A Strange History.

A Strange History.

By
David Calvert

‘Time will reveal everything. It is a babbler, and speaks even when not asked.’

(Euripides. Ancient Greek dramatist)
Certainly, it has revealed, in part, a human history replete with strange sights in the skies, powerful beings, and age-old artifacts that cast doubt on our understanding of 
archaeological, scientific and historical perspectives.
Though we should, perhaps, view these aberrances with a healthy dose of scepticism, it would be wise not to ignore them out of hand. Long before the advent of the written word, prehistoric man depicted scenes of everyday life through literal drawings or paintings. One such cave painting (circa 2000 BCE) discovered between the border of Russia and China is one such artifact.
cave_painting
But what had its originator witnessed that caused him to paint images of what, to all intents and purposes, are a space suited entity standing beneath a saucer-shaped UFO emitting a plume of smoke from its underbellywhile in 
the foreground stands another entity holding what appears to be a disc-shaped device. How do we square such imagery with orthodox science? Is it remotely possible for a prehistoric man to depict a scene of a modern-day phenomenon by chance alone, or is the image evidence of the archetypal phenomenon Carl Gustav Jung wrote of in his 1959 book. Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth Of Things Seen In The Sky?
His theory states that when a UFO (in its literal sense) manifests itself, its imagery is such that it stimulates powerful unconscious mental processes in the mind of the witness. These unconscious processes, in turn, are released into the conscious mind of the 
observer causing them to give meaning to what they have seen. Cultural and personal 
expectations colour the interpretation of the sighting. The projected meaning is then 
passed on, ad infinitum, to others and is perpetuated and strengthened over time. 
Our ancestral ‘gods’ are no longer in vogue, however, and have been replaced by icons befitting a technologically advanced and sophisticated society.
The Hieroglyphs of Thutmose III.
Hieroglyphics are one of the earliest known forms of writing and here, too, there are
disconcerting and troublesome anomalies. The papyrus text of Pharaoh Thutmose III (1504 – 1450 BCE), found among the papers of a director of the Vatican’s Egyptian 
museum, recorded aerial phenomena reminiscent to that of the Mexican UFO wave of the 1990s. This is considered to be the first sighting on record:
It began with “… a circle of fire coming in the sky …it had no head (not a comet), the breath of its mouth had a foul odour. Its body was one rod (5 m) long and one rod wide. It had no voice.” After some days, the UFOs began to multiply, becoming …“more numerous in the 
sky than ever.” They extended to …“the limits of the four supports of the heavens.” 
Eventually, they climbed high and headed south. 
While it is possible that some form of hysterical contagion was responsible for the 
sighting there are, nevertheless, curious aspects to these UFOs that are noteworthy: their  bright circular appearance, their peculiar smell and their silent manoeuvres seem to mirror contemporary UFO accounts.
Alexander’s Flying Shields.
Occasionally, UFOs are seen to take a hand in human affairs. No lesser personage than greek_alexander_the_greatAlexander the Great was allegedly aided in his conquest of the besieged city of Tyre by five “flying shields”, moving in a
triangular formation. The year was 322 BCE. The largest of the circling UFOs suddenly shot a beam of light at the city wall, breaching its defenses. Alexander’s army then poured into the city whilst the UFOs hovered overhead.When the citadel was secured, they flew off.
Personal research, however, has cast doubt on the authenticity of these events and reflects on the credibility of an earlier account Alexander was supposed to have had with UFOs at Jaxartes, India. In his work ‘Anabasis of Alexander‘, the second century Greek historian, Flavius Arrianus, attributes the city’s downfall to an intricate siege work that made it possible for Alexander’s army to scale the 150 ft high walls, with not a “flying shield” in sight.
Ezekiel’s “Wheels.”
Even the Bible is not spared the Ancient Astronaut Hypothesis. The story of Ezekiel’s 
wheel (595 BCE) has become a testament to its proponents of things extraterrestrial. It is one of the most controversial theories in ufological circles. Here the biblical prophet portrays a craft that NASA scientist, Joseph F Blumrich claims we are all familiar with. Even allowing for some variation in Blumrich’s design, other commentators agree that Ezekiel’s description is that of a helicopter-like craft, consisting of a capsule supported on four legs, each containing helicopter units having folding rotors and retractable wheels.‘Might Ezekiel’s description of the “living creatures” with four faces and four 
wings be his way of describing the legs and the four rotor units?’ Blumrich asks. 
ezekielvision2
The explanation seems plausible when one considers the primitive culture Ezekiel 
sprang from, and his limited vocabulary when faced with such an apparent super 
technology. He might very well have interpreted it in the only way he knew – as God. 
What is more, if the provenance of a helicopter hieroglyph and other astounding images discovered in the ancient temple of Seti I is proven to be true, then it would certainly seem that such technology existed over 3000 years ago. One might suppose, given all this alleged superior technology, that something other than cave drawings and ancient texts survived the ravages of time; some tangible ‘nuts and bolts’ evidence of the otherworldly intellects believed to have coexisted with man.
The Earliest Know Battery.
The 2000-year-old Baghdad battery was discovered by archaeologists in Iraq in 1936. But is it evidence of extraterrestrial know-how, or just simply the remnant of a long lost human civilisation, whose greatness rivaled and exceeded that of our own? The battery consists of all the components that go to make up a working battery cell and when 
researchers made up a replica of it, substituting battery acid for fruit juice, it produced a half volt of electricity, enough power to coat artifacts with silver or gold, a technique 
known to us today as electroplating. Such a discovery points to a knowledge and advanced technology being in place millennia before the Italian physicist Alessandra 
Volta (1745-1827) invented the first modern battery in 1800.
Charting the Heavens.
Parts of what is believed to be an early astrolabe (a device that is used to measure the 
altitudes of planets and stars)were recovered from a shipwreck in the eastern 
Mediterranean at the turn of the 20th century. Inscriptions on its workings dated it at 
around 80 BCE. Known as the Antikythera Mechanism, it was X-radio-graphed in 1971 
and it revealed a remarkably sophisticated internal arrangement of dials, gears and 
graded plates.
antikythera_mechanism_montage
Following an in-depth study of this unique instrument and its mechanisms, Professor Derek de Solla Price concluded that it must have been some form of computing device for studying the movements of the Sun, Moon, and planets. Whatever its function, it is a technology far in advance of its time. 
Babylonian priests possessed knowledge of Jupiter’s four largest moons, the phases of Venus and seven satellites belonging to Saturn, long before Galileo (1564-1642) invented the telescope and made astronomical observations, finally establishing the Copernican theory of the universe.
Age of Enlightenment.
Even today, Homo sapiens are still divided on the origins of mankind. About half believe in the Darwinian theory of evolution, in which no intelligent intervention is required, while the other half believe that some form of intelligence was necessary. Those holding the latter view are split into factions: a) the creationists who see God as the source of all life and b), the astrogenecists, who see humanity as the product of an extraterrestrial experiment.
The concept of extraterrestrial life is now one of the most persevering themes of western civilisation, yet strangely its roots date back to at least the ancient Greeks. Pre-1980s historians largely ignored it because they thought it did not constitute science or have any intellectually respected history
In 1977 Steven J. Dick, an astronomer and historian of science at the US Naval 

Observatory wrote, The Biological Universe: The Twentieth Century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science. The debate’s history offers numerous and timely lessons about the nature of evidence and inference. Dick has a BS in Astrophysics, and an MA and PhD in History and Philosophy of Science from Indiana University

However we interpret them, these and other anomalies have been with us since the earliest times. Only now are some beginning to seriously question their provenance. 
labelling them as oddities, fanciful anecdotes, quirks, and hoaxes, simply because they challenge our worldview of history, is unscientific. To ignore them is to deny our heritage– whatever that might ultimately prove to be.
References.
 White, Michael (1997): The X Factor, issue 12, Marshall Cavendish Partworks Ltd.
Brookesmith, Peter (1995): UFO: The Complete Sightings Catalogue, BCA.
Story, Ronald D (ed.) (2002): The Mammoth Encyclopedia of Extraterrestrial Encounters, Constable & Robinson Ltd.
Blumrich, Joseph F (1974): The Spaceships of Ezekiel, Bantam.
Watson, William H (March/April 1999): UFO Magazine, Quest Publications International Ltd.
Alford, Alan F (September/October 1997): UFO Magazine, Quest Publications International Ltd.
 

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