Tristan Hughes

With the same rude material they erected many remarkable monuments, which astonished and confused the modern architects.

Such are the druidic circles of Stonehenge and other places, consisting of huge upright masses of rock, surmounted by transverse blocks of immense size."

And it kind of goes on and on.

It's like the soil was poorly cultivated and many districts, which are now fruitful cornfields, were then barren wastes or impassable morasses.

It would seem at the present day but a poor boast for a powerful and civilized empire like Rome to gain victories over such tribes.

Immediate thoughts on that, Tom?

Better understanding, better dating, more insights into how they lived.

Still, presumably, many mysteries still abound, but we are learning through new discoveries in the north and south of Britain, more about how they lived and, yeah, how sophisticated they were, how they communicated, exchanged with each other, and so much more.

So we'll get to these settlements very quickly, keywords like roundhouses, hill forts, and so on.

But first of all, the arrival of the Iron Age in Britain, what should we be thinking?

Well, at a time when Britain gets a bit more miserable, then it sounds like it hurts the climate as well.

As an archaeologist, I would never say it gets miserable.

It just changes.

Yeah.

But it's interesting, that gradual process, which I'm hearing again and again now with so many ancient episodes, that when new technology comes in, how long it takes people over generations realizing or being able to get their hands on these new tools, this new metal that they now realize in their new settlements is more valuable, is more useful than, let's say, bronze and silver.

Well, let's have a look at the backbone, almost, of Iron Age society and how these people lived.

Is it fair that this time, I mean, agriculture, that's at the forefront.

Mm-hmm.

For people living in Iron Age Britain, an everyday figure, they're living in an agricultural type of settlement?

And what's the everyday settlement of one of these Iron Age farmers?