Chronicle (UK TV series)

Chronicle is a BBC Television programme that was shown monthly and then fortnightly on BBC Two from 18 June 1966 to its last broadcast on 29 May 1991. Chronicle focused on popular archaeology and related subjects, and is considered an influential programme and a landmark in early television presentation of archaeology. The series was commissioned by David Attenborough in 1966, Among the presenters of the programme are Magnus Magnusson, Colin Renfrew, David Drew, and John Julius Norwich.
Background
BBC first broadcast a regular archaeology programme on radio introduced by Glyn Daniel in 1946 titled The Archaeologist. This was followed by a popular quiz show Animal, Vegetable and Mineral on the television in 1952, and Burled Treasure broadcast from 1954 to 1959. In 1966, the first controller of BBC Two, David Attenborough, thought that there was sufficient interest in archaeology and established a special unit on the subject to produce Chronicle. Attenborough intended Chronicle to report on archaeological digs and findings around the word where archaeology would be shown as it was practised, and new discoveries could be presented on the show. It also financed projects that they would film and televise, the first of which was an excavation on a prehistoric mound Silbury Hill undertaken by Richard Atkinson in 1968 which was broadcast live. Other presenters include the archaeologists Colin Renfrew and David Drew, and the historian John Julius Norwich. A selection of excerpts and full programmes have been made available at the BBC archive website.
Notable episodes aired include the excavations at Sutton Hoo, The Last Days of Minos, and a 16-hour live coverage of the raising of Mary Rose from the Solent. The programme would become the primary outlet for archaeology documentaries for many years, although other occasional series such as In Search of the Dark Ages by Michael Wood in 1981, and Romer's Egypt by John Romer in 1982 had been produced, in particular when the history-based Timewatch was launched in 1982. The programme ended in 1991 after the death of its editor Bruce Norman. It had however attracted some criticisms for sensationalising some of the subjects, for example in the three episodes by Henry Lincoln on the Rennes-le-Château "mystery" broadcast in 1972, 1974 and 1979 (it would became the conspiracy theory expounded in The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail and later the inspiration for Dan Brown's novel The Da Vinci Code). It has also been criticised for its "soft-centered approach" on such subjects as the Mary Rose.<ref name="tusa"/>
Ratings
The show had good viewing figures for documentaries, rising from one million in 1973 to 2.5 million in 1983.<ref name"clack"/> Its most successful broadcast was the three day live coverage of the raising of the Tudor warship Mary Rose in October 1982, which gained a cumulative audience of 20 million in the UK as well as other viewers in Europe.<ref name"norman"/>

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