Chariots of the Gods (14 page)

Connexions between Easter Island and Tiahuanaco automatically force themselves upon us. There as here, we find stone giants belonging to the same style. The haughty faces with their stoic expressions suit the statues—here as there. When Francisco Pizarro questioned the Incas about Tiahuanaco in 1532, they told him that no man had ever seen the city save in ruins, for Tiahuanaco had been built in the night of mankind. Traditions call Easter Island the 'navel of the world'. It is more than 3,125 miles from Tiahuanaco to Easter Island. How can one culture possibly have inspired the other?

Perhaps pre-Inca mythology can give us a hint here. In it the old god of creation, Viracocha, was an ancient and elemental divinity. According to tradition Viracocha created the world when it was still dark and had no sun; he sculptured a race of giants from stone and when they displeased him, he sank them in a deep flood. Then he caused the sun and the moon to rise above Lake Titicaca, so that there was light on earth. Yes, and then—read this closely—he shaped clay figures of men and animals at Tiahuanaco and breathed life into them. Afterwards he instructed these living creatures of his own creation in language, customs and arts, and finally flew some of them to different continents which they were supposed to inhabit thenceforth. After this task the god Viracocha and two assistants travelled to many countries to check how his instructions were being followed and what results they had had. Dressed as an old man, Viracocha wandered over the Andes and along the coast, and often he was given a poor reception. Once, at Cacha, he was so annoyed by his welcome that in a fury he set fire to a cliff which began to burn up the whole country. Then the ungrateful people asked his forgiveness, whereupon he extinguished the flames with a single gesture. Viracocha travelled on, giving instructions and advice, and many temples were erected to him as a result. Finally he said goodbye in the coastal province of Manta and disappeared over the ocean, riding on the waves, but he said he intended to come back.

The Spanish conquistadores who conquered South and Central America came up against the sagas of Viracocha everywhere. Never before had they heard of gigantic white men who came from somewhere in the sky. Full of astonishment, they learnt about a race of sons of the sun who instructed mankind in all kinds of arts and disappeared again. And in all the legends that the Spaniards heard, there was an assurance that the sons of the sun would return.

Although the American continent is the home of ancient cultures, our accurate knowledge of America is barely 1,000 years old. It is an absolute mystery to us why the Incas cultivated cotton in Peru in 3000 B.C. although they did not know or possess the loom. The Mayas built roads, but did not use the wheel, although they knew about it. The fantastic five-strand necklace of green jade in the burial pyramid of Tikal in Guatemala is a miracle. A miracle because the jade comes from China. The sculptures of the Olmecs are incredible. With their beautifully helmeted giant skulls, they can only be admired on the sites where they were found, for they will never be on show in a museum. No bridge in the country could stand the weight of the colossi. Until recently we could only move smaller 'monoliths' weighing up to fifty tons with our modern lifting appliances and loaders. Only now have cranes which can handle hundreds of tons been developed. But our ancestors could do so. How?

It even seems as if the ancient peoples took a special pleasure in juggling with stone giants over hill and dale. The Egyptians fetched their obelisks from Asswan, the architects of Stonehenge brought their stone blocks from south-west Wales and Marlborough, the stonemasons of Easter Island took their ready-made monster statues from a distant quarry to their present sites and no one can say where some of the monoliths at Tiahuanaco come from. Our remote ancestors must have been queer people; they liked making things difficult for themselves and always built their statues in the most impossible places. Was it just because they liked a hard life?

I refuse to think that the artists of our great past were as stupid as that. They could just as easily have erected their statues and temples in the immediate vicinity of the quarries if an old tradition had not laid down where their works ought to be sited. I am convinced that the Inca fortress of Sacsayhuaman was not built above Cuzco by chance, but rather because a tradition indicated the place as A holy spot. I am also convinced that in all the places where the most ancient monumental buildings of mankind were found the most interesting and important relics of our past lie still untouched in the ground, relics, moreover, which could be of tremendous importance for the further development of present-day space travel.

The unknown space travellers who visited our planet many thousands of years ago can hardly have been less farsighted than we think we are today. They were convinced that one day man would make the move out into the universe on his own initiative and using his own skills.

It is a well-known historical fact that the intelligences of our planet have constantly sought for kindred spirits, for life, for corresponding intelligences in the cosmos.

Present-day antennae and transmitters have broadcast the first radio impulses to unknown intelligences. When we shall receive an answer—in ten, fifteen or a hundred years—we do not know. We do not even know which star we should beam our message at, because we have no idea which planet should interest us most. Where do our signals reach unknown intelligences similar to human beings? We do not know. Yet there is much to support the belief that the information needed to reach our goal is deposited in our earth for us. We are trying hard to neutralise the force of gravity; we are experimenting with elementary particles and anti-matter. Are we also doing enough to find the data which are hidden in our earth, so that we can at last ascertain our original home?

If we take things literally, much that was once fitted into the mosaic of our past with great difficulty becomes quite plausible: not only the relevant clues in ancient texts, but also the 'hard facts' which offer themselves to our critical gaze all over the globe. Lastly we have our reason to think with.

So it will be man's ultimate insight to realise that his justification for existence to date and all his struggles to advance really consisted in learning from the past in order to make himself ready for contact with the existence in space. Once that happens, the shrewdest, most die-hard individualist must see that the whole human task consists in colonising the universe and that man's whole spiritual duty lies in perpetuating all his efforts and practical experience. Then the promise of the 'gods' of peace on earth and that the way to heaven is open can come true.

As soon as the available authorities, powers and intellects are devoted to space research, the results will make the absurdity of terrestrial wars abundantly clear. When men of all races, peoples and nations unite in the supranational task of making journeys to distant planets technically feasible, the earth with all its mini-problem will fall back into its right relation with the cosmic processes.

Occultists can put out their lamps, alchemists destroy their crucibles, secret brotherhoods take off their cowls. It will no longer be possible to offer man the nonsense that has been purveyed to him so brilliantly for thousands of years. Once the universe opens its doors, we shall attain to a better future.

I base the reasons for my scepticism about the interpretation of our remote past on the knowledge that is available today. If I admit to being a sceptic, I mean it in the sense in which Thomas Mann used it in a lecture in the twenties:

'The positive thing about the sceptic is that he considers everything possible!'

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Although I emphasised that it is not my intention to call in question the history of mankind during the last 2,000 years, I believe that the Greek and Roman gods and also most of the figures in sagas and legends are surrounded by the breath of a very remote past. Since mankind has existed, age-old traditions have lived on among the various peoples. More recent cultures, too, provide us with indications pointing to the remote, unknown past.

Ruins in the jungles of Guatemala and Yucatan can bear comparison with the colossal edifices of Egypt. The ground area of the pyramid of Cholula, 60 miles south of the Mexican capital, is bigger than that of the pyramid of Cheops. The pyramid field of Teotihuacan, 30 miles north of Mexico City, covers an area of almost 8 square miles and all the edifices are aligned according to the stars. The oldest text about Teotihuacan tells us that the gods assembled here and took council about man, even before homo sapiens existed!

The calendar of the Mayas, the most accurate in the world, has already been mentioned, and so has the Venusian formula. Today it is proved that all the edifices at Chichen Itza, Tikal, Copan and Palenque were built according to the fabulous Mayan calendar. The Mayas did not build pyramids because they needed them; they did not build temples because they needed them; they built temples and pyramids because the calendar decreed that a fixed number of steps of a building had to be completed every fifty-two years. Every stone has its relation to the calendar, every completed building conforms exactly to certain astronomical requirements.

But an absolutely incredible thing happened about A.D. 600! Suddenly and for no apparent reason a whole people left its laboriously and solidly built cities, with their rich temples, artistic pyramids, squares lined with statues and grandiose stadiums. The jungle ate its way through buildings and streets, broke up the masonry and turned everything into a vast landscape of ruins. No inhabitant ever returned there.

Let us pretend that this event, this enormous national migration, happened in ancient Egypt. For generations the people built temples, pyramids, cities, water conduits and streets according to calendar dates; wonderful sculptures were laboriously carved out of stone with primitive tools and installed in the magnificent buildings; when this work lasting more than a millennium was finished, they left their homes and moved to the barren north. Such a procedure, brought a little closer to the course of historical events that we are familiar with, seems incredible because it is ridiculous. The more incomprehensible a procedure, the more numerous the vague explanations and attempts at interpretation. The first version put forward was that the Mayas might have been driven out by foreign invaders. But who could have overcome the Mayas, who were at the peak of their civilisation and culture? No traces that could be connected with a military confrontation have ever been found.

The idea that the migration could have been caused by a marked change in climate is well worth considering. But there are no signs to support this view either. How could there be, when the distance covered by the Mayas from the territory of the old to the borders of the new kingdom measures only 220 miles as the crow flies—a distance that would have been inadequate to escape a catastrophical change in climate. The explanation that a devastating epidemic set the Mayas on the move also deserves serious examination. Apart from the fact that this explanation is offered as one of many, there is not the slightest proof of it. Was there a battle between the generations? Did the young revolt against the old? Was there a civil war, a revolution? If we opt for one of these possibilities, it is obvious that only a part of the population, namely the defeated, would have left the country and that the victors would have remained in their old settlements. Investigations of archaeological sites have not produced one proof that even a single Maya remained behind. The whole people suddenly emigrated, leaving their holy places unguarded in the jungle.

I should like to introduce a new note into the concert of opinions, a theory that is not proved any more than the other interpretations are. But regardless of the probability of the other explanations, I venture to make my contribution boldly and with conviction.

At some point in a very early period the Mayas' ancestors were paid a visit by the 'gods' (in whom I suspect space travellers). As a number of factors support the assumption, the ancestors of the American cultural peoples may perhaps have immigrated from the ancient Orient. But in the world of the Mayas there were strictly guarded sacred traditions about astronomy, mathematics and the calendar! The priests guarded the traditional knowledge because the 'gods' had given their word to return one day. They created a grandiose new religion, the religion of Kukulkan, the 'Feathered Serpent'.

According to priestly tradition, the 'gods' would come back from heaven when the vast buildings were completed according to the laws of the calendar cycle. So the people hastened to complete temples and pyramids according to this holy rhythm, because the year of completion was supposed to be a year of rejoicing. Then the god Kukulkan would come from the stars, take possession of the buildings and from then on live among mankind.

The work was finished, the year of the god's return came round—but nothing happened. The people sang, prayed and waited for a whole year. Slaves and jewellery, corn and oil were offered up in vain. But heaven remained dumb and without a sign. No heavenly chariot appeared; they could hear no rushing or distant thunder. Nothing, absolutely nothing happened.

If we give this hypothesis a chance, the disappointment of priests and people must have been tremendous. The work of centuries had been done in vain. Doubts arose. Was there a mistake in the calculation of the calendar? Had the 'gods' landed somewhere else? Had they all made a terrible mistake?

I should mention that the mystical year of the Mayas, in which the calendar began, goes back to 311 B.C. Proofs of this exist in Mayan writings. If we accept this date as proved, then there was only a gap of a few hundred years between it and the beginning of the Egyptian culture. This legendary age seems to be genuine, because the hyper-accurate Mayan calendar says so over and over again. If this is so, the calendar and the national migration are not the only things that make me sceptical. For a comparatively new find starts off nagging doubts, too.