The Old World has confronted archaelogoists with many riddles, perhaps the most tantalising of which is the Dark Age, an economic and cultural recession so devastating it lasted for 400 years from 1200 to 800 BC. Or did it? The dates for the Near East and Mediterranean are derived from the highly regarded chronology of ancient Egypt, but could not that itself have been miscalculated? This is the pioneering theory proposed by Peter James in an intricate piece of scholarly detective work. Deciphering the clues from papyri and pottery, he and his team of experts search layer by layer throught he excavated treasures of a vast area from Spain to Iran and from Denmark to Sudan, until they reach Egypt, the root of the labyrinthine riddle. It is here that they unearth 250 years of 'ghost history'. Once these are eliminated, fresh perspective is thrown on not only the reality of the Dark Age, but also on the Trojan War, the foundation of Rome, the origin of the Greek alphabet and the Golden Age of Solomon. Centuries of Darkness is a masterpiece of archeological reasoning which will revolutionise our view of the ancient world.