THE MYSTERY OF CHACO CANYON Chaco Canyon, located in northwest
New Mexico, is perhaps the only site in the world constructed in
an elaborate pattern that mirrors the yearly cycle of the sun
and the 19-year cycle of the moon. How did an ancient
civilization, with no known written language, arrange its
buildings into a virtual celestial calendar, spanning an area
roughly the size of Ireland? Why did this society, ancestors of
today's Pueblo Indians, choose to establish the center of their
world in the middle of such an arid, barren land? And why, after
constructing buildings the size of the Roman Coliseum, did these
same people deliberately seal them and abruptly leave? These
enigmas have puzzled archaeologists for centuries. This program
presents substantial evidence that the Chacoan people expressed
a complex solar and lunar cosmology in their magnificent
architecture. The discoveries documented in the film have
transformed scientific understanding of this site - one of the
most elaborate and mysterious of an