n the Early Iron Age (800-500 BC.), the Netherlands were influenced by the Germans and the Celts.

The Celts, as traders of salt, of northern European fur and amber and south European wine, became the largest merchants north of the Alpes. They were the ones who brought their knowledge of manufacturing iron to Europe.

Iron objects are more advanced than bronze ones because iron is less fragile and much lighter.
Further more iron-ores were found in a lot more places (also in the Netherlands) then the ores neccessary for bronze-manufacturing. So iron tools became available for everybody. The increasing demand for iron lead to the decay of the bronze-industry but also lead to the rise of a new elite.
The introduction of iron meant more than just an expansion of technical knowledge. It was the beginning of a new time with economical, cultural and social changes.

An other raw material that contributed to these changes was salt. Salt was used for preserving fish and meat, it was also used as a flavouring. Generally it had to be obtained through trade.
In the Netherlands salt was found alongside the Northsea-coast.

It's likely that people learned new methods of agriculture and vegetations through the same contacts through which they took knowledge of manufacturing iron.

Already in the Early Iron Age (800-500 BC.) reclaiming small bogs and drainage of fields took place. There are also indications for systematic use of the ground in square regular fields, the so-called Celtic Fields.

There was a difference between the Iron Age farm and the Bronze Age farm.
It was smaller and possessed less room for the stable. The main entrances were moved to the middle of the farm.
A farm like this usually existed for 30 years and was, because of putrescence, rebuilt somewhere else. This is how moving settlements existed, usually around steady orientation-points.

In the Late Iron Age lots of floods occurred. That's why people lived on high settlements, mounds, in the wet area of the Netherlands.

n the Iron Age intensive occupation locally occurred like in Velsen on the Hoogoventerrein, in the Amsterdam area of the dunes and the Velserbroekpolder.

As a result of the decay of iron in our region only few prehistoric iron objects are found during excavations. But iron slag (a fabric that's left after melting iron) are resistant to rust, so lots of them are found.