Ancient Aliens s14e06 Episode Script
Secrets of the Maya
1 ATOR: The mass destruction of an ancient culture.
JONATHAN YOUNG: Their art, their philosophy, their scientific findings He burned the whole thing.
NARRATOR: Lost texts that could have offered evidence of extraterrestrial contact from across the globe.
DAVID CHILDRESS: Literally, people were coming from all over the world to Mexico at this time.
PRAVEEN MOHAN: Here we are in the middle of South America in a remote site that looks exactly like Hindu carvings.
- How is that possible? - It's amazing.
NARRATOR: Could the Vatican still be hiding proof of mankind's ancient alien origins? GIORGIO TSOUKALOS: I predict thousands as-of-yet undiscovered sites will finally show that our ancestors made contact with extraterrestrials.
NARRATOR: There is a doorway in the universe.
Beyond it is the promise of truth.
It demands we question everything we have ever been taught.
The evidence is all around us.
The future is right before our eyes.
We are not alone.
We have never been alone.
NARRATOR: The Yucatán Peninsula.
A fleet of Spanish galleons arrive on the coast of the New World.
And with them is a small army of Roman Catholic priests, who, during what is the height of the Inquisition, are determined to rescue the pagan souls of the natives for Almighty God.
And leading them Direct from the Vatican Is the fanatical Franciscan friar Diego de Landa.
During the Spanish colonial period in what we call Mexico Yucatán, the cradle of Mayan civilization, it was the priests who had a lot of power because the Vatican was one of the most powerful nations on the Earth.
JASON MARTELL: Diego de Landa came over wanting to teach Christian understandings and principles to the Mayans, but was probably intimidated by the vast wealth of knowledge that he actually saw that they had tapped into.
NARRATOR: The Mayan civilization that Friar Diego de Landa came upon had thrived in the rain-drenched jungles and fertile plains of Central America for more than 2,000 years.
ERICH VON DANIKEN: The Spanish conquerors found pyramids, they found temples, they found paved roads and they found thousands and thousands of Maya handwritings, thousands of it.
MARTELL: We have a lot of very interesting information that comes out of this culture we call the Maya.
They have been revered for many things in their knowledge base, especially around time and concepts of math and science, and the movements of the solar system.
NARRATOR: But while the Maya were in many ways culturally advanced, their religious beliefs were notoriously bloodthirsty.
They believed in human sacrifice, and as far as Friar Diego de Landa was concerned, did so at the expense of their eternal souls.
It was a clash of cultures that would not end well for the Maya people.
Diego de Landa, later, when he was back in Spain again, he wrote down, "We found thousands of handwritings "of the Indians.
But they all contained just a Devil's thing.
" YOUNG: A new teaching, a new religion comes into a place where there is a very strong adherence to a body of ideas.
We have a competitive situation.
One maneuver is to destroy as much evidence of the old way as you can, and that will help reduce its grip.
"It's not sacred anymore, this is just stuff, so we can burn it with impunity.
" NARRATOR: On July 12, 1562, the Catholic priests, with the armed assistance of the Spanish military, executed what was known during the Inquisition as an auto-da-fé, or "act of faith," whereby the Maya population was forced to declare their religious conversion to Christianity or be put to death.
It was also a day that reportedly saw the destruction of all of the Maya sacred scrolls and more than 5,000 priceless images, an entire historical record.
YOUNG: There were thousands of books called codices, probably scrolls, burned.
All their art, their philosophy, their scientific findings, the accumulative knowledge of this great civilization, they burned the whole thing.
NARRATOR: But by burning the vast knowledge accumulated by the Maya, did Friar Diego de Landa also destroy something of even greater historical value? Might he have erased all traces of the Maya's extraterrestrial ancestors? There's very interesting information told to us by the Mayan elders that still exist today.
They speak of a time that they were led to this land by the sky people.
Could they be referencing some type of lost race, even possibly extraterrestrial in nature? They seemed to have knowledge of math and science, which we can't explain how they got this information.
When you ask them, "How did they gain all of this amazing information?" they always reference, "We learned it from the sky people.
" HUGH NEWMAN: There were traditions in ancient Mexico of a great teacher arriving on the Gulf Coast.
And when he arrived, he brought with him the arts of civilization.
We know the tradition may have originated with a great civilization who were around long before the Maya, but no one knows who they really were, or where they really came from.
NARRATOR: Tres Zapotes, Mexico, Archeologist Matthew Stirling, chief of the Smithsonian's Bureau of American Ethnology, follows up on a report that had gone unexamined for more than 70 years, the discovery by a local farmer of an ancient megalithic sculpture.
Stirling's investigation results in a remarkable find: A giant stone head buried in the ground.
It was the first in what, to date, has become a total of 17 such heads, each weighing a staggering eight tons, and all estimated to be some 3,000 years old.
It is a date which suggests that the heads were carved not by the Maya, but by an even older civilization, the Olmecs.
STEPHEN JETT: The Olmecs, uh, they're often called the mother culture of Mesoamerica.
They are the first complex culture of any size and significance in that part of the world.
ANDREW COLLINS: The Olmec people come into existence probably about 1400 BC in the Tabasco region of what is today Mexico.
But then, very suddenly, you have the rise of a full-blown society and civilization.
And the question becomes "Where did the Olmec come from?" The controversy is that many of the beautifully carved statues and stelae seemed to show African men.
JETT: They appear to be not native to the New World, but are native to sub-Saharan Africa.
This is not scientific physical anthropology, but just the appearance of these things is pretty suggestive.
NEWMAN: And they also show Chinese, Vietnamese, possibly Polynesian and even Caucasian people carved into solid rock.
So, there's big mystery about the Olmecs.
CHILDRESS: Where are all these people coming from? Early archeologists were dumbfounded by all of these different racial characteristics that we're seeing in the Olmec figurines and statues.
Literally, people were coming from all over the world to Mexico at this time.
And how did they do that? NARRATOR: Do the Olmec heads and artifacts present evidence that this ancient civilization had its genetic origins not in South America, as many mainstream archaeologists believe, but thousands of miles away, and on the other side of the Earth? But how? Ancient astronaut theorists suggest the answer may be found after a careful examination of a number of extraordinary Olmec artifacts found in La Venta, Mexico.
TSOUKALOS: In La Venta, we have carvings that show the Olmecs in very bizarre scenes.
One of them is this plumed serpent, this snake that appears to be floating in the sky, and then down below, you actually see a person sitting inside this flying snake.
And so you have to wonder if somehow the Olmecs had access to aviation technology, and I personally think they did, because at the Museum of Natural History in New York City, there is a Olmec figurine.
He is clearly wearing some type of a pressurized suit.
He has some type of controls with tubes on his chest.
On the side, you have six wings coming out of him.
In my opinion, it is the smoking gun of our ancestors having access to aviation technology thousands of years ago.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that the ancestors of the Olmec people had come to South America from far across the ocean? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes, and believe the way they got there may not have been in ships, but across the skies, in extraterrestrially-designed spacecraft.
NARRATOR: San AgustÃn, Colombia.
March 27, 2019.
Ancient astronaut theorist David Childress has come to this remote mountain town to explore and study a site that has baffled the scientific community for decades.
Joining him is Hindu historian Praveen Mohan.
- CHILDRESS: Hello, Praveen.
- Hi, David.
- Welcome to Colombia.
- I know.
- CHILDRESS: Jump on in here.
- Sure.
CHILDRESS: You know, Praveen, I was here a number of years ago.
And I thought, "All right, there's a lot of Hindu influence here.
" And, so, that's when I thought that I need some expert on Hinduism, like you, to come here to San AgustÃn and-and see it for themselves.
Yeah, when I got the call about a place like this in Colombia, I was surprised.
A Hindu site in South America? My heart is actually pounding - to see the site.
- (chuckles) NARRATOR: Located deep within the Andean foothills of southern Colombia, the San AgustÃn Archaeological Park is home to more than 500 megalithic stone statues of unknown origin.
First discovered by a Spanish monk in the mid-18th century, they appear to be the work of the region's earliest civilizations and are thought to date back as many as 2,000 years.
So, this is the main gate here.
We've got a bit of a walk through the jungle.
And this is a very remote spot, even today.
So high in the mountains.
You wonder how people got to this site, why they would have even chosen this.
- Here it is.
- Wow.
- Check it out.
- Yeah, let's see.
NARRATOR: David Childress has been researching this area for many years.
He is convinced that many of the statues show strong connections to the Olmec statues that were first discovered in Mexico more than 1,600 miles to the north in the 1800s.
CHILDRESS: We know that the Olmecs were in Mexico and also in Central America, but evidence of the Olmecs in South America has been elusive until now.
Here at San AgustÃn, we have that evidence.
This would be one of the earliest Olmec sites because it's thought that San AgustÃn started as early as 3000 BC, and other Olmec sites in Mexico are only dated to around 1000 BC, so this is an extremely important site.
What I really wanted to show you is, what I think is Hindu things, - which are right over here.
- Okay.
- Wow! - NARRATOR: It is David Childress' belief that the stone sculptures of the San AgustÃn Archaeological Park not only show strong similarities to the Olmec carvings found in Mexico, but also show even more profound connections to Hindu carvings and artwork found in India and Southeast Asia.
I think you'll be interested in this.
MOHAN: Oh, a figure holding a skull flanked by two other figures.
That is so Hindu.
And these two doorkeepers see how they're holding weapons to protect the main deity? We can see a central deity holding a skull.
And two guardian doorkeepers holding tools.
This is typical South Indian architecture.
This is exactly what's portrayed in these temples.
This is amazing because I've never seen anything like this in South America.
What's really interesting to me, is that the main deity is shown with fangs.
That's typical of South India; In Tamil Nadu, Shiva is shown with fangs.
CHILDRESS: You think that's maybe Shiva, - right there in the middle? - MOHAN: Yes.
NARRATOR: Shiva? Also known as "The Destroyer"? Is it possible that evidence of this uniquely Hindu deity has been found in South America and on ancient megalithic stone carvings dating back some 2,000 years? So how bout these right here, huh? Wow, yeah, these are, uh, lingams.
These are symbols of Shiva.
And we can see these lingams have more and more details on them.
And look here it even has a face.
- CHILDRESS: Yeah, how bout that? - MOHAN: You see this is a classic mukhalingam.
It is a lingam with a face on top.
- A mukhalingam? - Yeah.
The word mukha means face, and the lingam means a cylindrical structure.
And this is classic Hindu iconography, and you can see this in many ancient temples.
So here, have a look at this one here.
I think you'll find this pretty interesting.
Wow! An eagle holding a snake in its beaks, and then it's also holding the snake on its talons.
I mean, this is classic Hindu iconography.
This is Garuda holding the Naga.
So Garuda is always depicted as a giant bird, and then typically, he's holding a snake - Yeah.
- In his beak and his talons.
I've seen something very similar to this in Vietnam, in a place called Champa.
I can show you a picture of this.
CHILDRESS: So the snake that he's holding in his beak and talons - is a Naga snake, is that right? - Yes.
Yes.
In Hindu text, we don't see the Garuda as an animal or the snake as an animal.
There are two different races; One is the Garuda, which actually comes from a planet up above the sky.
The Nagas are reptilian, snake-like shape-shifting beings which live underground.
CHILDRESS: Now that's an interesting story, because that's on the flag of Mexico today.
- MOHAN: Oh, really? - Yeah, how bout that? MOHAN: Oh, wow, wow! CHILDRESS: So the Garuda is in some ways a symbol of the airships, - the spaceships - Absolutely.
- And the flight that they would use.
- Yes.
Here we are in the middle of South America, in a remote site that looks exactly like Hindu carvings.
I mean, without any connection, how is that possible? Well, do you think, then, that these Hindu demigods are, are flying in-in spaceships, even scouting, they're creating a place like this? It's all so strange, but it's, it's so obvious that some kind of high, technical civilization was here.
- Yes.
Mm-hmm.
- It's it's amazing.
NARRATOR: Ancient Hindus? Traveling across the Pacific Ocean in flying aircraft? But even if such an incredible feat was possible where is the evidence? As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the evidence not only exists, but has been tested.
And it confirms the likelihood that extraterrestrial visitors came here to Earth thousands of years ago.
NARRATOR: At the San AgustÃn In Archaeological Park in Colombia, South America, ancient astronaut theorist David Childress and Hindu expert Praveen Mohan are investigating what they believe to be conclusive evidence that Hindu explorers migrated to this area more than 2,000 years ago.
So here, have a look at this dolmen here.
- What do you see? - Wow, there's a, uh, central deity flanked by two doorkeepers.
But these doorkeepers are not human or even humanoid.
You can see the scales on the body, you know, see the lines.
And what's even more interesting I mean, it seems almost like they have a hood on top of them, which is characteristic of cobras, and cobras don't exist in Americas.
How did this motif get here? And believe it or not, we still have this same depiction in many Southeast Asian countries.
In fact, I have pictures of it.
- CHILDRESS: Right.
- MOHAN: Yeah, this is a temple.
This is in Thailand.
You can see that this is being guarded by two Nagas.
CHILDRESS: I see that, and they have their ribs, uh, on their stomach, just like this.
MOHAN: Yeah, the-the scales on the bodies.
CHILDRESS: Yeah, that's fascinating.
MOHAN: And you know, there's yet another characteristic feature that you would really love.
These are feathered serpents like Kukulkan.
CHILDRESS: The feathered serpent of Kukulkan? - Yes.
MOHAN: And flanking on the pyramid.
NARRATOR: Kukulkan? The Mayan god that is most famously depicted on the temple of El Castillo in Chichen Itza? The one described as a feathered serpent that descended to Earth from the sky? But as far as many ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, depictions of the god Kukulkan are not merely depictions of a flying serpent, as many mainstream archaeologists believe, but of a spaceman.
And they cite the presence of a humanoid face, often seen emerging from the mouth of the serpent, as really a depiction of a helmeted astronaut piloting a large, flying spacecraft, similar to what is known as a "vimana" in the Hindu tradition.
In the Mahbharata, we can see very advanced flying machines, which are called vimanas.
It is clearly established that the gods come down from the sky using vimanas.
It is also talked about in Mayan culture.
There are several types of vimanas that - you yourself have published.
- Uh-huh.
And there is a type of vimana which has tail fins, correct? Yeah, the Chicuna vimana - has wings - Yeah, yeah.
While other vimanas were discoid and other vimanas were, like, tubular, - cigar-shaped ships.
- Yes, yeah.
And what's really fascinating is that, in the Gold Museum in Bogotá, we have the same vimanas made of gold, - correct? These discoid - We have the-the gold airplanes there.
NARRATOR: In the early 1900s, tomb robbers came upon a grave site along Colombia's Magdalena River dating back an estimated 1,500 years.
Inside, they discovered hundreds of small gold figurines.
TSOUKALOS: Hundreds of these small, gold objects have been found, many of which are rooted in the animal kingdom.
17 eerily look like modern-day airplanes.
The wings are attached at the bottom.
Birds, they have their wings attached where we have our shoulders, like this.
So no formation in the animal kingdom exists in the form of these Quimbaya artifacts.
And, in 1996, two engineers took a couple of these ancient artifacts, blew them up to this size, put a propeller inside, threw it up in the air, and it flew.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that among the Quimbaya figurines found in Colombia are representations of what the Hindu people on the other side of the world described as vimanas? Ancient astronaut theorists suggest the answer can be found by examining a character from the ancient Hindu texts: A character who bears the name "Maya.
" The word "Maya" itself is a Hindu word.
It means "illusion" or "god of illusion.
" And this was the name given to the king of Asuras, and he's known as Maya because he's able to create these magical illusions.
DEEPAK SHIMKHADA: Maya, he was born of divine god Brahma.
He was a great architect, he was a great magician, and he invented the flying machine.
He was not of the Earth because he was not born on Earth, so he was obviously extraterrestrial.
MOHAN: Maya actually traveled out of India, and he might've gone to Mexico.
Now, interestingly, Mayans have a book called Popul Vuh.
In that book, they talk about how a specific god came from the east, and I think this is the same god that both these cultures are talking about.
NARRATOR: If the divine King Maya was a real being, as millions of Hindus believe, is it possible that the Mayan civilization of Central America adopted his name? According to ancient astronaut theorist David Childress, the answer is a resounding yes, and he believes that at San AgustÃn there is a sculpture that doesn't only support his theory, but may also be a depiction of an actual alien visitor.
Would you like to see, perhaps, a spaceman? - (chuckling): A spaceman? - Yes.
- There's one more site.
- Yeah, absolutely! NARRATOR: San AgustÃn Archaeological Park in Colombia is located along the west bank of the Magdalena River, near a place where it converges with two other rivers.
It is a location that ancient astronaut theorists believe has a startling and not accidental significance.
MOHAN: They could've set up this site anywhere, but why did they choose San AgustÃn in Colombia? In India, we have this place called Triveni Sangam where three great rivers meet, and that site is chosen as a sacred site.
We have a lot of temples in this place.
Whoever came from India to here chose this place because this is where all these three rivers meet.
And to find a place like this, you needed to have aerial survey.
They were using the vimanas, which is why they set up this ancient Shiva temple here.
NARRATOR: Vimanas? The extraterrestrial flying machines that are described in the Mahabharata, the ancient Hindu text? Is it possible that Hindu explorers made the journey from India to South America, and then settled in this region centuries ago? And could they have made that journey, a distance of some 12,000 miles, by means of a vimana? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes, and they believe that the answer to what compelled them to come there can be found by examining one of the ancient stone statues located in San AgustÃn Archeological Park.
This was the final statue that I wanted you to look at.
- Pretty curious, huh? - Yeah.
CHILDRESS: I-I don't know what to call this e-except a spaceman.
You can see that he's wearing some kind of a helmet.
It looks like he has a visor, he's got two rectangular eyes and a rectangular mouth, he has no nose.
He's holding this, what they call a-a power staff.
But what's really fascinating about that is he's holding that long cylinder, and, if you look carefully, it's going even below his feet.
He's using that cylinder to go into the ground.
Now this is very interesting because, in Hindu culture, there's a god called Swarna Kala Bhairava, and he's the god of gold, and he uses a tool called keyla, and he uses it to go into the ground and mine gold.
It could be a special probe that you can put in the ground and detect gold and minerals, so perhaps he is the extraterrestrial that is guiding them.
He's a spaceman in a spacesuit with his gold mining tools.
NARRATOR: A spaceman mining gold? In 1976, author and researcher Zecharia Sitchin published a book called The 12th Planet, in which he translated and interpreted the writings of humanity's earliest known civilization, the Sumerians.
According to Sitchin, the beings described in the texts, the Anunnaki, were, in fact, visitors from another planet.
They created humankind as slaves that could be forced to mine the gold the Anunnaki needed to power their spacecraft.
CHILDRESS: San AgustÃn is still a remote mountain area today, and coming here in ancient times would've been extremely difficult, but this was a gold-bearing area, and if you're looking for gold, this is the place to come.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that the strange carvings found in the area can be proof that Sitchin's incredible theory is true? And that an ancient race of people traveled from Asia to South America in pursuit of a metal they had been taught to consider not just essential, but sacred? When you talk about how this place was used for gold, you know, how they were mining gold as offerings to gods, that's exactly what Hindus do, even today.
And Colombia, right here, in-in this remote spot, is land of gold.
So much of the gold in South America - came from right here.
- Mm-hmm.
So this is what they were looking for, gold, and they came here, and they found it.
They're flying here, they're creating a place like this, they're also sending ships across the Pacific Ocean.
- They're bringing power tools.
- Mm-hmm.
And when they're not mining, they're creating these amazing statues, that And there are hundreds of them all over here.
MOHAN: Your theory about people and Mayans moving from South India and-and coming here all the way to South America, this is all tying together.
We have an extraterrestrial god who comes down and he mines for gold, and he builds an entire civilization.
I think that makes a lot of sense.
CHILDRESS: When it comes to San AgustÃn, the Spanish did not know about this ancient site, and if they had known about it, they probably would've destroyed it.
So throughout Colombia and Mesoamerica, we have ruins of ancient civilizations still undiscovered, and with the discoveries at San AgustÃn in the last hundred years, we now have a chance to rewrite South American history.
NARRATOR: Do the stone statues at San AgustÃn provide compelling evidence, not only that there was interaction between the peoples of Asia and those of South America centuries ago, but also that this interaction was made possible as the result of extraterrestrial intervention? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes, and they suggest further proof can be found locked away in the secret vaults of the Vatican Library.
NARRATOR: Southeast Asia.
2000 BC.
An ethnically diverse civilization of seafaring explorers emerges in the area of modern-day Vietnam.
At roughly the same time the Olmec appear in Mesoamerica.
The Cham were an Austronesian and are an Austronesian-speaking group.
In, uh, central Vietnam, Austronesian languages include Polynesian, Indonesian and so forth.
And they are closely associated with highly maritime people.
The word "Cham" represents a race that extended from Egypt to India to Southeast Asia.
The ancient Cham were Hindu.
I believe there was a Cham migration to South and Central America.
This was ultimately a partnership between advanced human civilizations and extraterrestrials.
That's why you see all of the the diversity in these artifacts and these giant structures that defy logic.
NARRATOR: If the giant Olmec heads and artifacts found in Mexico resemble a community made up of multiple ethnicities Ethnicities that were not previously believed to have been present in Central or South America until the 15th century Then is it possible that these people were among a wave of migrants who traveled to South America from various parts of Southern and Southeast Asia thousands of years ago? JETT: It has occurred to me that the Cham might conceivably have been involved as the sort of middle persons in maritime transactions between Southeast Asia and the New World, particularly, perhaps, northwestern South America.
Modern DNA mapping, what we call, uh, molecular DNA study, has been revolutionizing the understanding of human migrations over the globe.
COLLINS: What this is very clearly stating again and again is there was a relationship between the peoples of Southern India, places like Sri Lanka, Southeast Asia, Australia, Micronesia, Melanesia, through Polynesia and particularly into South America and Mesoamerica.
NARRATOR: But if hundreds, perhaps thousands of people migrated from Southern and Southeast Asia to South America, how did they get there? Was it by sailing ship? Or was it by means of an alien-inspired aircraft known as vimana, as many ancient astronaut theorists believe? MOHAN: We hear this story time and time again in Mahabharata.
Some vimanas have these huge wings and they have, like, a tail fin, like a modern-day aircraft.
Almost all these machines were mentioned 5,000 years ago in Mahabharata.
NARRATOR: But if mass migration on a large scale had been taking place centuries ago and with the help of extraterrestrial technology, then why has no evidence been found to support this incredible theory? As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the answer dates back to the bloody persecutions of the Maya by the Spanish in the 16th century, and the deliberate destruction of hundreds of years of the Maya's written history by Friar Diego de Landa.
A destruction that many ancient astronaut theorists suggest was not as thorough as we were made to believe.
CHILDRESS: Catholic Church was trying to destroy the old religion and they-they made a big show of having huge bonfires of books and destroying them, but at the same time, the Catholic Church was trying to accumulate knowledge.
TSOUKALOS: It would also not surprise me if Diego de Landa did not burn everything.
And maybe some of these texts did make it back to the Vatican.
People often say, "Oh, but the Vatican just destroys stuff.
" Actually they don't, on the whole.
What they do is they hide it.
What kind of other organization in the world is known to have an archive that's actually called "the Secret Archive"? It's quite possible that while, on the surface, the Catholic Church was trying to destroy everything, this knowledge that they're gathering in North and South America can benefit the Catholic Church in the future and that's what they thought.
PICKNETT: It might molder away, but at least they have control of it.
That's the important thing.
The Vatican is always about control.
Knowledge is power.
The Vatican has always known this.
The Vatican has always known secrets it doesn't want the average person to know.
NARRATOR: Did the Catholic Church appear to destroy the Maya histories and sacred scrolls only to have hidden them away in the Vatican's notorious secret archive? As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the answer is yes.
And the Church's motives may not have been to simply steal valuable ancient knowledge, but something far more profound.
They believe the real reason was to hide the proof that the origins of the Maya civilization and those that existed thousands of years earlier couldn't only be traced to other continents, but to other planets.
NARRATOR: Giant megalithic stone heads figurines of what appear to be flying craft and statues that evoke cultures found on the other side of the world.
According to ancient astronaut theorists, it is this information that the Catholic Church sought to suppress when they attempted to destroy all traces of the Maya culture nearly 500 years ago.
MARTELL: Now, what's interesting is, all these great ancient cultures, including the Mayan, seemed to have knowledge of math and science, which we can't explain how they got this information.
When you ask them, they always tell you it came from the gods.
NARRATOR: If the proof existed, not only of cross-Pacific migration, but also extraterrestrial visitation, many ancient astronaut theorists believe it would have posed a serious threat to a Catholic hierarchy steeped in the bigotry and intolerance of the Inquisition.
But if this incredible theory is true, what then happened to the extraterrestrial visitors? Why did they come here only to leave or go into hiding? CHILDRESS: Because of various wars going on, cataclysms, eventually, these civilizations began to collapse.
As civilizations do.
And what happened in the end was the, the airships, they stopped coming.
And then, the extraterrestrial demigods pulled their technology back.
So we don't know what happened there with the extraterrestrials and where they went.
And so you have to wonder if they don't want us to know that they are here.
The extraterrestrials may have just decided, "Okay.
"Humans on planet Earth have, have got "the seeds of civilization.
"Let's just stand back and see what they do.
" NARRATOR: As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the proof of extraterrestrial visitation is still out there, much of it buried beneath centuries of dirt and rocks.
But every day, the truth is being revealed.
In February 2018 through March 2019, archeologists made a number of incredible discoveries just in the area of Mexico alone.
Mayan artifacts were discovered in Teotihuacan, a location previously thought to have been inhabited only by the Aztecs.
200 more artifacts were found in a hidden cave under the Mayan site of Chichen Itza.
And beneath dense jungles near Lake Pátzcuaro, LiDAR scanning uncovered an ancient city the size of Manhattan.
TSOUKALOS: In the early 1990s, there were these science fiction stories that one day we'll be able to somehow look underneath the overgrown jungle.
And sure enough, here we are, 20, 25 years later, and that technology now exists.
Satellites are now able to look through the soil into the ground to see if other structures exist.
And guess what? They do.
We have only now begun a new era of discovery and I predict thousands as-of-yet undiscovered sites will finally see the light of day.
If you have a puzzle with a thousand pieces, in order to see the final picture, you don't need to lay down all 1,000 pieces.
If you lay down 980 pieces, I guarantee you, you will see the big picture.
NARRATOR: Is mankind on an incredible threshold of discovery? One that will confirm that extraterrestrial visitation has occurred all over the world and for centuries? Perhaps beneath the ruins of a newly discovered site in Mexico, archeologists will uncover the ultimate evidence of alien contact and proof of humanity's true origins.
JONATHAN YOUNG: Their art, their philosophy, their scientific findings He burned the whole thing.
NARRATOR: Lost texts that could have offered evidence of extraterrestrial contact from across the globe.
DAVID CHILDRESS: Literally, people were coming from all over the world to Mexico at this time.
PRAVEEN MOHAN: Here we are in the middle of South America in a remote site that looks exactly like Hindu carvings.
- How is that possible? - It's amazing.
NARRATOR: Could the Vatican still be hiding proof of mankind's ancient alien origins? GIORGIO TSOUKALOS: I predict thousands as-of-yet undiscovered sites will finally show that our ancestors made contact with extraterrestrials.
NARRATOR: There is a doorway in the universe.
Beyond it is the promise of truth.
It demands we question everything we have ever been taught.
The evidence is all around us.
The future is right before our eyes.
We are not alone.
We have never been alone.
NARRATOR: The Yucatán Peninsula.
A fleet of Spanish galleons arrive on the coast of the New World.
And with them is a small army of Roman Catholic priests, who, during what is the height of the Inquisition, are determined to rescue the pagan souls of the natives for Almighty God.
And leading them Direct from the Vatican Is the fanatical Franciscan friar Diego de Landa.
During the Spanish colonial period in what we call Mexico Yucatán, the cradle of Mayan civilization, it was the priests who had a lot of power because the Vatican was one of the most powerful nations on the Earth.
JASON MARTELL: Diego de Landa came over wanting to teach Christian understandings and principles to the Mayans, but was probably intimidated by the vast wealth of knowledge that he actually saw that they had tapped into.
NARRATOR: The Mayan civilization that Friar Diego de Landa came upon had thrived in the rain-drenched jungles and fertile plains of Central America for more than 2,000 years.
ERICH VON DANIKEN: The Spanish conquerors found pyramids, they found temples, they found paved roads and they found thousands and thousands of Maya handwritings, thousands of it.
MARTELL: We have a lot of very interesting information that comes out of this culture we call the Maya.
They have been revered for many things in their knowledge base, especially around time and concepts of math and science, and the movements of the solar system.
NARRATOR: But while the Maya were in many ways culturally advanced, their religious beliefs were notoriously bloodthirsty.
They believed in human sacrifice, and as far as Friar Diego de Landa was concerned, did so at the expense of their eternal souls.
It was a clash of cultures that would not end well for the Maya people.
Diego de Landa, later, when he was back in Spain again, he wrote down, "We found thousands of handwritings "of the Indians.
But they all contained just a Devil's thing.
" YOUNG: A new teaching, a new religion comes into a place where there is a very strong adherence to a body of ideas.
We have a competitive situation.
One maneuver is to destroy as much evidence of the old way as you can, and that will help reduce its grip.
"It's not sacred anymore, this is just stuff, so we can burn it with impunity.
" NARRATOR: On July 12, 1562, the Catholic priests, with the armed assistance of the Spanish military, executed what was known during the Inquisition as an auto-da-fé, or "act of faith," whereby the Maya population was forced to declare their religious conversion to Christianity or be put to death.
It was also a day that reportedly saw the destruction of all of the Maya sacred scrolls and more than 5,000 priceless images, an entire historical record.
YOUNG: There were thousands of books called codices, probably scrolls, burned.
All their art, their philosophy, their scientific findings, the accumulative knowledge of this great civilization, they burned the whole thing.
NARRATOR: But by burning the vast knowledge accumulated by the Maya, did Friar Diego de Landa also destroy something of even greater historical value? Might he have erased all traces of the Maya's extraterrestrial ancestors? There's very interesting information told to us by the Mayan elders that still exist today.
They speak of a time that they were led to this land by the sky people.
Could they be referencing some type of lost race, even possibly extraterrestrial in nature? They seemed to have knowledge of math and science, which we can't explain how they got this information.
When you ask them, "How did they gain all of this amazing information?" they always reference, "We learned it from the sky people.
" HUGH NEWMAN: There were traditions in ancient Mexico of a great teacher arriving on the Gulf Coast.
And when he arrived, he brought with him the arts of civilization.
We know the tradition may have originated with a great civilization who were around long before the Maya, but no one knows who they really were, or where they really came from.
NARRATOR: Tres Zapotes, Mexico, Archeologist Matthew Stirling, chief of the Smithsonian's Bureau of American Ethnology, follows up on a report that had gone unexamined for more than 70 years, the discovery by a local farmer of an ancient megalithic sculpture.
Stirling's investigation results in a remarkable find: A giant stone head buried in the ground.
It was the first in what, to date, has become a total of 17 such heads, each weighing a staggering eight tons, and all estimated to be some 3,000 years old.
It is a date which suggests that the heads were carved not by the Maya, but by an even older civilization, the Olmecs.
STEPHEN JETT: The Olmecs, uh, they're often called the mother culture of Mesoamerica.
They are the first complex culture of any size and significance in that part of the world.
ANDREW COLLINS: The Olmec people come into existence probably about 1400 BC in the Tabasco region of what is today Mexico.
But then, very suddenly, you have the rise of a full-blown society and civilization.
And the question becomes "Where did the Olmec come from?" The controversy is that many of the beautifully carved statues and stelae seemed to show African men.
JETT: They appear to be not native to the New World, but are native to sub-Saharan Africa.
This is not scientific physical anthropology, but just the appearance of these things is pretty suggestive.
NEWMAN: And they also show Chinese, Vietnamese, possibly Polynesian and even Caucasian people carved into solid rock.
So, there's big mystery about the Olmecs.
CHILDRESS: Where are all these people coming from? Early archeologists were dumbfounded by all of these different racial characteristics that we're seeing in the Olmec figurines and statues.
Literally, people were coming from all over the world to Mexico at this time.
And how did they do that? NARRATOR: Do the Olmec heads and artifacts present evidence that this ancient civilization had its genetic origins not in South America, as many mainstream archaeologists believe, but thousands of miles away, and on the other side of the Earth? But how? Ancient astronaut theorists suggest the answer may be found after a careful examination of a number of extraordinary Olmec artifacts found in La Venta, Mexico.
TSOUKALOS: In La Venta, we have carvings that show the Olmecs in very bizarre scenes.
One of them is this plumed serpent, this snake that appears to be floating in the sky, and then down below, you actually see a person sitting inside this flying snake.
And so you have to wonder if somehow the Olmecs had access to aviation technology, and I personally think they did, because at the Museum of Natural History in New York City, there is a Olmec figurine.
He is clearly wearing some type of a pressurized suit.
He has some type of controls with tubes on his chest.
On the side, you have six wings coming out of him.
In my opinion, it is the smoking gun of our ancestors having access to aviation technology thousands of years ago.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that the ancestors of the Olmec people had come to South America from far across the ocean? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes, and believe the way they got there may not have been in ships, but across the skies, in extraterrestrially-designed spacecraft.
NARRATOR: San AgustÃn, Colombia.
March 27, 2019.
Ancient astronaut theorist David Childress has come to this remote mountain town to explore and study a site that has baffled the scientific community for decades.
Joining him is Hindu historian Praveen Mohan.
- CHILDRESS: Hello, Praveen.
- Hi, David.
- Welcome to Colombia.
- I know.
- CHILDRESS: Jump on in here.
- Sure.
CHILDRESS: You know, Praveen, I was here a number of years ago.
And I thought, "All right, there's a lot of Hindu influence here.
" And, so, that's when I thought that I need some expert on Hinduism, like you, to come here to San AgustÃn and-and see it for themselves.
Yeah, when I got the call about a place like this in Colombia, I was surprised.
A Hindu site in South America? My heart is actually pounding - to see the site.
- (chuckles) NARRATOR: Located deep within the Andean foothills of southern Colombia, the San AgustÃn Archaeological Park is home to more than 500 megalithic stone statues of unknown origin.
First discovered by a Spanish monk in the mid-18th century, they appear to be the work of the region's earliest civilizations and are thought to date back as many as 2,000 years.
So, this is the main gate here.
We've got a bit of a walk through the jungle.
And this is a very remote spot, even today.
So high in the mountains.
You wonder how people got to this site, why they would have even chosen this.
- Here it is.
- Wow.
- Check it out.
- Yeah, let's see.
NARRATOR: David Childress has been researching this area for many years.
He is convinced that many of the statues show strong connections to the Olmec statues that were first discovered in Mexico more than 1,600 miles to the north in the 1800s.
CHILDRESS: We know that the Olmecs were in Mexico and also in Central America, but evidence of the Olmecs in South America has been elusive until now.
Here at San AgustÃn, we have that evidence.
This would be one of the earliest Olmec sites because it's thought that San AgustÃn started as early as 3000 BC, and other Olmec sites in Mexico are only dated to around 1000 BC, so this is an extremely important site.
What I really wanted to show you is, what I think is Hindu things, - which are right over here.
- Okay.
- Wow! - NARRATOR: It is David Childress' belief that the stone sculptures of the San AgustÃn Archaeological Park not only show strong similarities to the Olmec carvings found in Mexico, but also show even more profound connections to Hindu carvings and artwork found in India and Southeast Asia.
I think you'll be interested in this.
MOHAN: Oh, a figure holding a skull flanked by two other figures.
That is so Hindu.
And these two doorkeepers see how they're holding weapons to protect the main deity? We can see a central deity holding a skull.
And two guardian doorkeepers holding tools.
This is typical South Indian architecture.
This is exactly what's portrayed in these temples.
This is amazing because I've never seen anything like this in South America.
What's really interesting to me, is that the main deity is shown with fangs.
That's typical of South India; In Tamil Nadu, Shiva is shown with fangs.
CHILDRESS: You think that's maybe Shiva, - right there in the middle? - MOHAN: Yes.
NARRATOR: Shiva? Also known as "The Destroyer"? Is it possible that evidence of this uniquely Hindu deity has been found in South America and on ancient megalithic stone carvings dating back some 2,000 years? So how bout these right here, huh? Wow, yeah, these are, uh, lingams.
These are symbols of Shiva.
And we can see these lingams have more and more details on them.
And look here it even has a face.
- CHILDRESS: Yeah, how bout that? - MOHAN: You see this is a classic mukhalingam.
It is a lingam with a face on top.
- A mukhalingam? - Yeah.
The word mukha means face, and the lingam means a cylindrical structure.
And this is classic Hindu iconography, and you can see this in many ancient temples.
So here, have a look at this one here.
I think you'll find this pretty interesting.
Wow! An eagle holding a snake in its beaks, and then it's also holding the snake on its talons.
I mean, this is classic Hindu iconography.
This is Garuda holding the Naga.
So Garuda is always depicted as a giant bird, and then typically, he's holding a snake - Yeah.
- In his beak and his talons.
I've seen something very similar to this in Vietnam, in a place called Champa.
I can show you a picture of this.
CHILDRESS: So the snake that he's holding in his beak and talons - is a Naga snake, is that right? - Yes.
Yes.
In Hindu text, we don't see the Garuda as an animal or the snake as an animal.
There are two different races; One is the Garuda, which actually comes from a planet up above the sky.
The Nagas are reptilian, snake-like shape-shifting beings which live underground.
CHILDRESS: Now that's an interesting story, because that's on the flag of Mexico today.
- MOHAN: Oh, really? - Yeah, how bout that? MOHAN: Oh, wow, wow! CHILDRESS: So the Garuda is in some ways a symbol of the airships, - the spaceships - Absolutely.
- And the flight that they would use.
- Yes.
Here we are in the middle of South America, in a remote site that looks exactly like Hindu carvings.
I mean, without any connection, how is that possible? Well, do you think, then, that these Hindu demigods are, are flying in-in spaceships, even scouting, they're creating a place like this? It's all so strange, but it's, it's so obvious that some kind of high, technical civilization was here.
- Yes.
Mm-hmm.
- It's it's amazing.
NARRATOR: Ancient Hindus? Traveling across the Pacific Ocean in flying aircraft? But even if such an incredible feat was possible where is the evidence? As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the evidence not only exists, but has been tested.
And it confirms the likelihood that extraterrestrial visitors came here to Earth thousands of years ago.
NARRATOR: At the San AgustÃn In Archaeological Park in Colombia, South America, ancient astronaut theorist David Childress and Hindu expert Praveen Mohan are investigating what they believe to be conclusive evidence that Hindu explorers migrated to this area more than 2,000 years ago.
So here, have a look at this dolmen here.
- What do you see? - Wow, there's a, uh, central deity flanked by two doorkeepers.
But these doorkeepers are not human or even humanoid.
You can see the scales on the body, you know, see the lines.
And what's even more interesting I mean, it seems almost like they have a hood on top of them, which is characteristic of cobras, and cobras don't exist in Americas.
How did this motif get here? And believe it or not, we still have this same depiction in many Southeast Asian countries.
In fact, I have pictures of it.
- CHILDRESS: Right.
- MOHAN: Yeah, this is a temple.
This is in Thailand.
You can see that this is being guarded by two Nagas.
CHILDRESS: I see that, and they have their ribs, uh, on their stomach, just like this.
MOHAN: Yeah, the-the scales on the bodies.
CHILDRESS: Yeah, that's fascinating.
MOHAN: And you know, there's yet another characteristic feature that you would really love.
These are feathered serpents like Kukulkan.
CHILDRESS: The feathered serpent of Kukulkan? - Yes.
MOHAN: And flanking on the pyramid.
NARRATOR: Kukulkan? The Mayan god that is most famously depicted on the temple of El Castillo in Chichen Itza? The one described as a feathered serpent that descended to Earth from the sky? But as far as many ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, depictions of the god Kukulkan are not merely depictions of a flying serpent, as many mainstream archaeologists believe, but of a spaceman.
And they cite the presence of a humanoid face, often seen emerging from the mouth of the serpent, as really a depiction of a helmeted astronaut piloting a large, flying spacecraft, similar to what is known as a "vimana" in the Hindu tradition.
In the Mahbharata, we can see very advanced flying machines, which are called vimanas.
It is clearly established that the gods come down from the sky using vimanas.
It is also talked about in Mayan culture.
There are several types of vimanas that - you yourself have published.
- Uh-huh.
And there is a type of vimana which has tail fins, correct? Yeah, the Chicuna vimana - has wings - Yeah, yeah.
While other vimanas were discoid and other vimanas were, like, tubular, - cigar-shaped ships.
- Yes, yeah.
And what's really fascinating is that, in the Gold Museum in Bogotá, we have the same vimanas made of gold, - correct? These discoid - We have the-the gold airplanes there.
NARRATOR: In the early 1900s, tomb robbers came upon a grave site along Colombia's Magdalena River dating back an estimated 1,500 years.
Inside, they discovered hundreds of small gold figurines.
TSOUKALOS: Hundreds of these small, gold objects have been found, many of which are rooted in the animal kingdom.
17 eerily look like modern-day airplanes.
The wings are attached at the bottom.
Birds, they have their wings attached where we have our shoulders, like this.
So no formation in the animal kingdom exists in the form of these Quimbaya artifacts.
And, in 1996, two engineers took a couple of these ancient artifacts, blew them up to this size, put a propeller inside, threw it up in the air, and it flew.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that among the Quimbaya figurines found in Colombia are representations of what the Hindu people on the other side of the world described as vimanas? Ancient astronaut theorists suggest the answer can be found by examining a character from the ancient Hindu texts: A character who bears the name "Maya.
" The word "Maya" itself is a Hindu word.
It means "illusion" or "god of illusion.
" And this was the name given to the king of Asuras, and he's known as Maya because he's able to create these magical illusions.
DEEPAK SHIMKHADA: Maya, he was born of divine god Brahma.
He was a great architect, he was a great magician, and he invented the flying machine.
He was not of the Earth because he was not born on Earth, so he was obviously extraterrestrial.
MOHAN: Maya actually traveled out of India, and he might've gone to Mexico.
Now, interestingly, Mayans have a book called Popul Vuh.
In that book, they talk about how a specific god came from the east, and I think this is the same god that both these cultures are talking about.
NARRATOR: If the divine King Maya was a real being, as millions of Hindus believe, is it possible that the Mayan civilization of Central America adopted his name? According to ancient astronaut theorist David Childress, the answer is a resounding yes, and he believes that at San AgustÃn there is a sculpture that doesn't only support his theory, but may also be a depiction of an actual alien visitor.
Would you like to see, perhaps, a spaceman? - (chuckling): A spaceman? - Yes.
- There's one more site.
- Yeah, absolutely! NARRATOR: San AgustÃn Archaeological Park in Colombia is located along the west bank of the Magdalena River, near a place where it converges with two other rivers.
It is a location that ancient astronaut theorists believe has a startling and not accidental significance.
MOHAN: They could've set up this site anywhere, but why did they choose San AgustÃn in Colombia? In India, we have this place called Triveni Sangam where three great rivers meet, and that site is chosen as a sacred site.
We have a lot of temples in this place.
Whoever came from India to here chose this place because this is where all these three rivers meet.
And to find a place like this, you needed to have aerial survey.
They were using the vimanas, which is why they set up this ancient Shiva temple here.
NARRATOR: Vimanas? The extraterrestrial flying machines that are described in the Mahabharata, the ancient Hindu text? Is it possible that Hindu explorers made the journey from India to South America, and then settled in this region centuries ago? And could they have made that journey, a distance of some 12,000 miles, by means of a vimana? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes, and they believe that the answer to what compelled them to come there can be found by examining one of the ancient stone statues located in San AgustÃn Archeological Park.
This was the final statue that I wanted you to look at.
- Pretty curious, huh? - Yeah.
CHILDRESS: I-I don't know what to call this e-except a spaceman.
You can see that he's wearing some kind of a helmet.
It looks like he has a visor, he's got two rectangular eyes and a rectangular mouth, he has no nose.
He's holding this, what they call a-a power staff.
But what's really fascinating about that is he's holding that long cylinder, and, if you look carefully, it's going even below his feet.
He's using that cylinder to go into the ground.
Now this is very interesting because, in Hindu culture, there's a god called Swarna Kala Bhairava, and he's the god of gold, and he uses a tool called keyla, and he uses it to go into the ground and mine gold.
It could be a special probe that you can put in the ground and detect gold and minerals, so perhaps he is the extraterrestrial that is guiding them.
He's a spaceman in a spacesuit with his gold mining tools.
NARRATOR: A spaceman mining gold? In 1976, author and researcher Zecharia Sitchin published a book called The 12th Planet, in which he translated and interpreted the writings of humanity's earliest known civilization, the Sumerians.
According to Sitchin, the beings described in the texts, the Anunnaki, were, in fact, visitors from another planet.
They created humankind as slaves that could be forced to mine the gold the Anunnaki needed to power their spacecraft.
CHILDRESS: San AgustÃn is still a remote mountain area today, and coming here in ancient times would've been extremely difficult, but this was a gold-bearing area, and if you're looking for gold, this is the place to come.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that the strange carvings found in the area can be proof that Sitchin's incredible theory is true? And that an ancient race of people traveled from Asia to South America in pursuit of a metal they had been taught to consider not just essential, but sacred? When you talk about how this place was used for gold, you know, how they were mining gold as offerings to gods, that's exactly what Hindus do, even today.
And Colombia, right here, in-in this remote spot, is land of gold.
So much of the gold in South America - came from right here.
- Mm-hmm.
So this is what they were looking for, gold, and they came here, and they found it.
They're flying here, they're creating a place like this, they're also sending ships across the Pacific Ocean.
- They're bringing power tools.
- Mm-hmm.
And when they're not mining, they're creating these amazing statues, that And there are hundreds of them all over here.
MOHAN: Your theory about people and Mayans moving from South India and-and coming here all the way to South America, this is all tying together.
We have an extraterrestrial god who comes down and he mines for gold, and he builds an entire civilization.
I think that makes a lot of sense.
CHILDRESS: When it comes to San AgustÃn, the Spanish did not know about this ancient site, and if they had known about it, they probably would've destroyed it.
So throughout Colombia and Mesoamerica, we have ruins of ancient civilizations still undiscovered, and with the discoveries at San AgustÃn in the last hundred years, we now have a chance to rewrite South American history.
NARRATOR: Do the stone statues at San AgustÃn provide compelling evidence, not only that there was interaction between the peoples of Asia and those of South America centuries ago, but also that this interaction was made possible as the result of extraterrestrial intervention? Ancient astronaut theorists say yes, and they suggest further proof can be found locked away in the secret vaults of the Vatican Library.
NARRATOR: Southeast Asia.
2000 BC.
An ethnically diverse civilization of seafaring explorers emerges in the area of modern-day Vietnam.
At roughly the same time the Olmec appear in Mesoamerica.
The Cham were an Austronesian and are an Austronesian-speaking group.
In, uh, central Vietnam, Austronesian languages include Polynesian, Indonesian and so forth.
And they are closely associated with highly maritime people.
The word "Cham" represents a race that extended from Egypt to India to Southeast Asia.
The ancient Cham were Hindu.
I believe there was a Cham migration to South and Central America.
This was ultimately a partnership between advanced human civilizations and extraterrestrials.
That's why you see all of the the diversity in these artifacts and these giant structures that defy logic.
NARRATOR: If the giant Olmec heads and artifacts found in Mexico resemble a community made up of multiple ethnicities Ethnicities that were not previously believed to have been present in Central or South America until the 15th century Then is it possible that these people were among a wave of migrants who traveled to South America from various parts of Southern and Southeast Asia thousands of years ago? JETT: It has occurred to me that the Cham might conceivably have been involved as the sort of middle persons in maritime transactions between Southeast Asia and the New World, particularly, perhaps, northwestern South America.
Modern DNA mapping, what we call, uh, molecular DNA study, has been revolutionizing the understanding of human migrations over the globe.
COLLINS: What this is very clearly stating again and again is there was a relationship between the peoples of Southern India, places like Sri Lanka, Southeast Asia, Australia, Micronesia, Melanesia, through Polynesia and particularly into South America and Mesoamerica.
NARRATOR: But if hundreds, perhaps thousands of people migrated from Southern and Southeast Asia to South America, how did they get there? Was it by sailing ship? Or was it by means of an alien-inspired aircraft known as vimana, as many ancient astronaut theorists believe? MOHAN: We hear this story time and time again in Mahabharata.
Some vimanas have these huge wings and they have, like, a tail fin, like a modern-day aircraft.
Almost all these machines were mentioned 5,000 years ago in Mahabharata.
NARRATOR: But if mass migration on a large scale had been taking place centuries ago and with the help of extraterrestrial technology, then why has no evidence been found to support this incredible theory? As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the answer dates back to the bloody persecutions of the Maya by the Spanish in the 16th century, and the deliberate destruction of hundreds of years of the Maya's written history by Friar Diego de Landa.
A destruction that many ancient astronaut theorists suggest was not as thorough as we were made to believe.
CHILDRESS: Catholic Church was trying to destroy the old religion and they-they made a big show of having huge bonfires of books and destroying them, but at the same time, the Catholic Church was trying to accumulate knowledge.
TSOUKALOS: It would also not surprise me if Diego de Landa did not burn everything.
And maybe some of these texts did make it back to the Vatican.
People often say, "Oh, but the Vatican just destroys stuff.
" Actually they don't, on the whole.
What they do is they hide it.
What kind of other organization in the world is known to have an archive that's actually called "the Secret Archive"? It's quite possible that while, on the surface, the Catholic Church was trying to destroy everything, this knowledge that they're gathering in North and South America can benefit the Catholic Church in the future and that's what they thought.
PICKNETT: It might molder away, but at least they have control of it.
That's the important thing.
The Vatican is always about control.
Knowledge is power.
The Vatican has always known this.
The Vatican has always known secrets it doesn't want the average person to know.
NARRATOR: Did the Catholic Church appear to destroy the Maya histories and sacred scrolls only to have hidden them away in the Vatican's notorious secret archive? As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the answer is yes.
And the Church's motives may not have been to simply steal valuable ancient knowledge, but something far more profound.
They believe the real reason was to hide the proof that the origins of the Maya civilization and those that existed thousands of years earlier couldn't only be traced to other continents, but to other planets.
NARRATOR: Giant megalithic stone heads figurines of what appear to be flying craft and statues that evoke cultures found on the other side of the world.
According to ancient astronaut theorists, it is this information that the Catholic Church sought to suppress when they attempted to destroy all traces of the Maya culture nearly 500 years ago.
MARTELL: Now, what's interesting is, all these great ancient cultures, including the Mayan, seemed to have knowledge of math and science, which we can't explain how they got this information.
When you ask them, they always tell you it came from the gods.
NARRATOR: If the proof existed, not only of cross-Pacific migration, but also extraterrestrial visitation, many ancient astronaut theorists believe it would have posed a serious threat to a Catholic hierarchy steeped in the bigotry and intolerance of the Inquisition.
But if this incredible theory is true, what then happened to the extraterrestrial visitors? Why did they come here only to leave or go into hiding? CHILDRESS: Because of various wars going on, cataclysms, eventually, these civilizations began to collapse.
As civilizations do.
And what happened in the end was the, the airships, they stopped coming.
And then, the extraterrestrial demigods pulled their technology back.
So we don't know what happened there with the extraterrestrials and where they went.
And so you have to wonder if they don't want us to know that they are here.
The extraterrestrials may have just decided, "Okay.
"Humans on planet Earth have, have got "the seeds of civilization.
"Let's just stand back and see what they do.
" NARRATOR: As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the proof of extraterrestrial visitation is still out there, much of it buried beneath centuries of dirt and rocks.
But every day, the truth is being revealed.
In February 2018 through March 2019, archeologists made a number of incredible discoveries just in the area of Mexico alone.
Mayan artifacts were discovered in Teotihuacan, a location previously thought to have been inhabited only by the Aztecs.
200 more artifacts were found in a hidden cave under the Mayan site of Chichen Itza.
And beneath dense jungles near Lake Pátzcuaro, LiDAR scanning uncovered an ancient city the size of Manhattan.
TSOUKALOS: In the early 1990s, there were these science fiction stories that one day we'll be able to somehow look underneath the overgrown jungle.
And sure enough, here we are, 20, 25 years later, and that technology now exists.
Satellites are now able to look through the soil into the ground to see if other structures exist.
And guess what? They do.
We have only now begun a new era of discovery and I predict thousands as-of-yet undiscovered sites will finally see the light of day.
If you have a puzzle with a thousand pieces, in order to see the final picture, you don't need to lay down all 1,000 pieces.
If you lay down 980 pieces, I guarantee you, you will see the big picture.
NARRATOR: Is mankind on an incredible threshold of discovery? One that will confirm that extraterrestrial visitation has occurred all over the world and for centuries? Perhaps beneath the ruins of a newly discovered site in Mexico, archeologists will uncover the ultimate evidence of alien contact and proof of humanity's true origins.