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This series presents information based in part on theory and conjecture.

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The producer's purpose is to suggest some possible explanations but not necessarily

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the only ones to the mysteries we will examine.

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A thousand years ago Indian empires flourished in what is now Mexico and Guatemala.

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People built incredible cities and awesome pyramids.

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They often used these same pyramids however for a grim ritual.

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The sacrifice of human beings.

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What sort of men were these?

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What dark secrets are entombed inside their massive pyramids?

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Bast areas of Central America are dense uninhabited jungle.

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For centuries the only regular visitors have been men known as chicleiros.

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They come in search of the chicle tree from whose sack chewing gum is made.

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Often it was these chicleiros who first discovered towering, bine- shrouded mounds.

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Ancient stone pyramids.

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All over Mexico and Guatemala pyramids lie in ruins.

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Remains of many separate Indian cultures, some dating back thousands of years.

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The few pyramids that have been restored are among the most awesome works of antiquity.

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In Chalula there is a pyramid which in volume is the largest building on earth.

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1400 feet on each side it covers 45 acres.

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To probe its construction archeologists dug four miles of tunnels inside the pyramid.

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They found steps of the pyramid.

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They found the remains of the pyramids.

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Four miles of tunnels inside the pyramid.

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They found steps of three earlier pyramids built one on top of another.

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The oldest dates back some 1800 years.

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In the heart of Mexico City workers are digging out an Aztec pyramid.

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Covering two city blocks the ruins consist of nine overlapping pyramids.

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Archeologists are restoring the original appearance.

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It was here in 1520 that Spanish conquistadores led by Hernán Cortés,

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marvels at the fact that the ruins were the first to be restored.

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It was here in 1520 that Spanish conquistadores led by Hernán Cortés,

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marveled at a gleaming white pyramid 100 feet high.

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It supported temples dedicated to the chief Aztec gods.

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The many temples and plazas comprised one of the great religious and ceremonial centers of ancient Mexico.

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When the Spaniards arrived in the New World,

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most of these pyramids were already in ruins, sources of mystery even to the native peoples.

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Later, travelers in Mexico who knew that the Egyptian pyramids were burial monuments

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asked whether the pyramids of Mexico might contain tombs or buried treasures.

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When none was found they wondered what strange meaning

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these pyramids might have had.

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Ancient American pyramids are found in the ruins of great architectural complexes.

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At the top of each pyramid is a platform reached by a steep staircase.

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Here stands a temple consisting of a few dark rooms.

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Why did these tiny temples require such massive bases?

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Near Mexico City sprawled the sun-baked ruins of Teotihuacan,

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largest and most mysterious city of ancient America.

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Dominating its avenues are huge pyramids.

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Here the enigmas begin.

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Facing west, the largest pyramid of Teotihuacan was dedicated to the sun god.

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Only half the height of the largest Egyptian pyramid,

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the pyramid of the sun nevertheless covers the same immense area,

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almost 600,000 square feet.

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If the builders had contact with Egypt, no one can say.

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Recently an ancient tunnel was discovered under the sun pyramid.

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It leads to a natural cavern where only a few pottery shards have been found.

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To Mexican Indians, caves symbolize Mother Earth.

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Some archaeologists believe the cave was the legendary birthplace of the pyramid builders tribe.

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Its discovery has fueled some of the most recent discoveries

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Its discovery has fueled speculation that somewhere in the huge bulk of the pyramid are hidden chambers,

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perhaps even a tomb.

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300 meters from the sun pyramid is a group of ancient holes forming a triple cross.

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From this spot on June 21st, the longest day of the year,

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the sun can be seen to rise over the pyramid's third notch,

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precisely marking the summer solstice.

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Of the people who built Teotihuacan, little is known.

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To their origin, we have scarcely a clue.

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The city flourished for centuries, then suddenly, 1200 years ago,

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it was burnt and abandoned for reasons unknown.

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No other great city left so few traces of its demise.

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No hieroglyphic writing or apocalyptic legends record the city's end.

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Did the climate change suddenly?

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Could disease, hunger and civil strife have made the city vulnerable to invaders from the north?

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Why was their city of over 200,000 laid out in such precise grids?

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What was their religion?

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Who were their gods?

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We are still searching for clues.

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One pyramid is decorated with great serpents.

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The snake heads resemble Quetzalcoatl, an important Mexican deity of later centuries.

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A strange blend of God, man and beast, he was revered for introducing learning and art.

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He shares the pyramid with Flaloc, the fierce Mexican rain god.

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Remarkably, the same goggle eyes are the same as the other.

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Remarkably, the same goggle eyes are found 700 miles to the east, in ruined cities whose people we do know.

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They were a separate culture, the Mayan, and were somehow connected to Teotihuacan.

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Within a century of the end of Teotihuacan, the Mayan Empire also collapsed.

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At the Mayan center of Chichen Itza, there is a temple known as the Caracol.

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It was a solar and astronomical observatory used a thousand years ago by Mayan priests.

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Night after night, astronomer priests charted the movements of heavenly bodies, making sightings with sticks or hollow tubes.

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Despite their lack of modern instruments, these early astronomers created a solar calendar whose accuracy was unrivaled until the 19th century.

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They recorded the rising of stars, had an excellent lunar calendar, and could warn of eclipses years in advance.

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The Dresden Codex, an ancient Mayan manuscript, preserves their calculation of the motions of Venus, accurate to one hour in a span of 300 years.

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For the Maya, the cycle of day and night was linked to the supernatural world of life and death.

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The nine tiers of their pyramids represented the nine levels of the underworld.

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Why, if the pyramids were connected with death, did they not have tombs?

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In 1949, archaeologist Alberto Rousse was exploring a pyramid at the Mayan center of Palenque.

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To his surprise, he uncovered a rubble-filled staircase leading down to the heart of the pyramid.

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At the bottom of the staircase, Rousse found skeletons of several youths, perhaps placed there as guardians.

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Then, he broke through to a large vaulted room.

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Around the walls were stucco reliefs of Mayan gods known as Lords of Darkness.

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In the center of the chamber, Dr. Rousse saw a huge stone monolith covered with carvings.

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We lifted the flat and scribe stone and found a large opening that was covered with another stone.

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We lifted that one too and found a sarcophagus in which appeared a skeleton of a man with all his jade jewelry.

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Over the man's face was a mask made of 200 jade pieces to the Mayans more precious than gold.

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The sarcophagus lid, its colors restored, shows a priest looking up through sacred trees.

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It appears the lid was intended to help the deceased to heavenly paradise.

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The pyramids, however, had another more grisly connection with death.

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They were often the scene of grim ceremonies ending in human sacrifice.

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Why were such technically advanced people so mesmerized by blood and death?

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When archeologists excavated the Karakol at Chichen Itza, they found 14 skulls on a platform adjoining the main stairway.

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The skulls belonged to victims of human sacrifice.

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The most common form of sacrifice, the heart was torn still beating from the victim's chest by the heart.

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The most common form of sacrifice, the heart was torn still beating from the victim's chest by the high priest and offered to the gods.

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The victims were prisoners of war, slaves, or even devout women like the Chichen Itza.

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were prisoners of war, slaves, or even devout volunteers.

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Often, the body was divided among priests and populists and eagles.

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According to Dr. Ruse, we don't know whether the Mayans perform sacrifices on the tops of the pyramids.

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For the Aztecs, we have information from the writings of the chroniclers, including some drawings.

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And there you can see that they made human sacrifices in front of the temple on the tops of the pyramids.

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After they killed the sacrificial victims, they threw them down the stairs.

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In front of the pyramid of Mexico City was a bizarre structure called the Skull Rack.

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According to Spanish reports, it contained 136,000 human heads.

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The Aztec obsession with sacrifice was no isolated example.

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Five centuries earlier, the Mayans of Chichen Itza also practiced sacrifice.

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It is believed that this platform once supported poles on which were stacked the heads of sacrificial victims.

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There were many situations that called for sacrifice.

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The rain god had to be appeased.

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And to protect the sun during its nightly passage through the underworld, priests felt compelled to make daily offerings of human hearts and blood.

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Ancient Mexican and Mayan art is rich in death-inspired images.

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Nightmare visions of the grotesque, the fantastic and the terrifying abound.

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The famous calendar stone found near the Aztec pyramid embodies the highest flowering of their science and art.

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At its center is the sun god.

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Sticking out in the form of a knife, his tongue depicts the god's incessant demand to be fed with human hearts and blood.

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Why were these people so preoccupied with death?

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How could cultures so advanced in art and science be so obsessed by blood and sacrifice?

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They were a people who invented zero and counted time in the millions of years.

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Yet slaughter fascinated them more than anything else.

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In the shadow of the pyramid was the bustling marketplace.

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Amidst clay pots and garden vegetables, a young man leads a procession.

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He is dressed in the garb of the god to whom he will be sacrificed.

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Such sacrificial victims felt especially honored since their souls would rise to the house of the sun.

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For ancient Mexicans, there were no absolute barriers between the living and the dead.

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They feared death but believed that flowed naturally from life.

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We know their descendants, simple corn farmers living in the torrid plains and jungle villages of Central America.

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In the Yucatan, most of the villagers are pure Mayans.

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Today the Mayans' descendants remain suspended between ancient and modern worlds,

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tied to unfathomed mysteries in the buried cities of their ancestors.

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Deep in the Guatemala jungle is the most awesome of all Mayan ruins.

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It is the fabulous city of Tikal.

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Like ancient skyscrapers, its huge pyramids pierce the rainforest canopy.

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They support dark, narrow temples with walls up to 40 feet thick.

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Crowning the temples are giant roof cones, covered with ornate but decaying sculpture.

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Once, gleaming white plaster coated the pyramids.

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The temples were painted a gaudy red.

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Great crowds gathered in the plazas to watch spectacles of pomp and sacrifice.

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The population didn't have access to the temples, which were on tops of the pyramids.

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The only ones allowed were the priests.

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For the ordinary people, the pyramids were proved

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that the ruling class had great power, that they had better obey.

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Perhaps the pyramids were symbols of ruling class power, designed to awe and frighten the populace.

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The pyramid stairs are so steep that some tourists have slipped and fallen to their deaths.

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Perhaps they were built so that bodies of sacrificial victims would roll unimpeded to the ground.

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Everywhere at Tikal are altars paired with vertical stones called stile.

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A common theme of altar carvings is the bound prisoner destined for decapitation.

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On one stone, skull and thigh bones represent the captive, dispatched by two executioners with stone knives.

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Why are there so many altars at Tikal?

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Could it have known the horrors of mass sacrifice?

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More than 50,000 people once lived in Tikal.

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But in 889 AD, the dates carved in stone suddenly stopped.

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The city was mysteriously abandoned.

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The whole Mayan empire collapsed. No one knows why.

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The jungle has today reclaimed its territory.

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Once gleaming temples have crumbled to ruin.

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No other civilizations vanished so mysteriously.

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Most experts believe the city dwellers fled to small villages, leaving the ceremonial centers empty.

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Why did they leave? What chased them out?

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The city was destroyed.

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In ancient America, gods and men met in ways we may never understand.

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Animalistic, fatalistic and magical ideas ruled supreme.

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With these peoples, reality was multileveled, like the steps of their pyramids.

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In a system of mystical thinking alien to us, pyramids were symbolic stairways to heaven, the ultimate in spiritual technology.

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Somewhere in the vast gulf between the pyramid builders' accomplishments and their practices, lies the myth of the pyramids.

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The pyramids' accomplishments and their practices lies the answer to their mysterious disappearance.

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Primeval jungle spreads around Tikal in every direction.

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The dense rainforest covers 20,000 square miles concealing countless ruins.

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Archaeologists are just now uncovering what could be the greatest ruin of all.

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50 miles north of Tikal, an old Mayan road stretches toward the unescavated city of El Mirador and its giant rubble-covered pyramids.

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Today, El Mirador is almost completely concealed by vegetation.

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Both larger and older than Tikal, it may be the first true city of the Americas.

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At El Mirador, archaeologists hope to find crucial clues to the strange fate of the lost civilization of the Americas.

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Morgan, Rockefeller and other captains of industry and robber barons who shape the world we live in at 9 here on the History Channel, where the past comes alive.