Atlas of the Celts, due in shops at the end of the month, promises to give a "comprehensive and fascinating" picture of the people we regard as our ancestors.

Put together by Colin Twist, with consultant editor Barry Raftery of UCD, it is large, glossy, impressively illustrated and has time lines, biographies, an atlas of Celtic sites, recent debates on Celtic identity - anything you could want to know from the birth of the Roman Empire to Iron-Age Britain, from Christian Ireland to the Viking onslaughts.

With chapters on clothing, housing, jewellery and writing it is aimed at the general reader as well as second-level students and children. The publishers are Philips and the hardback edition costs £28.