The ancients, they still amaze us. It is hard to believe that people that lived thousands of years ago could have had anything that was more advanced than what we have today, but there were not only things like that, there were also things that existed that wouldn't be rediscovered for thousands of years after some of these civilizations became extinct. I am fond of saying that ancient people were just as smart as we are today, they just lacked some of the tools that we have today. As a matter of fact they did some remarkable things with what they had and if we would have been in the same situation we may not have been able to do what they did. There are a lot of questions connected with some of the ancient races, like how did they move super heavy stones to create their huge structures, how did they make such precise measurements and even how did they construct some of those figures that can only be seen to be what they are, from high up in the air, just to mention a few? Some of the answers to these questions might have been contained in the Library at Alexandria that was burned down, but we will never know.

One of the very first things that really is a tremendous puzzle is how the Maya of South America, who reached the pinnacle of their civilization around 250 AD to 900 AD, were able to construct such accurate astronomical models? This was known as their classic period. They were the only Mesoamerican civilization that had a written language. They had developed advanced mathematics and astronomy far before the 250 AD date and their astronomy was so accurate that their calendar rivaled ours. Contrary to what most people believe, they did not invent their calendar, it was taken from even older civilizations, but they did improve it. They were actually able to predict the alinement of planets that will occur in 2012, which some people think will be the end of the world. Don't worry though, it was never meant to mean that, it was only meant to be the last great event before we pass into a new era according to many archaeologists and scientists. You see the Maya loved to try and mark different eras with great ending events.

There is a theory that just keeps popping up which states that somehow the Egyptians learned how to levitate huge stones and that is how they were able to build the pyramids. When we first hear this, it sound ridiculous doesn't it? Oh come on admit it, it does sound crazy. It probably would have died right there if it wasn't for a guy named Edward Leedskainin. This is the name of the person that built and then moved the Coral Castle in Florida. The Coral Castle is a structure that was built using huge pieces of coral that weighed up to 30 tons, which is about 3 times the size of the stones used in the pyramids. No one saw it being built and Leedskainin said that he built it himself using a block and tackle. Well that was impossible. The largest crane would have a hard time lifting these stones. As if this wasn't enough, he then moved the entire structure. When asked how he did it, he said he used a truck. This has to be one of the strangest stories ever told. The fact that not one witness saw anything is incredible. It is said by some that he found out the ancient secret of levitation that the Egyptians used. What do you think of the theory now?

The Romans are considered the greatest builders of buildings and infrastructure that the world has ever seen. It is just amazing to see buildings in Rome that were built by them over 2,000 years ago, that you can still go into. They had perfected a cement that was harder than anything we have today. They were also the ones that developed the first cement that dried underwater. It is said that the design of the Roman Coliseum is superior to most designs of stadiums today, since the exit structure allows for more efficient entry and exit from the building. The Romans were far ahead of the rest of the world in medicine and their model was used until the middle ages. The Pantheon is a building in Rome that is about 2000 years old and the public can actually go into it and observe the beauty of its construction with its marble floors and columns. Do you think that any of our present buildings will be around in 1000 years, much less 2000?

The Chinese were miles ahead of most cultures. They invented the mass production of books and had books for sale hundreds of years before any were available to the common people of Europe. The ancient Chinese invented many different things, but what were considered their four greatest inventions are the compass, paper, gunpowder and printing, including movable type. If we go back to the Neolithic cultures of China we find inventions such as the spade, stone hoes and semilunar and rectangular stone knives. Clearly the Chinese were far ahead of almost anyone. Perhaps the cultivation of certain food crops was even more important to the Chinese than the four inventions that I mentioned above. The Chinese were big on small inventions, those inventions that made life easier, such as the wheelbarrow, India ink, paper money, umbrellas, brandy, whiskey and chess. We can not forget they they built the biggest structure on earth and much of it still stands today and is called the Great Wall. Many of the so called western inventions were really created by the Chinese first.

The ancient Greeks could just turn out to be the most advanced ancient race of them all. When the Antikythera mechanism was found, it was sent to the basement of a museum and resided there for over 50 years until it was realized that there was something special under all that corrosion. It was a set of complex gears that were part of an even more complex machine that was the forerunner of the modern computer and it was thousands of years old and from a time when it was believed that gears did not exist. It was a device that had been dredged up from a wrecked ship and reconstructions of it have shown that you could set it and it would show you the positions of the planets, sun and moon in the heavens at any given time. The art of gear making was then lost for over 1500 years. The device dates back to an incredible 2,089 years. It is believed to have been built around 80 B.C. Along with this, it is known that the ancient Greeks had things like automatic vending machines that dispensed soap and water in some temples, automatic doors, singing sculptures of bronze and dancing statues to name a few things. In combat they even had flame throwers.

Will we find that some ancient people had even more astounding devices? It certainly could be. The problem is that they may have had one or two of some device and because they were so scarce, when the civilization went under, these things had little chance of survival. Even if they did survive, if there was only one or two devices, we might never know that they existed. If we look at some of the evidence in ancient Egyptian tombs we notice that a small model glider is in at least one of them and pictures of it in several. It has been shown to actually fly. How can we be sure that the Egyptians hadn't built a full size glider? Why wouldn't they have tried? You never know what you might find when looking into these ancient societies