British Iron Age, pt. 2, Welsh Celtic settlement

Iron Age settlements of hut circles in hillforts, Wales, and the British Isles (Wikipedia links used).

Image courtesy of Wiki Commons, attributed to Stephen Elwyn Roddick, Llynon Mill roundhouse reconstruction, Llanddeusant, Anglesey.

The British Iron Age simply put was the beginning of mining iron in Great Britain. The new technologies of smelting metals into weapons were to help hunt prey and enable a new society of Celtic tribes to grow in Wales and the British Isles, this was similar to the European Iron Age too. At its earliest, 500 BC is generally the accepted timeframe for the start of the Iron Age in Anglesey, Wales after a late Bronze Age. The British Iron Age tribes were the nomadic Celtic peoples and it was their hunter-gatherer ancestors who had previously settled parts of Wales and had assembled Neolithic monuments such as megaliths on locations in some cases later used for Iron Age hillforts. Some areas were first settled at the end of the Mesolithic period, circa 4,000 BC. The monuments built in some cases were adapted continuously over millennia. Those tribal nomads settled their territories permanently during the British Iron Age, beginning in lowland Britain roughly 800 BC and eventually ending in 43 AD with the conquest by the Roman Emperor Claudius, thus beginning the Roman Iron Age from 0- 400 AD. The Greco-Roman historian Ptolemy recorded the lives of Celtic people circa 150 AD. The Celts constructed fortifications to last thousands of years, some hillforts were in direct use well into the late medieval ages until the reign of King Edward II, c. 14th century.

The Celts established a network of tribes spanning throughout the British Isles and had a connection to Europe and Eastern Europe. There had been several waves of Celtic migration to the British Isles starting 3,000 years ago and involved the Southeastern European royalty, primarily the family of Brutus of Troy, who sailed from the Aegean Sea in the Mediterranean. During the British Iron Age, the Kings of Britain established their monarchy, he ruled from England until after half a millennium of rule the British Isles descended into civil war roughly 530 BC. There were then 5 Kingdoms who ruled separately for a century until the first time rules were set in Britain on how the people should live amongst one another in their hillfort land settlements. The Molmutine Laws were written by King Dunvallo Molmutius (in Welsh, Dyfnwal Moelmud). Dyfnwal had unified the Kingdom of Britain under his tutelage after the chaos of war, these laws would be the basis of the eventual Cyfraith Hywel in 10th century AD Wales. His son Brennius/Brennus from Northern England flourishing circa 387 BC married the daughter of the King of Norway and went to battle conquering parts of Southern Europe and leading to the battle of Allia in Rome. It was during this era that Dyfnwal's grandson granted the exiled Spanish King Parthol a presumably uninhabited island of Ireland as part of the British Isles. Today this Brittonic speaking Celtic connection is cemented through the Basque country between Spain and France, the southern part is autonomous and is seeking independence. Although the Basque culture is predominantly Celtic, they do not speak a Celtic language which is the same as other parts of the Iberian peninsula. The nations who continue to speak Celtic languages are the modern Celtic nations of Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Cornwall in England, Isle of Man, and Brittany in France, they are part of the North-East Atlantic Ocean.

Officially, the history of the tribes named Celts is that they migrated separately. Firstly during the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age in Europe, circa 1,200 BC - 800  BC from Eastern Europe westward. Another wave of migration to Atlantic Europe and the British Isles was between 500 BC to 200 BC mostly from the German and Austrian Alps in Western Europe. It was then the official time scale of the British Iron Age in North Wales began, this lasted half a millennium until the Roman occupation after approximately 50 AD. Celtic Britons had established their own natural borders and tribal boundaries internally within Great Britain and Northwestern Europe, some of which are still in use today. Tribal Wales was split into north (Ordovices), east (Deceangli), south (Silures) and west (Demetae). What the British Celts had in common except for similar languages was the use of hillforts in Britain, some were built from the late Bronze Age into the early Iron Age as defensive fortifications. These locations had man-made mud-banked enclosures in strategically important locations similar to the later Medieval castle towns which are often surrounded by moats and high walls. 

Hillforts were used for a period that lasted millennia in Wales, over 600 were built during that phase. One of the most adapted is Castell Dinas Brân (Bran's castle) built by the the Celtic Welsh peoples. The site is an Iron Age hillfort built c. 600 BC and was later mentioned in the Welsh mythological folk tales, the Welsh prose stories named in Welsh: Y Mabinogion. The home was in use for almost 2,000 years and was named after Brân the Blessed (Brân Fendigaidd, i.e. blessed crow) c. 30 BC. Bran was the Governor of North Cambria (Wales) and Earl of Ewias and Urchingfild, the position and royal title was held by his ancestors the Silures tribe for a millennium prior to the Roman invasion, at this time he was also titled the Duke of Westsexe (potentially Wessex). The hillfort Dinas Bran (Bran's town) was developed into a castle in the later medieval ages by the rulers as Lord of Dinas Bran but was abandoned circa 1300 AD after the Norman invasion and subsequent English war. The importance of the Iron Age settlement of Wales is still evident today, although most of the locations were abandoned during the Roman occupation of Britain by the 3rd to 5th centuries after the establishment of Kingdoms during the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain. However, in some cases, the settlements were incorporated into modern cities. In Cardiff, the capital of Wales is the area of the Caerau hillfort (caerheritageproject.com). The modern-day settlement was built around an ancient hillfort of around 51,000 m² in diameter and was inhabited millenniums ago. Although the hillfort itself is abandoned, the town's geography surrounds the mud banks built to protect the local people of the town, also flint tools and weapons were found on the site dating to 3,600 BC, showing the importance of the location in Wales' history. Traditionally these hillforts mentioned were later adapted and then used as farmlands by their former occupants until as late as the 7th century, as was the case with Garn Boduan (Castell Buan) a home of between 100- 400 people strategically built over 900 ft above sea level overlooking the Llyn peninsula in Gwynedd, North-West Wales.

Image courtesy of Wiki Commons, attributed to John S. Turner, Garn Boduan roundhouse ruins on an Iron Age hillfort. 

Within hillforts were villages and in Britain was the use of walled enclosures and inside were roundhouses. These enclosures had naturally built stone roundhouse dwellings. Similar ancient dwellings were found elsewhere throughout Western Europe, these roundhouse fortifications built as homes were also in North America and the Arctic Circle (Igloos). In some places they are still in use today, such as parts of sub-Saharan Africa, some of Oceania like Papua New Guinea, and in the Amazon jungle, South America. Roundhouses were built as family homes and often in villages from the Bronze Age for millennia afterward in Britain until after Roman occupation. 

There are over 100 hut circle walled enclosures in Wales, mostly throughout the north, aka Gwynedd. A rare surviving example of a practically intact stone hut circle roundhouse today is Din Lligwy (Din Llugwy) at the east of Anglesey on the coast of the Irish Sea. The layout was a pentagon-shaped outer wall with two circles and several rectangular huts, the village is from the 4th century which supersedes an open village, however, the setup of Llugwy was of a small palace. It's recorded as the site of an Irish chieftain of the Deccheti dynasty.

Image courtesy of Wiki Commons, attributed to Jeff Buck, Din Lligwy Hut Circle, Anglesey. 

With the Iron Age came Celtic art and Wales was part of La Tene culture in Europe. In Anglesey was an artifact deposit named the Llyn Cerrig Bach Plaque, a bronze, Iron, and copper hoard named after the lake it was found in 1943. The votive offering was made by Druids (Celtic religious priests) around the turn of the first millennium after the arrival of the Roman military legions to the area. The lake find revealed a catchment of swords, shields, spears a musical trumpet, and much more hidden from sight for 2 millenniums. The Celtic art deposit was also similar to a hidden artifact deposited at the same time named the Trawsfynydd Tankard from the village it was named after in Gwynedd. The drinking vessel was found to be buried in a peat bog in the Eryri mountain range and was again deposited at the same time as other votive offerings during the late Iron Age and the beginning of Roman occupation, this was a century before or after 0 AD. The find was one of only 6 similar vessels found in key locations throughout the British Isles, this shows the diversity of the Celts in the British Isles at the time, they had similar belongings of the same design. The purposeful burial of common objects was a sign of the times changing because of a direct influence from the Roman invasion of Britain, this time period, the Roman Iron Age in Northern Europe lasted 4 centuries after the end of the British Iron Age of Europe which started over a millennium prior. It was after this time frame, around the 400s AD that lots of the hillforts were finally abandoned in Wales. After centuries, families left their homes in roundhouses and moved to more modern housing influenced by the prior Roman occupation and then subsequent Anglo-Saxon invasion. This was when we saw the first settlements that would last the medieval ages, for instance, the location of the later royal court (llys) of Aberffraw in Anglesey was first settled permanently around 450 AD.

Image courtesy of Wiki Commons, attributed to Wolfgang Sauber, Llyn Cerrig Bach plaque.