6 THE HISTORY OF NEWMARKET. [Book I. 



that the territory of the Iceni cannot have been far 

 distant from Camulodunum. There is a class of 

 coins which are principally found in the counties of 

 Norfolk and Suffolk, possessing sufficient peculiarities 

 of type to distinguish them as the currency of an 

 independent tribe. On some of these coins the in- 

 scription ECEN occurs, which has been thought to 

 refer to the name of the tribe, and doubtless justifies 

 the reading iceni, in preference to simeni, or any of 

 the other forms. A tribe called Cenimagni is specified 

 among those who, after the surrender of the Trino- 

 bantes, sent ambassadors, and submitted themselves 

 to Julius ; and it has been suggested by Camden, and 

 accepted by some other writers, that in the first portion 

 of this name we are to rfccognize that of the Iceni. 

 The principal facts which are known in connection with 

 this tribe are those of Tacitus (" Annals," lib. xii. cap. 

 31, et seg.). In a.d. 50 the Iceni are spoken of as a 

 powerful nation, and unbroken by war, because they 

 had voluntarily entered into an alliance with the 

 Romans. At that time, however, they came into 

 collision with the invaders, and were defeated by 

 Ostorius, after which it would appear that they 

 retained a kingly form of government only by 

 sufferance of the Romans. This may be gathered 

 from the testamentary disposition of one of their 

 kings, who, in a.d, 61, when next the Iceni are 

 mentioned, it would seem was but recently dead. 

 This king, Prasutagus by name, renowned for his 

 immense wealth, made the Roman emperor and his 

 own two daughters his joint heirs, thinking by this 



