Cracking the Maya Code

NARRATOR: Imagine explorers arriving to find our cities deserted; our books have perished in some unknown catastrophe; all that is left to speak for us are the written words we have carved in stone. The travelers cannot make sense of our mysterious script, but if they could, would they comprehend who we were?
In the jungles of southern Mexico and Central America, the ancient ruins of the Maya posed such a mystery. They revealed a civilization of stunning achievements, created in isolation from Europe and Asia. Their cities were full of strange inscriptions, fantastic, twisting forms called hieroglyphs. They were carved on monuments and objects, painted on pottery and written in bark-paper books.
For centuries, the hieroglyphs confounded explorers. What secrets did they hold? Were they merely pictures and symbols, or, in fact, true writing, expressing an ancient language?
MICHAEL D. COE (Author, Breaking the Maya Code): People threw their hands up and said, "Nobody's ever going to crack this script. It just can't be done."
NARRATOR: The quest would obsess artists and adventurers, archeologists and linguists, and the youngest recipient ever of the MacArthur genius award.
DAVID STUART (Epigrapher, University of Texas at Austin): It became very clear to me that the real task of code-breaking was getting through this morass of the tangled visuals of the script.
NARRATOR: After centuries of struggle, the stories of the Maya scribes are coming to life.
MICHAEL COE: We began to see blood everywhere in the hieroglyphs. It was a rather darker view of the Maya that shocked a lot of people.
NARRATOR: As the hieroglyphs reveal their meaning, a history of a lost world is emerging, transforming our view of the ancient Maya.
DAVID STUART: These were literate people. They had these fantastic stories to tell. And we really got this amazing understanding of how the Maya saw their world.
NARRATOR: Up next on NOVA, Cracking the Maya Code.PBS Airdate: April 8, 2008