General Notes

Following the pardon of Caractacus, a close relationship developed between the two former enemies and their households evolving into a startling climax. Emperor Claudius greatly admired the character and extraordinary beauty of Gladys, the daughter of Caractacus. It grew into a deep paternal affection with the result that Emperor Claudius adopted Gladys as his own daughter, a girl who was an exceptionally devout Christian!

The Emperor was well aware of the strong Christian convictions of Gladys, and what strikes one forcibly is the fact that the record states that the terms of her adoption did not require her to recant from her faith.

Gladys was not to remain long under the royal roof. The year after her adoption was to see a beautiful romance destined to culminate later in heartbreaking tragedy. In her teens, Claudia was betrothed and married. In the year AD 53, she became the wife of Rufus Pudens Pudentius, an epochal event history could well make as momentous.

Pudens, as he is most commonly referred to, was a Roman Senator and former personal aide-de-camp to Aulus Plautius. Pudens went to Britain with the Commander-in-Chief at the commencement of the Claudian campaign AD 42.

What could be a stranger circumstance than that of the British Pendragon Caractacus permitting his favorite daughter to become adopted by the remorseless enemy who had brought about his defeat at Clune and see his sister and daughter married to Plautius and Pudens, the leaders he had opposed in battle for nine long years?

Claudia was seventeen years of age when she married Rufus Pudens. The nuptials did not take place at the Imperial Palace of her adopted father, as one might expect, but at the palace of her natural father, the Plautium Britannicum, a Christian household. It was a Christian marriage performed by the Christian Pastor, Hermas, which proves that Pudens was already a Christian convert. It is interesting to note that they continued to live at the Plautium Britannicum; interesting because Pudens was an extremely wealthy man, owning vast estates in Umbria, but he chose to live at the Place of the British, where their four illustrious children were born.

The first Christian Church at Rome, known first as the "Titulus," is now called St. Prudentiana. Here the nuptials of Claudia and Rufus Pudens Prudentinus were celebrated AD 53. Four children were the issue of this marriage-- St Timotheus, St. Novatus, St. Prudentiana, St. Praxedes. Of the sons of Caradoc, Cyllinus and Cynon returned to Britian, the former succeeding on his death to the Silurian throne. The second, Lleyn, or Linus, remained with his father, and was subsequently, consecrated by St. Paul first bishop of the Roman Church.