As I write this I am in the throws of preparing for our trip to Egypt, a journey that is guaranteed to be thought provoking and, I hope, exciting for all concerned. However, already my thoughts are turnng to next year and the proposed Quest trip to Mexico. Every bit as exciting as Egypt and, if anything, even more mysterious, the trip to Mexico promises to be timely. For it would seem that profound changes are afoot in even orthodox circles concerning our understanding of the origins of Mayan civilization. The BBC "Timewatch" programme: Lords of the Maya, which was shown a coupleof weeks ago in Britain and which will probably appear in Australia and the USA shortly, made this clear. It would seem that it has finally dawned on the scientific community that the Mayans were telling the truth when they said that their religion was brought to them by a foreigner. He is now identified as a man called "The Lord of the West", and evidently wore "goggles". The revelation, if such one may call it, was that this man-or rather prophet-came to the Maya Region from Teotihuacan, the Pre-Columbian city to the North-East of Mexico city. The discovery of statuettes and royal skeletons wearing the same "goggles" is now recognised as proof that the religion of the Classic Maya was basically the same as that of Teotihuacan. Now I don't want to say I told you so but this is what I wrote in The Mayan Prophecies, which was published two years ago:
'Walking down from the Palace (in Palenque) I came to a building known as the Count's House...Here, protected by a thatched roof from the harsh glare of the sun, was an unusual stucco face. It was executed in quite a different style from other stucco work present on the site and, perhaps because he looks as though he is wearing glasses, has been identified as the Mexican rain god Tlaloc. This has been puzzling archaeologists greatly in recent years because it is considered to be in Teotihuacan style. Evidence of pottery fragments and obsidian implements proves that the Teotihuacans traded with the Maya, but this mask appears to indicate close cultural and religious links in addition between these very different Amerindian races.' [The Mayan Prophecies, A. Gilbert & M. Cotterell pp104-5, Element Books, Shaftesbury, 1995]
When The Mayan Prophecies was published I little dreamt that within two years there would be a such a profound shift in academic attitudes concerning the origins of Mayan civilization. It now seems to be accepted by the archaeologists working in the Maya Area that the jungle cities were developed in imitation of Teotihuacan, which lies some 700 miles to the east. What they didn't say on the programme, though, is that the goggle-eyed god of Teotihuacan (believed to be the same as the Aztec Tlaloc, or rain-god) is anything but human in appearance. Rows of these Tlaloc faces have been found at Teotihuacan, alternating with curious jaguar faces, lining the staircase of the Questzalcoatl pyramid inside the "Citadel". The Tlaloc faces have a curious, alien feel to them and are more suggestive of extra-terrestrials in space-suits than powerful chieftains in glasses.
Mexican archaeologists are still in denial about Transatlantic contacts between the Old World and the New. Yet it is clear that the peoples of Central America were in contact with Europeans long before the arrival of Columbus and proof of this is the numbers of sculptures to be seen of men with beards and Caucasian features. (One example, which I call "The Jewish Merchant" is to be seen in the Museum at Oaxaca. He doesn't look like an Indian, his beard and turban indicating a Middle-Eastern origin.) If the archaeological community is in denial about Europeans in pre-Columbian America they are even less open to any ideas concerning alien contacts from the stars. However another curious figure, from the same museum at Oaxaca, shows what looks like a hybrid alien-human. I have yet to hear what orthodox opinion has to say about him. Hazarding a guess I would say that he represents a half-caste, a man (maybe even a king) who was half-Indian and half something else. What that "something else" was, I leave to the imagination but draw attention to his "goggle-eye" and Tlaloc-type mouth. I don't say this is proof of alien contacts but when we go to Mexico I for one shall certainly be on the look-out for more evidence.
Article first published in "Quest" magazine Vol.1 issue 7.
© Adrian G. Gilbert 1997.