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*Arrianna* · May 19, 2008, 01:55 PM

There was also one on History channel. They don't actually check their shows for accuracy so they are often quite entertaining though not factual.

FOXNews.com - Real-Life Crystal Skull Cult Inspires Indiana Jones Movie

Quote:

Experts dismiss the hundreds of existing crystal skulls as fakes that were probably made by colorful antiquities traders in the 19th century. But Mayan priests worship the skulls, even today, and real-life skull hunters still search for them.
...
In fact, few of today's crystal skulls can be documented any further back than the 1860s, when Europe was swept by a rage for pre-Hispanic "relics."

Frenchman Eugene Boban, a colorful antiquities dealer with a checkered past and murky political ties, set up a store here to supply the trade after the French invaded Mexico. Eventually he carted skulls around between New York, Paris and Mexico City, selling them to private collectors.

Buyers were often told that the skulls were made by the Mayas, whose civilization peaked between 300 and 900 A.D. But no crystal skull has ever been excavated from a documented archaeological site.
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Thousands of miles away in Washington, Jane MacLaren Walsh keeps one of the skulls in her office at the Smithsonian Institution. She doubts the ancient Mayans ever had any such skulls.

An anthropologist and antiquities sleuth, she has spent more than a decade studying the best-known skulls, like the ones acquired by the British Museum and Paris' Quai Branly museum over a century ago, as well as the Smithsonian's own skull.

She says they are stylistically unlike pre-Hispanic depictions of death's heads, and often show microscopic marks from cutting tools unavailable in pre-Hispanic times.

"None of them is ancient," Walsh said.
...
It's possible that the near-human sized fakes may have been inspired by two real crystal skulls now on display at Mexico City's respected National Anthropology Museum.

Much smaller and less perfectly carved than the ones held at the museums in Europe, these jewelry-sized trinkets, about an inch in height, are in the Aztec and Oaxaca collections, where the museum classifies them as either late pre-Hispanic or early colonial.

The skulls' legend has spawned a new breed of followers.

New-agers have associated the skulls with the belief that the Mayan "Long Count" calendar runs out on Dec. 21, 2012, when it reaches the end of a 5,126-year cycle. According to this theory, all 13 skulls must be reunited and lined up together to prevent the world from falling off its axis.

For example the show claimed there are only 7 known skulls but in reality there are hundreds sold around the world and only 2 possible real ones that are about 1 inch tall. Heck the story may have even been made up by the French trader in the 1860's. Still it makes a good movie.