La Tene (C2-D) was an Iron Age culture in Europe named after an archaeological site at Lake Neuchatel in Switzerland that ran from approximately 175-27 BCE.
[1]
The territory centered on ancient Gaul and at its height spanned areas in modern day France, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Southern Germany, Czechia, parts of Northern Italy, Slovenia, Hungary, and adjacent parts of the Netherlands, Slovakia, Croatia, western Romania, and western Ukraine.
Settlements during this period included fortified urban settlements, larger towns, villages and farmsteads spread throughout their territories.
[2]
During this period tribes became urbanised and more centralized but although they formed alliances with other tribes, they did not join together within a unified centralized polity.
[3]
Each tribe had their own fortified urban settlements and there was no capital city.
Production of goods at many of the larger sites included glass jewellery, leather-working, bronze-casting and coin minting.
[4]
The population is estimated at around 70,000-80,000, and much of the information we have about the population (and other aspects of La Tene life during this period) comes from the time of Caesar’s invasion of Gaul.
[5]
[6]
[1]: (Collis 2003, 172, 217-218)
[2]: (Wells 1999, 45-47)
[3]: (Kruta 2004, 105)
[4]: (Wells 1999, 49-54
[5]: (Wells 1984:171)
[6]: (Patterson 1995, 136)