, extending well into the third day, did the Roman forces finally manage to breach Sorbindunum’s wall.”
After nearly a week of battle, the exhausted Roman forces finally cornered the audacious Cadyrne in the northwestern sector of the city and defeated his elite guard, killing the Celtic war chief in the process. Cadyrne’s hastily prepared alliance quickly crumbled, with only the Ordovices king, Gwethorne offering any tangible resistance to the Roman advance after Cadyrne’s death. On August 23rd, Gwethorne’s capital, Segontium, fell to Pollio, officially ending the Roman conquest of southern Britain.
Pollio rested his army for nearly two months before advancing into northern Britain. He decided on a rather risky tactic by campaigning during the winter, but he believed that by doing so he would gain the advantage against the unsuspecting northern tribes. He made sure to secure treaties with every British tribe to his rear before marching, and by this time most had willingly or by force submitted to Roman authority.
Pollio then marched his army north into Brigantes lands, quickly capturing the town of Cataractonium after the town elder peacefully submitted to the Roman army. By this time, Pollio’s reputation as a general and a tactician was well known to the northern tribes of Britain and many a tribal leader opted to submit rather than offer the Romans a futile resistance. One king in particular, Hathuldar of the Caledonians, a fierce tribe in the northernmost lands of Britannia, refused to submit to Roman authority. Pollio advanced against Hathuldar by first marching on the city of Luguvallium. The Battle of Luguvallium, the hardest fought battle of the entire campaign in Britain, ended with Pollio’s defeat outside the city walls. By this time, Pollio and his exhausted army were absolutely desperate to find shelter from the horrendously cold winter and the never-ending snow of northern Britain. Pollio retreated to Brocavum, a town captured only weeks prior, to find a mutiny lead by the Brigantes chieftain Agothores.
Though demoralized by the recent defeat at Luguvallium and weary after months of constant campaigning, the Roman army managed to defeat the insurgents and retake Brocavum. Pollio offered the Brigantes an honorable peace, but did execute Agothores for his treasonous act. It is speculated by the majority of historians, including myself, that it was the Battle of Brocavum that saved Pollio’s campaign in Britain, for had he lost this crucial battle, the entire Roman army may have mutinied against him or at best, the other subjugated tribes of Britain may have rebelled against the Roman occupation, considerably prolonging the campaign. After a full month of rest and making sure to adequately equip his army for winter combat, Pollio advanced his army north once again, completely bypassing Luguvallium and instead attacking and capturing the Caledonian capital at Calvodunum on the western bank of the River Clyde.
Calvodunum was an extremely important trading center for the Caledonians and its capture forced Hathuldar to advance quickly to recapture the fallen capital. Pollio abandoned Calvodunum after burning the town to the ground, the first time Pollio had resorted to such a tactic in Britain. Pollio finally met Hathuldar for the second time on January 16th, 712 AUC at a small hilltop village east of the River Clyde called Vuvidenum. The rather unassuming village would forever be immortalized as the last significant battle of the Roman conquest of Britain. Even in modern times, the Battle of Vuvidenum resonates through history as one of the most significant events in the early history of the empire. Most recently, the Hathroth series of novels, a story about an eight- year-old Celtic prince named Hathroth who learns to use magic and use this magic against the Dark Army of Lord Gnaeus, is based on the mythical King Hathuldar and his feud with Pollio. Even the final battle of Unconquered, the last book and movie in the series, is a fictional parody of the Battle of Vuvidenum.
Pollio, with his 28,000 man army, though significantly outnumbering the Caledonians by nearly 10,000 men, narrowly escapes the battle with his life, much less a victory. The Romans only win after using their mercenary auxiliary to outflank Hathuldar and capture Trothtor Bridge (this famous bridge retains its name verbatim in Unconquered and also boasts the fourth largest income from tourism in all the empire) on the northern end of the village, making the village accessible to the Roman army. The use of mercenaries to bear the brunt of the fight was a wise decision by Pollio as it freed the Legions to engage the fortified Caledonians within Vuvidenum. After a two-day, fiercely fought contest, Pollio captured Hathuldar, effectively subjugating the Caledonians and ending his campaign in Britain on January 24th.
Pollio remained in Britain after the Battle of Vuvidenum, establishing a fort called Campus Caledonia, which later became the provincial capital of Caledonia, Caledonum. He continued to build roads and other infrastructure along with Campus Caledonia and Londinium for several months until Caesar ordered Pollio to leave for Gaul and build an army in preparation for his campaign in Germania in June 712 AUC. During the interim between the end of Pollio’s campaign and Caesar’s order to return to Gaul, the remarkable general learned of a land to the west of Britannia known as Hibernia through local legend. According to Tobias, Pollio began planning a punitive expedition to Hibernia followed by a second invasion to complete a Roman conquest of the mysterious land. Tobias’ describes in exuberant detail Pollio’s proposed conquest of Hibernia, providing as evidence the generals personal memoirs which were supposedly handed down through Pollio’s family line until 1125 AUC when the wealthy Sicilian senator, Horacious Eupheus acquired them upon Julius Decimus Pollio’s death in the same year. Through rather questionable means Tobias eventually ended up with the documents from which we get the fantastic tale of Pollio’s proposed Hibernian conquest and his supposed reaction to Caesar’s order.
Despite Tobias’ less than admirable method of obtaining Gaius Pollio’s memoirs (having obtained the documents from a pirate who had stole them from Eupheus, perhaps on order of Tobias himself) I am inclined to believe the majority of Tobias’ tale of Pollio’s plans based on the exceptional detail involved in Tobias’ account and the superb reliability of his other works. Tobias explains how Pollio was extremely dissatisfied with Caesar’s demand to return to Gaul and prepare for an extended campaign in Germania.
Tobias iterates that, “by this time, the magnificent Pollio was rather accustomed to the cool, damp air and sweet women of Britain and excitedly prepared for a glorious campaign in Hibernia, hoping to find much of the same in the new mysterious land. Upon hearing Caesar’s order to return to Gaul from the emperor’s envoy Arturus Vatiaus, Pollio, in a drunken rage, nearly killed the poor man where he stood proclaiming, “I shall let Fate herself dictate whether I return to wretched Gaul prematurely, not the whims of a man half a world away! Survive my arrow and I shall follow your commands, but should you die in this contest, all the better for me!” Pollio then preceeded to shoot an arrow at Vatiaus, which fortunately for the befuddled diplomat, missed his head entirely, landing on the wall behind him and sparing him from the certain death Pollio surely wished upon him. With this, Fate declared he return to Gaul, and return to Gaul he did shortly thereafter.”
Now of course it is difficult to say whether or not Pollio actually contemplated disobeying Caesar (given that not one document exists in which he refused to follow a military order), but regardless of the story’s probity, the modern saying, “Ad exspecto arbitratus sagitta” or “To await the arrow’s decision” has its roots in the rather substantial mythology that surrounds Pollio in modern culture. Most commonly, the phrase is used at bachelor parties, where the groom’s best man throws a fake arrow at the husband-to-be to see if “Fate” sanctions his future union. In theory, if the arrow hits the groom (implying that he is giving his life away) then he is to marry his significant other. However if the arrow misses the groom, then he should wait at least a year before marrying his bride. This is but one of many humorous examples of history infiltrating modern culture.
It is the work of the modern day historians Guvian and Radamanthus (who obtained the majority of their history from Tobias and Livy) that offer the best documentary on the Germanian conquests of Caesar and his prerequisite conquests in southeastern Europe. In the middle of May 710 AUC, Julius Caesar and Marc Antony invaded Thrace, marking the official beginning of Caesar’s conquest of southeastern Europe. Caesar sent Antony east to capture Byzantium before marching his army north into Moesia and toward the southern bank of the Danube while Caesar himself marched north toward western Moesia. Julius Caesar advanced quickly, capturing several small villages in western Thrace culminating in his capture of Vordium north of the Rhodope Mountains. It is after this battle that Caesar began writing his Commentarii de Bello Thracico in which he greatly exaggerates the magnitude of the Roman victory at Vordium. He also begins construction on Castrum Thracia, which eventually served as an Imperial prison from 2454 to 2565 AUC, in northwestern Thrace. While Caesar’s rapid advance made tremendous progress, Marc Antony’s campaign was slowed by guerilla tactics by the Thracian army in the Rhodope Mountains and the massive Battle of the Plotin Plains outside of Plotinopolis.
If Eric is so busy, he could jsut say that he would quit writing this. But I suppose he'll always be busy, and this'll drag on for five more years. Having to wait six months btween update is rather depressing.