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Hidden worlds: Fresh clues to the past : did Columbus, Magellan and Piri Reis know the Glareanus maps?
The mysterious ancients who advanced civilizations did not come from the stars--but from Earth itself. The evidence has been uncovered, and now 2 investigators into mankind's farthest past have presented that evidence in an amazing book that will shatter history's strongest assertions. If you read this book, be prepared to surrender some of your most closely held beliefs about who we re and where we come from.
- GenresNonfiction
221 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1974
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September 3, 2023
DID ‘THE ANCIENTS’ (NOT ETs) BRING ABOUT CIVILIZATION ON EARTH?
The ‘About the Authors’ section of this 1972 book explains, “M.H.J. Th. van der Beer and P. Moerman were brought together by a common interest in man’s early history. Ted van der Veer was born in the… Netherlands, and … he became interested in Latin American and Caribbean prehistory. At present, he is Port inspector at Rotterdam and, as a painter, assistant director of the Academy of Vlaadingen. Peter Moerman is a secondary school teacher of biology at Vlaardingen and has traveled extensively in both Eastern and Western Europe.”
They wrote in the Introduction, “This book sets out in some detail a new theory about the simultaneous development of the great civilizations of the ancient world; and while it certainly does not claim to offer a cut-and-dried solution to the discovery of America, it does show, by carefully following the story of Columbus and using all the available evidence, how historians have come to accept what they consider to be THE discovery of America---which in fact cannot possibly have been its real discovery!
“By letting the facts speak for themselves---and these facts were largely supplied by Columbus himself---we hope to demonstrate the validity of our arguments to those who simply accept conventional views about the discovery of America, and to convince them both by cold reason and by historical evidence which can no longer be questioned; and in this we will rely a good deal on the ‘Glareanus’ map, which we ourselves discovered, and which outlines South America more precisely than many other maps produced years later. It provides us with indisputable evidence… for South America is not shown as being joined to the Antarctic land mass, but as terminating in a clearly defined point with sea all round it!...
“We fully appreciate that once we have convinced you that Columbus did not discover, but merely re-discovered, America it becomes our responsibility to try to find out who really discovered it. Thor Heyerdahl has already demonstrated the feasibility of early voyages of discovery in boats made of papyrus … Other clues can be found in ancient Egypt and indeed in all the old civilizations… one particular trail … runs back from Columbus to a great race of sea-farers whose splendid achievements have hitherto been unknown to us… numerous new clues … lead to some inescapable conclusions, one of which is that long before the time of Columbus there must have been contact between Europe and the New World…
“We are glad to see… that more and more people are rejecting outdated ideas and attempting instead to come to their own conclusions about both the origins of the ancient civilizations and the discovery of the New World; and all we can do here is to offer you the benefit of our own conclusions and discoveries so that you can decide what the most probable answer is to a particular problem.” (Pg. xi-xiii)
They ask, “What is known of the Sumerians? Only that they appear in Southern Mesopotamia somewhere between the sixth and fourth millennia B.C… though where they came from is unknown. It was they who left the ziggurats, sacred domes dedicated to the moon-god… everything suggests that the cultural level was truly high. (Pg. 45) Later, they add, “We are still left with the important problem of where the Sumerians came from and how early civilization originated there. How and from whom did they obtain their specialized knowledge?” (Pg. 53)
They assert, “To suggest a ‘rapid’ transition from the Stone Age to the ancient civilizations is, chronologically speaking, quite absurd! The inhabitants of those areas where civilizations arose and flourished MUST, quite simply, have made contact with another race---whom we shall term the Ancients---who already possessed a fairly high level of sophistication at that time. Did this race belong to our own world or were they cosmonauts?” (Pg. 68)
They state, “If we consider things logically, we cannot assume that Columbus was the first person from the Old World to discover the New! More and more evidence is being put forward to convince us that there were links between the Old and the New Worlds MUCH earlier than Columbus!” (Pg. 86)
They note, “it is claimed that the sun-god of Tiahuanaco is surrounded by secret symbols in the figures accompanying him: these are said to represent a ‘space-diver,’ and unknown machine, a jet-engine, a solar battery, a retro-rocket, a space vehicle, and finally a space-ship.” (Pg. 87)
They wonder, “In ‘Was God An Astronaut?’ Von Däniken asks himself how the ‘pagans’ acquired the idea of a physical return to life? He and his school believe that there is a cosmic influence at work, a conclusion he has been forced to by the failure of science to provide an adequate answer. Perhaps they might even be right after in an indirect way. Is this a manifestation of man’s unconscious realization that he is a part of the whole universe, arising from it and returning once again to it?” (Pg. 109)
They suggest, “Could it be that … the megalith builders reached South America long before anyone else? We are not yet completely certain that this is the case, but it could well be that in the near future we shall have to re-write our history all over again! When talking about the Ancients, we may be referring to the oldest civilization in the world from which all other cultures have derived. Did it provide the inspiration for the megalith builders[?]… if this original culture flourished… this brings us back to the main theme of this book: how was it possible that simple Sone Age farmers, nomads and hunters should, after tens of thousands of years of a wandering life, suddenly evince an … inexplicable urge to achieve a … more sophisticate culture and standard of living? Are we dealing here with the descendants of the Ancients and their religion?” (Pg. 134)
They ask, “Imagine… that prehistoric man had encountered an extraterrestrial intelligence… we must not automatically assume that the being from space would have been recognized as ‘human’ by primitive man… An extraterrestrial intelligence could have decided without any difficulty to subject man to some kind of posthypnotic suggestion or instruction which would ensure that he would be unable in his present state to set about the conquest of space…” (Pg. 143-144)
They assert, “We can only hope that our apparent urge to exterminate ourselves is not an affliction that was laid upon us by an extra-terrestrial intelligence … If our self-destructive urge springs from within man himself we can still hope that something may be done before darkness overtakes intelligent life on earth!” (Pg. 146)
They argue, “Atlantis … might have been in the Indian Ocean! … it was very unlikely to have been in the Atlantic, and we hope that future investigators will not make the same mistake as their predecessors … which drove them to search for Atlantis in places where there was nothing to find!” (Pg. 162)
They contend, “the use of the swastika slowly spread outwards from a central point of origin to cover an enormous area, since contact overland between these regions was possible… Chance is ruled out… we must still ask which ancient seafaring nation was capable of crossing the ocean at the time of Christ’s birth. Frankly, we do not know… the mound-builders of North America had no contact with the civilizations of Central America… Yet the swastika is found in both areas, so we must assume that this is not a matter of an isolated and accidental discovery of America, but of some great seafaring race having paid several visits to North and Central America… So we must ask ourselves this: was the swastika brought to the New World by the Ancients?” (Pg. 166-167)
They explain, “the map we came across, the so-called Glareanus map not only quite clearly shows the whole of South America … but also the southernmost tip of the continent, definitely indicating that it has been circumnavigated!” (Pg. 183)
They summarize, “What we think happened is this: somewhere on earth a civilization arose or perhaps several such civilizations, which because of extremely favorable conditions flowered earlier than any others. This enabled its people to build up a clear advantage over all the rest, giving them a clear start of a thousand years of more… the favored race, whom… we call the Ancients… kept their routes and trading areas secret… We believe that one or more natural disasters destroyed this original civilization, and that its survivors found refuge among… those favored areas which later gave rise to the ancient civilizations we now know about.” (Pg. 193)
They clarify, “our theory about human evolution differs from those of Von Däniken, Charroux and others… we have looked for sone factor common to all these ancient cultures and originating here on our own planet. We are convinced that the Ancients existed, and that it will one day be known exactly where they lived; and … when we have discovered this, we will also have resolved the riddle of Atlantis!” (Pg. 201) Rejecting the extraterrestrial hypothesis, they ask, “Why should so much ingenuity go into elaborating theories that are beyond the range of our imagination … when we have here on earth… another explanation of the origins of the early civilizations? We are, of course, referring to our theory about the Ancients. There is only one obstacle in the way of this theory, which is that scholars have not yet found any evidence which satisfies THEM as to the existence of such a central culture, as a result of which they reject our ideas…” (Pg. 201)
This book may appeal to those interested in ‘ancient mysteries’ and ‘lost civilizations’/Atlantis.
The ‘About the Authors’ section of this 1972 book explains, “M.H.J. Th. van der Beer and P. Moerman were brought together by a common interest in man’s early history. Ted van der Veer was born in the… Netherlands, and … he became interested in Latin American and Caribbean prehistory. At present, he is Port inspector at Rotterdam and, as a painter, assistant director of the Academy of Vlaadingen. Peter Moerman is a secondary school teacher of biology at Vlaardingen and has traveled extensively in both Eastern and Western Europe.”
They wrote in the Introduction, “This book sets out in some detail a new theory about the simultaneous development of the great civilizations of the ancient world; and while it certainly does not claim to offer a cut-and-dried solution to the discovery of America, it does show, by carefully following the story of Columbus and using all the available evidence, how historians have come to accept what they consider to be THE discovery of America---which in fact cannot possibly have been its real discovery!
“By letting the facts speak for themselves---and these facts were largely supplied by Columbus himself---we hope to demonstrate the validity of our arguments to those who simply accept conventional views about the discovery of America, and to convince them both by cold reason and by historical evidence which can no longer be questioned; and in this we will rely a good deal on the ‘Glareanus’ map, which we ourselves discovered, and which outlines South America more precisely than many other maps produced years later. It provides us with indisputable evidence… for South America is not shown as being joined to the Antarctic land mass, but as terminating in a clearly defined point with sea all round it!...
“We fully appreciate that once we have convinced you that Columbus did not discover, but merely re-discovered, America it becomes our responsibility to try to find out who really discovered it. Thor Heyerdahl has already demonstrated the feasibility of early voyages of discovery in boats made of papyrus … Other clues can be found in ancient Egypt and indeed in all the old civilizations… one particular trail … runs back from Columbus to a great race of sea-farers whose splendid achievements have hitherto been unknown to us… numerous new clues … lead to some inescapable conclusions, one of which is that long before the time of Columbus there must have been contact between Europe and the New World…
“We are glad to see… that more and more people are rejecting outdated ideas and attempting instead to come to their own conclusions about both the origins of the ancient civilizations and the discovery of the New World; and all we can do here is to offer you the benefit of our own conclusions and discoveries so that you can decide what the most probable answer is to a particular problem.” (Pg. xi-xiii)
They ask, “What is known of the Sumerians? Only that they appear in Southern Mesopotamia somewhere between the sixth and fourth millennia B.C… though where they came from is unknown. It was they who left the ziggurats, sacred domes dedicated to the moon-god… everything suggests that the cultural level was truly high. (Pg. 45) Later, they add, “We are still left with the important problem of where the Sumerians came from and how early civilization originated there. How and from whom did they obtain their specialized knowledge?” (Pg. 53)
They assert, “To suggest a ‘rapid’ transition from the Stone Age to the ancient civilizations is, chronologically speaking, quite absurd! The inhabitants of those areas where civilizations arose and flourished MUST, quite simply, have made contact with another race---whom we shall term the Ancients---who already possessed a fairly high level of sophistication at that time. Did this race belong to our own world or were they cosmonauts?” (Pg. 68)
They state, “If we consider things logically, we cannot assume that Columbus was the first person from the Old World to discover the New! More and more evidence is being put forward to convince us that there were links between the Old and the New Worlds MUCH earlier than Columbus!” (Pg. 86)
They note, “it is claimed that the sun-god of Tiahuanaco is surrounded by secret symbols in the figures accompanying him: these are said to represent a ‘space-diver,’ and unknown machine, a jet-engine, a solar battery, a retro-rocket, a space vehicle, and finally a space-ship.” (Pg. 87)
They wonder, “In ‘Was God An Astronaut?’ Von Däniken asks himself how the ‘pagans’ acquired the idea of a physical return to life? He and his school believe that there is a cosmic influence at work, a conclusion he has been forced to by the failure of science to provide an adequate answer. Perhaps they might even be right after in an indirect way. Is this a manifestation of man’s unconscious realization that he is a part of the whole universe, arising from it and returning once again to it?” (Pg. 109)
They suggest, “Could it be that … the megalith builders reached South America long before anyone else? We are not yet completely certain that this is the case, but it could well be that in the near future we shall have to re-write our history all over again! When talking about the Ancients, we may be referring to the oldest civilization in the world from which all other cultures have derived. Did it provide the inspiration for the megalith builders[?]… if this original culture flourished… this brings us back to the main theme of this book: how was it possible that simple Sone Age farmers, nomads and hunters should, after tens of thousands of years of a wandering life, suddenly evince an … inexplicable urge to achieve a … more sophisticate culture and standard of living? Are we dealing here with the descendants of the Ancients and their religion?” (Pg. 134)
They ask, “Imagine… that prehistoric man had encountered an extraterrestrial intelligence… we must not automatically assume that the being from space would have been recognized as ‘human’ by primitive man… An extraterrestrial intelligence could have decided without any difficulty to subject man to some kind of posthypnotic suggestion or instruction which would ensure that he would be unable in his present state to set about the conquest of space…” (Pg. 143-144)
They assert, “We can only hope that our apparent urge to exterminate ourselves is not an affliction that was laid upon us by an extra-terrestrial intelligence … If our self-destructive urge springs from within man himself we can still hope that something may be done before darkness overtakes intelligent life on earth!” (Pg. 146)
They argue, “Atlantis … might have been in the Indian Ocean! … it was very unlikely to have been in the Atlantic, and we hope that future investigators will not make the same mistake as their predecessors … which drove them to search for Atlantis in places where there was nothing to find!” (Pg. 162)
They contend, “the use of the swastika slowly spread outwards from a central point of origin to cover an enormous area, since contact overland between these regions was possible… Chance is ruled out… we must still ask which ancient seafaring nation was capable of crossing the ocean at the time of Christ’s birth. Frankly, we do not know… the mound-builders of North America had no contact with the civilizations of Central America… Yet the swastika is found in both areas, so we must assume that this is not a matter of an isolated and accidental discovery of America, but of some great seafaring race having paid several visits to North and Central America… So we must ask ourselves this: was the swastika brought to the New World by the Ancients?” (Pg. 166-167)
They explain, “the map we came across, the so-called Glareanus map not only quite clearly shows the whole of South America … but also the southernmost tip of the continent, definitely indicating that it has been circumnavigated!” (Pg. 183)
They summarize, “What we think happened is this: somewhere on earth a civilization arose or perhaps several such civilizations, which because of extremely favorable conditions flowered earlier than any others. This enabled its people to build up a clear advantage over all the rest, giving them a clear start of a thousand years of more… the favored race, whom… we call the Ancients… kept their routes and trading areas secret… We believe that one or more natural disasters destroyed this original civilization, and that its survivors found refuge among… those favored areas which later gave rise to the ancient civilizations we now know about.” (Pg. 193)
They clarify, “our theory about human evolution differs from those of Von Däniken, Charroux and others… we have looked for sone factor common to all these ancient cultures and originating here on our own planet. We are convinced that the Ancients existed, and that it will one day be known exactly where they lived; and … when we have discovered this, we will also have resolved the riddle of Atlantis!” (Pg. 201) Rejecting the extraterrestrial hypothesis, they ask, “Why should so much ingenuity go into elaborating theories that are beyond the range of our imagination … when we have here on earth… another explanation of the origins of the early civilizations? We are, of course, referring to our theory about the Ancients. There is only one obstacle in the way of this theory, which is that scholars have not yet found any evidence which satisfies THEM as to the existence of such a central culture, as a result of which they reject our ideas…” (Pg. 201)
This book may appeal to those interested in ‘ancient mysteries’ and ‘lost civilizations’/Atlantis.
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