The Coritani Tribe

The thing about inspiration is that it can strike in the randomist of places. For example, for our Exploring Creative Writing assignment we had to research the history of Leicester. To begin with I was unsure what I would find, as most people were researching the Victorian period and the first and second World Wars and those periods don't interest me as much as, for instance, the Egyptians or pirates. However I was pleasently surprised.

I went all the way back to the first century, where I discovered that the whole of Leicestershire, stretching from Charnwood Forest to the Valley of the Soar in Staffordshire, was covered in trackless forests. It was inhabited by a Celtic tribe called the Coritani, who ruled Lincolnshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Rutland and Northamptonshire.

They were bordered by the Brigantes to the North, the Cornovii to the West, the Dobunni and Catuvellauni to the South and the Iceni to the East and their capital was called Ratae Corieltauvorum, which is today's Leicester.

I then researched life in the first century, in the Iron Age, and I visited Beacon Hill in Leicester as it is the sight of a Bronze Age fort that the Coritani inhabited for a short while.

So why not research your hometown, or a place that interests you? Go right back to the very first century and look at how it was born, who inhabited it, how they lived. You might just find something that sparks inspiration for a story!