In 1961, von D äniken started publishing articles about his theories and by 1966 had prepared a book, Erinnerungen an die Zukunft, which was published in Germany and serialized in the Swiss newspaper Die Weltwoche.

With the advent of American and Soviet space travel, such theories became much more plausible to many people. Von D äniken began to evolve a theory of sky-borne gods in vehicles resembling accounts of flying saucers, built around the religious legends and myths of ancient civilizations. In his reading, he was particularly impressed by the biblical account of Ezekiel's fiery wheel and by Sumerian accounts of the coming of the Sun God in the ancient epic of Gilgamesh. He visited South America, Russia and Egypt, seeing firsthand many of the monuments of the ancient past. After leaving school, he took various jobs in hotels, and this seasonal work left him with spare time that he spent in traveling and reading. At an early age von D äniken was fascinated by 'inconsistencies' between religious doctrine and the accounts of mysterious events in the Bible. Born in Zofingen, Switzerland, April 14, 1935, he was brought up in a conservative Roman Catholic setting at St. Swiss writer whose 1969 book, Chariots of the Gods, gave focus to a wave of popular interest in the idea that in ancient times the earth was visited by extraterrestrials whose presence is documented in a variety of archeological remains.

Erich von däniken books in order