From Pliny the Elder's burning shield to a Renaissance Madonna with a disc in the sky, the idea that aliens visited antiquity has deep roots in modern pop culture. This episode traces the ancient astronaut hypothesis from 1898 science fiction and H.P. Lovecraft through Italy's clipeology movement, Carl Sagan's misread 1966 caveat, and Erich von Daniken's 1968 bestseller Chariots of the Gods.

We examine the evidence proponents cite and what mainstream scholarship says instead: the Watchers and Nephilim in Genesis and Enoch, Ezekiel's wheels, the cargo cult model, Wandjina rock art, Pakal's sarcophagus, lenticular clouds in Renaissance paintings, and the out-of-place artifact argument for the pyramids, Stonehenge, the Nazca lines, and the Easter Island moai. The episode also covers Zecharia Sitchin's Anunnaki claims, Akhenaten's elongated sku ...