"Are all these legends a confused account of great events on a planetary scale which were beheld in terror simultaneously by men scattered everywhere over the world?" Anonymous Editor, Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology

"But when the planets in evil mixture to disorder wander,   
What plagues and what portents, what mutiny,   
What raging of the sea, shaking of earth,
Commotion in the winds!"
William Shakespeare

Modern scholars typically define myth as a form of sacred history—an attempt to explain the origins of the world and the foundations of cultural life. Yet if myth also preserves clues to the recent history of our solar system, as the evidence increasingly suggests, then its study becomes even more significant. Comparative mythology reveals striking cross-cultural parallels that imply a shared, planetary core to the world’s oldest stories. This raises an intriguing question: How could planets that appear today as tiny, indifferent points of light have once commanded such overwhelming attention from our ancestors?

"All the stories, characters, and adventures narrated by mythology concentrate on the active powers among the stars, who are the planets."
Giorlgio de Santilla, Hertha von Dechend, Hamlet's Mill

According to the prevailing paradigm, the Nebular Hypothesis, planets and stars coalesced from a primordial dust cloud billions of years ago. In this model, it is assumed—often without serious scrutiny—that these bodies have occupied stable, unchanging orbits ever since. Anyone who questions this assumption is quickly reminded that the only forces permitted to shape planetary motion are gravity and inertia, and that any alternative would require “mysterious” or “unknown” influences. Yet when plasma and electromagnetism are taken into account, such influences are neither mysterious nor implausible.

A plasma-based view of the universe widens the interpretive frame considerably. It encourages us to revisit mythology without condescension, rather than dismissing ancient narratives as the products of ignorance or superstition. Perhaps our ancestors were not merely inventing stories, but attempting to describe a sky that behaved very differently from the one we observe today—one marked by dramatic instability, planetary encounters, and spectacular electrical phenomena. If so, the great myths of the world may preserve memories of events that would make our modern auroras and natural disasters seem modest by comparison.

"...A 'derivation' of the sword from a 'root' or archetype in lightning is universal and world wide."
Ananada Coormaraswamy

Many mythological details seem impossible when viewed through the lens of the modern sky: flying and fire-breathing dragons, planets in unusual configurations, celestial battles, and countless other extraordinary motifs. It is tempting to dismiss such imagery as nothing more than creative invention. Yet this attitude encounters a serious obstacle — these same “impossible” themes recur across cultures that had no contact with one another. Leading anthropologists, classicists, historians, and mythologists have long noted this striking continuity.

It is difficult to explain such global coherence as mere coincidence or imagination. Recognising the patterns — and the remarkable points of agreement across widely separated traditions — is therefore essential. Rather than treating these stories as isolated fantasies, we must consider the possibility that they preserve memories of a sky very different from the one we see today.

"...The extreme preoccupation of most early societies with celestial imagery...appears to be part of a world wide phenomenon."
Mark Bailey, astronomer, Armagh Observatory

Before the Electric Universe merged with David Talbott's recreation of mythic themes, Talbott noted that today's world does not answer to the ancient world. The video below from 1996, Remembering the End of The World, explores the Saturn model before plasma and electromagnetism provided an explanation for the celestial mechanics.

Remembering The End of The World

The broader perspective offered post merger in Symbols of an Alien Sky includes an electrified cosmic environment and high energy electrical events. Both videos enjoy Talbott's captivating narration.

Symbols of an Alien Sky

In Remembering the End of The World (at around 45 minutes), Talbott reflects on the role of Saturn as the backdrop to the cosmic drama. One part of his summary goes something like this: A worldwide tradition says that before a king ever ruled on Earth, a prototype of kings arose in heaven — the father of kings or universal monarch. This was the model of the good king. For example, the Hindu Brahma, the Aztec Quetzacoatl, and the Egyptian Ra. In the epic era known as the golden age, this good king brought about abundance. The Chinese called it the age of Perfect Virtue, the Iranians called it the age of the Brilliant Yima, The Danish, Peace of Frodi, and so on. It was paradise on Earth, or the Purple Dawn. The Garden of Eden. It is impossible to overstate the power of this memory among different cultures. Saturn was the founding king of the Golden Age, and most cultures pay tribute to it with their original Sabbath or Saturn day (Saturday).

Even today our language retains the age old cultural ambivalence toward this most ancient god. The word Saturnian expresses the splendour and munificence of the Golden Age, while the word Saturnine (morose, gloomy) reflects the melancholy of Paradise Lost.

Interestingly, after the death of Her Royal Majesty Queen Elizabeth II on 8th September 2022, in a speech before the House, former UK prime minister Boris Johnson paid tribute to her 'unvarying Polestar Radiance'. Twitter link (from 1:15).

Another artist's impression of the Polar Configuration, offset.

Ancient Babylonians were careful to distinguish Shamash, their ancient Sun god, from our current Sun, identifying it with the distant planet Saturn. This led Velikovsky to consider the possibility that Saturn once loomed much larger in the sky ... perhaps as a sunlike body over satellite Earth!

The Popol Vuh, considered the 'Mayan Bible', also attests to this:

"Like a man was the sun when it showed itself … It showed itself when it was born and remained fixed in the sky like a mirror. Certainly it was not the same sun which we see, it is said in their old tales."
D Goetz & S. Morley, Popul Vuh (Norman 1972)

Sol, Helios, and Kronos were actually names for the first or old Sun. Many cultures were careful to differentiate it as the Best Sun, Superior Sun, or Exemplary Sun, which ruled from the axis of the sky around which the heavens turned.

"Helios and Kronos were one and the same God."
Franz Boll, Classicist

As bizarre as the above may sound to the uninitiated, the Saturn theory actually suffers from an embarrassment of riches. Early descriptions of the 'Sun' and various planets from Mesopotamia and elsewhere describe them as occupying positions not possible within current astronomical thinking.

For the Egyptians, Atum was was the primeval sun, who ruled from the center and summit of the sky.

"The great god lives, fixed in the middle of the sky."
Egyptian Coffin texts.

As part of the evolution of what is known as the Polar Configuration, Venus assumed a radiant appearance. Streams of luminous plasma formed a flower like pattern across the face of the ancient sun-god. Artists impressions, above right and top right. With the white background, the Mespotamian Shamash from Wikipedia, is pictured right. The 'cosmic wheel' and many other identical symbols are common across numerous ancient cultures. The cosmic wheel is occasionally dismissed as a crude representation of our current sun, although this approach fails to account for the bodies depicted in front of it, among numerous other anomalies.

The planet Venus plays a prominent and often paradoxical role in ancient mythology. Converging images include the Babylonian “torch” and “bearded star,” the Mexican “smoking star,” the Peruvian “long-haired” star, and the Egyptian Great Star “scattering its flame in fire.” Across cultures, Venus is repeatedly depicted as a luminous serpent or dragon in the sky.

Venus is frequently portrayed as both radiant and destructive. In Greek mythology this duality appears clearly: the planet is associated not only with Aphrodite, the golden-haired goddess of beauty and desire, but also with Medusa, whose serpent-crowned visage embodies terror and ruin.

Venus has long been identified as both the Morning and Evening Star, and as Lucifer — the “Bringer of Light” or “Shining One,” from the Latin lux (“light”) and ferre (“to bear or bring”). If Venus entered the inner solar system dynamically, or emerged from an earlier planetary configuration, this may help explain the widespread legends of a fallen or rebellious light-bearer.

Originally thought to be an Earth-like twin, Venus instead revealed itself as a world with an extraordinarily dense, hot atmosphere rich in hydrocarbons — a prediction made in advance by Immanuel Velikovsky, and later confirmed. This was not the first controversy to fall in his favour.

"How you have fallen from heaven,
O morning star, son of the dawn!
You have been cast down to the earth,
you who once laid low the nations!"
Isaiah 14:12, Old Testament

"Quomodo cecidisti de caelo,
Lucifer, fili aurorae?
Deiectus es in terram,
qui deiciebas gentes."
From the latin Vulgate

Venus is also unique in rotating counter-clockwise relative to most other planets. In many ancient traditions, motion “against the way” was considered ominous. Such reversals recur symbolically in religious rites and mythic cycles, possibly preserving memory of an earlier period when Venus behaved in ways unfamiliar to the modern sky.

The planet Mars is universally associated with war, violence, and catastrophe. The month of March bears its name, and across cultures Mars appears as the scarred warrior, the thunderbolt-wielder, and the bringer of conflict.

Numerous traditions converge on strikingly similar imagery. The Blackfoot “Scarface,” also known as “Star Boy,” the Pawnee “Morning Star,” and the Greek Ares all share defining characteristics — wounds or scars, thunderous weapons, and violent celestial encounters. In Greek myth, when Ares is wounded, he roars with the din of a thousand warriors. In Hindu tradition, Indra bears a great scar upon his head, earned in cosmic battle while wielding the thunderbolt (vajra).

Ancient accounts also describe luminous connections forming between planets. Seneca wrote that “the space between two planets lights up and is set aflame,” a statement that resonates strongly with plasma-based interpretations of interplanetary electrical interaction.

Mars’ role as a visibly scarred world — both mythologically and geologically — reinforces the impression of a planet that underwent extreme stress in the recent past, remembered by human witnesses and preserved in mythic form.

"The space between two planets lights up and is set aflame by both planets and produces a train of fire."
Seneca, Roman naturalist

Video link: Symbols of an Alien Sky Episode 2 - The Lightning-Scarred Planet Mars

There is persistent confusion in mythological and popular traditions between the roles of Venus and Mars — particularly in their identification as the Morning Star and associated “light-bearers.”

In common usage, the Morning Star is often identified exclusively with Venus, and by extension with Lucifer, the bringer of light. However, this simplification obscures a more complex celestial history preserved in myth.

The five-pointed star motif discussed throughout this section is better understood as a snapshot of a different sky — one in which Mars appeared positioned in front of Venus, accompanied by luminous plasma-stream structures. In such a configuration, Mars could temporarily assume the visual and symbolic role more commonly attributed to Venus.

Within the broader context of the polar configuration, this interpretation can be extended further to include Saturn as the central luminary, with Venus and Mars aligned along the polar axis. Under such conditions, visual dominance, colour, brightness, and apparent motion would differ radically from those observed today, naturally leading to later confusion in mythic attribution.

Conventional interpretations struggle largely because they assume the planets have occupied stable, long-term orbits throughout recorded history, and that the architecture of the solar system has remained unchanged in comparatively recent times. When this assumption is relaxed, many long-standing mythological contradictions begin to resolve.

The moon is mysterious. Relevant to this particular page is the fact that the further you go back in time the fewer mentions of it there are to be found, although numerous accounts speak of a sky 'before the moon arrived'. The Proselenes of Arcadia, for example, claimed to have been around before there was a 'moon in the heavens' and, on the other side of the earth, the ancient Tiwinaku culture of Bolivia refer to a time when there was no 'moon in the sky', claiming it arrived around 12,000 years ago. Zulu legends also have it that our Moon was a spaceship moved here by reptilian beings. See conspiracy theories below for a mythological perspective on dragon and serpent symbology.

"As far as science is concerned, the Moon should not be there! It's too large, too light, and its density reveals no substantial iron core. It's older than the Earth, apparently, with no natural explanation for the extra exposure (baking) the lunar material has received from the Sun. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, it rang like a 'bell' for hours when NASA decided to drop its launch rockets near pre-placed seismic registers in order to test the depth and make other calculations about its crust."
ScienceDaily.com

If the moon arrived relatively recently, is it such a stretch to contemplate other planets in our solar sytem shifting on their orbits?

Pictured right is a thunderstorm on Saturn that has remained fixed since 2004, much to the further puzzlement of the scientific community. Meteorologists do not fully understand terrestial lightning, let alone the 'surprise' of lightning on other planets, and Saturn produces stupendous displays!

The spiraling shape of dragons and serpents in mythology are strikingly similar to plasma instabilities in the laboratory and in space, a fact which reminds us of the metamorphosing and life-like qualities of plasma phenomena. It should be little surprise, then, that we see similar configurations of electrified plasma in megalightning on Saturn today.

Sprites in the upper atmosphere of Earth.

Thunderbolt imagery is widespread the world over, but few scholars and scientists ever pause to wonder about this ancient fascination. After all, most contemporary researcher’s routinely assume the old sky was essentially identical to what we see now. As today so before, is their default.

However, if the planets shifted on their orbits within human memory, is it possible that huge sparks jumped between them in order to establish electrical equilibrium? Were any such electrical interactions the thunderbolts witnessed by the ancients, and handed down via 'myth and legend'? Again, this notion is anathema to the gradualist paradigm. Here is a conventional academic take:

"It should be admitted that all of these thunderweapons — Indian, Hittite, and Greek — are variations of the same basic form, a form that really looks nothing like the thunderbolt."
R. Miller, Iconographic Links between Indic and West Asian Storm Gods, 2016

Planetary Gods?

Is it not possible that the names of the gods were derived from the planets, and not the planets from the gods? Were the planets the gods, in other words, if they occupied different orbits much closer to the earth in past ages? This euhemeristic approach would begin to explain the commonalities across languages and cultures. There is no doubting that the ancients had a fascination with the heavens. Furthermore, there are so many key points of agreement when it comes to the personalities ascribed to the planets of our solar system, as described above. Again, can over-wrought imagination alone account for these remarkable concordances?

Please note that it is not the purpose of this web site to promote nor denigrate any views in respect of an intelligence behind the universe. That's a separate philosophical debate, and one beyond the scope of this subject matter which falls under the broad heading of comparative mythology.

"The peoples of ancient Mesoamerica keenly observed the sky and used the calendar to predict solar and lunar eclipses, the cylce of the planet venus, the apparent movements of the constellations and other celestial events. To them, these occurences were not the mechanical movements of innate celestial bodies but constituted the activities of gods, the actual recapitulation of mythical events from the time of creation."
Kaule Taube, Aztec and Maya myths, P14.

"With one voice, every culture declared that great gods once ruled the world, before they departed for remote regions. Let the world's first astronomers point the way for us. They knew that what the myths called Gods were planets, and aspects of planets. Planets appeared close to the earth in heaven spanning configuration. Memories of that celestial splendour still surround us, even if humanity later forgot much more than it remembered."
David Talbott, comparative mythologist

Another view of Venus within the Polar Configuration, above.

The early Greek philosophers can be said to provide a bridge between the old world of 'superstition' and the new world of 'rationalism'. Both Plato and Aristotle acknowledged that the gods were originally astronomical bodies, and Aristotle was proud to state it as known.

"A tradition has been handed down by the ancient thinkers of very early times ... to the effect that these heavenly bodies are Gods ... the rest of the tradition has been added later in a mythological form to influence the vulgar..."
Aristotle (384 - 322 BC)

Plato (427 - 347 B.C.) also taught that the myth of Phaeton describes real events in nature:
[it] "really signifies a declination of the bodies moving in the heavens around the earth, and a great conflagration of things upon the earth."

Conspiracy theories abound in respect of many of the archetypal symbols mentioned above, and it is often claimed that certain groups secretly worship Saturn (which they associate with 'Satanism'), or Venus (Lucifer or the Morning Star in western tradition). As we have seen above, these symbols pervade modern religions and much more. Caution is obviously recommended as many of the symbols under discussion are ingrained in our culture and subconscious, and are often misunderstood. At best, when touched upon they are generally considered an artifact of the human mind.

"The ultimate origin of neary all folktales and myths must remain a mystery."
Stith Thompson

Saturn is associated with the number six. It's the sixth planet from the Sun, and it is also associated with the black cube, mentioned above. A cube has six sides, of course. The hexagon pattern seen on Saturn, below left, surprised many. Again, caution is urged before jumping to negative conclusions. Consider that humans are made from carbon, for example, and that carbon atoms comprise six irons, six electrons, and six neutrons. Six doesn't have to be an evil number, but anything can be inverted.

(Numerology is an interesting but speculative subject matter. For example: 3x6=18. 1+8=9. Nine is considered a universal number. Nikola Tesla, of course, was obsessed with the numbers 3, 6, and 9, which also add up to 18, and then 9. And so on. He is supposed to have said that 3, 6, and 9 were the key to the universe.)

The warrior or hero figure slaying or banishing the dragon or serpent is an archetypal symbol. England has St George and the Dragon, who they share with Georgia, and Catalonia in Spain, among others; while Ireland has St Patrick who rids the country of snakes; and in Norse and Scandinavian mythology, Fáfnir (the mythical dragon) was slain by Sigurd. The theme is widespread. See also Ninurta chasing Anzû with his thunderbolts, pictured above.

David Icke has taken a sustained interest in reptilian symbolism, extending this to the claim that the world is covertly ruled by reptilian hybrids. It seems more plausible, however, that the enduring appeal of this idea lies not in the literal truth of the claim, but in the power of the underlying archetype. Reptilian imagery has deep mythological and psychological roots, long predating any modern conspiracy narrative. It is worth noting, in passing, that in the context of the Purple Dawn discussed above, both plants and reptiles are known to thrive under red or purple light. Some readers may be tempted to draw symbolic connections here, though no such interpretation is required.

The word conspiracy is frequently used without regard for important distinctions between symbolism, speculation, and evidence. As a result, unconventional ideas are often categorised and dismissed before they are examined.

Wikipedia functions reasonably well for settled knowledge, but is a poor guide to unresolved or controversial subjects. In these cases, editorial framing often substitutes for analysis, and alternative paradigms such as the Electric Universe are routinely dismissed rather than critically assessed. See here for the ancient alien hypothesis.

"Heavenly fire is spit forth from by the planet as crackling charcoal flies from a burning log." Pliny, Roman naturlist

Graham Hancock has popularised the idea of a lost or fallen civilisation in prehistory, arguing that the pyramids and a range of other ancient structures point to cultures more advanced than those acknowledged by conventional archaeology. More recently, he has proposed that a global cataclysm — most likely a comet impact, in his view — struck Earth around 12,000 years ago, roughly coinciding with the Younger Dryas, and that this event precipitated the collapse of that earlier civilisation. In this respect, Hancock’s narrative echoes much older Atlantean traditions. The discovery of Göbekli Tepe in modern-day Turkey, dated to around 9,000 BCE, has undeniably unsettled established archaeological timelines. At the very least, it invites renewed questioning of orthodox assumptions about the development of complex human societies — a point Hancock has been quick to emphasise.

David Talbott, by contrast, does not frame the past primarily in terms of a lost technological civilisation. Instead, he argues that dramatic changes in planetary configurations led to Earth-shattering events remembered in myth and legend, catalysing a profound shift in human perception and consciousness. From this perspective emerged the myth-making epoch, during which monumental structures arose not as remnants of a vanished civilisation, but as symbolic acts of remembrance. In Talbott’s view, the “Golden Age” is therefore best understood as a mythic and experiential memory rather than a conventional historical society.

Perhaps these differing views are not mutually exclusive, and there is clearly some overlap. Hancock has worked with geologist Robert Schoch, for example, who has spoken at an Electric Universe conference and has noted the plasma-related characteristics of much ancient rock art. As things stand, however, neither Talbott’s nor Hancock’s interpretations are regarded as acceptable within mainstream science or archaeology — a judgement reflected in their treatment on Wikipedia, a resource that should be approached with caution on contested subjects.

Conclusion

Many mysteries remain from the myth-making epoch, yet they begin to cohere once we allow for the possibility that planetary configurations within human memory were once very different from those we observe today. In the earliest traditions, time and planets are not described as abstract concepts; the gods were the planets, presiding over a remembered age of order and abundance — the Golden Age, later mythologised as the Garden of Eden.

When this age ended, its survivors appear to have developed an intense preoccupation with the heavens. The planets were tracked with extraordinary care, their motions recorded and ritualised, as though to guard against the return of catastrophe. Monumental temples and sacred architectures arose from this impulse. Much has been forgotten, but the underlying symbols and themes persist with remarkable consistency across cultures. Modern apocalyptic anxieties may reflect the same deep-seated memory — sometimes expressed not only as fear of recurrence, but as an equally powerful reluctance to confront what may once have occurred.

"Contents of an archetypal character are manifestations of processes in the collective unconscious. In the last analysis, therefore, it is impossible to say what they refer to."
Carl Jung

While psychologists readily acknowledge the role of archetypes, there has been comparatively little interest in exploring their origins. Their significance is recognised, yet the question of how such patterns arose is often set aside, as if beyond recovery. Against this background, the work of David Talbott, Dwardu Cardona, and Ev Cochrane on recurring mythic themes may offer a path toward understanding the historical and experiential roots of archetypal symbols. Whether psychologists, anthropologists, or others will be willing to engage with this possibility — particularly within conservative academic settings — remains an open question.

“The inertia of the human mind and its resistance to innovation are most clearly demonstrated not, as one might expect, by the ignorant mass—which is easily swayed once its imagination is caught—but by professionals with a vested interest in tradition and in the monopoly of learning.  Innovation is a twofold threat to academic mediocrities: it endangers their oracular authority, and it evokes the deeper fear that their whole, laboriously constructed intellectual edifice might collapse.  The academic backwoodsmen have been the curse of genius from Aristarchus to Darwin and Freud; they stretch, a solid and hostile phalanx of pedantic mediocrities, across the centuries.” 
Arthur Koestler, The Sleepwalkers [New York, 1959], p. 427.