800 BC-AD 43 Iron Age

Eastern England is bounded to the east and north by the North Sea and to the west by flat fenland. It is a region with rich fertile soils that have been intensively farmed for many hundreds of years. Because the land has been used continuously, evidence of many past settlements has been erased from the landscape. From what remains we can see that people were not living in enclosed settlement sites in this region. Instead they appear to have lived in open ‘villages’ that appear to have ‘moved’ across the landscape as buildings were replaced over time.

In the late Iron Age, differences between communities in eastern England become obvious. In the 1st century BC and early 1st century AD, people in the north and south of the region used quite distinct types of objects. To the south, in the area thought to be occupied by the tribe of the Trinovantes, there seems to have been greater emphasis on acquiring Roman goods. To the north, in the tribal area attributed to the Iceni, there is less Roman material and more ‘native’ style objects. This suggests that by the end of the Iron Age, this area was divided into two distinct groups.