PUBLIC SPACE AND SOCIAL ACTION IN IRON AGE SOCIETIES
Channel: European Association of Archaeologists
Date: 2020-12-21

Recent approaches to the Iron Age in Britain have challenged traditional models that envisaged hierarchical, triangular, or traditionally ‘Celtic’ societies. In their place, a variety of social models have been suggested that can variously be described as segmentary, heterarchical or anarchic. In such communities, corporate decision-making is necessarily collaborative rather than coercive – as it might be, for instance, in a chiefdom or similarly-constituted hierarchical structure – implying the existence of periodic gatherings of potentially large numbers of people. In certain parts of Iron Age Britain it may be possible to identify the public spaces where these communities came together. In particular, a group of large hilltop enclosures in various parts of Scotland, such as the Brown Caterthun and Traprain Law, seem to have existed during the Iron Age as enclosed (yet empty) spaces, with a distinctive, non-defensive architecture. This paper argues that we might see these places as centres for communal debate and decision-making within societies that lacked hierarchical structures. As such, they may also have taken on other functions associated with social co-operation, such as ritual performances and the exchange of goods. With the appearance of overtly hierarchical structures at the end of the Scottish Iron Age, certain of these locations (notably Traprain Law), appear to be co-opted as centres of chiefly power, and take on a wholly different character.


Author(s): Armit, Ian (University of Bradford)