Blood Slakes The Sand At The Circus Maximus Lyrics

Blood Slakes The Sand At The Circus Maximus lyrics

THOUGHTS OF AN ICENI GLADIATOR,
AWAITING THE OPENING OF THE ARENA
PORTCULLIS:

MEMORIES OF REBELLION (CARNAGE AT CAMULODUNUM):

ICENI
MESSENGER:
Hearken! The Ninth Legion has been put to the sword!
The
war-Chief of Queen Boudicca: Onwards to Camulodunum...
wet your swords!
Redden the earth with Roman blood!

I remember the carnage at
Camulodunum...
The glorious clash of Celtic sword against Roman
gladius,
The pride in the eyes of our war-queen
As we hacked down the
Imperial Eagle,
And the severed heads of centurions gaping atop our
spears.

BLOODSHED AND BATTLE: 61 AD (C.E.)

???

We
certainly taught the arrogant invading dogs a lesson, at any rate.
The omens
and portents spoke of vast bloodshed and great carnage,
and after our
slaughterous victories at Camulodunum (the Temple
of Claudius burned
wonderfully!), Londinium and Verulanium,
the cursed Romans finally dared to
meet us honourably upon the field
of war at Mandeussedum. They sent fifteen
thousand legionaires,
their armour gleaming like gold in the sun... but it
would still yield to our
swords and spears, no matter how it
sparkled.

The Roman scoundrel, Governor Suetonius
Paullinus,
battle-scarred from his campaigns against the Druids,
was able
to choose the ground upon which to make his stand,
and so it was that he
selected as the battlefield a narrow valley,
fronted by a flat plain, with
dense woodland at its rear. Aye...
Mandeussedum, "the place of the
chariots"... I remember it vividly.

???

We were swelled by our
victories,
empowered by our noble cause,
enraged with the battle
frenzy;
thirsting to take as many Roman heads
as our bright blades could
sever!
And yet we were perhaps somewhat overconfident that
day...

ABDUCTED FROM THE ICENI:

In the aftermath of our defeat at
Mandeussedum,
I was captured by Romans with a veiled intent...
(though
three of them died at my hands in the attempt!)

Nero was growing bored
with the gladiators,
slaves and lion-fodder at his great Circus,
and so
had requested Suetonius Paullinus
to provide the citizens of Rome with new
entertainment...

The Emperor had heard much of the wildness and fighting
spirit
of these barbaric Britons who had brought such woe to his far-famed
legions;
these painted, pagan tribesmen who had resisted the Empire's iron
fist
where the glorious phalanxes of the East had not.

"Agents of the
Imperium... hearken to my words", Nero had demanded.
"Bring to Rome some of
these tribesman for the Games. Let us pit them
against our most ravenous
beasts and our greatest gladitorial champions."

And so I was taken in
fetters aboard a Roman trireme,
the blood of slain legionaires still crusted
upon my thews,
I was taken far from the fens of my beloved homeland,
to
tread the sun baked sand of the Circus Maximus...
to fight for my life in
the Imperial Arena.

ARRIVAL AT THE CIRCUS MAXIMUS:

The Circus
Maximus was certainly a splendid sight, I'll admit.
A vast colosseum with
great stone columns and tiers,
huge ornate arches and mighty statues of grey
marble.
Countless people filled the seats surrounding the sandy floor of the
Arena...
and in his opulent royal enclosure, flanked by gleaming
guards
and grovelling lackeys, sat the great Emperor
himself...

EMPEROR NERO:
Fight, barbarian outlander!
Please us,
and mayhap Mars will smile on thee this day!

ICENI WARRIOR:
Bah! I do
not hail to your Roman gods, and you are not my emperor!
By Cernunnos, the
blood of my enemies shall stain the sand
of this cursed arena red this
day!

THE COMBAT COMMENCES:

They unleashed the lions first. Hunger
maddened beasts,
goaded into a frenzy by the cruel point of many a
pilum...
And yet my own hunger, the hunger for revenge, was greater,
and
my honed steel was sharper than bestial fang and claw.

And so they
ranged their finest warriors against me.
Three more iron gates around the
arena yawned open,
and they strode from the colosseum tunnels amidst
a
cacophony of cheering from the assembled Roman spectators,
urged on and
showered with mar tial adulation from the massed
arena crowd, who howled
their bloodlust without cessation.

???

Far above, upon his great
dias,
the Emperor gave the signal for the combat to begin,
and with the
battle-lust engulfing me,
with the red mist swirling before my eyes,
I
vowed to my northern gods that I would show these leering
Romans the
fighting spirit and battle prowess of my people...
I would leave the arena
littered with the bloody corpses of my opponents...

I would cast off the
imperial fetters and return to the fens!
Aye, I would escape, and make all
Romans fear my name,
and compel Nero to rue the day Julius Caesar had first
ordered
his legions across the grim grey sea to my ancient
island...

Blood For Boudicca... Carnage For Cernunnos!!

To be
continued...