Iron Age Lives provides the first integrated academic treatment of the Iron Age of Britain and Ireland. After considering the social changes that marked the end of the Later Bronze Age, it examines the environmental, economic, demographic and cultural factors that underpinned the emergence of the fragmented and regionalised societies of the Early Iron Age. Subsequent chapters trace the development of increasingly complex and distinctive social forms across Britain and Ireland including the hillfort societies of southern England and the Welsh Marches; village communities of the Upper Thames Valley; the dense settlement landscapes, cemeteries and chariot burials of East Yorkshire; the hillfort communities of Northumbria and south-east Scotland; the broch-building societies of Atlantic Scotland; and the ritual landscapes of Iron Age Ireland

Central themes that cut across the book's broadly chronological structure include: the creation and expression of individual and collective identities; the social role of art and religion; changing gender roles; technological innovation, including iron-working and rotary technology; the complex and varied treatments of the dead; gift-giving, trade and exchange; and the role of conflict and violence.

The text is supported throughout by box features expanding on individual sites, objects, themes or debates and the book focuses, where appropriate, on fresh and exciting new finds and discoveries from the last few years including, for example, the well-preserved bog bodies from eastern Ireland, recently excavated chariot burials from Newbridge and Ferry Fryston, Iron Age roads from East Anglia, the Midlands and Ireland, musical instruments from High Pasture Cave in Skye and Cnip in Lewis, the shrine containing gold torcs from Stirlingshire, and the impact of AMS dating on the chronologies of Iron Age art and burial.