Editing Pseudohistory (section)

==== Ancient aliens, ancient technologies, and lost lands ====
{{main|Ancient astronauts}}

[[Immanuel Velikovsky]]'s books ''[[Worlds in Collision]]'' (1950), ''[[Ages in Chaos]]'' (1952), and ''Earth in Upheaval'' (1955), which became "instant bestsellers",<ref name="Fritze"/> demonstrated that pseudohistory based on ancient mythology held potential for tremendous financial success<ref name="Fritze"/> and became models of success for future works in the genre.<ref name="Fritze"/>

In 1968, [[Erich von Däniken]] published ''[[Chariots of the Gods?]]'', which claims that ancient visitors from outer space constructed the pyramids and other monuments. He has since published other books in which he makes similar claims. These claims have all been categorized as pseudohistory.<ref name="Fritze"/>{{rp|201}} Similarly, [[Zechariah Sitchin]] has published numerous books claiming that a race of extraterrestrial beings from the [[Nibiru cataclysm#Nancy Lieder and ZetaTalk|Planet Nibiru]] known as the [[Anunnaki]] visited Earth in ancient times in search of gold, and that they genetically engineered humans to serve as their slaves. He claims that memories of these occurrences are recorded in [[Sumerian religion|Sumerian mythology]], as well as other mythologies all across the globe. These speculations have likewise been categorized as pseudohistory.<ref name=heiser>{{cite web|title=The Myth of a Sumerian 12th Planet|url=http://www.michaelsheiser.com/nibiru.pdf|author=Michael S. Heiser|access-date=30 July 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081120023753/http://www.michaelsheiser.com/nibiru.pdf|archive-date=20 November 2008|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name="Skepdic">{{cite web|url=http://www.skepdic.com/sitchin.html|title=Zecharia Sitchin and ''The Earth Chronicles''|last=Carroll|first=Robert T|date=1994–2009|work=The Skeptic's Dictionary|publisher=John Wiley & Sons|access-date=30 July 2017}}</ref>

The ancient astronaut hypothesis was further popularized in the United States by the [[History (U.S. TV network)|History Channel]] television series ''[[Ancient Aliens]]''.<ref name="Fritze2009">{{cite journal|last=Fritze|first=Ronald H.|title=On the Perils and Pleasures of Confronting Pseudohistory|journal=Historically Speaking|volume=10|number=5|date=November 2009|pages=2–5|issn=1941-4188|doi=10.1353/hsp.0.0067|s2cid=144988932}}</ref> History professor [[Ronald H. Fritze]] observed that the pseudohistorical claims promoted by von Däniken and the ''Ancient Aliens'' program have a periodic popularity in the US:<ref name=Fritze/><ref name=Rorotoko/> "In a pop culture with a short memory and a voracious appetite, aliens and pyramids and lost civilizations are recycled like fashions."<ref name=Fritze/>{{rp|201}}<ref name=Rorotoko>{{cite web|last=Fritze|first=Ronald|title=Ronald H. Fritze, On his book Invented Knowledge: False History, Fake Science and Pseudo-Religions, Cover Interview|url=http://rorotoko.com/interview/20090708_fritze_ronald_invented_knowledge_false_history_fake_science_pseudo/?page=4|work=July 08, 2009|date=8 July 2009|publisher=Rorotoko.com|access-date=July 17, 2012|archive-date=December 28, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191228085921/http://rorotoko.com/interview/20090708_fritze_ronald_invented_knowledge_false_history_fake_science_pseudo/?page=4|url-status=dead}}</ref>

The author [[Graham Hancock]] has sold over four million copies of books promoting the pseudohistorical thesis that all the major monuments of the ancient world, including [[Stonehenge]], the [[Egyptian pyramids]], and the [[moai]] of [[Easter Island]], were built by a single ancient supercivilization,<ref>{{cite book|last=Sheiko|first=Konstantin|date=2012|title=Nationalist Imaginings of the Russian Past: Anatolii Fomenko and the Rise of Alternative History in Post-Communist Russia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=74s0DwAAQBAJ&q=Graham+Hancock+Pseudohistory&pg=PA83|series=Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society|location=Stuttgart, Germany|publisher=Ibidem-Verlag|volume=86|page=83|isbn=978-3838259154}}</ref> which Hancock claims thrived from 15,000 to 10,000 BC and possessed technological and scientific knowledge equal to or surpassing that of modern civilization.<ref name=Fritze/> He first advanced the full form of this argument in his 1995 bestseller ''[[Fingerprints of the Gods]]'',<ref name=Fritze/> which won popular acclaim, but scholarly disdain.<ref name=Fritze/> [[Christopher Knight (author)|Christopher Knight]] has published numerous books, including ''[[Uriel's Machine]]'' (2000), expounding pseudohistorical assertions that ancient civilizations possessed technology far more advanced than the technology of today.<ref>Merriman, Nick, editor, ''Public Archaeology'', Routledge, 2004 p. 260</ref><ref>Tonkin, S., 2003, [http://www.astunit.com/astrocrud/uriel.htm Uriel's Machine – a Commentary on some of the Astronomical Assertions.]</ref><ref>{{cite book|chapter=The comforts of unreason: the importance and relevance of alternative archaeology|editor-last=Merriman|editor-first=Nick|title=Public Archaeology|url=https://archive.org/details/publicarchaeolog00merr_661|url-access=limited|publisher=[[Routledge]]|location=London|date=2004|page=[https://archive.org/details/publicarchaeolog00merr_661/page/n274 260]|isbn=978-0415258890}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Tonkin|first=Stephen|date=2003|url=http://astunit.com/astrocrud.php?topic=uriel|title=Uriel's Machine – a Commentary on some of the Astronomical Assertions|work=The Astronomical Unit|access-date=21 November 2013}}</ref>

The claim that a lost continent known as [[Lemuria (continent)|Lemuria]] once existed in the Pacific Ocean has likewise been categorized as pseudohistory.<ref name="Fritze"/>{{rp|11}}

Furthermore, similar conspiracy theories promote the idea of embellished, fabricated accounts of historical civilizations, namely [[Khazar hypothesis of Ashkenazi ancestry|Khazaria]] and [[Tartarian Empire|Tartaria]].