CSUN Professor Reveals Egalitarian Roots of Iron Age Hillforts
This summer, fascinating work has been taking place in the forests and farmlands of Romania. Archaeologist Owen Doonan, a professor of art history at California State University, Northridge, has been leading a team of researchers into the rugged landscapes of the Black Sea region. Their mission has been to uncover clues about the lives of people who lived in hillfort settlements during the Iron Age, roughly 2,500 years ago. What has been discovered so far is changing the way history is understood, especially when it comes to how early societies were organized.
Rather than kingdoms dominated by rulers, these early Iron Age communities appear to have been remarkably egalitarian. According to Doonan, the hillforts were large settlements where people lived and worked together without permanent hierarchies. Leaders were chosen only when their skills were needed—whether for diplomacy, rituals, or military defense—and once their role was complete, they stepped back into the community. There was no sign that power was inherited or passed down within families, at least in those early centuries. Over time, however, interaction with other cultures helped these communities evolve into larger political entities, eventually giving rise to kingdoms around the Black Sea.
Also Read:The fieldwork itself has been both challenging and innovative. Doonan’s team has relied not only on traditional methods—walking through farmlands, searching for pottery shards, stone tools, and fragments turned up by plowing—but also on new technology. Hobby drones were flown to help scan the land from above, capturing patterns and details that might reveal hidden fortifications beneath today’s oak forests and sunflower fields. The team hopes to advance further by using drones equipped with thermal cameras and laser-based LiDAR imaging, which would allow for faster and more efficient surveys than the slow, labor-intensive process that archaeologists have relied on for decades.
What makes these discoveries even more significant is the broader cultural story they reveal. From about 600 BCE onward, Greek settlers began establishing colonies along the Black Sea coast, places like Sinop and Apollonia. When the Greeks arrived, cultural exchanges took place that reshaped both the indigenous and the colonial worlds. Doonan emphasizes that innovation came not simply from “Greek influence,” but from the interaction of different groups living side by side. These encounters created a kind of cultural melting pot that spurred new forms of leadership, art, and community structure, eventually leading to the rise of regional kingdoms.
The project, supported by Harvard’s Loeb Classical Library Fellowship and recognized by the Explorers Club, is not just about piecing together artifacts. It is about telling the human story of how cooperation, diversity, and cultural exchange shaped societies long before written history. Early Iron Age hillforts remind us that complex communities can thrive without rigid hierarchies, and that innovation often sparks when different cultures meet and learn from each other.
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