Even before Manching first graced the pages of ANTIQUITY it had achieved the status of a key-site in the prehistory of Europe. The small La Téne B-C cemeteries of Steinbichel and Hundsrücken, the latter within the area enclosed by the ramparts of the later oppidum, have become the type-sites for their period in Southern Germany, but more important they could be seen to overlap chronologically in La Téne C with the beginning of the Late La Téne settlement that has been the subject of the recent excavations. With this continuity of occupation Manching offers a unique opportunity to study the origin and development of one of those settlements whose size, trade and industry justify their claim to be the earliest truly urban settlements in Temperate Europe.