David Keys is an archeological correspondant and journalist. He has been archaeology correspondent for the London based daily paper, ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' since 1986, as well as a writer on historical climate change, and contributor to television programs on archeological subjects. His book ''Catastrophe: An Investigation into the Origins of the Modern World'' (2000) on a 6th-century AD climatic disaster has had a mixed reception – he and his theory were featured in the 2000

Television pilot A television pilot (also known as a pilot or a pilot episode and sometimes marketed as a tele-movie) in United Kingdom and United States television, is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell a show to a television netwo ...

to the

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...

series, ''

Secrets of the Dead ''Secrets of the Dead'', produced by WNET 13 New York, is an ongoing PBS television series which began in 2000. The show generally follows an investigator or team of investigators exploring what modern science can tell viewers about some of t ...

''.

Early life

6th Century catastrophe theory

Keys' book ''Catastrophe: An Investigation into the Origins of the Modern World'' (2000) theorizes that a natural disaster caused changes during the 6th and 7th centuries in the whole world, including Christian territories, that contributed to the end of ancient civilization and initiated what is now known as the medieval era. Key's work expands on that by

Mike Baillie Michael G. L. Baillie (1944-2023) was a leading expert in dendrochronology, or dating by means of tree-rings, and Professor of Palaeoecology at Queen's University of Belfast, in Northern Ireland. In the 1980s, he was instrumental in building a y ...

in ''Exodus to Arthur: catastrophic encounters with comets'' (1999) in which the primary evidence for the event is

dendochronology Dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) is the scientific method of chronological dating, dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed in a tree. As well as dating them, this can give data for dendroclimatology, ...

(shown by narrow rings around c. 540 CE), as well as acidity in Greenlandic ice cores (suggesting volcanic activity), as well as accounts of historians such as

John of Ephesus John of Ephesus (or of Asia) (Greek: Ίωάννης ό Έφέσιος, Classical Syriac: ܝܘܚܢܢ ܕܐܦܣܘܣ, c. 507 – c. 588 AD) was a leader of the early Syriac Orthodox Church in the sixth century and one of the earliest and the most im ...

Procopius Procopius of Caesarea (; ''Prokópios ho Kaisareús''; ; – 565) was a prominent Late antiquity, late antique Byzantine Greeks, Greek scholar and historian from Caesarea Maritima. Accompanying the Roman general Belisarius in Justinian I, Empe ...

, and

Cassiodorus Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator (c. 485 – c. 585), commonly known as Cassiodorus (), was a Christian Roman statesman, a renowned scholar and writer who served in the administration of Theodoric the Great, king of the Ostrogoths. ''Senato ...

on changes in climate, including dimming of the sun. Keys adds further information from East Asia and develops his own version of the theory; he attributes the changes to a volcanic event in East Asia, in 535 AD, possible at

Krakatoa Krakatoa (), also transcribed (), is a caldera in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java and Sumatra in the Indonesian province of Lampung. The caldera is part of a volcanic island group (Krakatoa archipelago) comprising four islands. Tw ...

Critical response

Keys' propositions seem not to have been either submitted for academic publication or subject to peer review. No referrable critique is available. Keys' popular book Catastrophe has been subject to many reviews, readily available elsewhere. The work has received mixed reviews: ''

Publishers Weekly ''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of ...

'' criticized the book, writing that "Huge claims call for big proof, yet Keys reassembles history to fit his thesis, relentlessly overworking its explanatory power in a manner reminiscent of Velikovsky's theory that a comet collided with the earth in 1500 B.C." A mainly critical review in ''

The New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...

'' by

Malcolm W. Browne Malcolm Wilde Browne (April 17, 1931August 27, 2012) was an American journalist and photographer, best known for his award-winning photograph of the self-immolation of Buddhist monk Thích Quảng Đức in 1963. Early life and education Brown ...

concluded that "Still, this book must be taken seriously, if only as a reminder that survival in a world threatened by real dangers hangs by a very slender thread". British archaeologist

Ken Dark Kenneth Rainsbury Dark (born in Brixton, London in 1961) is a British archaeologist who works on the 1st millennium AD in Europe (including Roman and immediately post-Roman Britain) and the Roman and Byzantine Middle East, on the archaeology o ...

commented that "much of the apparent evidence presented in the book is highly debatable, based on poor sources or simply incorrect. ..Nonetheless, both the global scope and the emphasis on the 6th century AD as a time of wide-ranging change are notable, and the book contains some obscure information which will be new to many. However, it fails to demonstrate its central thesis and does not offer a convincing explanation for the many changes discussed". Archaeologist Brian M. Fagan referred to it as "investigative journalism" and "an interesting and, at times, compelling narrative (and good television)" concluding that "Keys is right to draw attention to the importance of short-term climatic change, but, in our present state of knowledge, the deterministic and somewhat sensationally written Catastrophe goes too far."

British monarchy

Keys has warned against the United Kingdom becoming a republic. In an ''Independent'' article published a few days after the

coronation of Charles III and Camilla The Coronation of the British monarch, coronation of Charles III and his wife, Queen Camilla, Camilla, as Monarchy of the United Kingdom, king and List of British royal consorts, queen of the United Kingdom and the 14 other Commonwealth re ...

, he wrote: "In most examples of the abolition of monarchies in major countries, their demise was followed by a strengthening of the right and the erosion of democracy, justice, equality and liberty."

References

External links