The settlement record of the Neolithic of the northern Alpine foreland is used to address the question of what difference having high-resolution chronology — in this case principally provided by dendrochronology — makes to the kinds of narrative we seek to write about the Neolithic. In a search for detailed histories, three kinds of scale are examined. The longer-term development of cultural patterns and boundaries is found to correlate very imprecisely with the character and architecture of settlements. Individual houses and settlements were generally short-lived, suggesting considerable fluidity in social relations at the local level. Greater continuity can be found in the landscape, perhaps involving more than individual communities. We argue that the particular history of the northern Alpine foreland is best understood by interweaving multiple temporal scales, an approach that will need to be extended to other case studies.

Traditionally, research on late Iron Age societies of Central Europe has to some degree focused on large fortified settlements or oppida, presumably ranking at the top of the Celtic settlement hierarchy. The oppidum of Manching in Upper Bavaria has in the past been seen as a paradigmatic example of pre-Roman transalpine urbanization, in both chronological and functional terms. However, both its dating and its topographical position in a shallow flood plain of the Danube justify a distinction from contemporaneous or successive fortified ‘towns'. Recent studies have identified another particular type of settlement – large unfortified centres of crafts and trade – as a major feature of prehistoric urbanization. Again, Manching and its pre-fortified stages of urban development reveal a characteristic scheme of eastern Celtic settlement evolution that eventually breaks with a standard development when a massive rampart is constructed. Based on recent research at Manching and its hinterland, and taking into account the dynamic character of urbanization, a flexible model of urban evolution is developed here. This model allows for a comparative and quantifiable notion of variable degrees of local and supra-regional urban status.

The archaeological study of assembly practices in the medieval west is often met with scepticism. The reliance on late documentary records and place-names, and the difficulties inherent in defining what actually constituted an ‘assembly’, are just some of the issues that face researchers. This paper brings together some of the first collated and excavated evidence by the HERA TAP project 1, and offers a cross-European perspective, drawing attention to the great variety of systems and types of structure created for the purpose of assembly in the late prehistoric and medieval eras. Selected case studies emphasize the chronological variations in the inception and life-span of assembly places and underline the diverse relationships of designated assembly sites to pre-existing landscapes, resource patterns, and social structures. Connections between the ‘architecture’ and location of these sites, and their role in the creation, maintenance, and signalling of collective identities are suggested.

Poggio Civitate has made an important contribution to the understanding of domestic architecture in pre-Roman central Italy since excavations commenced in 1966 uncovering two phases of monumental architecture. Interpretations of the site have been varied, with suggestions that it was the seat of a north Etruscan league or the base of a local élite family. This study argues that it was the latter, based upon an analysis of the famous ‘cowboy’ statue acroteria from the Archaic period complex. It is argued that the statues, as ancestral figures of the élite inhabitants, personified their wealth and power. The complex, and acroteria more generally, had a powerful psychological effect on those living within it, but more importantly those living in the surrounding territory. In addition the building is placed within its physical and socio-political landscape of north inland Etruria