Original subtitles

NARRATOR: Ancient ruins that defy conventional timelines.

GIORGIO TSOUKALOS: G �bekli Tepe's dating

has changed the history of archaeology.

NARRATOR: Sophisticated structures

discovered deep beneath the sea.

DAVID CHILDRESS: This city is so deep in the ocean

that archeologists are saying that it must be

50,000 years old.

NARRATOR: And architectural ruins with untraceable origins.

There were extraordinary civilizations

that have been lost to the story of the world until now.

NARRATOR: In ancient texts and folklore,

there are accounts of pre-historic civilizations

that were catastrophically erased from the planet.

Could it be that humans are not

the first intelligent beings to inhabit Earth?

WILLIAM HENRY: We have to be open to the possibility

that whoever built these structures

were not, in fact, human beings.

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: Six thousand years ago,

this ancient mound was the site of Eridu--

the oldest city of the Sumerian empire.

According to mainstream archaeologists,

this is the cradle of civilization.

FELICIA BEARDSLEY: Many archeologists will say civilization began

in Mesopotamia some 6,000 years ago.

It is built on small bands of hunter-gatherers

who then become settled in that area

as kind of semi-sedentary communities.

They adopt agriculture,

the population starts to grow,

and we begin to recognize

we need to organize our communities.

You start seeing these step-sided pyramids,

where the religious practitioner

might conduct his rites or rituals and so on.

And we have an urban planning environment

that also means we've got a lot of engineering going on,

we have a lot of science, a lot of mathematics.

It has all of those elements we would call a civilization.

NARRATOR: Many researchers around the world believe

there is evidence to suggest civilization existed on Earth

long before the Sumerians.

And one key source

is the writing of the Sumerians themselves.

Ancient cuneiform tablets

list kings who ruled tens of thousands of years ago,

and they tell of an earlier age

when humans lived among powerful beings

that came down from the sky called the Anunnaki.

ANDREW COLLINS: The Anunnaki were the builder gods

behind the creation

of the civilizations of Sumer and Babylon.

They provided humanity with the rudiments of civilization.

They gave humanity animal husbandry,

but also agriculture for the first time.

NARRATOR: The Sumerians also wrote

that the Anunnaki were responsible

for bringing a devastating cataclysm

upon the Earth...

...eerily similar to the story that would later appear

in the Hebrew Bible as the Great Flood.

This was only just discovered in 2009,

when Dr. Irving Finkel--

one of the world's foremost experts on cuneiform writing--

translated a 3,700-year-old Sumerian tablet.

IRVING FINKEL: In the Bible, God decided,

because human race was so sinful and wicked,

to destroy everything.

And at last minute, relented enough to inform Noah

that he has to build a boat really fast

and put all the animals in it and shut the doors.

Then afterwards,

life could continue when the waters went down.

Everybody in the world is interested in Noah's flood

and where it might've come from,

so when this tablet came across the desk to me

and I realized,

clearly, how important it was,

it was one of those heart-stopping moments.

When I picked it up for the first time

to look at it properly and started to read it,

one of the first things you read

is when a human being finds out from the gods

up in heaven that there's going to be a dreadful flood

and the world and all its life is going to be destroyed,

and a boat has to be built.

So I thought to myself, "This is very exciting."

The tablet is at least a thousand years older

than the story in the Bible.

So, of course, this means

that the question of where the story came from

has a whole different explanation.

NARRATOR: Could the translation of this ancient cuneiform tablet

be evidence that a Great Flood did, in fact,

occur in the distant past?

While nearly identical stories of a great deluge

can be found in the ancient texts

of many religions and cultures,

mainstream archaeologists had argued that there was

no evidence of any civilization existing

more than 6,000 years ago

to support the idea that such a cataclysm actually took place.

But in the early 1990s,

Klaus Schmidt of the German Archaeological Institute

began excavations at the ancient site

of G �bekli Tepe in southeast Turkey,

and what he unearthed changed everything.

PAUL BAHN: Once Klaus Schmidt

started excavating G �bekli Tepe

it just blew everybody away

because we'd never before known or imagined, even,

that people 12,000 years ago

could produce such spectacular, monumental structures

as he found at G �bekli Tepe.

TSOUKALOS: It is the first archeological site in the world

that proves its age dating as far back

as 12,000 years, around 10,000 BC.

The discovery and the official acceptance

of G �bekli Tepe's dating

has changed the history of archaeology.

ROBERT SCHOCH: This is indications of a major civilization

at that remote time.

A time when the standard historians all along have said,

"Well, no, civilization didn't occur at that time.

"They were just simple hunter and gatherers.

They were primitive people."

But we now have evidence to the contrary.

BAHN: It really did send shockwaves through the whole world

of early pre-history,

because we have never, ever seen anything like this

from anywhere in the world at that time, 12,000 years ago.

NARRATOR: G �bekli Tepe's nearly two dozen enormous T-shaped pillars--

some weighing more than 20 tons--

feature numerous carvings

that include depictions of animals,

human hands,

and intricately designed symbols.

Archaeologists estimate that it would have taken

a team of fifty men an entire week

to move just one of the monolithic pillars

from the limestone quarry

to the top of the hill where they stand today,

and over 300 hours to carve the bas-reliefs.

ROY FISHER: The structures seem to reflect

coordinated effort among significant numbers of people,

which is not how we typically imagine

hunter-gatherer societies,

which are usually smaller in size.

NARRATOR: For years, mainstream scholars maintained

that G �bekli Tepe was a completely unique site,

and while highly impressive,

it was not large enough to constitute

what would be considered a civilization.

But then, in 2004,

author Andrew Collins was shown photographs of a location

that looked remarkably similar to parts of G �bekli Tepe.

ANDREW COLLINS: I was visiting G �bekli Tepe,

and some children came up to me

and showed me a picture of this T-shaped standing stone

with this snake along the side.

And I thought, "I've never seen this before.

Where is this?"

And it became clear

that it was some unexcavated site

in the Tek Tek Mountains, which is about 25 miles

away from G �bekli Tepe,

and so I set out to find it.

And, eventually, I came to this bare limestone hill,

and as I walked up towards it, I could then see,

sticking out of the ground,

these heads of these T-shaped pillars,

again, exactly as you see at G �bekli Tepe.

And I realized

that somewhere beneath this soil

was something as grand and spectacular as G �bekli Tepe.

NARRATOR: For 15 years, only a small group of researchers

were aware of the pillars protruding from the earth

at the site known as Karahan Tepe.

When it was finally excavated,

archaeologists were shocked once again.

In 2019, digging begins.

And beneath the surface layers, the archaeologists start

uncovering dozens of these T-shaped pillars.

CHILDRESS: You have about 200 of these T-shaped megaliths.

They're typically 13 feet high, weigh about 11 tons.

You have other phallic stones,

you have certain depictions of animals

and some human faces as well.

So we have really a, a pretty extensive site.

NARRATOR: The discovery of the vast megalithic complex

made headlines around the world,

as it was estimated by experts to have been inhabited

somewhere between 11,000 and 12,000 years ago,

Just like G �bekli Tepe.

TSOUKALOS: Both Karahan Tepe and G �bekli Tepe

are striking in beauty,

striking in how massive and incredible

those megaliths are.

And in my opinion, they are related.

So it's also possible

that at some point a long time ago,

that entire region was one gigantic city.

NARRATOR: Could these sites confirm the written accounts found both

in the Bible and on Sumerian tablets

of a sophisticated civilization

that existed on Earth in the remote past?

One in which humans lived alongside

powerful visitors from the sky,

but ultimately fell victim to a devastating cataclysm?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and claim there is evidence

that these vast, megalithic complexes

were built with the help of otherworldly visitors.

NARRATOR: Nevsehir Province, central Turkey.

Here, 300 miles northwest

of the 12,000-year-old megalithic sites

of G �bekli Tepe and Karahan Tepe,

there is an ancient subterranean city called Derinkuyu

that archaeologists believe

once housed more than 20,000 people.

First discovered in 1963,

the maze of carved tunnels and rooms lies

200 feet below ground.

Who built it and when remain unknown.

Derinkuyu is a multi-leveled city

that has existed since time immemorial.

It was certainly used during Christian times.

But there's also evidence

that there's prehistoric activity

going on at these places

as early as 11, perhaps even 12,000 years ago,

right after the end of the last ice age.

NARRATOR: Much like G �bekli Tepe,

Derinkuyu was thought to be an anomaly.

But in 2014, just six miles to the north,

a local construction crew

excavating for an urban renovation project

stumbled across a strange series of carved rooms

and tunnels deep underground.

Upon further exploration,

they found a subterranean network

known as Kaymakli, which spans several miles

and extends hundreds of feet below the surface of the Earth,

much like the nearby underground city of Derinkuyu.

I was many times

in the underground cities in Turkey.

And this is a fantastic experience.

They are linked together.

Between Derinkuyu and Kaymakli, there are seven-kilometers-long

underground tunnels connecting the two cities.

NARRATOR: Evidence that these cities once housed thousands of people

has been further supported by the discovery of air vents

and water wells that would have made it possible

for people to live underground for years at a time.

COLLINS: These are huge, vast cities

that have been cut out of the living rock themself.

Who, exactly, built them?

The fact that G �bekli Tepe was built

right at the end of the last Ice Age

tells us that there is a possibility

that there is a connection

between these underground cities

and the building of G �bekli Tepe and Karahan.

It could have been the same people.

NARRATOR: Is there a connection between Turkey's mysterious

underground dwellings and the extremely ancient sites

of G �bekli Tepe and Karahan Tepe?

Could both have been built by a pre-flood civilization?

But if so, who would have had the ability

to manufacture such sophisticated structures?

Ancient astronaut theorists suggest the answer may lie

within sacred texts that describe interactions

between early humans and otherworldly beings.

Uruk, Southern Iraq.

In the early 19th century,

archaeologists excavating this ancient city

unearthed clay tablets covered in a form of symbolic writing

known as cuneiform.

It remains the world's first known writing system.

When the tablets were deciphered in the 1820s,

they revealed a record of Sumerian daily life,

names of important figures and rulers,

and accounts of sky gods called the Anunnaki.

These clay tablets are

5,000 years old and more,

and they tell of the arrival

of the Anunnaki, the pantheon of gods.

The chief was Anu.

This is the sky god who came along and created everything.

So the origin of civilization on the planet came from the sky.

The high god of the Anunnaki, Anu,

presided over the divine council.

There were a multitude of beings that came to this council.

They deliberated with Anu,

they made decisions for humanity,

they intervened in human affairs.

Karahan Tepe and G �bekli Tepe

are in an area that is well-known for its mythology.

Which suggests that the Anunnaki were responsible

for giving humanity the rudiments of civilization.

It was said that they gave humanity animal husbandry,

but also agriculture for the first time,

both of which we know

occurred in the area

of G �bekli Tepe and Karahan Tepe.

At G �bekli Tepe,

there's a carving of these three handbags

that appear above this bird-like creature.

And what's fascinating about this

is that you can find carvings of similar handbags

about 400 miles to the south

where the ancient Sumerians lived.

And there, the handbags are held by these winged figures

with bird-like heads called Anunnaki.

And the bags are said to hold

all the knowledge of the universe.

Professor Klaus Schmidt,

the rediscoverer of G �bekli Tepe in 1994,

actually wrote that he believed

that the founders of G �bekli Tepe were the Anunnaki.

NARRATOR: Similarly, the Bible also tells of early humans

having help from beings who came down from the sky

called the Watchers.

HENRY: The Watchers are the fallen angels

who came to Earth and intermingled with humans.

We are told that they are here to observe

and they're not going to interfere

in human development, although some of them did.

They're also seeding humanity with knowledge

that will help us to progress.

COLLINS: Both the Watchers

and the Anunnaki, who almost certainly were the same,

have been associated

with this culture at G �bekli Tepe and Karahan.

And is it possible, therefore,

that they are behind the creation of these sites?

And if we consider the possibility

that there was a huge cataclysm,

the chances are the underground cities of Cappadocia--

they would have been used as places of refuge.

NARRATOR: As mainstream scholars struggle to explain

how people living 12,000 years ago

were able to carve out

millions of square feet of rock from the earth

and build sprawling megalithic sites,

could the answer be found in the ancient writings

that describe our earliest ancestors

receiving assistance from extraterrestrials?

Perhaps further clues can be found

by more closely examining the T-shaped pillars

at the ancient sites

and the curious features carved into them.

Karahan Tepe is really something quite spectacular.

Absolutely.

NARRATOR: Authors Andrew Collins

and Hugh Newman have spent decades

investigating ancient sites around the world,

and have made multiple trips

to Karahan Tepe in southeast Turkey.

NEWMAN: In the last couple of years,

they've uncovered only a small amount,

but enough to provide some remarkable insights

into what was going on here in southeast Turkey.

Absolutely.

I mean, it's like this is pieces of a jigsaw

that's just waiting to be put together.

NARRATOR: In September 2022,

Andrew and Hugh traveled to the site together

in search of further clues

as to just who built it and why.

Upon their arrival at Karahan Tepe,

Andrew and Hugh were joined

by local researcher Taha Ozyavuz.

Taha.

Nice to meet you. This is Hugh.

Thank you, and good to meet you.

I'm absolutely astounded by this site,

how vast it is, how, like, immaculate it is

and how it is just

literally one of the most astonishing places

I've ever visited.

Well, this is just, you know, just enormous,

everything that's here.

We can see T-pillars going in every direction.

And just think what is below our feet right now.

And if you do compare it to G �bekli Tepe,

it is, it's got the T-pillars,

it's got the enclosures,

it's got the remarkable 3D-relief carving,

the statues, the serpents and everything else.

There are incredible images of different animals

and creatures of the natural world.

What do they mean?

NARRATOR: Most mainstream scholars identify the sites

of G �bekli Tepe and Karahan Tepe as temples of worship.

Others have suggested

that the round enclosures may have been used

as corrals for animals

and that the T-shaped pillars once supported roofs.

However, Klaus Schmidt,

the archaeologist behind the excavation

of G �bekli Tepe in the 1990s, was certain

that the T-shaped pillars represent human forms,

but with some curious features.

COLLINS: I think what we see when we look at these

T-shaped pillars is

abstract human beings, basically.

The heads are the actual T-shaped terminations.

The stems of the stones are the bodies.

Sometimes we see belts around them.

But what's so weird about these

is that the arms here almost seem

like an abstract animal, as well.

Perhaps a bird, perhaps a snake.

NEWMAN: That is intriguing.

And this is a tradition we find linked

with giants all around the world.

And even in the Bible, we have the giant of Gath

that had extra fingers.

We have stories of Goliath and his family having extra fingers.

We have stories

of great Irish, giant gods having extra digits, as well.

And the fact that the Watchers, the Nephilim and the Anunnaki

would seem to be associated

with the mythology of this region suggests to us

that they could be one of the builders of Karahan Tepe.

NARRATOR: According to the Bible's Book of Genesis,

prior to the Great Flood, angels known as the Watchers

defied God's will and came down to Earth to live among humans.

These otherworldly beings mated with their human subjects,

producing a race of hybrid human giants

that were known as the Nephilim.

ROY FISHER: One of the most

tantalizing, small tidbits in the Hebrew Bible

is found in the opening verses of Genesis, chapter six,

where we hear the story of the Nephilim,

who are described

as basically being the hybrid offspring of humans

and divine beings,

who are called the Sons of God.

RABBI ARIEL BAR TZADOK: Who were these sons of God?

Legend expands and tells us

that they were rebellious angels.

But yet, we must understand angels

to not be spiritual beings,

but very tangibly physical.

Or else how could they take human wives

and bear children?

Now, the children of these sons of God and human women

became known as the hybrids called the Fallen Ones,

in Hebrew, "the Nephilim."

They existed in the days before Noah.

REVEREND MICHAEL CARTER: Aside from the Bible, religious texts

that talk about these demigods, these hybrids,

are the Hindu Upanishads.

And if we look at Sumer,

again, gods coming down from the Earth,

fraternizing with the natives, which are us,

and creating a new race of people--

half-human and half-extraterrestrial gods.

Yes, we can speculate,

were those who were to become known as the sons of God

originally inhabitants of a place like Karahan?

NARRATOR: Does the eight-fingered figure

found at Karahan Tepe provide evidence

to support the biblical accounts of giants existing on Earth

before the Great Flood?

And if so, might they have been involved in the creation

of Turkey's mysterious sites, both above ground and below?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and claim that these hybrid beings

not only built megalithic sites in Turkey

but all over the world.

NARRATOR: In the center of the Mediterranean Sea,

between Italy and Africa,

lies a three-island archipelago

that makes up the Republic of Malta.

PICKNETT: Malta is this really small island nation

just south of Sicily. And it's so small

it's only 122 square miles in its entirety.

But because its dead center of the Mediterranean Sea,

Malta really packs a punch, historically.

NARRATOR: Malta has been a strategic outpost

for many of the most powerful cultures in the world,

from the Phoenicians to the Romans

and even the British Empire.

But what makes Malta one of the most unique locations on Earth

are its massive stone ruins,

whose origins could date back

thousands of years before any known civilization

ever set foot on her shores.

JASON OSEQUEDA: It was assumed

that Malta was a long-lost Greek colony

from the Mycenaean Period.

And this goes from,

you know, maybe 800 BC to sometime before 1,200 BC

However, because of radiocarbon dating

in the mid-20th century, we discovered

that Malta is actually one of the oldest megalithic sites

in the world.

NARRATOR: Mainstream archaeologists now know

that Malta's oldest megalithic structures

were built at least 5,600 years ago,

but little is known about who these ancient builders were

and how long their culture existed.

PICKNETT: One of the most pressing questions

about the megalithic builders is,

what happened to these amazing, super smart guys

who built all this stuff?

Because the last known evidence of them being there

is about 3,000 years ago.

They were there one minute,

archeologically-speaking, and gone the next.

NARRATOR: While the world's first known human civilization,

the Sumerians, is said to have emerged

in Mesopotamia around 4,000 BC,

some researchers believe

the ancient inhabitants of Malta lived

on the Mediterranean islands thousands of years earlier.

As evidence, they point

to mysterious carvings found throughout the area

called "cart ruts."

SCHOCH: Something that Malta

is very well known for, archaeologically,

besides the megalithic temples,

are the cart ruts.

These are ruts literally in the limestone rock.

The traditional view

is that they were eroded into the rock

literally by carts being pulled over the soft rock.

TSOUKALOS: We have cart ruts

that go into the Mediterranean Sea.

And then, they also come out on the other side.

How is this possible?

NARRATOR: Some of the cart ruts that extend

from dry land down into the sea have reportedly been found

at depths of as much as 140 feet.

This presents a critical clue as to just how long ago

they must have been created.

SCHOCH: I suspect that some of these cart ruts

are really ancient, and when I say "really ancient,"

that is, going back

to before the end of the last Ice Age.

Approximately 12,000 years ago,

the Ice Age ended, we know, by incredible warming,

incredible rises in sea level.

So some of these cart ruts go back to an early enough period,

what looks like it's going into the water,

that would've been dry land when sea levels were much lower.

If you propose the idea

that 12,000 years ago, which is a fact,

the worldwide water levels were lower,

then, all of a sudden, these cart ruts

that go into the Mediterranean Sea make sense.

The last time that area was free of water,

and when also Malta was connected to Sicily and to Italy

with a land bridge-- that was 12,000 years ago.

So the fact that these cart ruts exist,

to me, illustrates that an advanced civilization

must have existed at that time.

NARRATOR: Could the cart ruts provide evidence

that civilization existed on the islands of Malta

as much as 12,000 years ago?

Until recently, mainstream scholars

would have considered such a notion

to be impossible.

But then, in 1994,

archaeologists discovered the ruins of G �bekli Tepe

in southeast Turkey.

TSOUKALOS: It is the first archaeological site in the world

that proves its age dating as far back

as 12,000 years,

around 10,000 BC

The discovery and the official acceptance

of G �bekli Tepe's dating

has changed the history of archaeology.

NEWMAN: G �bekli Tepe is a series

of kind of oval-shaped stone circles

that have T-shaped pillars as the stones,

with two central pillars in the center.

The thing is, many of these stones are over 20 feet tall.

They're huge. They're serious monoliths.

And this was the era of hunter-gatherers.

So who could have done it? We really don't know.

SCHOCH: I studied G �bekli Tepe in great detail.

The Malta temples, by conventional dating,

go back maybe 6,000 years ago, but I wonder--

and this is based on my own work and analysis--

if the origins of the Malta temples may go back

to a much earlier period, also.

HENRY: We have to be open to the possibility

that whoever built the structures on Malta

were not, in fact, human beings,

but were perhaps a separate race.

And their existence and even their origins,

is completely shrouded in mystery.

NARRATOR: Could it be that the incredible

megalithic structures on Malta

are as much as 12,000 years old?

If so, who created them?

Perhaps further clues can be found

by closely examining the islands' mysterious temples

and local traditions about a giant being

who came from the stars.

NARRATOR: The Republic of Malta.

Situated across the island nation's 122 square miles

sit the remains of seven megalithic sites.

These include the two temples of Ggantija,

Hagar Qim,

Mnajdra,

Tarxien,

Ta'Hagrat

and Skorba.

These marvels of ancient construction were all built

with the same type of Maltese limestone

which was extracted from local quarries.

SCHOCH: The fact that they were moving around

these multi-ton blocks, building these temples

and actually, when you look at them,

moving the blocks within very, very narrow confines...

Okay, it's one thing to move a block out

in the open that's multi-ton,

but to then place it systematically

and very carefully next to another one,

next to another one, next to another one,

to form these beautiful temple structures--

that's a real engineering feat.

NARRATOR: While there are some researchers

who believe that Malta's megalithic temples

could be as much as 12,000 years old,

mainstream scholars believe they were created

no earlier than 3,600 B.C,

during what is known as the Neolithic Age.

And they also theorize

that the massive structures were built by a human culture

that used only primitive stone tools.

TSOUKALOS: Archaeology suggests, at the time,

we barely invented the wheel,

we barely had tools,

there was no known language,

and we had no writing.

Well, let's step back for a moment and think about this.

From an evolutionary and technology perspective,

that makes no sense, because

you begin with simple, you continue bigger,

bigger and then biggest, but you start small.

What we have in the case of the Maltese structures

is that the biggest are the oldest.

So, that makes zero sense

from a logical perspective

because there was no evolution in technology.

The archaeologists-- they agree with this.

OSEQUEDA: To construct similar temple after similar temple,

with the same material, without evidence of writing,

shows a high degree of communication.

And we find terracotta models,

in fact, of temples,

and archaeologists have suggested perhaps

that this is an early architect's rendering.

This is more evidence of the high level of thought

and ability that went into the construction of these temples.

NARRATOR: No written records have ever been discovered

to explain who built the megalithic temples in Malta.

However, local traditions

of the Maltese people have offered a stunning possibility.

They claim that the massive structures were built

by a race of giant beings who came to Earth

from the stars.

YOUNG: There is a story

that a meteorite came down from the heavens

and turned into a goddess, a giant

named Sansuna.

And the locals, of course, were terrified of this giant,

but at a place called Ggantija, she started building a temple

and moved stones much larger than any human could ever move

and assembled this structure that was so massive

it remains, to this day,

still a place of mystery, still a giant's construction.

HENRY: When you see the cyclopean stones,

some of them weighing as much as 50 tons,

you can appreciate

why we have the story of this giantess, Sansuna.

NARRATOR: The local legends of Sansuna

may sound incredible to some.

However, in the 17th century,

a Maltese nobleman named Gian Francesco Abela

claimed to have found forensic evidence

that these legends may have been based in fact.

In the early 1600s, Gian Francesco Abela was living

on the island of Malta, and he actually wrote about

the fact that giants were involved

in the construction of these sites.

One of the reasons he wrote this is because

he said he found bones, skulls, and even giant teeth

all across the island.

And there were other reports of them

coming forth at this time.

NARRATOR: In order to investigate the local legends

connecting giant extraterrestrial beings

to the massive structures on Malta,

in 2022,

ancient astronaut theorist Giorgio Tsoukalos traveled

to Malta's oldest megalithic structures--

the temples of Ggantija-- on the island of Gozo.

There, he met with Frans van Avendonk...

I'm Giorgio. Pleasure to meet you.

NARRATOR: ...an expert in Maltese history,

who has lived on the island

since 1991.

Look at this. I mean...

- Gigantic. - It is gigantic.

"Ggantija" means "the giant goddess,"

and it makes sense why,

because right now,

I feel like an ant.

We are so small, and especially when you're right next to it.

VAN AVENDONK: It's very impressive.

TSOUKALOS: And, in my opinion,

still a massive question mark.

VAN AVENDONK: There are still questions, yeah, definitely.

What can you tell us about the dating?

Well, when it was excavated--

because we don't talk about discovery--

- it was always visible. - Mm-hmm.

People thought it was a Phoenician temple.

- Okay. - Much later, they realized,

it must've been prehistoric, so it was put

in the 2000s before Christ.

Then it moves back to the 3000s.

Now we're saying 3600 at least.

Technology has improved,

different ways of looking at things,

so, therefore, they're getting older.

They were built much earlier than we thought before.

NARRATOR: When viewed from above,

the two adjacent temples of Ggantija are designed

with large apses, resembling a cloverleaf.

Each housed an altar,

and artifacts suggest a wooden roof covered the entire temple.

Many of the stone blocks stand 20 feet tall,

and some weigh in excess of 50 tons.

Is it possible that we've lost some type of masonry knowledge?

Because you could create it using smaller stones.

Clearly, this required planning.

- It required logistics. - VAN AVENDONK: Yes.

TSOUKALOS: In my opinion,

master builders were at work here,

and mainstream archeologists are suggesting

that whoever built this did not have any writing.

Well, not only would it require writing,

but you have to have calculations.

- And leadership. - Exactly.

With the evidence of how old or when it was built,

- who built it, and how it was built. - Mm-hmm.

Might be there, but we haven't found it yet.

I can imagine that people saw this and thought,

- "This must have been the work of a giant." - Right.

OSEQUEDA: Throughout the Mediterranean,

you see an association with giants

constructing megaliths.

For instance, in Mycenaean Greece,

there's a structure called The Lion's Gate.

Aristotle mentioned

that this construction style was called cyclopean masonry

because of the large stones.

The ancient Greeks figured

that only a giant called Cyclops

could have had the strength to move these.

The same sort of cyclopean masonry is present

in the Maltese temples as well.

TSOUKALOS: These stories

of giants have been an integral part

of our entire human history

since the beginning of time.

Now, this is not something

that the ancient astronaut theory came up with.

So, is it possible

that the reason why we have these stories

of these giants is because,

at one point, they actually existed?

And the answer to that is yes.

NARRATOR: Could it be possible

that the temples at Ggantija were built

by gigantic, otherworldly beings

who inhabited the islands of Malta thousands of years ago?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

given the sophistication

of these mysterious, prehistoric structures.

And they suggest

that further evidence

of advanced construction

by unknown civilizations can be found

beneath some of the world's most sacred temples.

NARRATOR: Cusco, Peru.

Nestled in a high river valley of the Andes Mountains,

among peaks towering over 20,000 feet,

this once great city served as the capital

of the Inca Empire from the 13th to 16th centuries A.D.

In 1533,

Spanish Conquistadors arrived in Cusco

and were astonished by the incredible stonework

found at a site just north

of the city called Sacsayhuam�n.

FOERSTER: Above the city of Cusco,

we find the megalithic site and huge ceremonial Inca complex

called Sacsayhuam�n.

Its most prominent feature

is a zigzag wall of three levels.

Some of the stones there weigh as much as 125 tons

and were moved from the quarry at least three miles away.

Sacsayhuam�n is one of the most beautiful

ancient structures you will ever see in your life.

There are massive, gigantic megalithic blocks.

And you find the most amazing of masonry style

where you can't even fit a dollar bill

in between the fittings of any of the blocks.

NARRATOR: Sacsayhuam�n served both as a fortress

and a ceremonial center.

A circular structure that lies within

the megalithic walls, called Muyuq Marka,

was the base of a tower where the Inca

worshipped the Sun God Inti.

However, many experts suggest

that while the Inca certainly utilized

this megalithic structure,

they were not the ones to build it.

Standard belief is that the Inca constructed

Sacsayhuam�n less than a thousand years ago.

But some of the earliest Spanish chronicles

it is said that the Spanish were completely astounded

by seeing this site and they asked the local Inca,

"Did you build it?"

And the Inca replied, "No.

This was here when we arrived 500 years ago."

NARRATOR: Many experts believe Sacsayhuam�n

predates the Inca by thousands of years,

and that the Inca built on top of what came before.

The Inca were a Bronze Age civilization

and the stones at Sacsayhuam�n

are metamorphosed limestone,

which is much harder than bronze

and could not be cut or shaped using bronze tools.

The Inca built on top

because you can tell a major difference

between megalithic construction

where the stones fit perfectly together,

and the Inca, which is stones piled on top of stones

with mortar as filler.

But if Sacsayhuam�n really does pre-date the Inca--

as the Inca themselves claimed--

how could an even earlier civilization

have possessed far superior technology?

TSOUKALOS: The ancient Inca talk about

celestial beings who descended from the sky

a long time ago and imparted

the first knowledge of anything

toward people of Earth.

The ancient astronaut theory suggests

it was human beings who built Sacsayhuam�n,

but under the tutelage

of the extraterrestrials.

NARRATOR: Is it possible that the astonishing

megalithic stonework at Sacsayhuam�n

was achieved with the help of alien technology,

as ancient astronaut theorists suggest?

And if so,

might the Inca have built on top of it

and established it as a place of worship

because they were somehow aware of this?

Sacsayhuam�n is only one of many places

where ancient civilizations have felt compelled

to repeatedly build their most sacred sites.

In fact, there are locations all around the world

where successive cultures have rebuilt over and over again.

This has been going on since the end of the last Ice Age

with places like G �bekli Tepe in Southeast Turkey,

where the oldest and most sophisticated monuments

were built first on the bedrock

and then eventually they would be covered over

and a new structure, a new enclosure built on top of them.

Some of the most iconic temple sites around the world

from Baalbek in Lebanon

to the Temple of Horus at Edfu in Egypt,

are built on the exact same location

as former temples that were reputed to be there.

And the question is, why?

NARRATOR: It is not uncommon for people

to repurpose an old structure

or rebuild on its foundation for practical purposes.

But what ancient astronaut theorists find intriguing

is how the most sacred sites

tend to remain sacred over thousands of years.

And of all the places in the world

where this phenomenon is found,

perhaps there is none more universally revered

than the 35-acre platform in Jerusalem

known as Temple Mount.

KATHLEEN McGOWAN: The Temple Mount is arguably

the most important spiritual site in the world.

All three of the primary monotheistic religions

have a connection to

the events of history that occurred

on top of the Temple Mount.

It's believed that is this the stone

from which the world originates?

It's a crucial element in the Jewish tradition.

When Isaac is offered up for sacrifice by Abraham,

this happens on the exposed surface of Mount Moriah.

That's the Temple Mount.

For Muslims, this is where

the prophet Muhammad ascends up to heaven.

That stone is now covered over

by the Dome of the Rock, this very important Islamic monument.

NARRATOR: The Dome of the Rock has stood at Temple Mount

for more than 1,300 years,

but the very first temple to occupy this sacred space

was the legendary Solomon's Temple,

constructed upon order of the Israelite king

in the tenth century BC

According to the Hebrew Bible,

King Solomon received a message from the heavens

to build his temple on this spot.

Its primary purpose was to house the Ark of the Covenant,

the golden box which carried the two stone tablets

inscribed with the Ten Commandments,

and which was said to be God's earthly throne.

Solomon has a communication

with the angel Michael

who comes and helps Solomon to build this.

And so, not only

is this the presence of God on this spot,

it's God who's helping in the building of this.

And so that's part of what makes that place so special.

So literally divine.

NARRATOR: Solomon's Temple was destroyed

by the Babylonians in 586 BC

But 70 years later,

Jewish exiles returning to Jerusalem

built a new temple on the exact same location.

That's what we call the second temple.

And that temple survives until the year 70 A.D.,

when it's destroyed by the Romans.

Then in the seventh century,

Muslims conquered Jerusalem.

They build the Dome of the Rock there.

And so there's been a long history

of different people coming in,

taking control, building,

rebuilding, places there.

McGOWAN: Solomon was instructed to build the temple

on this incredibly important space.

So why is this space important?

Is it an energetic space? Is it a portal?

What we see over and over again,

with these profound religious sites all over the world

is we see this reverence for power places

endures from the earliest human history to today,

we're constantly building on top of these places.

NARRATOR: If a higher power instructed King Solomon

to build on Temple Mount,

could there be something special

about this particular location on Earth?

And could the same be true

for other places around the world

where successive cultures built again and again?

Perhaps further clues can be found by examining

one of the most astonishing megalithic sites in the world

and stories about its connection to the stars.

? ?

NARRATOR: Baalbek, Lebanon.

Here, in the fertile Beqaa Valley,

stands what many consider

to be the greatest ruin of Roman antiquity...

...the colossal Temple of Jupiter.

But the imposing remains that tower over the site today

are only the latest

in a long line of structures erected on this spot.

Archaeologists say the area has been continually inhabited

for at least 10,000 years,

and no one knows who built the first place of worship here.

But according to legend,

both Egyptian and Assyrian conquerors

erected sanctuaries on the site,

followed by the Canaanites and Phoenicians

who built a great temple here to their god Baal around 2500 BC.

Baalbek is one of those places

where you have different people over millennia

building their shrines, their temples

to their particular, you know, gods or goddesses.

You've got this temple that's built by the Phoenicians

for one of their deities, Baal.

Then Alexander the Great conquers this area

and-- surprise, surprise--

builds a temple to the Greek gods.

NARRATOR: In the first century BC,

roughly 300 years after Alexander the Great,

the Romans conquer Lebanon and decide to erect a temple here

to their chief god Jupiter.

The main Roman temple once boasted 54 columns,

each a staggering 65 feet in height.

But while visitors to the ruins

may first notice the towering Roman columns,

the most impressive feature at Baalbek

is its massive foundation.

TSOUKALOS: To this day,

Baalbek, Lebanon, has remained

one of the most enduring mysteries on planet Earth.

Because the masonry that we find there is unparalleled

compared to the rest of the world.

In fact, there are three stone blocks called the Trilithons,

each weighing approximately 800 metric tons,

which is 1.6 million pounds.

COLLINS: Each of these blocks is approximately 62 feet in length

by about 14 feet in depth

and 12 feet in breadth.

And they're not even on the ground.

So whoever placed them there in ancient times

would have had to have raised them

up to a height of about 20 feet.

HENRY: Each of the stones were quarried two miles away

and put perfectly into place

with such precision that you can't even put a credit card

or a needle in between those massive blocks.

NARRATOR: How ancient people carved and moved such massive stones

is a question that baffles archaeologists to this day.

And equally as mysterious is who placed them there.

The giant blocks in the foundation

are clearly of a different building style

than the temples that sit above.

And in my opinion, that platform is not just ancient,

it is prehistoric.

NARRATOR: But if the platform at Baalbek

was constructed thousands of years

before the Romans arrived in the Beqaa Valley,

why did they choose this as the site

to build their most magnificent temple?

One pioneering Russian scholar has proposed

that humans may have been drawn to this location

because it was the site

of one of Earth's earliest extraterrestrial events.

Scientist and mathematician Dr. Matest Agrest

sends shockwaves through the world of academia

with an article in which he poses a new theory

called "paleo contact,"

a precursor to what is known today

as the ancient astronaut theory,

suggesting that certain biblical texts

could be interpreted as evidence of alien visitation.

And, according to Agrest,

one place where such visitations occurred was Baalbek.

HENRY: Dr. Matest Agrest

went into the ancient record,

the Book of Enoch and other Hebrew texts,

and noticed that there were beings coming from the sky

or the stars that came to Earth,

and he came up with a theory that they were

extraterrestrial beings who came to Earth

to assist humanity in developing advanced technology

to build stone constructions,

such as what we see at Baalbek in Lebanon.

NARRATOR: Agrest wrote about the Watchers,

a group of fallen angels who,

according to the biblical account,

descended to Earth at Mount Hermon,

very near the site of Baalbek.

Agrest suggested that the Watchers were, in fact,

visitors from another planet

who built the megalithic platform at Baalbek

as a launchpad.

CHILDRESS: He thought it was

a giant stone platform

that spaceships could land on and take off from.

And this makes a lot of sense,

because it's so incredibly solid,

with these huge stone blocks in it,

that even huge vehicles, such as rockets,

could land and take off from this huge platform.

NARRATOR: Two decades after the publication

of Agrest's controversial article,

author and researcher Zecharia Sitchin

came to the same conclusion about Baalbek

based on a 5,000-year-old Sumerian text.

The Epic of Gilgamesh tells of a hero of superhuman strength

who embarks on an impossible quest.

In the course of his journeys,

Gilgamesh arrives at a site

where he encounters otherworldly gods,

a site that sounds suspiciously like Baalbek.

In the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh,

which is one of the great and important legends,

um, of human history,

we have the hero arriving in a place

known as the Landing Place.

A space which allows the ascent and the descent

of beings from the heavens to the Earth.

HENRY: Zachariah Sitchin in the 1970s proposed,

based on his reading of the Epic of Gilgamesh,

that Gilgamesh himself had seen

some sort of a spacecraft take off from a landing site

and pinpointed that site as Baalbek.

NARRATOR: Is it possible that Baalbek was a landing pad

for alien visitors

and that it remained so for thousands of years?

Could that be why so many ancient peoples,

such as the Egyptians, Assyrians,

Canaanites, Phoenicians,

Greeks and Romans

all chose to build and rebuild

some of their greatest temples on this spot?

Perhaps further clues can be found

by examining new discoveries

made at a mysterious ancient site

on the other side of the world.

NARRATOR: While searching for the southern capital of the Inca Empire,

Spanish conquistador Pedro Cieza de Le�n

comes upon something far stranger--

a vast abandoned city near the shore of Lake Titicaca

that the locals call Tiwanaku.

The ruined city contains temples,

huge megalithic structures

and vast ceremonial buildings.

ED BARNHART: Tiwanaku was huge.

It spanned for miles and miles

and had a population of...

perhaps as many as 20,000 people.

NARRATOR: Among Tiwanaku's most impressive ruins

is a carved monolith called the Gateway to the Sun

and a terrace mound called Puma Punku,

containing stone blocks cut with extraordinary precision.

According to archaeologists,

the Tiwanaku complex once served

as the capital of a sprawling empire

that rose and fell centuries before the Inca.

TSOUKALOS: This is why we have the term called "the pre-Inca."

But who were the pre-Inca?

And this is where it gets interesting,

because pre-Inca construction is more sophisticated

than Inca construction.

NARRATOR: While some mainstream historians say

the site dates back only to the Bronze Age,

others maintain it is far older.

TSOUKALOS: Arthur Posnansky spent an exorbitant amount of time

at Tiwanaku,

and he calculated an actual origin date of Tiwanaku,

which he based to be around 12,500 BC,

which is an incredible time,

because, at that time,

according to mainstream archaeology,

we were munching on bananas.

HENRY: So, it opens up the possibility

that this site is vastly more ancient

than we're led to believe.

And we're only just now beginning to discover

the complete history of that site.

NARRATOR: Some experts believe that the builders of Tiwanaku

were the ancestors of the local Aymara people

who still live in the area today.

But many of the Aymara themselves disagree.

TSOUKALOS: The local population, the ancient Aymara culture, say,

"It was not us who built this.

"It was the gods,

los dioses."

NARRATOR: Recently, the mystery of who built Tiwanaku

only deepened with a staggering discovery--

not within the city

but beneath it.

2017.

Researchers from UNESCO,

working with local archaeologists at Tiwanaku,

announce findings that send shockwaves

through the world of archeology.

While analyzing satellite imagery

and ground-penetrating radar of the Tiwanaku site,

they find dozens of previously unknown structures

buried virtually everywhere they look.

What this aerial technology has found

is 34 acres

of terraced mounds,

underground platforms and elements of a pyramid complex.

Undated constructions reveal that temples

may have taken the form

of industrial strength platforms,

and this begs the question, why are the bases,

these platforms, so industrial strength?

It's as though they were built to support extreme weight.

So, originally, there could've been one large mega platform,

similar to what we find at Baalbek.

This could have belonged to a much earlier civilization.

NARRATOR: If Tiwanaku is yet another sacred site

where successive cultures built temples atop the ruins

of far earlier structures,

is it possible that there is a connection

to extraterrestrial visitation?

As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned,

Tiwanaku's most mysterious ruins, at Puma Punku,

provide the best evidence

that the site was not only significant

to the native people,

but also to otherworldly visitors.

Puma Punku is, to me, the most important place on Earth

as far as an extraterrestrial visitation would be concerned.

The construction style at Puma Punku does not exist

anywhere else on Earth.

HENRY: These stones, some of them weighing a hundred tons,

are made of andesite

and other hard materials that, today,

we would use a diamond-tip drill

in order to shape or mold such stones.

How did they do it with hammers and chisels?

NARRATOR: Like the foundation stones beneath Baalbek

and the megalithic blocks of Sacsayhuam�n,

the buried platforms beneath Puma Punku

raise a provocative question:

why were the largest, heaviest,

and most sophisticated parts of these sites

those that date back farthest in time?

According to ancient astronaut theorists,

more than 12,000 years ago,

human civilizations existed on Earth

that possessed incredible technology

given to them by extraterrestrial beings.

The ancient Egyptians referred to

a-a time called "the first time,"

when the gods, extraterrestrial beings,

walked among men.

Pre-10,000 BC.

CHILDRESS: We have authentic legends about

these lost lands and lost worlds and

that extraterrestrials were here at the same time.

We have these all over the world,

we have the stories of Atlantis and Lemuria.

Many cultures around the world have also these

same legends and lores and myths of cataclysms.

The Scandinavians have this.

Also, we have the flood of Noah.

We have the Greeks, also have tales of a flood.

COLLINS: What we now know from incredible amount of evidence

coming from every part of the world

is around 10,800 BC,

the Earth suffered a terrible catastrophe

in the form of a comet impact known as

the Younger Dryas event.

And this devastated every continent

of the world with fires and floods.

So, now, it looks like we're looking at

a secret history of planet Earth.

One where there's extraterrestrial intervention.

And there were civilizations and activities

going on then, and they were destroyed

in a cataclysmic flood.

HENRY: From Baalbek in Lebanon

to the Temple Mount to Puma Punku,

some of these sites are thought to be the locations where

pre-flood temples once existed.

So, after the cataclysm, people are regaining

civilization and they go back to the exact same location

as previous temples and-and rebuild the temple there.

NARRATOR: But if, as ancient astronaut theorists insist,

the Earth played host to an advanced civilization

long before our own, what happened to it?

And why is there no hard evidence to prove it existed?

For many, the answer can be found hiding in plain sight,

and the hard evidence exists in the form of objects made

using the only substance that can stand the test of time:

stone.

NARRATOR: Aerospace engineer and satellite imagining expert,

Dr. Mark Carlotto has spent the past three years

investigating some of the world's most impressive

archeological sites.

After closely examining each site's

precise geographical orientation,

he has come to the incredible conclusion

that many ancient structures provide evidence

of being far older than has been suggested

by mainstream archaeology,

and were likely built tens of thousands of years ago.

If you look at many monuments today,

they're often built with respect,

to the cardinal directions.

So, knowledge of the Earth, of astronomy,

of the heavens was very important in alignments.

NARRATOR: Because most of the world's megalithic structures

were built so that they would be in precise alignment

with the Earth's cardinal directions of north,

south, east, and west,

Dr. Carlotto's investigation had a breakthrough

after he noticed that Teotihuacan,

the ancient complex north of Mexico City,

didn't properly line up.

An extraordinary possibility then occurred to him:

perhaps the structure was built

tens of thousands of years earlier,

when the Earth's poles were not in their current locations.

It was an idea that was not as far-fetched as it seems.

In the 1950s, Harvard-educated scientist Charles Hapgood

proposed a theory known as crustal displacement,

whereby, at certain moments in history,

the Earth's crust suddenly and rapidly shifts positions

and, in the process, changes the positions

of the North and South Poles.

MICHAEL DENNIN: Plate tectonics have plates moving slowly

as individual separate plates.

Um, Charles had a theory that, basically,

instead of a slow, steady movement,

he was really interested in sudden, quick movements

of the crust as a whole.

CHILDRESS: What Hapgood was saying was that the thin crust

of the Earth can slip forward on the mantle.

And, therefore, the North Pole and South Pole

can shift somewhat.

And this causes huge cataclysmic changes.

Hapgood's analysis was based on climate data.

Looking at patterns of climate change,

changes in glacial patterns, ice ages,

and then correlating those patterns

with what he believed was the cause,

which was a shift of the poles.

Hapgood believed that, over the last

hundred thousand years or so,

that there were three previous locations

of the North Pole.

And when I looked at the imagery

of these Meso-American sites and realized

that these pyramids and temples

were not aligned to north, I thought perhaps

they were aligned to former North Poles

that Hapgood had discovered.

Hapgood actually sent this theory to Albert Einstein,

who endorsed it.

And when Einstein died,

he actually had Hapgood's book open on his desk.

NARRATOR: Dr. Carlotto believes

that some of the world's most impressive ancient structures

not only confirm Hapgood's theory,

but radically alter our understanding

of intelligent life on planet Earth.

So, my process for analyzing these images starts with

a geographically registered image where north is up.

So, for example, here we have Teotihuacan,

and this is where my search began.

And let me just highlight the four sides,

so we can define a direction towards the north.

As you can see in this image, the pyramid is not oriented

to their cardinal directions-- north, south, east and west.

NARRATOR: To test his theory, Dr. Carlotto was curious

to find out if other ancient structures

shared Teotihuacan's same geographic anomaly.

What I ended up doing was developing an algorithm

as the basis for analyzing their alignment.

So, now, as we'll see when we zoom out

we'll find that Teotihuacan

is aligned to other sites nearby,

and I'll show you that by zooming out here.

And this shows a number of other sites in the valley of Mexico

that are aligned in the same general direction.

All of these lines are meridians

that lead to a point east of Hudson Bay.

NARRATOR: Incredibly, these sites align

with a location that Hapgood proposed

was once the North Pole.

CARLOTTO: Hapgood believed the Hudson Bay Pole existed

12,000 to 18,000 years ago.

So, these sites, by virtue of their alignment

to this particular pole, could be that old.

NARRATOR: If Dr. Carlotto's analysis is correct,

it would date the construction of Teotihuacan

to at least 10,000 BC, which is 10,000 years older

than mainstream archaeologists propose.

And he contends that other ancient sites

were built even earlier.

CARLOTTO: One of the most enigmatic sites

on Earth is Baalbek,

the Temple of Jupiter, in Lebanon.

As you can see, this site

is oriented to a point in northern Greenland

that Hapgood believed

was a former location of the North Pole.

NARRATOR: Based on Hapgood's theory,

Baalbek's alignment to northern Greenland

would date it to a staggering 50,000 years ago.

Another site nearby,

the Western Wall in the city of Jerusalem,

is aligned in the direction of the Greenland Pole.

And let's take a look at a third site,

the Parthenon in Athens.

We believe that the original structures

at these sites, in other words, the original sites themselves,

were established as long ago as 50,000 years.

NARRATOR: According to Dr. Carlotto,

these are still not the oldest structures that exist on Earth.

Based on Hapgood's theory, the North Pole was located

in the Bering Sea more than 100,000 years ago.

So, this is the Temple of the Six Monoliths

at Ollantaytambo,

and it's the Sun Temple.

Normally, sun temples are aligned

to the cardinal directions.

They have an eastern side that faces

the rising sun on the equinox.

Here, the Sun Temple is tilted approximately 45 degrees.

An alignment to the current pole doesn't make any sense,

but if we now change our reference

and look at an earlier pole,

this pole thought to have existed in the Bering Sea,

then the orientation of the Sun Temple makes perfect sense.

So, what's significant about this analysis

is that it actually extends the time frame for archeology

from 10,000 years to tens of thousands of years,

to perhaps a hundred thousand years or more.

So, it's my contention

that the five ages of the Aztecs,

the five ages of the Greeks

and the previous and current locations

of the pole are all correlated.

They all tell the same story.

CHILDRESS: The idea that cataclysmic pole shifts actually occurred

is startling.

These structures can be much older

than archaeologists admit.

And, ultimately,

hundreds, thousands of years later,

people found them again and-and started reusing them.

It's a fascinating thought.

NARRATOR: Could it be, as Mark Carlotto's research suggests,

that these structures

belong to not just one previous society of builders,

but various ages of man?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and, as evidence, point to recently revealed ruins found

on the ocean floor.

NARRATOR: 2001.

Canadian explorer Paulina Zelitsky and her team

are conducting an oceanic survey off the coast when they detect

curious formations more than 2,000 feet underwater.

NEWMAN: They found, when they were taking images,

some kind of pyramidical structure and other structures.

There were circular areas, there was what appeared to be

some kind of city built down there.

It was about two square kilometers in size.

And so, this is something quite astonishing

if this is, you know, a reality.

CHILDRESS: This pyramid city-- it is so deep in the ocean

that geologists and archeologists are saying

that it must be 50,000 years old

for sea levels to be that low.

NARRATOR: 50,000 years old?

Remarkably, these underwater ruins

are among many that have been uncovered in recent years.

We've got ruins all over the world that are underwater.

Ruins have been found underwater in Lake Titicaca.

The formation of Yonaguni,

off the southern Japanese island of Yonaguni.

We have underwater cities around India,

such as Dwarka,

which is the famous home of Krishna,

and Indian archeologists for years

thought it was just a mythical city

until they started finding these underwater ruins off of Gujarat.

There's over 200 known sunken cities in the Mediterranean.

So, much of the evidence for early civilizations

on planet Earth would be underwater today.

So, they were obviously built at a time

when the ocean levels and the seas and the continents

were quite different than they are today.

HUGHES: All of this evidence tells us that

there were extraordinary civilizations and cultures

that have been lost to the story of the world until now.

NARRATOR: Could it be that the latest archaeological finds

are collectively pointing to the existence

of a lost prehistoric civilization?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and they suggest further clues can be found

in Earth's geological record.

1940.

Dutch archaeologist Cornelis Hijszeler

is excavating a sandpit when he notices something strange:

a thin layer of ash buried 50 feet deep in the soil.

NEWMAN: It's like a layer of black ash.

This suggests there was a great conflagration that took place,

and it dates to between 11,000 and 13,000 years ago.

NARRATOR: Over the next few years, the ash layer--

dubbed Usselo Horizon-- is found all over the world.

CHILDRESS: The Usselo Horizon is found, actually,

in ten countries on four continents.

In Australia, in South Africa

and other parts of Europe and India.

And this deposit of ash around the world

is evidence of a worldwide cataclysm.

NARRATOR: Could this layer of ash really be evidence

of a devastating global event,

like the one known as the great flood, for instance?

Geologist Dr. Robert Schoch believes the cataclysmic event

and the resulting layer of ash was created

by a devastating solar flare,

a sudden flash of increased brightness on the sun.

SCHOCH: Based on my analysis of the evidence,

there was a major, major solar outburst.

This caused, in a flash, the glaciers to melt

virtually instantaneously.

It caused evaporation of water.

We have physical evidence of this in the geological record.

NARRATOR: To many, the Usselo Horizon

is the strongest evidence yet discovered

that supports stories of the great flood.

For ancient astronaut theorists,

proof of a global flood could offer

some of the most compelling evidence

that extraterrestrial intervention occurred on Earth

in the distant past.

In the Babylonian poem the Epic of Gilgamesh,

the hero Utnapishtim is told of a coming flood by the god Enki.

In Vedic texts, King Manu is alerted by Lord Vishnu,

who appeared in the form of a fish.

And in the biblical tale, Noah is warned by God.

The common denominator in the flood myths

around the world is that there was

an otherworldly being, an extraterrestrial being

who is providing knowledge to certain humans

of what is to come.

This tells us that there was definitely

an extraterrestrial connection.

NARRATOR: If advanced civilizations existed on Earth

that were lost to history,

could the story of the flood explain what happened?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes

and suggest that further evidence can be found

within the Dead Sea Scrolls,

discovered in a cave in Jerusalem in 1947.

COLLINS: Some Bedouin shepherds

came across these jars

and inside these were ancient texts.

Very quickly, archaeologists and linguists

started to realize that these contained

Jewish religious literature that were

of incredible importance,

not just to the Jewish people, but to the world as a whole.

NARRATOR: Among the texts is a story that describes the birth of Noah

that doesn't appear in the Old Testament.

Noah is described of having skin that is whiter than snow,

of having hair that is whiter than the whitest of wool.

And Noah's eyes were brighter than the sun.

Now, when Noah was born, the father,

Lamech, went to his father, Methuselah,

and says, "This is not my son. What happened here?"

And Methuselah then says,

"He may have come from a different place

where man has met the angels."

Now, we need to first figure out what is the kernel of truth.

And, in my opinion, it certainly was not

a giant ship made out of wood.

And you combine that with Noah,

who looks very otherworldly, well, there's your answer.

NARRATOR: Could a catastrophic flood explain the disappearance

of an advanced civilization that preceded our own?

And if so, might ancient structures

hidden beneath our feet one day reveal the truth

behind the legends of a time

when the so-called gods inhabited our world?

Perhaps, as we learn more about our buried past,

we will discover that we grossly underestimated

the timeline of civilization on our planet,

and that humans are not the first species

to make Earth their home.

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