The Later Iron Age in Britain and Beyond

The nature and causes of the transformation in settlement, social structure, and material culture that occurred in Britain during the Later Iron Age (c. 400-300 BC to the Roman conquest) have long been a focus of research. In the past, however, there was a tendency for attention to be directed mostly to southern England and the increased manifestations of Gaulish and Roman influence apparent there towards the end of this period. For the most part, developments in other regions were assumed to be secondary in character and of relatively little significance. Thanks to new work, this viewpoint can no longer be sustained. Throughout Britain, the extent and vitality of the social changes taking place during the later first millennium BC is becoming more apparent, as is the long-term character of many of the processes involved. The time is ripe therefore for new narratives of the Later Iron Age to be created, drawing on the burgeoning material from developer-funded archaeology and the Portable Antiquities Scheme, as well as on new methodological and theoretical approaches. The thirty-one papers collected here seek to re-conceptualise our visions of Later Iron Age societies in Britain by examining regions and topics that have received less attention in the past and by breaking down the artificial barriers often erected between artefact analysis and landscape studies. Themes considered include the expansion and enclosure of settlement, production and exchange, agricultural and social complexity, treatment of the dead, material culture and identity, at scales ranging from the household to the supra-regional. At the same time, the inclusion of papers on Ireland, northern France, the Low Countries, Denmark, and Germany allows insular Later Iron Age developments to be placed in a wider geographical context, ensuring that Britain is no longer studied in isolation.

Table of Contents

New narratives of the Later Iron Age (Colin Haselgrove and Tom Moore)
The dynamics of social change in Later Iron Age eastern and south-eastern England c. 300 BC-AD 43 (J D Hill)
Life on the edge? Exchange, community, and identity in the Later Iron Age of the Severn-Cotswolds (Tom Moore)
Central places or special places? The origins and development of oppida in Hertfordshire (Stewart Bryant)
Cultural choices in the 'British Eastern Channel Area' in the Late Pre-Roman Iron Age (Sue Hamilton)
Sea, coast, estuary, land, and culture in Iron Age Britain (Steven Willis)
Social landscapes and identities in the Irish Iron Age (Ian Armit)
Re-situating the Later Iron Age in Cornwall and Devon: new perspectives from the settlement record (L J Cripps)
Unravelling the Iron Age landscape of the Upper Thames valley (Gill Hey)
Rooted to the spot: the 'smaller enclosures' of the later first millennium BC 175 in the central Welsh Marches (Andy Wigley)
From open to enclosed: Iron Age landscapes of the Trent valley (David Knight)
Realigning the world: pit alignments and their landscape context (Jim Rylatt and Bill Bevan)
Good fences make good neighbours? Exploring the ladder enclosures of Late Iron Age East Yorkshire (Melanie Giles)
Putting the neighbours in their place? Displays of position and possession in northern Cheviot 'hillfort' design (Paul Frodsham, Iain Hedley and Rob Young)
Dominated by unenclosed settlement? The Later Iron Age in eastern Scotland north of the Forth (Mairi H Davies)
Artefacts, regions and identities in the northern British Iron Age (Fraser Hunter)
Silent Silures? Locating people and places in the Iron Age of south Wales (Adam Gwilt)
Perspectives on insular La Tène art (Philip Macdonald)
Dancing with dragons: fantastic animals in the earlier Celtic art of Iron Age Britain (A P Fitzpatrick)
An archaeological investigation of Later Iron Age Norfolk; analysing hoarding patterns across the landscape (Natasha Hutcheson)
Detecting the Later Iron Age: a view from the Portable Antiquities Scheme (Sally Worrell)
The end of the Sheep Age: people and animals in t