When Spanish friar Diego de Landa arrived in the Yucatán Peninsula in 1549, he orchestrated the destruction of thousands of Maya codices and sacred texts during an auto-da-fé on July 12, 1562. Ancient astronaut theorists including Giorgio Tsoukalos and David Childress argue this mass burning may have obliterated evidence that the Maya had contact with visitors from across the globe—and potentially extraterrestrial beings who provided flying craft. They point to the Maya's advanced knowledge of astronomy and mathematics as potentially inexplicable without outside intervention, while Praveen Mohan highlights architectural similarities between Maya sites and Hindu carvings in South America as evidence of ancient global contact that conventional history cannot explain.
Mainstream archaeologists attribute Maya achievements to centuries of indigenous development, noting that their astronomical observations emerged from agricultural necessity and careful generational record-keeping, not alien intervention. The codices that survived, including the Dresden Codex, contain detailed calendrical and astronomical information consistent with earthly observation. While Diego de Landa's cultural destruction was indeed catastrophic—eliminating invaluable historical records—scholars view it as religious zealotry rather than a cover-up of extraterrestrial evidence. The episode remains compelling because it grapples with a genuine historical tragedy: we truly cannot know what knowledge was lost in those fires, and the Maya's sophisticated understanding of celestial mechanics continues to impress researchers, even without invoking ancient aliens.
American Museum of Natural History
United States · Mesoamerican
Theorists claim an Olmec figurine housed at the Museum of Natural History in New York City depicts a being wearing a pressurized suit with controls and tubes on the chest and six wings, which they interpret as a smoking gun for ancient aviation technology. No mainstream counter-claim is presented in the episode regarding this specific figurine.
Ancient city near Lake Pátzcuaro
Mexico · Mesoamerican
Ancient astronaut theorists point to the LiDAR discovery of a Manhattan-sized ancient city hidden beneath dense jungle near Lake Pátzcuaro as proof that thousands of undiscovered sites will eventually reveal evidence of extraterrestrial contact with ancient civilizations. Mainstream archaeologists see the find as a testament to LiDAR technology's power to reveal the true scale of pre-Columbian urbanism.
Chichen Itza
Mexico · Maya
El Castillo pyramid engineered to create serpent shadow effect during equinox
Gold Museum, Bogotá
Colombia · Pre-Columbian
Ancient astronaut theorists identify Quimbaya gold figurines in the Bogotá Gold Museum as physical representations of vimanas—the extraterrestrial flying machines described in the Hindu Mahabharata—linking South American pre-Columbian artifacts to Hindu cosmological traditions. The museum presents these objects as examples of pre-Columbian Quimbaya goldsmithing depicting zoomorphic forms.
La Venta
Mexico · Pre-Columbian
Theorists contend that the colossal Olmec stone heads found at La Venta, some apparently wearing helmets and displaying non-indigenous facial features, depict extraterrestrial visitors or beings from distant lands who arrived with 'sky gods.' Mainstream archaeologists interpret the colossal heads as portrait monuments of powerful Olmec rulers or important individuals, carved between approximately 1500 and 400 BC.
Magdalena River gold tomb site
Colombia · Pre-Columbian
Ancient astronaut theorists contend that the hundreds of gold Quimbaya figurines recovered from a grave site along the Magdalena River include 17 objects that aerodynamically resemble modern aircraft—with wings attached at the bottom rather than at the shoulders as on birds—and that two engineers in 1996 proved scaled-up versions could fly. Mainstream archaeologists attribute these objects to the Quimbaya culture and interpret them as stylized zoomorphic representations of insects, fish, or birds.
Palenque
Mexico · Maya
King Pacal's sarcophagus lid depicts him piloting an alien spacecraft
San Agustín Archaeological Park
Colombia · Pre-Columbian
Theorists argue that more than 500 megalithic stone statues at San Agustín show unmistakable Hindu iconography—including depictions of Shiva, mukhalingams, Garuda, Nagas, and a helmeted 'spaceman' holding a gold-mining probe—as evidence that Hindu extraterrestrial visitors traveled from South Asia to Colombia thousands of years ago. Mainstream archaeology identifies the statues as the work of early indigenous Andean cultures dating back as far as 3000 BC, linked to pre-Columbian funerary and ceremonial traditions.
Tres Zapotes
Mexico · Mesoamerican
Theorists cite the giant Olmec stone heads found at Tres Zapotes as evidence of a multi-ethnic civilization whose diverse racial features suggest visitors from Africa, Asia, and beyond arrived in the Americas thousands of years ago, possibly via extraterrestrial transport. Mainstream archaeologists attribute the heads to the Olmec, the earliest complex culture of Mesoamerica, dating to around 1400 BC.
Tulum
Mexico · Maya
A window in the Temple of the Descending God acts as a lighthouse and navigation beacon — alien guidance system for maritime travel
Yucatán Peninsula
Mexico · Maya
Theorists argue the Maya civilization of the Yucatán was the cradle of advanced knowledge allegedly provided by extraterrestrial 'sky people,' and that the Spanish destruction of Maya codices erased evidence of this contact. Mainstream history identifies the Yucatán as the heartland of Maya civilization, which flourished for over 2,000 years before Spanish colonization in the 16th century.
“So the snake that he's”