For thousands of years, people have described inexplicable shiny objects in the sky.
Some aerial phenomena such as comets, meteor showers, bolides, aurorae or even earthquake lightning – all easily explained with current knowledge – were widely reported in the ancient world.
The US Congress is currently investigating unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs – what you might think of as UFOs), in the wake of previously classified images of UAPs being leaked and a former intelligence official claiming that the US government possesses ‘alien’ technologies .
Meanwhile, a recent NASA report concluded that there is no evidence that UAPs are of extraterrestrial origin.
Ancient writers saw these phenomena as signs of social unease and impending disaster. In this way, modern responses to UAPs are similar to those of thousands of years ago. There is a long history of strange objects in the sky linked to political and military crises.
Old signs of trouble
In the Bible, the prophet Ezekiel mentioned a divine chariot: it glowed like hot metal in a fire and Ezekiel could see four living creatures in it. They looked like humans, even though they had four faces and four wings.
The vimāna – the flying chariots of the gods – also appear in ancient Indian epics, including the Mahābhārata and the Rāmāyana.
In Hindu myths, the gods were depicted driving these chariots to all corners of the universe.
The Roman historian Livius described the omens of the winter of 218 BC. and said there was “a spectacle of ships gleaming in the sky.” The Second Punic War had begun and the enemy general Hannibal was on the brink of a series of victories.
Perhaps these ‘ships’ in the sky were strange cloud formations, but Livius’ choice of words suggests something ‘shiny’ or ‘shiny’ – qualities associated with UAPs even today.
Livy reports another appearance of ships in the sky in 173 BC, when a ‘great fleet’ is said to have appeared. In the spring of 217 BC, when Hannibal was still threatening Rome, “round shields were seen in the sky” over central Italy, according to Livy.
Livius doesn’t say whether these objects shone like the “ships” we saw last year, but the “shields” recall the appearance of “flying saucers,” the type of UAP that came to prominence at the height of the Cold War.
Another remarkable classical UAP was recorded by the Greek writer Plutarch in his Life of Lucullus, a Roman General. Lucullus’ forces were about to fight King Mithridates VI of Pontus when a strange object appeared between the two armies:
“suddenly the sky parted and a huge, flame-like body was seen falling between the two armies. In shape it most resembled a wine jar (pithos), and in color like molten silver. Both sides were astonished at the sight and separated.
That the object was described as a pithos, a vessel with a specific shape, suggests more than a flashing light. Some have interpreted this as a meteor, but Plutarch’s focus on its shiny metallic nature is inconsistent with this possibility.
Whatever it was, both armies thought it was a bad omen and retreated.
Writing about the war between Roman and Jewish forces, the Roman Jewish historian Josephus reports on an aerial battle between UAPs in AD 65. Before sunset, ‘chariots’ were seen in the sky, accompanied by ‘armed battalions racing through the clouds ‘.
Josephus says that numerous eyewitnesses saw it and believed it foretold the subsequent Roman victory.
From ancient to modern doomsdays
Saint Paul referred to God’s “shield of faith” in his Letter to the Ephesians, while “ships traveling through the air” were a common theme in medieval Ireland, symbolizing the safety that the “ship” of the Church offered the faithful.
Reports of unusual phenomena increased around the turn of the millennium, as Christian people feared or hoped for the Day of Judgment predicted in the Book of Revelation in the Bible.
Millennial ufology is a fascinating development of recent Christian predictions about the end of the world, in which the Messiah poses as a space traveler who returns to save us from satanic aliens.
Millions of adults report their experiences with UAPs every year: when interviewed about their experiences, some admit to being religious; others argue that this is not the case. Importantly, ufology may well be a way to reconcile religion with science, an approach that many find attractive.
We will never know what the objects and lights described in ancient texts are, and whether they were real or the result of psychological stress. At the very least, significant observations of ancient UAPs almost always speak of conditions of fear and impending change.
UAPs – ancient and modern – confirm our need to project our crises onto objects in the sky.
Ancient people didn’t have the Doomsday Clock to warn them how close the end was, but they looked closely at the sky and found plenty of warnings up there.
Michael B. Charles, Associate Professor, Management Discipline, Faculty of Business, Arts and Law, Southern Cross University; Eva Anagnostou-Laoutides, Associate Professor of Ancient History, Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Macquarie University, and Marcus Harmes, Professor of Pathways Education, University of Southern Queensland
