toad wrote:
On 13 Mar, 19:39, Andy Champ wrote:
toad wrote:
I've just read a biography of Boudica.
While we are on the pedantry trail - two Cs, or else you can't misread
it as Boadicea.

Clue: It wasn't misread as Boadicea from an English language text.

The current English language spelling is as I wrote it. (http://
tinyurl.com/2rp6q2) Of course that's academic. Nobody knows if she
really existed. If she existed, nobody knows if she was really leader
of the rebellion or a smaller player. Nobody knows if Boudica was a
name or a title. Nobody knows how the name or title was spelt or what
it really meant. (Boudica probably translates as Victorious but nobody
knows.) Spellings of the name of the Iceni warrior Queen run into
dozens. Some completely unrecognizable as Boudica, some pretty
similar. Voudica is a similar one for instance.

In short, you can, with some credibility, spell the name/title of the
Iceni warrior Queen any way you wish. What you can't do with any
credibility is tell someone else how they should spell it.


Blimey! I'm outgunned!

I admit I haven't read the original sources. My understanding was that
Boadicea came out of a misreading of some 19th century academics
handwriting. This could easily be an urban legend - certainly Wikipedia
disagrees with me on that (and on the spelling...)

BTW Google hits count:
Boudicca 1,080,000
Boudica 260,000
Boadicea 324,000

which tends to say that "current English" is as I have it, even though
I'm wrong.

Still, this is Atrebates country, we wouldn't know about them Iceni lot...

Andy