Luyện nghe bài hát Blood Slakes The Sand At The Circus Maximus

THOUGHTS OF AN GLADIATOR,
AWAITING THE OPENING OF THE ARENA

MEMORIES OF (CARNAGE AT CAMULODUNUM):

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

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

BLOODSHED AND 61 AD (C.E.)

???

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

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

???

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

ABDUCTED FROM THE

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

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

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

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

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

ARRIVAL AT THE CIRCUS

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

EMPEROR
Fight, outlander!
Please us, and mayhap Mars will smile on this day!

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

THE COMMENCES:

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

And so they their finest warriors against me.
Three more gates around the arena yawned open,
and they strode the colosseum tunnels amidst
a cacophony of from the assembled Roman spectators,
urged on and showered with mar adulation from the massed
arena crowd, who howled their bloodlust cessation.

???

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

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

Blood For Boudicca... For Cernunnos!!

To be continued...