Chronicle (1966)

On the heights of the Andes there lived before the Incas a shadowy people: headhunters, maize-growers, moon-worshippers. Their faces and moods are reflected in the pottery which has survived them in the dry Peruvian sand.

The Niah Caves in Borneo tell a story of human activity which spans 40,000 years. Men lived and died in these caves before the end of the Ice Ages, and today their strange rites of burial are still observed.

Gold bracelets, Roman carvings, Anglo-Saxon and medieval paintings - the history of our islands from the Bronze Age to Victorian times is reflected in the most exciting finds and acquisitions of 1967. Archaeologists and museum workers who have brought these finds to the Chronicle studio talk about them to Magnus Magnusson and Patricia Connor.

More than 3,000 years ago the great monument of Stonehenge was raised by the Bronze Age warriors of Britain. Its unique and sophisticated design suggests that it may have been the work of a single architect - a priest or king who could command such a massive undertaking. Who was he? How did he live - or die? No written or spoken record has survived to tell us. Tonight's Chronicle uses the evidence of archaeology and other studies to reconstruct, in dramatic form, the story as it might have been.

The first two weeks' work on the excavation of Silbury Hill is nearly complete. The first 'live' outside broadcast from the excavation.

In a disused army camp in Co. Durham a collection of more than 10,000 items which reflect life as it was lived in the North-East in the last two centuries, from a complete colliery to a miner's kettle on the hob, await reassembly into working units in one of the most exciting new museums in Britain. Frank Atkinson, Director of the Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, describes the doubts and difficulties to be overcome in creating a living museum of this kind.

Between the eighth and fourth centuries B.C. the rich Etruscans of Vulci, a town seventy miles north of Rome, were buried with their possessions - including precious metals and jewellery - in thousands of rock-cut tombs. These graves attracted the attention of tomb robbers from the period of the Roman Empire, and raiding of tombs in the Vulci area has gone on sporadically ever since. In the last few years it has turned almost into a large-scale business - and these underground riches are the subject of a complicated struggle between robbers, policemen, international middle-men, and archaeologists. This film follows the activities of two young Italian labourers who defy strict police vigilance and the risk of jail sentences by living off the proceeds from what they dig out of tombs.

The story of the assassination of the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife - the act which led to the outbreak of the First World War. The documentation of this fateful incident is extraordinarily detailed, and the programme has been filmed in the actual streets where it happened on that hot day in June 1914.

The Roman palace at Fishbourne opened its gates to the public this morning. This incredible gift to a local British king was worth £1 million when it was built in A.D. 75. It is also the subject of a breakthrough in museum design and site preservation. Magnus Magnusson talks about this to Professor Barry Cunliffe, the archaeologist who has excavated the palace over the past seven years.

Startling new evidence that bull-fighting may have originated in Turkey 8,000 years ago has recently been revealed at Catal Huyuk - the earliest known civilised town. A vivid red painting of a bull being baited is just one of the most astounding finds which show that this Stone Age people were not only intensely religious but had a very sophisticated way of life. James Mellaart talks to Patricia Connor about his discoveries.

Silbury is one of the largest prehistoric earthworks in Europe, possibly dating to 2400BC. In this programme, originally broadcast live, Magnus Magnusson meets the archaeologists who have uncovered a tunnel that leads into the heart of the mound. 'Chronicle' filmed excavations at the Silbury Mound from 1968 to 1970, one of the largest operations mounted by the programme.

1666 was a year of miracles... In England unprecedented hail-storms, the Great Plague, and the Fire of London were all seen as signs that the hand of God was at work. While one sect of English Puritans expected the Second Coming of Christ, and others expected the Day of Doom, the Jews found a Messiah. Tonight's film tells the strange story of Sabbati Zevi and the wave of messianic ferment he unloosed on the world of 1666.

Tomorrow the vast temples of Abu Simbel - now safe above the rising waters of the Nile - are to be opened again to the public. The threatened temples were sawn into pieces, transported up the cliff and rebuilt in a five-year operation that used the skills of an international team of archaeologists, engineers, and workmen. Magnus Magnusson, from its new site, tells the story of a unique achievement - the rebirth of Abu Simbel.

An aura of violence, treachery, and even incest surrounds the names of Pope Alexander VI and his children Caesar and Lucretia Borgia. Michael Adams tells the story of this notorious family in a film shot in the places where these dramatic events took place.

The finest period of British architecture was deeply influenced by the great palace of the Roman Emperor Diocletian in modern Yugoslavia. It stands to this day as the nucleus of the city of Split, and it was this building which inspired the young Scots architect Robert Adam in much of his best work. His enthusiasm for the place was boundless: he drew it and measured its every detail. His book on The Palace was dedicated to George III, and through him the style of the late Roman Empire produced perhaps the greatest period of British architecture.

This summer, Norwegian archaeologists excavating in Orkney came upon the grave of a Viking Chieftain. Among its miraculously well-preserved contents were a small pile of female bones, the first indisputable evidence ever found for Viking human sacrifice. Chronicle cameras recorded from start to finish the delicate process which threw this dramatic new light on life in the Orkneys a thousand years ago.

Thirty years ago archaeologists came upon one of the richest finds ever made in Britain, the Sutton Hoo treasure ship. But the ship itself consisted only of rivets and stains in the sand. Now by a remarkable process technicians from the British Museum have made a ninety-foot-long cast of the vessel, bringing to life again the great Anglo-Saxon warship.

The Industrial Revolution began in Britain, but every day now buildings, machinery, and processes which made possible this crucial advance in man's history are being destroyed. Chronicle looks at some of the successes and some of the frustrations of trying to save part of Britain's great industrial heritage.