Product Details

• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Wgbh Boston
• VHS Release Date: March 28, 2000
• Run Time: 60 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6305049017
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #487,987 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Discover a lost civilization that inhabited caves high on the isolated cliffs of Southern Mexico nearly 1,000 years ago. The tantalizing clues, including graphic evidence of ritual child sacrifice and a sophisticated writing system, shed new light on this mysterious people, the Zoqui, who may have been precursors of the Mayans.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars A stimulating, significant archaeological adventure, July 30, 2006

By 

Daniel Jolley "darkgenius" (Shelby, North Carolina USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Nova: Search for the Lost Cave People [VHS] (VHS Tape)

I don't remember having heard of the Zoque before watching this NOVA documentary. They must have been a fascinating people, to have chosen some of the most isolated, inaccessible sites you can imagine for some of their most significant ceremonies. The caves used by these Cave People were hundreds of feet up vertical cliffs along the Rio La Venta basin, which is located in the wild jungles of the Chiapas region of southern Mexico. The area is so remote that just getting there today is an adventure, taking you through dense jungle and a series of rapids. We follow a team of scientists who, in 1997, made the journey and, with the help of expert climbers, undertook the first real investigation of the mysterious caves high up on the cliffs. Why are the Zoque so important? Not only did they pre-exist and live alongside with the Mayan civilization, they also developed writing centuries before the Maya did, at least insofar as the evidence now shows.

The international team featured in this documentary made some important discoveries in the few caves they chose to examine - broken pottery shards, designs on stucco floors, incense burners with jaguar designs, preserved human excrement (which provides information on the people's diet), and - most significantly - human remains of children, all but one of them dying before their first birthday. These latter findings, of course, support the common belief that the Zoque, like other ancient MesoAmerican Indian tribes, sacrificed children to the gods they worshipped. These may not sound like major finds, but they really are, principally because so little seems to be known about Zoque culture as of yet. Of course, the most entertaining part of the documentary comes with watching the archaeologists and their related teams risking their lives to get to these all but inaccessible caves up the sheer cliff walls. These aren't a bunch of newly-graduated youngsters undertaking this series of daunting tasks; the leaders, in particular, include men well advanced in years. I'll say this for them - they're definitely dedicated to their work.

After exploring several caves, the group makes its way through dense jungle to an area that may hide the ruins of an ancient Zoque settlement - aerial photographs suggest there are large geometric objects there, and the modern Zoque of the region point to it as a former Zoque site. Sure enough, after four days of hiking, impressive ruins of a fairly large settlement emerge from underneath the jungle growth. Relatively giddy with excitement, the team of archaeologists and related experts get to work surveying the site, eventually acquiring enough information for them to depict what the ancient city probably looked like.

Clearly, this Search for the Lost Cave People stirs up your interest in the subject matter and leaves you wanting more in the way of answers. I for one would certainly like to see some kind of follow-up documentary that shows what has been learned in the years since this documentary originally aired in 1998.

5.0 out of 5 stars Video Of Life And Death, February 23, 2005

By 

Monica D. Affleck "spiritcavegrl" (Philadelphia,, Pennsylvania United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Nova: Search for the Lost Cave People [VHS] (VHS Tape)

This is an interesting NOVA show that goes back in time approximately 1,000 years, back to a time when sacrifice and worship went hand in hand, out of respect for the Gods young children were possibly sacrificed for better crops, better year.
A hard look into the past of an ancient civilization of people who were creative and innovative. Just like other areas in the world we have alot of discoveries still waiting to be found, this is just one. But it is in Ancient Mayan times, if you like history and would like to be entertained for about an hour this video is worth the time. The Computer recreations of the complex
is awesome, capturing the amagination.