 First of all, I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to present a paper in this very interesting session. My paper will explore the applicability of the concept of low-density urbanism as developed by Roland Fletcher to Iron Age Europe, with examples that range from the early Iron Age first and second to the late Latin opida. This approach has two-fold aims. First, to gain a better understanding of Iron Age agglomerations, and second to place Iron Age urbanism within the broader field of comparative urban studies. Many of the arguments presented in this paper can be found in my article entitled, Urbanization in Iron Age Europe, Trajectories, Patterns, and Social Dynamics, which has just been published a few weeks ago in the Journal of Archaeological Research. Before I develop the concept of low-density urbanism, I would like to make some general remarks and discussions about Iron Age urbanization. The first one concerns the use of the term cities and towns. Thanks to the research carried out in the last decades, it has become increasingly evident that the originality of Iron Age agglomerated settlements. Neither the early Iron Age first and second nor the late Iron Age opida represent a uniform group of settlements, but rather they were centers that could often arise enormously in regard of when they were established, the inner area, the architecture, and the manner in which they function as central places. Thus, rather than making general statements about the urban or non-urban character of Iron Age megasites, we should base our assessments on contextual analysis. The academic distinction between the study areas of classical and prehistoric archeology can sometimes heavily influence interpretations. In this sense, I do not share the reluctance of some colleagues in applying terms such as urban city or towns to Iron Age temperate Europe. When visiting the Honeiburgs some years ago, my American colleague, Michael Smith, said that the discussion on the urban nature of the site reminded him of the debate around the North American megasite of Cahokia. If Cahokia will have been located in Mesoamerica, no scholar will doubt in classifying it as an urban site. But because it is in the middle of the Midwest, there has been an ongoing discussion on the matter. Similarly, if the Honeiburg or Manching will be located in central Italy, I'm pretty sure scholars will have little doubts in regard of the urban character. From my perspective, many of the sites encompassed under the broad terms first in Sician Opida were not urban, but at the same time, we do have good arguments to classify other settlements like the Honeiburg, Manching, Coro and Vibratti as cities or towns on the basis of criteria such as evidence of a preconceived plan, housing a population of several thousand inhabitants and bringing together different categories of population and activities. Moreover, new research is showing that some open agglomerations are closer to a contextual definition of urbanism that many fortified centers. So that we need to acknowledge their importance in iron age settlement, patterns and society. Why do we need comparisons and how to compare? Despite the considerable attention that Hilfords and Opida have attracted since the 19th century, iron age centralization processes have rarely been considered from an anthropological perspective. Obviously, there are some exceptions such as John Coley's book on the Opida, but in general terms, this has not been really approached. Most studies have focused on comparisons with the classical world, particularly with Greek and Roman cities, interpreting the appearance of major settlements in temperate Europe as a barbarian attempt to emulate Mediterranean urbanization. The widespread distinction between prehistoric and classical studies and therefore between civilized south versus barbarian north, carries significant problems for the way iron age urbanization processes have been traditionally understood. This includes the use of checklist approaches in which the urban character of a site is determined by its supposed similarities with the supposed standard model of classical cities. All the maintenance of diffusionist views in which cultural change among central European societies is dependent on stimuli coming from the south. As John Coley's has rightly expressed it, I quote, if we expand our horizons in time and space, looking at urbanization on a worldwide scale, we see a much greater variety in the urban phenomenon of which a classical Greek and Roman cities are just one type, or better said, several types. The urban sites in temperate Europe, as in medieval Europe, are based on different principles and characteristics, quote, end. Rather than seeing urbanization north of the Alps as dependent on the Mediterranean, it is better to envisage two distinct zones evolving in close contact with one another. Having said this, I still consider it useful to establish comparisons and analogies with nucleation processes in the ancient Mediterranean. But in order to achieve a better understanding, it is also helpful to adopt a broader approach based on the comparative analysis of complex societies and the multiple pathways to aggregation in pre-industrial societies. This way we can go beyond colonial dualisms and reductionist perspectives that obscure the rich diversity of urban forms. Recent perspectives on urbanism have emphasized its diverse nature, arguing that it should be measured less on the basis of a particular checklist, such as those exposed by Gordon Child in his famous article of 1950, but on the relationship between sites and their hinterlands and underplays within a wider social context. In this sense, concepts such as Michael Smith's Study of Neighborhoods as universal features of urban life or Roland Fletcher's concept of low-density urbanism can provide fruitful insights. I would like to particularly hide at the work of this last ocelot. In several publications, the Sydney professor, Roland Fletcher, has drawn attention to the widespread existence of low-density pathways to urbanism, which form alternative to Gordon Child's classic model of concentrated high-density urbanism, of the kind typified by early Bronze Age Uruk, classical Rome, and early Byzantine Constantinople. In contrast to these densely occupied settlements, throughout history, many urban sites all around the world have been characterized by the large areas and manifold functions, but also by low-density occupation of often fewer than 15 habitants per hectare. Examples include Angkor in Cambodia, Cahogia in the American Midwest, Gretzin Bahu in Africa, some Mesoamerican cities, such as the Maya Centers, the so-called African giant villages of the Iqbo in Nigeria, or even the first millennium BC, Tripulia, Megasite in Ukraine. These places are clearly very different from Child's high-density in Norn and deserve consideration in their own terms. To name an example, Mayan Aztec cities exhibited a kind of low-density urbanism common in ancient Mesoamerica. The non-monumental components of these cities differed from the high-density cities in the old world that are often considered the norm of pre-modern urbanism. Distinctive features of Maya and some Aztec cities include the practice of intense agricultural cultivation within urban settlements, residential zones that were dispersed and unplanned, and the arrangement of houses into spatial clusters that served as neighborhoods. The residential areas of Maya and Aztec cities resembled modern peri-urban zones and informal settlements. As indicated by Fletcher himself, the late Iron Age Opeda fit well into the notion of low-density urbanism. And the same can be said about earlier centers such as the outer settlement of the Heunenburg or the nature of the late Halstatt and early Latin agglomeration at Bursch. In the first half of the 6th century BC, the outer settlement, the three hectare properties of the Heunenburg in southwest Germany were surrounded to the north and southwest by a large outer settlement of around 100 hectares. Whereas the hilltop of the Acropolis was densely occupied with rows of houses set along an erect linear street network and surrounded by a Mediterranean-inspired madrig wall, the outer settlement was comprised of farmstead-typing closures in distinct blocks. It is tempting to interpret the subdivision of the outer settlement into neighborhoods as evident for the existence of different kinship groups which came together during a process of synarchism which underpined the creation of the agglomeration. During this period, the settlement complex with hilltop, lower town and outer settlement is estimated to have had a population of around 5,000 inhabitants, therefore having a density of about 50 inhabitants per hectare. All in all, the outer settlement appears to reveal a presence of farmstead-like compounds within a larger urban agglomeration. Rather than being the result of a gradual population growth, the honey work seems to have been created within a relatively short period of time, probably as the result of a political decision that would have brought together different population groups that previously were dispersed. However, this large agglomeration lasted for only two or three generations and was largely destroyed by a catastrophic fire around 540, 530 BC. After this traumatic event, most of the exterior settlement was abandoned and the exotic madrigal wall on the plateau was replaced by a wall of earthen timber following traditional patterns. In the case of the early-army site of Gourch in central France, investigations have revealed that the hilltop was contemporary with outer and enclosed agglomerations, one immediately opposite the hilltop enclosure and another in the adjacent valley. This appeared to have been focused on craft production, but also include high status imports from the Mediterranean. In the 5th century BC, the entire settlement complex of Gourch covers several hundred hectares, although the density of settlement in some areas was relatively low. Just as many other early iron age centers, Gourch was a combination of an acropolis on a promontory, suburbs characterized by craft activities, and rich barriers in the surroundings. But the examples of Hoineburg and Gourch are also important on a wider scale, since they show the complexity of existing situations that go beyond simple categorizations into general models. At the Hoineburg, for example, the decision-prone occurrence of a very high density occupation on the hilltop and a low density occupation in the outer settlement. At the same time, neither the Neolithic Tripilla Megasite from Ukraine, nor most of the temperate European Opida, follow Fletcher's model of an urban trajectory in which cities that initially had high densities later became not only increasingly large but also increasingly lower density. Regarding the opida, my Darren Collington Moore has just published an article in the Oxford Journal of Archaeology entitled Beyond Iron Age Towns, examining the opida as examples of low density urbanism. I referred to his excellent paper from more detailed insight into late iron age agglomeration and the application of Fletcher's concept. In any case, I would like to highlight here that the opida enclose large areas but generally present a low population density per hectare. The figures of 5,000 to 10,000 inhabitants proposed for manching and vibracte would result in a population density of 13 to 26 inhabitants per hectare in the case of manching and 37 to 74 for the second fortification phase of vibracte. This means that even this and other opidas such as Titlberg that present a significant internal occupation also include large free areas inside the fortified space. The layout of the walls was often determined by the local topography but in addition, the empty spaces could serve a variety of economic and social purposes from areas for agriculture and cattle breeding to places for assembly and refuge of the rural population in case of danger. The recurring existence of large open areas within the opida suggests that these unoccupied spaces were in fact one of the principal elements playing a fundamental role in the negotiation of control over people and resources. This would have included the periodic assembly of the dispersed rural population for political gatherings and religious ceremonies. Rather than interpreting the existence of open spaces and low density occupation as an indication for unfinished urban places we should recognize that they constitute a defining characteristic of many major settlements. To name only one extra European example even in the Mesoamerican megalopolies of Teotihuacan there were extensive open areas for agriculture. In summary, urban open spaces constitute a widespread characteristic of many ancient and modern cities so that the presence in the opida does not contradict the urban character of at least some of these sites. A final feature of many late iron age centers that I would like to mention is that the basic settlement units were often enclosed farmsets that resembled rural settlement types. The third urban coined by Smith in 1972 encapsulates the idea of the domination of these sites by unbuilt space more similar to farm landscapes that are a traditional notions of urban quarters. These groups of farms with their outbuildings indicate to transfer rural settlement patterns to a more confined area. In other words, a kind of translocated landscape with clustered extended households that would occasionally also perform craft and commercial functions. This phenomenon is similar to the pattern already observed centuries earlier in the outer settlement of the Heuneburg. It suggests the nucleation of part of rural population and a concentration of activities that were previously dispersed more widely in the landscape. But the large settlements were more than a simple collection of farms. Their population would have included non-producers for example full-time specialists and elite members and religious specialists. And we often know about the existence of different functional zones or neighborhoods such as in Manchin and Corot. Finally, an increasing number of public spaces for religious and political gatherings have been identified over the last few decades within the Opida. The fieldwork of the last few decades has expanded our knowledge of iron age central places enormously. The picture that emerges is much more complex and dynamic than traditionally sought and it can be expected that the large-scale application of LiDAR images, drone flights and geophysical service will continue to significantly expand the corpus of known sites particularly open large automations and our understanding of the functions and internal organization. From a theoretical perspective the application of comparative approaches is still seminal and should be expanded in coming years. Such an approach will allow archaeologists working on iron age Europe to draw on the rich variety of concepts and insights of comparative urban studies. Thank you.