Tracking Ancient Legends: How the Biblical Flood, Sky Gods, and Ufos Fit into Prehistory

By Alan Dale Daniel

Can we logically combine recent research on human origins with ancient legends of floods, paradise lost, and cloud clad gods destroying civilizations? Yes, says author Alan Daniel, who has thoughtfully joined key primordial legends with mitochondrial DNA research, archeological and anthropological finds, and geological evidence in Tracking Ancient Legends.

DNA evidence shows a small band of humans crossed out of Africa into Eurasia about 100,000 BC; however, why is lost to the primordial mists. But the why may be answered by primeval legends overlooked until now. The author theorizes that prehistoric legends may explain the flight from Africa. The model set forth is fascinating, as well as epic in scope.

Competing theories are examined, including the ancient astronaut concepts, and the foundations of theory itself. Are aliens from other worlds the source of our legends, or is something much more earthly and surprising the groundwork of our legendary past?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 27, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483682303

Alan Dale Daniel

Alan Dale Daniel was born in Bakersfield, California in 1947. His dad worked in the oilfields while mom kept the household. His brother Charlie was several years older than him. They lived in the tiny area of Greenfield before moving to the city of Bakersfield in the early 1960s. Alan graduated from South High School, in Bakersfield, CA in 1966. His dad died that same year as Alan went off to college. Alan graduated from Bakersfield Jr. College in 1968 with an AA degree. He then went on to his four year degree in History. Alan received his BA in History from San Fernando Valley State Collage, now Cal State Northridge in 1970. He volunteered for the US Marine Corps as a helicopter pilot from 1970 - 1975. He earned his MBA from Pepperdine University while serving with the Marines. After his separation from the Marines Alan attended Pepperdine University School of Law and received his Juris Doctorate in 1978, the same year he passed the California Bar. He worked for the Kern County District Attorney's office and then the City of Bakersfield City Attorney's Office where he reached the position of Assistant City Attorney. Alan retired from the law in 2004 and is now living in the small town of Dayton, Nevada with his energetic wife Lori. Alan published the Super Summary of World History, Revised in 2010; Tracking Ancient Legends in 2013, and Drawings of Hollywood 1920 - 1939 in 2019.

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Copyright © 2013 by Alan Dale Daniel

Library of Congress Control Number:      2013914457

ISBN:                  Hardcover                          978-1-4836-8229-7

                            Softcover                            978-1-4836-8228-0

                            Ebook                                 978-1-4836-8230-3

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Rev. date: 08/27/2013

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CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

ANCIENT LEGENDS

THE FLOOD

PARADISE LOST

GODS FROM THE SKY

THE THEORY

OUT OF AFRICA

DNA AND HUMAN HISTORY IN AFRICA

THE ICE AGES

LANGUAGE AND HISTORY

THE MAGIC OF WORDS

BOILING DOWN THE LEGENDARY PAST

TYING EVENTS TO THE LEGENDS

GODS AND SCIENTISTS

THE ANCIENT ASTRONAUT THEORY

THE ROLE OF THEORIES IN SCIENCE

THE ROLE OF THEORY IN PERCEPTION

WHAT CONSTITUTES A FACT?

MUST HISTORY BE MEASURABLE AND DETECTABLE?

ANCIENT ALIENS AND UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS

LIFE ON OTHER WORLDS

INVESTIGATIONS OF UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS

UFOS, GODS, AND THEORIES

WHAT DOES THE ANCIENT ALIEN THEORY EXPLAIN?

THE PALEOLITHIC GAP

ANCIENT ACCURACY

PUMA PUNKA

THE IDEA OF AN EGYPTIAN PROTO-CIVILIZATION

MAINSTREAM EXPLANATIONS

WHO OR WHAT WERE THE SKY GODS?

WHERE THIS LEAVES US

ENDNOTES

INTRODUCTION

W e are going to hypothesize that many of our worldwide prehistoric legends of sky gods and floods have a basis in fact going back nearly 100,000 years. We believe that during this time our species was crossing the Red Sea from the Great Rift Valley into what is now Arabia in response to an epic volcanic eruption. Is it possible that our well known legends grew from one event and was carried by a then proto-language all the way to the beginning of the written word some 60,000 years later?

While the answer is probably no, the entanglement of history and legend set the foundations for our theory’s accuracy. It is possible for the ifs to fall into place and validate the idea. If this idea is wrong or deeply lacking in worthiness it will quickly become apparent. If the postulation leads to different or better ideas then I have accomplished my goal. Thinking about the past in new ways can help us understand our civilization and ourselves. Refusing to think in new ways is the ultimate defeat for anyone.

I will also apologize in advance to the ancient astronaut theorists. It is key to say that only by seriously addressing and demolishing the alien theories can anthropology and archeology show they are not mired in dogma. The public does not have to take an academic’s word for anything. Degrees and professorships alone do not carry the day. Pointing and laughing do not constitute arguments. A lot of people were laughed at and ended up being right. I remember the floating continents theory when it was a joke; however, it now dominates the field of geology. Yes, I am that old and remember the theory being considered ridiculous when I took geology as an undergraduate in the late 1960s. If the anthropologist and archeologist cannot meet the ancient astronaut theory head on with facts then the academic legions lose.

At least the ancient astronaut theorists see science as a contest for truth, not a contest over credentials. There is ample proof that mainstream ideas are set in ideological cement and jackhammers are not allowed. The ancient alien theorists are the jackhammers of our era, and science should allow itself to be debased enough to meet their challenge.

Throughout the text I have tried to use references from the Internet. This is to make checking the research easier for the average reader without access to a massive library. These Internet connections will also lead to additional information on the topics and the pictures on the internet are in color which will assist the reader in understanding the graphics.

To all readers who search for new ideas: welcome.

ANCIENT LEGENDS

A ll historians know history began with Sumer in about 3,500 BC ¹ when the written cuneiform ² word first set down the thoughts of mankind in wet clay. It is from writing that we understand humanity and its history to its fullest. One of my most enduring complaints about the current state of historical knowledge is people think everything important to humanity happened in the last one hundred years, and maybe sooner. In fact, the most important events in human history happened before writing began; that is, prior to 3,500 BC. The use of fire, the wheel, our social organization, language, the making and use of tools, religion, art, the invention of agriculture, government, megalithic construction, and writing—to list a few—happened BEFORE the start of script and history. The most essential era of all is the prehistoric era. Yet, it is this time frame that we know the least about.

Humans began, from their very first attempts at writing in ancient Sumer, to set down what we now call legends. While there are scores of stories, three seem to have imbedded themselves in human history a bit deeper than others. These were stories of humanity destroying floods, a lost golden age of care free living, and creatures from a smoking sky hurling down destruction. Oddly, these stories are not just found in a few places. These tales are told all around the world, and many of them hold fast to the basic features of the three often repeated legends.³

The Flood

The legend of a flood destroying all of humanity is probably the most pervasive mysterious story ever told.⁴ This well known story is told throughout the world, from Europe to the Americas. In Flood Stories From Around the World Mark Isaak details hundreds of such stories, and the majority of them follow the Biblical version. The ancient Sumerian story of the flood, the first written story of this disaster, tells us the king of the gods (Enlil) became angry with man for disturbing his sleep. He counseled with the other gods and they decided to destroy mankind. Word leaked out through one of the gods to Utnapishtim, a citizen of Sumer, so he gathered his family, a small number of other people, and a few animals into a boat in time to avoid death. Then:

The gods of the abyss rose up

The dams of the waters beneath were thrown down

The seven judges of hell lit the land with their torches

Daylight became night

The land was smashed as a cup

Water poured over the people as the tides of battle.⁵

Utnapoishtim’s boat was stormed wracked for seven days and nights before the crisis abated. The survivors went on to replenish the earth as they started over. In the Sumerian story the gods got together to kill off humanity, but the reason for the killing was insignificant. This was typical of the Sumerian view of the gods, in that they were thought to be exceptionally fickle. Note the line about the seven judges of hell lit the land with their torches. This is a fair description of a volcanic event and fits into our ensuing theory accurately. We should point out that the epic story of the flood from Sumer comes from two sources that do not convey exactly the same tale. The most quoted of these stories comes from the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh, the oldest epic recorded on earth. Even the Gilgamesh epic has more than one version. The flood story from the Akkadian account is the one most often heard because this version is the most complete. The tablets holding the story from Sumer are older and more fragmented.

In a later Babylonian flood story the hero, a wise king, builds an ark as Noah does in the Hebrew tale. In the great flood everyone except those on the ark are killed. The flood story from India also involves a great king, Manu, who is warned by a god of the coming flood. The king builds a large boat in which he carried his family, seeds for crops, and animals to repopulate the earth. After the waters receded Manu and his boat wound up on top of mountains in Malaya.⁶

Great flood stories from the Americas take an odd turn. In Peru the sole survivor has climbed a tall mountain to outlast the flood waters and then somehow re-propagates humanity. It seems a few unmentioned women survived somewhere. The Mayan flood story has the survivors turning into fish until the flood subsides.⁷ Thereafter, the fish return to human form and save the human species by repopulating the planet. Another pre-Columbian American legend stems from the Cholula Pyramid, which is the largest ancient pyramid structure in the new world and the largest structure in the world in terms of cubic content. In this story, . . . after the deluge which destroyed the primeval world, seven giants survived, one of whom built the great pyramid of Cholula in order to reach heaven, but the Gods destroyed the pyramid with fire and confounded the language of the builders, much like the Tower of Babel story from the Bible.⁸

The Biblical story is probably the best known. In this version the one and only God (Yahweh) decides to destroy humans because they are wicked and the thoughts of men’s hearts were continually evil, but God decides to spare one man and his family from the coming deluge. He choses Noah, from the line of Seth—Adam and Eve’s third son—because Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord, and was a just man, perfect in his generations, and walked with God. The hereditary line is important in the Bible. Adam and Eve’s original son, Cain, murdered their second son Able and was cast out by God into the land of Nod. From there he started a clan of his own; however, this clan was evil. In the flood story all these people die. Adam and Eve’s third son, Seth, started his own line, but this line was godly; nonetheless, God would kill all of Seth’s line with the sole exception of Noah and his family consisting of Noah’s wife, his three sons and their three wives (eight survivors). We should note the Biblical story implies all flesh was corrupt, not just Cain’s.

After the storm breaks Noah, his family, and two of every air breathing animal on the planet, set sail in the ark as the flood waters cover the earth. After a long while the flood waters subside and Noah and his family debark and replenish the earth. Here are the key parts of the story from Genesis 6:5-8:14 in the New International Version of the Bible:

6:5 The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. 6 The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the Lord said, I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them. 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

9 This is the account of Noah and his family.

Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. 10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.

11 Now the earth was corrupt in Gods sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high. 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubit high all around. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. 18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons wives with you. 19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. 21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.

22 Noah did everything just as God commanded him.

7:1 The Lord then said to Noah, Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. 2 Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, 3 and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. 4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.

5 And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him.

6 Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. 7 And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. 8 Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, 9 male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. 10 And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth.

11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12 And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.

13 On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. 14 They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. 15 Pairs of all creatures that