origins of the gods by erich von daniken

I’ve blogged about von Daniken’s history of deceit before.

In 1964, von Däniken simply appropriated this material wholesale for a magazine article, and on the strength of the magazine article, he received a book deal for what became Chariots of the Gods … Their book inspired several by Robert Charroux, who presented Bergier’s and Pauwel’s discursive, disorganized ideas in a more popular and readable format. Jacques Bergier and Louis Pauwels put together the entire case for ancient astronauts as we currently know it-from the claims about ancient atom bombs to the claims about “impossibly” precise and heavy stone architecture. Lovecraft put out a book called Morning of the Magicians in which they tried to show that Lovecraft’s vision of ancient astronauts could be correlated to the “occult” truths of Theosophy and the UFO movement. In 1960, two French authors who were interested in the occult, Nazis, UFOs, and H. Eventually, he would be convicted of embezzlement and fraud yet again, serving a year in prison.

He took another hotel position, and he stole money there, too, by falsifying records in order to obtain tens of thousands in fraudulent loans to finance his interest in space aliens and what the court later called his “playboy lifestyle.” The court psychiatrist declared him a pathological liar. He was convicted of embezzlement after leaving that job. He was convicted of theft when he was 19, and he left school to become a hotelier. Here’s an excerpt from Jason’s essay:Įrich Anton Paul von Däniken was born in Switzerland in 1935, raised a strict Catholic, and in Catholic school developed an interest in UFOs, like many youths in the early 1950s.

Sound harsh? He has the prison record to prove it. That book demonstrates that von Daniken is a person of low moral character and little intellectual originality. In a nutshell, he’s a clever crook. Lovecraft And Extraterrestrial Pop Culture. Kudos are once again in order for Jason Colavito for his review of the Ancient Aliens episode entitled “The Legacy of von Daniken.” As part of his review, Jason summarizes some of the material that can be found in his book The Cult of Alien Gods: H.P.

Origins of the gods by erich von daniken