Erich von Daniken - Chariots Of The Gods-pages

Page 88 of 119

Page 88 of 119
Erich von Daniken - Chariots Of The Gods-pages

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There sits a human being, with the upper part of his body bent forward like a racing motorcyclist; today any child would identify his vehicle as a rocket. It is pointed at the front, then changes to strangely grooved indentations like inlet ports, widens out and terminates at the tail in a darting flame. The crouching being himself is manipulating a number of undefinable controls and has the heel of his left foot on a kind of pedal. His clothing is appropriate: short trousers with a broad belt, a jacket with a modern Japanese opening at the neck and closely fitting bands at arms and legs. With our knowledge of similar pictures, we should be surprised if the complicated headgear were missing. And there it is with the usual indentations and tubes, and something like antennae on top. Our space traveller—he is clearly depicted as one—is not only bent forward tensely, he is also looking intently at an apparatus hanging in front of his face. The astronaut's front seat is separated by struts from the rear portion of the vehicle, in which symmetrically arranged boxes, circles, points and spirals can be seen. If the stone relief from Palenque is also rejected from the chain of proofs, one must doubt the integrity which scholars bring to the investigation of outstanding finds. After all, one is not seeing ghosts when one is analysing actual objects. To continue with our series of hitherto unanswered questions: why did the Mayas build their oldest cities in the jungle, and not on a river, or by the sea? Tikal, for example, lies 109 miles as the crow flies from the Gulf of Honduras, 161 miles north-west of the Bay of Campeche and 236 miles as the crow flies north of the Pacific Ocean. The fact that the Mayas were quite familiar with the sea is shown by the wealth of objects which were made of coral, mussels and shellfish. Why, then, the ‘flight’ into the jungle? Why did they build water reservoirs when they could have settled by the water? In Tikal alone there are thirteen reservoirs with a capacity of 214,504 cubic yards. Why did they absolutely have to live, build and work here and not in some more '‘logically' situated place? After their long trek the disappointed Mayas founded a new kingdom in the north. And once again cities, temples and pyramids arose according to the dates pre-fixed by the calendar. 20 kins = 1 uinal or 20 days 18 uinals = 1 tun or 360 days 20 tuns = | katun or 7,200 days 20 katuns = 1 baktun or 144,000 days 20 baktuns = | pictun or 21,880,000 days 20 pictuns = | calabtun or 571,600,000 days 20 calabtuns = 1 kinchiltun or 12,1521,000,000 days 20 kinchiltuns = 1 atautun or 232,0401,000,000 days the most die-hard sceptic stop and think. What does this relief have to tell us? Nothing? Is everything that anyone links up with space travel a stupid figment of the imagination? To give some idea of the accuracy of the Mayan calendar, here are the periods of time they used: But the stone steps based on calendar dates are not the only things that tower above the green roof of