Most people regard the sighting of strange things in the skies, which have recently been dubbed 'unidentified flying objects', as a phenomenon belonging to modern times - but there is actually a history of UFO reports. Strange sightings have been reported for thousands of years and historical references to them can be found in several old texts. Here is an example of an excerpt from writer, Julius Obsequens in 216 BC, from his book, 'Prodigorium Liber':

"Things like ships were seen in the sky over Italy....At Arpi, a round shield was seen

in the sky....At Capua, the sky was all on fire, and one saw figures like ships...."

Similar accounts came from Cicero, the Roman statesman, and many occurred at the time of Charlemagne, when even human abductions were reported. (For a more thorough accounting of ancient UFO sightings, please refer to the works of Harold T. Wilkins and Jacques Vallee.)

Countless references in ancient texts from Mesopotamia, Egypt and the Americas, including many from the Bible, the Apocrypha (ancient Hebrew texts that were not included in the Bible) and Vedic texts, could easily be interpreted as being about strange flying craft. In an old epic poem from India called the Mahabharata, there is a description of what sounds like a flying saucer dogfight (involving Vishnu, Nara and Narayana), complete with nuclear explosions, fallout and ray-gun weaponry. Dr. Robert Oppenheimer, who helped create the first atomic bomb, was familiar with the Mahabharata and held similar beliefs that it was describing a nuclear explosion.Similar accounts can be found in some translations of the Hindu Vedas, particularly the Srimad Bhagavatam and the Hymn to Vata. Ancient skeletons discovered in India gave off fifty times the normal levels of radio-activity. (for a brief video on the subject click here: vedic mysteries )

Many Biblical passages, including several in Genesis and Exodus, sound like descriptions of advanced weaponry or the take-offs and landings of flying craft. By far the most graphic and detailed of such descriptions can be found in the Book of Ezekiel, which is 48 chapters long. In 1968, in reaction to Von Däniken's 'Chariots of the Gods', a NASA engineer by the name of Joseph Blumrich, who had been awarded the Exceptional Service Medal, began to study Ezekiel from an engineer's perspective, with the intent of showing the world that Von Däniken's views were ridiculous. Instead, he became convinced that its descriptions were about some sort of spacecraft, and has published a book, 'The Spaceships of Ezekiel', detailing his findings. Other Biblical references that sound like descriptions of rocket launchings can be found in stories involving Moses, Elijah and others.

Among the most compelling theories are those that involve the Anunaki, a race of ETs that are said to have interacted with the ancient Sumerians. About 100 years ago, an archeologist named Sir Leonard Wooley was excavating sites in what is now Iraq - the region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers that was called Mesopotamia. He uncovered several layers of civilization, the oldest of which went back to 4500BC, making it the oldest sophisticated civilization to be unearthed so far. This civilization is known as Sumer. Mountains of clay glyphs, cylinder seals and ancient texts containing enormous amounts of information about many aspects of life in Sumer were also found.

Scholars, such as Sumerologists Arno Poebel in 1914, Thorkild Jacobsen in 1940, and Henri Frankfort in 1950, set about the arduous task of deciphering and translating this information. It revealed a society of breathtaking sophistication, one that seemed to arrive relatively suddenly. Cities such as Uruk (considered the oldest city on Earth), Ur and Eridu contained relatively luxurious houses that speak of a comfortable standard of living. Many of civilization's 'firsts' happened in Sumer, such as; writing, school, congress, libraries, proverbs, cosmogony, historians, the wheel, money, taxation, laws, social reform, medicine, surgery and much more. It also marks the first production of bronze, a fairly complex operation requiring a mix of 15% tin to 85% copper. Tin, a difficult metal to extract, does not naturally occur in Mesopotamia. This degree of sophistication seems to have come out of nowhere, with no evidence of an incremental accumulation of such knowledge that surely would have taken many centuries. How can we account for this abrupt arrival of culture and technology?

One of the scholars chosen to translate Sumerian cuneiform writings was a man named Zecharia Sitchin. He began to note that a great deal of it, in fact a disproportionate amount of it, dealt with information about the cosmos, flying chariots and a race of 'gods' called the Annunaki. Throughout Mesopotamian art there are many depictions of stylized rockets, fiery landings, battles in the sky, planets, etc. Sitchin began to see connections with Biblical stories in the Old Testament, especially in Genesis. In the original Hebrew text the Annunaki are referred to as the Nephilim or the Elohim. (In the modern version of the Bible, the word 'Elohim' has been replaced by 'God' or 'the Lord God'.) Even though these terms are used to denote God in the singular, they are definitely pluralized words. The Bible also makes mention of a group called 'the Watchers', who also appear in Apochryphal texts such as the Book of Jubilees and the Book of Enoch. (for a short video about the Nephilim, click here: nephilim  )

Sitchin began to cross-check Sumerian information with the original ancient Hebrew texts. He also began to research other ancient cultures, looking at the Sumerian writings from many perspectives. He found that the Genesis stories such as; the seven days of creation, Adam and Eve, Noah, the Tower of Babel, etc., come directly from old Mesopotamian texts like the Enuma-Elish, the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Atra Hasis. In the older accounts, however, the stories are longer and more detailed than the Biblical versions.

This body of ancient info contains a great deal of knowledge about the solar system and other things that the Sumerians shouldn't have had, that Sitchin has uncovered. A year before the unmanned spaceship, Voyager 2 flew by and photographed Neptune in August, 1989, Sitchin accurately predicted what it would look like based on Sumerian information. These predictions appeared in several magazines in the US, Europe and South America. Sitchin claims that this enigmatic info comes from the Anunaki.

He claims that, according to Sumerian writings, the Annunaki came to Earth about 400,000 years ago to mine gold, mostly in South Africa where, it is said, there can still be found old mine-shafts containing bones that have been dated to 150,000 years ago. They came from a planet named Nibiru, sometimes referred to as the tenth planet in our system, which has a strange, highly elliptical orbit that brings it close to the inner planets every 3600 years. The familiar symbol of the winged disc, examples of which have been found in numerous ancient cultures, is said to de a depiction of Nibiru.

(There has been a good deal of talk about a tenth planet recently. In 1981, the US Marine Observatory speculated on the existence of a tenth planet that was affecting the orbit of Pluto. In 1983, the infrared space telescope, IRAS, spotted something that could be a new planet. In 1987, NASA officially admitted the possibility of a tenth planet which they call Planet X. The Sumerian and Babylonian accounts of the size, orbit and directional location of Nibiru, fit the NASA description of the hypothetical Planet X. A Google search will reveal much info on the 10th planet.)

The grand leader of this mining project was named Anu, who resided mostly on Nibiru, coming to Earth every 3600 years. On Earth, his two sons, Enki and Enlil were left in charge, with Enlil holding higher rank. (Some other names for Enlil are El Shaddai, Yahveh and Jehovah.) There was an ongoing rivalry between the two. After 200,000 years of mining, the Annunaki decided that life would be much easier if they had slaves, so they genetically manipulated some native hominids and thus created the first man. Enki and his partner, Ninkhursag, were in charge of this project and grew to love their creation, while Enlil maintained a colder, more utilitarian disposition toward the new slaves, who were known as the Adama (the word adama means earth/clay/dust). Over the years there was some genetic experimentation, sometimes yielding Adama that were too smart to be slaves, and sometimes too stupid to be of use. Eventually they got it just right. (for a brief video about the Anunaki and Nibiru ckick here:  anunaki  )

Sitchin's views are certainly controversial and very compelling and convincing. Other researchers have expounded on this info. In the next newsletter we'll continue to explore this theme of ETs in our past and our present.

(To access a larger excerpt from 'Why Is Life' on the subject of 'EXTRA TERRESTRIAL  SKELETONS  IN  THE  CLOSET', click here: book excerpt )