WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.359 So imagine you're standing on the white chalk 00:00:02.359 --> 00:00:04.500 cliffs of Dover. Yeah, right on the edge of the 00:00:04.500 --> 00:00:09.259 water. Exactly. The year is 55 BC. You're a member 00:00:09.259 --> 00:00:11.960 of a Celtic tribe, like maybe the Canty. Right. 00:00:12.279 --> 00:00:16.140 And the wind is just whipping off the English 00:00:16.140 --> 00:00:19.059 Channel. And as you look out over the gray water, 00:00:19.339 --> 00:00:22.539 you see something that is, frankly, terrifying 00:00:22.539 --> 00:00:25.519 oh absolutely horrifying slowly appearing over 00:00:25.519 --> 00:00:28.660 the horizon is this massive fleet of what 80 00:00:28.660 --> 00:00:31.620 ships yeah about 80 transport ships 80 ships 00:00:31.620 --> 00:00:35.140 carrying two entire legions of the deadliest 00:00:35.140 --> 00:00:37.880 military machine on earth the Roman Empire and 00:00:37.880 --> 00:00:40.240 right for you coming right for you but here's 00:00:40.240 --> 00:00:42.500 the truly crazy part about this scenario right 00:00:43.179 --> 00:00:46.060 The man leading that fleet, Julius Caesar himself. 00:00:46.219 --> 00:00:48.420 The guy who literally just conquered all of Gaul. 00:00:48.619 --> 00:00:51.219 Right. He has absolutely no idea who you are. 00:00:51.460 --> 00:00:52.719 I mean, he doesn't know your language. He doesn't 00:00:52.719 --> 00:00:55.979 understand your politics. And he he barely even 00:00:55.979 --> 00:00:57.899 knows where he's going to land his boats. It's 00:00:57.899 --> 00:01:00.119 actually a profound historical blind thought. 00:01:00.240 --> 00:01:03.100 I mean, we are so used to viewing history through 00:01:03.100 --> 00:01:05.840 the, you know, the meticulously documented records 00:01:05.840 --> 00:01:07.540 of the victors. All right. The guys who win write 00:01:07.540 --> 00:01:10.680 the books. Exactly. We have Caesar's own commentaries, 00:01:11.000 --> 00:01:13.840 his letters to the Senate, all his justifications 00:01:13.840 --> 00:01:17.719 for war but when we look at that moment of contact 00:01:17.719 --> 00:01:21.060 from the cliffs like looking out at the water 00:01:21.060 --> 00:01:23.840 rather than from the Roman boats looking in the 00:01:23.840 --> 00:01:27.459 historical record suddenly goes incredibly quiet 00:01:27.459 --> 00:01:30.340 it's completely silent and that's exactly what 00:01:30.340 --> 00:01:32.680 we're getting into today welcome to another deep 00:01:32.680 --> 00:01:36.219 dive I am I am so thrilled you're joining us 00:01:36.219 --> 00:01:38.280 today because we are going to completely shift 00:01:38.280 --> 00:01:40.879 the way you think about ancient history and really 00:01:40.879 --> 00:01:43.079 shift how we think about the voices that just. 00:01:43.200 --> 00:01:46.159 you know, get lost to time. Yes. So our mission 00:01:46.159 --> 00:01:49.079 today is based on a really monumental piece of 00:01:49.079 --> 00:01:52.400 scholarship from the early 20th century called 00:01:52.400 --> 00:01:54.620 Ancient Britain and the invasions of Julius Caesar 00:01:54.620 --> 00:01:57.219 by T. Rice Holmes, which is an incredible text. 00:01:57.219 --> 00:01:58.980 It really is. And it's currently preserved on 00:01:58.980 --> 00:02:00.760 the Project Gutenberg archive free for anyone 00:02:00.760 --> 00:02:03.939 to read. And our specific focus for this deep 00:02:03.939 --> 00:02:06.159 dive is to try and reconstruct that impending 00:02:06.159 --> 00:02:09.360 Roman conquest entirely from the viewpoint of 00:02:09.360 --> 00:02:11.539 an ancient British tribe member. rather than 00:02:11.539 --> 00:02:15.759 just defaulting to that traditional lens of the 00:02:15.759 --> 00:02:18.500 Roman conqueror. Right. Which, I mean, that presents 00:02:18.500 --> 00:02:20.639 a massive hurdle for us, doesn't it? Oh, a massive 00:02:20.639 --> 00:02:23.780 hurdle. For us as researchers today, and definitely 00:02:23.780 --> 00:02:26.659 for Holmes as a historian back in the early 1900s, 00:02:27.120 --> 00:02:29.919 the primary conflict at the heart of this source 00:02:29.919 --> 00:02:32.840 material is that we're trying to reconstruct 00:02:32.840 --> 00:02:36.590 the daily life the prehistoric culture, the development 00:02:36.590 --> 00:02:38.830 of early British society. But so is a catch. 00:02:38.949 --> 00:02:42.370 There's a huge catch. We are facing the severe, 00:02:42.610 --> 00:02:45.310 almost echoing lack of written records from the 00:02:45.310 --> 00:02:47.530 Britons themselves. They just didn't write things 00:02:47.530 --> 00:02:49.930 down. No, they didn't. The Celtic tribes of Britain 00:02:49.930 --> 00:02:53.150 in the Iron Age had this incredibly rich oral 00:02:53.150 --> 00:02:55.889 tradition, right? It was maintained by the Druidic 00:02:55.889 --> 00:02:58.169 class. The Druids, yeah. But they committed almost 00:02:58.169 --> 00:03:01.629 nothing of their history or their poetry or their 00:03:01.629 --> 00:03:04.610 political alliances to writing. memorized. Okay 00:03:04.610 --> 00:03:07.009 let's unpack this for a second because how do 00:03:07.009 --> 00:03:08.930 you tell the story of your people when the only 00:03:08.930 --> 00:03:11.710 person writing anything down is the general actively 00:03:11.710 --> 00:03:14.530 trying to conquer you? Yeah that is the ultimate 00:03:14.530 --> 00:03:16.710 methodological challenge. It's a paradox. It 00:03:16.710 --> 00:03:19.509 is and the source material emphasizes the sheer 00:03:19.509 --> 00:03:22.629 complexity of reconstructing Britain's prehistory 00:03:22.629 --> 00:03:26.289 precisely because of this silence. I mean without 00:03:26.289 --> 00:03:30.250 a British archive their internal thoughts the 00:03:30.250 --> 00:03:33.520 the complex diplomacy between tribes like the 00:03:33.520 --> 00:03:35.599 Trinovantes and the Cattavallani, that's all 00:03:35.599 --> 00:03:37.460 on. All those political rivalries. Completely 00:03:37.460 --> 00:03:40.960 hidden. Their daily fears, as this Roman juggernaut 00:03:40.960 --> 00:03:43.979 loomed across the water in Gaul, all of that 00:03:43.979 --> 00:03:45.979 remains hidden from the traditional literary 00:03:45.979 --> 00:03:49.060 historian's view. So what do we do? Well, it 00:03:49.060 --> 00:03:51.319 forces a complete shift in how we uncover the 00:03:51.319 --> 00:03:53.740 truth. Like if you cannot read the texts, you 00:03:53.740 --> 00:03:55.900 have to read the earth. Read the earth. I love 00:03:55.900 --> 00:03:57.699 that. You know, it reminds me of a scenario. 00:03:57.740 --> 00:04:00.139 It's like trying to figure out the plot of a 00:04:00.139 --> 00:04:02.379 massively complex, multi -layered movie. But 00:04:02.379 --> 00:04:04.620 you don't have the script. No script at all. 00:04:04.740 --> 00:04:06.240 You don't have the director's notes. You don't 00:04:06.240 --> 00:04:09.060 even have the audio track. All you have is unrestricted 00:04:09.060 --> 00:04:10.879 access to the prop department. That's a great 00:04:10.879 --> 00:04:13.360 way to put it. You have to guess the entire story, 00:04:13.659 --> 00:04:16.639 the motivations, and the culture based entirely 00:04:16.639 --> 00:04:18.920 on the physical object left behind in the warehouse. 00:04:19.379 --> 00:04:21.939 That analogy actually cuts right to the core 00:04:21.939 --> 00:04:25.000 of Holmes's methodology in the book. He relies 00:04:25.000 --> 00:04:28.300 heavily on what he calls, quote, rich archaeological 00:04:28.300 --> 00:04:31.759 evidence. The props. The props, exactly. But 00:04:31.759 --> 00:04:33.920 reading that prop department isn't just about 00:04:33.920 --> 00:04:36.300 cataloging objects and putting them on a shelf. 00:04:36.720 --> 00:04:39.060 It requires an entirely different scientific 00:04:39.060 --> 00:04:43.000 language. Like what? Well, Holmes leans into 00:04:43.000 --> 00:04:45.750 the emerging sciences of his time. Things like 00:04:45.750 --> 00:04:48.069 stratigraphy. Oh, right. The layers of the dirt. 00:04:48.329 --> 00:04:50.529 Exactly. The idea that the depper you dig into 00:04:50.529 --> 00:04:53.569 the soil, the further back in time you go, layer 00:04:53.569 --> 00:04:55.490 by layer. So you're reading time as a physical 00:04:55.490 --> 00:04:59.410 depth. Yes. And he also jives deep into ethnology, 00:04:59.490 --> 00:05:01.750 which is essentially mapping out the cultural 00:05:01.750 --> 00:05:04.810 and genetic family tree of these tribes. So you're 00:05:04.810 --> 00:05:06.649 sure they weren't just one big, identical group 00:05:06.649 --> 00:05:08.410 of people? Right. They weren't a monolith. They 00:05:08.410 --> 00:05:10.790 were a diverse landscape of totally different 00:05:10.790 --> 00:05:13.410 peoples with distinct customs. So when we look 00:05:13.410 --> 00:05:15.800 at the prop department of ancient Britain, we 00:05:15.800 --> 00:05:18.319 aren't just looking at like a rusty sword and 00:05:18.319 --> 00:05:21.579 moving on. We're reading the evolution of their 00:05:21.579 --> 00:05:24.180 culture through time. Because if you are that 00:05:24.180 --> 00:05:26.459 ancient British tribe member, you know, the one 00:05:26.459 --> 00:05:29.339 standing on the cliff. These artifacts aren't 00:05:29.339 --> 00:05:31.879 antiquities to be put behind glass in a museum. 00:05:32.120 --> 00:05:34.720 No, they're your daily reality. They're your 00:05:34.720 --> 00:05:36.740 life. So what kind of objects are we talking 00:05:36.740 --> 00:05:38.220 about here? Give me some examples of what Holmes 00:05:38.220 --> 00:05:40.579 is looking at. OK, consider the artifacts found 00:05:40.579 --> 00:05:43.139 at places like the Glastonbury Lake Village. 00:05:43.680 --> 00:05:46.040 Holmes incorporates this heavily into his understanding 00:05:46.040 --> 00:05:48.660 of Celtic antiquity. Glastonbury Lake Village. 00:05:48.959 --> 00:05:51.660 What did they find there? We are talking about 00:05:51.660 --> 00:05:56.009 intricately carved weaving combs. really beautically 00:05:56.009 --> 00:06:00.129 decorated pottery and glass beads that actually 00:06:00.129 --> 00:06:01.930 had to be imported from the continent. Wait, 00:06:02.149 --> 00:06:06.060 imported? From mainland Europe? Yes. These physical 00:06:06.060 --> 00:06:07.920 objects prove that the Britons were engaging 00:06:07.920 --> 00:06:10.800 in complex manufacturing and international trade 00:06:10.800 --> 00:06:13.560 long before Caesar ever even thought about crossing 00:06:13.560 --> 00:06:15.540 the channel. Oh, wow. So they were already tied 00:06:15.540 --> 00:06:17.740 into the global economy, basically. They absolutely 00:06:17.740 --> 00:06:20.379 were. And these objects, they serve as the only 00:06:20.379 --> 00:06:24.800 true unbiased witnesses to early British life. 00:06:24.990 --> 00:06:27.170 Unbiased, right, because a pot doesn't have an 00:06:27.170 --> 00:06:30.569 agenda. Exactly. A Roman senator's speech has 00:06:30.569 --> 00:06:34.230 a huge political agenda. But a Celtic stater, 00:06:34.670 --> 00:06:36.889 which is a type of gold coin minted by British 00:06:36.889 --> 00:06:40.730 tribes, has no political motivation. A Celtic 00:06:40.730 --> 00:06:42.449 stater. Did they come up with that design on 00:06:42.449 --> 00:06:45.399 their own? Well, they mimicked Greek and Macedonian 00:06:45.399 --> 00:06:47.699 designs, actually. No way. Greek designs in Britain. 00:06:47.839 --> 00:06:50.759 Yeah. And the existence of this coinage simply 00:06:50.759 --> 00:06:53.399 proves that the local economy was sophisticated 00:06:53.399 --> 00:06:56.740 enough to require high value currency. You don't 00:06:56.740 --> 00:06:59.319 mint gold coins unless you have a complex trade 00:06:59.319 --> 00:07:02.269 system. Right, and that completely shatters the 00:07:02.269 --> 00:07:05.410 idea that British society was just sitting around 00:07:05.410 --> 00:07:08.629 in the mud, completely static, just waiting for 00:07:08.629 --> 00:07:11.470 Rome to arrive so civilization could officially 00:07:11.470 --> 00:07:14.009 begin. That's the myth, and it's totally false. 00:07:14.170 --> 00:07:16.610 The artifacts prove they were a developing, evolving 00:07:16.610 --> 00:07:19.029 people. They were undergoing their own massive 00:07:19.029 --> 00:07:21.069 social and cultural transition. Yeah, they were 00:07:21.069 --> 00:07:22.910 mining tin and cornwall, they were exporting 00:07:22.910 --> 00:07:25.589 hunting dogs. Hunting dogs, that's so specific. 00:07:25.670 --> 00:07:28.449 And grain, lots of grain. And they were forging 00:07:28.449 --> 00:07:31.439 iron weapons with beautiful enamel inlays that 00:07:31.439 --> 00:07:33.560 actually rivaled anything being produced in the 00:07:33.560 --> 00:07:35.759 Mediterranean at the time. So the physical evidence 00:07:35.759 --> 00:07:38.720 establishes this incredibly vibrant evolving 00:07:38.720 --> 00:07:42.199 world. The Britons had a deeply rooted framework 00:07:42.199 --> 00:07:45.439 of existence. A very rich culture. And establishing 00:07:45.439 --> 00:07:48.019 that reality is essential for our deep dive today. 00:07:48.240 --> 00:07:51.379 because we have to contrast that rich physical 00:07:51.379 --> 00:07:53.699 truth with how the Romans actually viewed them 00:07:53.699 --> 00:07:56.139 right before the invasion. Right. The view from 00:07:56.139 --> 00:07:58.399 across the water. Which brings us to a detail 00:07:58.399 --> 00:08:01.259 in the text that is just, it's wild when you 00:08:01.259 --> 00:08:03.160 think about the military logistics involved. 00:08:03.339 --> 00:08:06.040 Ah, it's baffling. T. Rice Holmes notes that 00:08:06.040 --> 00:08:08.980 Julius Caesar made, quote, initial inquiries 00:08:08.980 --> 00:08:12.810 into Britain. but he acquired only scant knowledge 00:08:12.810 --> 00:08:15.410 about its peoples, its tribes, and its customs. 00:08:15.629 --> 00:08:17.970 Scant knowledge. It is a staggering admission 00:08:17.970 --> 00:08:20.250 of ignorance from one of antiquity's greatest 00:08:20.250 --> 00:08:22.709 tacticians. Wait, if we connect this to the bigger 00:08:22.709 --> 00:08:25.870 picture, how does one of history's greatest military 00:08:25.870 --> 00:08:29.069 minds plan an amphibious invasion of an entirely 00:08:29.069 --> 00:08:32.730 new landmass with only scant knowledge of the 00:08:32.730 --> 00:08:34.730 people he's invading? It makes no sense, right? 00:08:35.070 --> 00:08:38.980 None. How do you feed two legions if you don't 00:08:38.980 --> 00:08:41.580 know the agricultural capacity of the land? How 00:08:41.580 --> 00:08:43.360 do you even land your ships if you don't know 00:08:43.360 --> 00:08:45.779 where the harbors are? The short answer is that 00:08:45.779 --> 00:08:48.480 he planned it very poorly and it nearly cost 00:08:48.480 --> 00:08:50.759 him everything. So why didn't he know more? To 00:08:50.759 --> 00:08:53.120 understand why his knowledge was so scared we 00:08:53.120 --> 00:08:55.200 have to look at how he gathered his intelligence 00:08:55.200 --> 00:08:58.320 in the first place. Okay. Caesar summoned the 00:08:58.320 --> 00:09:01.700 merchants from Gaul who traded with Britain and 00:09:01.700 --> 00:09:04.539 he interrogated them. Make sense. Talk to the 00:09:04.539 --> 00:09:06.480 guys making the trip. Right, but think about 00:09:06.480 --> 00:09:09.299 the incentives there. These merchants held a 00:09:09.299 --> 00:09:11.899 highly lucrative monopoly on the cross channel 00:09:11.899 --> 00:09:15.080 trade in tin and grain. Oh, I see where this 00:09:15.080 --> 00:09:17.379 is going. Yeah. The absolute last thing they 00:09:17.379 --> 00:09:19.919 wanted was the Roman military taking over their 00:09:19.919 --> 00:09:22.639 trade routes. So they lied to him. They essentially 00:09:22.639 --> 00:09:25.379 feigned total ignorance. They told Caesar they 00:09:25.379 --> 00:09:26.940 didn't know how big the island was. They didn't 00:09:26.940 --> 00:09:28.440 know what tribes live there. They didn't know 00:09:28.440 --> 00:09:31.220 what their military tactics were. That is incredible. 00:09:31.659 --> 00:09:34.080 They stonewalled the most powerful man in Europe 00:09:34.080 --> 00:09:37.059 just to protect their profit margins. They absolutely 00:09:37.059 --> 00:09:39.250 did. But let's put ourselves back in the shoes 00:09:39.250 --> 00:09:41.389 of that British tribe member for a second. OK. 00:09:41.710 --> 00:09:44.529 You belong to a society with those complex trade 00:09:44.529 --> 00:09:46.789 networks we just talked about. You are minting 00:09:46.789 --> 00:09:49.230 your own gold coins. You have a deep spiritual 00:09:49.230 --> 00:09:51.529 connection to the land overseen by the Druids. 00:09:51.830 --> 00:09:55.970 Right. And there is a massive militaristic empire 00:09:55.970 --> 00:09:58.529 looking across the water at you, and they send 00:09:58.529 --> 00:10:00.889 a scout ship. Commanded by a guy named Volusinus. 00:10:01.009 --> 00:10:03.370 Right, Volusinus. And this guy just sails up 00:10:03.370 --> 00:10:05.750 and down the coast for, what, five days? Yeah, 00:10:05.789 --> 00:10:08.309 five days. And he never even lands the boat. 00:10:08.549 --> 00:10:11.029 He never even lands. And based on that Caesar 00:10:11.029 --> 00:10:14.340 decides to invade. The arrogance of it is just 00:10:14.340 --> 00:10:16.639 palpable. It really is. I mean to be invaded 00:10:16.639 --> 00:10:19.960 is a horrific trauma for any society. But to 00:10:19.960 --> 00:10:22.679 be invaded by an entity that possesses only scant 00:10:22.679 --> 00:10:25.000 knowledge of your customs, that views you not 00:10:25.000 --> 00:10:28.200 as a complex network of nations, but merely as 00:10:28.200 --> 00:10:31.679 a barbarian blank space on a map, it highlights 00:10:31.679 --> 00:10:34.240 a really unique kind of vulnerability. Because 00:10:34.240 --> 00:10:36.240 they aren't treating you like human beings with 00:10:36.240 --> 00:10:39.330 a culture. Exactly. The Romans didn't understand 00:10:39.330 --> 00:10:42.129 the political rivalries between the British tribes. 00:10:42.529 --> 00:10:44.309 Rivalries that they could have easily exploited, 00:10:44.330 --> 00:10:46.470 by the way. Which they did everywhere else. Exactly. 00:10:46.529 --> 00:10:48.889 They didn't understand the landscape. They didn't 00:10:48.889 --> 00:10:51.649 even understand the tides of the English Channel. 00:10:52.190 --> 00:10:54.250 Oh, right. The tides. Yeah, the tides in the 00:10:54.250 --> 00:10:56.590 channel are vastly different from the tideless 00:10:56.590 --> 00:10:58.730 Mediterranean Sea that the Romans were used to 00:10:58.730 --> 00:11:02.429 sailing in. The danger of that asymmetry is massive. 00:11:02.590 --> 00:11:06.490 Huge. Because on one hand, you have the profound 00:11:06.830 --> 00:11:09.889 deeply rooted social structures of the Britons, 00:11:10.250 --> 00:11:12.889 which is backed up by undeniable archaeological 00:11:12.889 --> 00:11:15.250 evidence. The props in the warehouse. The props. 00:11:15.389 --> 00:11:17.909 And on the other hand, you have a foreign conqueror 00:11:17.909 --> 00:11:20.509 operating completely in the dark, relying on 00:11:20.509 --> 00:11:23.389 superficial inquiries and faulty intelligence 00:11:23.389 --> 00:11:26.850 from merchants who are lying to him. And that 00:11:26.850 --> 00:11:29.750 asymmetry directly led to chaos when the two 00:11:29.750 --> 00:11:32.090 forces finally collided. So let's talk about 00:11:32.090 --> 00:11:34.379 that collision. We have to. We have this rich 00:11:34.379 --> 00:11:36.720 culture of the Britons, you know, whispered through 00:11:36.720 --> 00:11:39.080 their artifacts and earthworks. And we have the 00:11:39.080 --> 00:11:42.240 blind spots of Caesar documented in his own writings. 00:11:42.759 --> 00:11:45.659 So we must examine what actually happens when 00:11:45.659 --> 00:11:49.059 prehistory violently meets Roman influence during 00:11:49.059 --> 00:11:52.639 these expeditions of 55 and 54 BC. Here's where 00:11:52.639 --> 00:11:55.220 it gets really interesting. because the source 00:11:55.220 --> 00:11:58.580 explicitly focuses on the period, quote, leading 00:11:58.580 --> 00:12:01.220 up to Roman influence. Which is a very specific 00:12:01.220 --> 00:12:03.419 framing. It is. It paints a picture of early 00:12:03.419 --> 00:12:06.200 British society right on the brink. This invasion 00:12:06.200 --> 00:12:08.600 wasn't just a sudden clean military event where 00:12:08.600 --> 00:12:11.259 Roman troops landed, planted a flag and left. 00:12:11.379 --> 00:12:14.539 Not at all. It was a distinct, highly stressful 00:12:14.539 --> 00:12:17.679 twilight period for these tribes. The text uses 00:12:17.679 --> 00:12:19.980 an archaeological framework to understand the 00:12:19.980 --> 00:12:22.039 influence of these early invasions. It was a 00:12:22.039 --> 00:12:24.679 massive cultural shock. And that shockwave was 00:12:24.679 --> 00:12:27.039 both physical and psychological. I mean, when 00:12:27.039 --> 00:12:29.340 Caesar finally attempted to land his forces on 00:12:29.340 --> 00:12:32.139 the beaches of Kent, his scant knowledge immediately 00:12:32.139 --> 00:12:35.039 betrayed him. How so? What happened? Well, his 00:12:35.039 --> 00:12:37.000 heavy transport ships couldn't get close enough 00:12:37.000 --> 00:12:39.500 to the shore. He didn't understand the shallow 00:12:39.500 --> 00:12:41.820 shelving of the British beaches. Oh, so the boats 00:12:41.820 --> 00:12:43.620 are getting stuck out in the water. Exactly. 00:12:44.240 --> 00:12:46.679 So his heavily armored legionaries had to jump 00:12:46.679 --> 00:12:49.970 into deep water. In full armor. In full armor, 00:12:50.330 --> 00:12:52.850 wading toward the beach, struggling just to keep 00:12:52.850 --> 00:12:55.850 their heads above water, while the Britons, who 00:12:55.850 --> 00:12:57.990 obviously knew exactly how to fight on their 00:12:57.990 --> 00:13:01.330 own terrain, rode their chariots right to the 00:13:01.330 --> 00:13:03.909 water's edge. Just raining down weapons on them. 00:13:04.090 --> 00:13:07.309 Raining down javelins. It terrified the Roman 00:13:07.309 --> 00:13:09.669 troops. Let's talk about those chariots for a 00:13:09.669 --> 00:13:11.830 second, because the text makes a big deal about 00:13:11.830 --> 00:13:14.929 Celtic antiquity and ethnology, and chariotry 00:13:14.929 --> 00:13:16.710 is a huge part of that, right? Oh, it's central 00:13:16.710 --> 00:13:20.440 to their warfare. Because the Romans had largely 00:13:20.440 --> 00:13:23.879 abandoned the war chariot centuries prior, but 00:13:23.879 --> 00:13:26.259 the Britons had perfected it. They had turned 00:13:26.259 --> 00:13:29.179 it into a highly mobile psychological weapon. 00:13:29.720 --> 00:13:32.059 Holmes details how the British charioteers would 00:13:32.059 --> 00:13:34.759 drive furiously across the battlefield. Just 00:13:34.759 --> 00:13:37.200 the noise of the wheels alone caused panic among 00:13:37.200 --> 00:13:39.919 the Roman ranks. I can imagine. And then the 00:13:39.919 --> 00:13:41.980 warriors would actually run out onto the pole 00:13:41.980 --> 00:13:44.740 of the chariot. Wait, while it's moving? While 00:13:44.740 --> 00:13:46.980 it's moving at full speed. They run out, throw 00:13:46.980 --> 00:13:49.220 their weapons, and then retreat back into the 00:13:49.220 --> 00:13:51.940 cart. That is insane. It's like an ancient drive 00:13:51.940 --> 00:13:55.519 -by. It was a sophisticated, highly trained military 00:13:55.519 --> 00:13:58.940 tactic. And it completely caught Caesar's legions 00:13:58.940 --> 00:14:02.240 off guard. Because, again, his initial inquiries 00:14:02.240 --> 00:14:05.100 failed to reveal the true nature of British warfare. 00:14:05.519 --> 00:14:08.259 So let me ask you this. If the written records... 00:14:08.269 --> 00:14:10.950 which we know are largely from Caesar's own commentaries 00:14:10.950 --> 00:14:14.029 on the Gallic War, are fundamentally based on 00:14:14.029 --> 00:14:17.549 this scant knowledge and his need to, you know, 00:14:17.629 --> 00:14:19.950 look good for the politicians back in Rome. Right. 00:14:19.950 --> 00:14:22.649 It's basically propaganda. Does that mean our 00:14:22.649 --> 00:14:25.009 archaeological framework actively contradicts 00:14:25.009 --> 00:14:27.730 the Roman story? Like if the props in the warehouse 00:14:27.730 --> 00:14:30.110 don't match the script Caesar wrote, how do we 00:14:30.110 --> 00:14:32.389 synthesize the truth? That's the perfect question. 00:14:32.529 --> 00:14:34.789 We look at where the dirt proves the ink wrong. 00:14:34.990 --> 00:14:37.149 I like that. Where the dirt proves the ink wrong. 00:14:37.710 --> 00:14:39.750 Yeah. And Holmes's great contribution is that 00:14:39.750 --> 00:14:42.110 he doesn't just throw out Caesar's writings completely, 00:14:42.629 --> 00:14:45.149 but he refuses to take them as absolute truth. 00:14:45.389 --> 00:14:48.149 Give me an example. OK. Caesar famously wrote 00:14:48.149 --> 00:14:50.470 that the Britons living in the interior of the 00:14:50.470 --> 00:14:53.529 island did not sow corn. He said they lived on 00:14:53.529 --> 00:14:57.690 milk and flesh and clothed themselves in skins. 00:14:57.830 --> 00:15:00.669 So he painted them as absolute savages. Entirely 00:15:00.669 --> 00:15:02.950 to justify the difficulty of his campaign. Like, 00:15:02.990 --> 00:15:05.169 look how wild and barbaric these people are. 00:15:05.210 --> 00:15:07.899 No wonder it took me so long. Department says 00:15:07.899 --> 00:15:11.299 otherwise. Radically otherwise. Modern archaeology 00:15:11.299 --> 00:15:13.899 building on the framework Holmes utilized has 00:15:13.899 --> 00:15:16.879 uncovered massive Iron Age hillforts, places 00:15:16.879 --> 00:15:19.509 like Dainbury. Dainbury. What's there? Danebury 00:15:19.509 --> 00:15:22.049 contains hundreds of deep pits dug specifically 00:15:22.049 --> 00:15:24.870 for the storage of massive agricultural surpluses 00:15:24.870 --> 00:15:27.769 of grain. Wait, massive surpluses. So they were 00:15:27.769 --> 00:15:30.549 farming a lot. A ton. And the artifacts, like 00:15:30.549 --> 00:15:33.090 the iron plowshares, the rotary corns they used 00:15:33.090 --> 00:15:35.909 for grinding the grain, they prove beyond a shadow 00:15:35.909 --> 00:15:38.590 of a doubt that the inland Britons were heavily 00:15:38.590 --> 00:15:41.330 engaged in widespread organized agriculture. 00:15:41.509 --> 00:15:44.070 So Caesar was just completely wrong. He was simply 00:15:44.070 --> 00:15:47.070 wrong. Either through ignorance or more likely 00:15:47.070 --> 00:15:50.509 deliberate propaganda. So P. Rice Holmes is essentially 00:15:50.509 --> 00:15:52.730 fact checking the Roman Empire. That's exactly 00:15:52.730 --> 00:15:56.029 what he's doing. By forcing Caesar's flawed politically 00:15:56.029 --> 00:15:59.250 motivated written accounts to sit side by side 00:15:59.250 --> 00:16:02.009 with the undeniable physical truths of Celtic 00:16:02.009 --> 00:16:05.470 antiquities, Holmes achieves a much closer approximation 00:16:05.470 --> 00:16:08.970 of what that British tribe member actually experienced. 00:16:09.250 --> 00:16:11.429 We can see where Caesar misunderstood a custom. 00:16:11.720 --> 00:16:14.519 because the archaeological record shows us the 00:16:14.519 --> 00:16:17.139 reality of that custom. Exactly. The artifacts 00:16:17.139 --> 00:16:20.100 provide the rich complex context that Caesar 00:16:20.100 --> 00:16:22.279 entirely missed while he was just, you know, 00:16:22.419 --> 00:16:24.320 trying to salvage his wrecked ships on the beaches 00:16:24.320 --> 00:16:27.299 of Kent. Wow. Okay, so what does this all mean 00:16:27.299 --> 00:16:30.649 for us today? That's a big question. It is. We've 00:16:30.649 --> 00:16:32.809 explored this ancient conflict, the silence of 00:16:32.809 --> 00:16:34.990 the Britons, the tactical ignorance of the Romans, 00:16:35.289 --> 00:16:37.450 and the collision of those two worlds. But I 00:16:37.450 --> 00:16:39.309 want to shift gears for a second and talk about 00:16:39.309 --> 00:16:42.230 how this specific history, this synthesis by 00:16:42.230 --> 00:16:44.990 T. Rice Holmes, has been preserved and delivered 00:16:44.990 --> 00:16:47.549 to you, the modern listener. Right. The medium 00:16:47.549 --> 00:16:49.789 is just as interesting as the message here. Because 00:16:49.789 --> 00:16:52.539 the text we are referencing isn't exactly a new 00:16:52.539 --> 00:16:55.139 release. No, the metadata surrounding the source 00:16:55.139 --> 00:16:57.740 is actually a fascinating reflection on the endurance 00:16:57.740 --> 00:17:00.919 of knowledge. T. Rice Holmes lived from 1855 00:17:00.919 --> 00:17:04.140 to 1933. Oh, wow. OK. Yeah. And this historical 00:17:04.140 --> 00:17:06.680 account was published in the early 1900s. Yet 00:17:06.680 --> 00:17:09.380 it remains highly relevant and actively sought 00:17:09.380 --> 00:17:11.819 after today. It really does. When you look at 00:17:11.819 --> 00:17:14.400 the Project Gutenberg archive, this highly specific 00:17:14.400 --> 00:17:17.279 text about Celtic antiquities and Roman military 00:17:17.279 --> 00:17:21.559 strategy had over 4000 downloads in just a 30 00:17:21.559 --> 00:17:24.420 day period. 4000 downloads for a century old 00:17:24.420 --> 00:17:26.680 academic text. That's pretty remarkable. It is. 00:17:26.740 --> 00:17:28.920 And what stands out even more is it reading ease 00:17:28.920 --> 00:17:31.259 score. Oh yeah the metadata on that is really 00:17:31.259 --> 00:17:34.019 interesting. The metadata lists a score of 69 00:17:34.019 --> 00:17:36.819 .9 which equates to an eighth and ninth grade 00:17:36.819 --> 00:17:39.450 reading level. It explicitly notes it is, quote, 00:17:39.630 --> 00:17:41.809 neither easy nor difficult to read. And that 00:17:41.809 --> 00:17:44.150 score highlights exactly why Holmes' work has 00:17:44.150 --> 00:17:46.569 survived the century. How so? Well, he took an 00:17:46.569 --> 00:17:49.210 incredibly dense, multidisciplinary subject. 00:17:49.289 --> 00:17:52.309 I mean, he's combining classical philology, military 00:17:52.309 --> 00:17:55.210 history, ethnology, and the emerging science 00:17:55.210 --> 00:17:57.710 of archaeology. That's a lot of etiologies. It 00:17:57.710 --> 00:18:01.609 is, but he synthesized it so cleanly that a modern 00:18:01.609 --> 00:18:04.289 reader, someone without a PhD in ancient history, 00:18:04.650 --> 00:18:08.109 can actually grasp the profound cultural transitions 00:18:08.109 --> 00:18:10.589 of early British society. He's basically doing 00:18:10.589 --> 00:18:13.430 what we try to do on this deep dive. Exactly. 00:18:13.509 --> 00:18:16.549 He took the impenetrable academic jargon and 00:18:16.549 --> 00:18:18.970 distilled it into the story of people. And if 00:18:18.970 --> 00:18:21.390 we connect this to the bigger picture, the role 00:18:21.390 --> 00:18:24.390 of archives like Project Gutenberg is essentially 00:18:24.390 --> 00:18:27.230 doing for Holmes what Holmes did for the ancient 00:18:27.230 --> 00:18:29.569 Britons. That's a great point. We are digitizing 00:18:29.569 --> 00:18:32.579 and distributing this work for free. across multiple 00:18:32.579 --> 00:18:36.579 formats, like EPUB, Kindle, HTML, ensuring it 00:18:36.579 --> 00:18:38.680 doesn't just decay in some locked university 00:18:38.680 --> 00:18:41.329 vault. There is a really beautiful symmetry there. 00:18:41.529 --> 00:18:44.170 The preservation of this early 20th century text 00:18:44.170 --> 00:18:46.970 mirrors the preservation of the prehistoric artifacts 00:18:46.970 --> 00:18:49.890 themselves. Yes. Just as the surviving iron tools, 00:18:50.029 --> 00:18:52.329 the gold stators, and the grain pits at Danebury 00:18:52.329 --> 00:18:55.210 allow us to access those voiceless ancient Britons, 00:18:55.890 --> 00:18:58.369 digital archives allow modern learners free access 00:18:58.369 --> 00:19:01.329 to foundational historical texts. Both the physical 00:19:01.329 --> 00:19:03.609 artifacts in the earth and the digital files 00:19:03.609 --> 00:19:06.420 on a server. are just vehicles for preserving 00:19:06.420 --> 00:19:09.000 the story of our past against the erosion of 00:19:09.000 --> 00:19:11.559 time. They're both ways of fighting back against 00:19:11.559 --> 00:19:14.319 the silence. Okay, as we wrap up today's journey, 00:19:14.559 --> 00:19:17.000 let's just recap what we've unpacked here. We've 00:19:17.000 --> 00:19:19.819 covered a lot of ground. We really have. We started 00:19:19.819 --> 00:19:22.299 with the silent landscape on the cliffs of Dover, 00:19:22.460 --> 00:19:25.279 facing a historical record entirely dominated 00:19:25.279 --> 00:19:27.700 by the conqueror holding the pen. Right, the 00:19:27.700 --> 00:19:30.059 Roman perspective. But using T. Rice Holmes' 00:19:30.279 --> 00:19:32.920 framework, we learned how to peer past those 00:19:32.920 --> 00:19:35.730 missing written records. We push back against 00:19:35.730 --> 00:19:39.109 Julius Caesar's scant knowledge and his profound, 00:19:39.390 --> 00:19:42.089 almost arrogant misunderstanding of the complex 00:19:42.089 --> 00:19:44.849 Celtic society he was invading. We replaced his 00:19:44.849 --> 00:19:47.369 Roman propaganda with the rich archaeological 00:19:47.369 --> 00:19:49.730 evidence. The whisper of the artifact. Exactly. 00:19:49.950 --> 00:19:52.809 The coinage, the chariots, the agricultural infrastructure. 00:19:53.470 --> 00:19:55.670 This allowed us to feel the cultural transitions 00:19:55.670 --> 00:19:58.269 of early British society, not just as a footnote 00:19:58.269 --> 00:20:01.349 in Roman history, but as a vibrant world experiencing 00:20:01.349 --> 00:20:04.849 a stressful, world -altering cultural shockwave. 00:20:05.089 --> 00:20:06.970 From the viewpoint of the tribes themselves. 00:20:07.470 --> 00:20:10.109 Exactly. We fact -checked the conquerors with 00:20:10.109 --> 00:20:12.730 the prop department of history. The prop department 00:20:12.730 --> 00:20:16.170 never lies. It really doesn't. History is rarely 00:20:16.170 --> 00:20:19.190 as clean or as one -sided as the official written 00:20:19.190 --> 00:20:22.069 records suggest. Seeking out multiple perspectives 00:20:22.069 --> 00:20:24.950 and combining literary texts with the hard truths 00:20:24.950 --> 00:20:27.930 of archaeology is absolutely essential to finding 00:20:27.930 --> 00:20:30.630 anything resembling the truth of the human experience. 00:20:31.069 --> 00:20:33.269 Which brings us to the end of our deep dive today. 00:20:33.609 --> 00:20:35.410 But before you go, I want to leave you with a 00:20:35.410 --> 00:20:37.690 final lingering thought. Something to ponder. 00:20:37.829 --> 00:20:40.410 Yeah, something to chew on long after you finish 00:20:40.410 --> 00:20:42.789 listening. We spent this time talking about how 00:20:42.789 --> 00:20:45.390 Caesar fundamentally misunderstood the ancient 00:20:45.390 --> 00:20:48.450 Britons based on his scant knowledge and how 00:20:48.450 --> 00:20:50.970 historians had to rely on the physical artifacts 00:20:50.970 --> 00:20:53.549 they left behind. You know, their tools, their 00:20:53.549 --> 00:20:56.130 homes, their trash to know the true complexity 00:20:56.130 --> 00:20:58.849 of their culture. Right. So think about your 00:20:58.849 --> 00:21:00.950 own life right now. Think about your daily routines, 00:21:01.150 --> 00:21:04.049 your apartment, your car, the objects you use 00:21:04.049 --> 00:21:06.509 and discard every single day. The physical stuff 00:21:06.509 --> 00:21:10.109 of your life. Exactly. If an invading force with 00:21:10.109 --> 00:21:12.650 scant knowledge of our modern world were to arrive 00:21:12.650 --> 00:21:15.150 centuries from now and they can only look at 00:21:15.150 --> 00:21:18.129 the physical artifacts you leave behind. What 00:21:18.129 --> 00:21:21.269 completely inaccurate, totally wild story would 00:21:21.269 --> 00:21:23.529 they tell about your tribe, your customs, and 00:21:23.529 --> 00:21:26.930 your culture? It's a humbling and really fascinating 00:21:26.930 --> 00:21:29.769 question to ask ourselves. It really is. Thank 00:21:29.769 --> 00:21:31.849 you so much for exploring the lost voices of 00:21:31.849 --> 00:21:34.170 ancient Britain with us today. Keep questioning 00:21:34.170 --> 00:21:36.170 the official record, keep looking for the artifacts 00:21:36.170 --> 00:21:38.589 in the dirt, and we'll see you on the next Deep 00:21:38.589 --> 00:21:38.950 Dive.