Sharing more than 200 never-before-published full-color photographs from his personal archives, bestselling author Erich von Däniken provides clear evidence of ancient alien contact and technology among the archaeological sites of the Maya as well as other ancient cultures, such as the Aztecs and the Hindus. He reveals how the "gods" immortalized in Maya sculptures, carved reliefs, and myth were not supernatural beings but technologically advanced visitors, astronauts who gifted the Maya with their sophisticated understanding of calendar time and cosmology. He explains how, with no explanation for their technologies and origins, the Maya interpreted the visitors as divine and, thus, the "gods" were born. Offering visual proof of the ancient world's contact with advanced alien visitors they recorded as gods and teachers, von Däniken also raises the question of the "heavenly" origins of royal families and dynasties in Mesoamerica, Egypt, and beyond, revealing how the Mayan kings of Palenque and the pharaohs of Egypt may be descendants of the "gods."