Vettonia was one of the most important Celtic regions in Iberia which emerged in the Iron Age. It corresponds largely to western Spain, between the Duero and Tagus valleys. The archaeological evidence indicates that the formation of this ethnic group lay in an historical process whose roots went back to the Late Bronze Age-Early Iron Age, when we begin to find a regular association between the first fortified sites and stable populations. These groups did not consolidate before the second half of the first millennium BC, in parallel with the development of other peoples of the interior of the Iberian Peninsula. This period can be recognized in particular through the spread of the ritual of cremation, ironworking, the adoption of the potter's wheel and the expansion of some settlements -oppida -which were ultimately to disappear with the Roman conquest. This paper sets out to examine the evolution of the area from an indigenous perspective, examining the process of change before and after the evidence referred to by Greek and Roman writers. THE NATURE OF THE PROBLEMEuropean prehistory has developed under the premise that there is a direct relationship between technological change and changes in the exploitation of natural resources. Thus, the origins of the Iron Age have been seen in two separate developments: on one hand the use of new types of tools and the technology necessary to produce them and, on the other, taking possession of land and the introduction of new crops. The transition to the Iron Age also marks the change between two different ways of conceiving the past. The ephemeral nature of the dwellings gave way to fortified settlements which indicate permanent occupation. The emergence of these hillforts was an important development, perhaps the most important in the transformation of nature. They helped to create a new sense of place and time and were, to some extent, the result of adopting new technologies that were part and parcel of a general process of economic intensification, and promoted a stable way of life. There is little doubt that the most recent prehistory of the Iberian Peninsula was witness to this fundamental change in the landscape: certain kinds of pottery, sites and structures disappear or become extremely scarce, and others appear. But all too often it is assumed that the adoption of a sedentary lifestyle was more sweeping than it was. Traditionally, researchers propose models of analysis advocating a nomadic and impermanent pattern of settlement before the new stage, and only
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