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Proelium ad Viam Vitellinam
About
Governor Suetonius Paulinus, with only about 10,000 legionaries against a far larger Britons force, chose a narrow defile that neutralized Queen Boudica's numbers and funneled her warriors onto Roman javelins. Tacitus claimed roughly 80,000 Britons died against fewer than 400 Romans. Boudica died soon after, ending her revolt following the burning of Camulodunum, Londinium, and Verulamium. Historians still dispute the exact battlefield among several candidate sites.
What happened here
A Roman army fights the way it camps: in lines, by drill, on ground chosen if possible. The legions form up in cohorts with gaps that let ranks rotate, throw a volley of heavy javelins at close range, and then close with the short sword, pushing behind the shield. Auxiliaries hold the flanks and do most of the cavalry work and most of the skirmishing. Battles are short and decided by whether one line breaks, and the killing happens in the pursuit rather than the fighting. The camp is dug and palisaded every night regardless. Afterwards the dead are stripped and the field is looted for days; the ground is remembered locally long after the campaign is a paragraph in someone's history.
Sources
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