Secrets of the Dead (2000)

S1E1 Catastrophe (1)

Could a catastrophic event have led humanity into the early Dark Ages? Researchers now suggest that a natural disaster around 535 A.D. might be to blame. Science writer David Keys argues that this event, described as a "loud bang," was a volcanic eruption powerful enough to equal "two thousand million Hiroshima-sized bombs." Keys contends that this environmental upheaval had far-reaching effects, impacting societies from Mongolia to Constantinople. It may have triggered plagues, famines, mass migrations, contributed to the fall of Teotihuacan, enabled the Anglo-Saxons to defeat the Celts, and possibly even influenced the emergence of Islam.