Mates (Matest) Mendelevich Agrest (20 July 1915 – 20 September 2005) was a Russian Empire-born

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

and a proponent of the

ancient astronaut theory Ancient astronauts (or ancient aliens) refers to a pseudoscientific hypothesis which holds that intelligent extraterrestrial beings visited Earth and made contact with humans in antiquity and prehistoric times. Proponents suggest that this ...

Biography

Agrest was born in Knyazhitsy in the

Mogilev Governorate The Mogilev Governorate () or Government of Mogilev was a governorate () of the Russian Empire in the territory of the present day Belarus. Its capital was in Mogilev, referred to as Mogilev-on-the-Dnieper, or Mogilev Gubernskiy. The area of the ...

of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

(present-day Republic of

Belarus Belarus,, , ; alternatively and formerly known as Byelorussia (from Russian ). officially the Republic of Belarus,; rus, Республика Беларусь, Respublika Belarus. is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by R ...

) on 20 July 1915. He graduated from Leningrad State University (now

Saint Petersburg State University Saint Petersburg State University (SPBU; russian: Санкт-Петербургский государственный университет) is a public research university in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Founded in 1724 by a decree of Peter the G ...

) in 1938 and received his PhD in Science, Physics and Mathematics in 1946. He became the Chief of the University's Laboratory in 1970. He retired in 1992 and emigrated with his wife Riva to Charleston, South Carolina, in the United States. Agrest authored more than 100 scientific articles and five monographs on the subjects of mathematics, physics and astronomy. Some of his articles were devoted to the question of paleocontacts- contacts of extraterrestrial intelligent beings with Earth. His article "Космонавты древности" (translated in some places as Astronauts of Yore, and also as Ancient Astronauts; literally, Cosmonauts of Antiquity), published in 1961 in Moscow, has been translated into many languages. Agrest has been said to be the first scientist to advance the theory that Earth had been visited in pre-historic times by intelligent beings from outer space. In a 1959 work, he asserted a number of unorthodox claims, such as that the

megalithic A megalith is a large stone that has been used to construct a prehistoric structure or monument, either alone or together with other stones. There are over 35,000 in Europe alone, located widely from Sweden to the Mediterranean sea. The ...

stone terracing at

Baalbek Baalbek (; ar, بَعْلَبَكّ, Baʿlabakk, Syriac-Aramaic: ܒܥܠܒܟ) is a city located east of the Litani River in Lebanon's Beqaa Valley, about northeast of Beirut. It is the capital of Baalbek-Hermel Governorate. In Greek and Roman ...

had been used as a launch site for spaceships, and that the destruction of Biblical

Sodom and Gomorrah Sodom and Gomorrah () were two legendary biblical cities destroyed by God for their wickedness. Their story parallels the Genesis flood narrative in its theme of God's anger provoked by man's sin (see Genesis 19:1–28). They are mentioned frequ ...

were the result of a

nuclear explosion A nuclear explosion is an explosion that occurs as a result of the rapid release of energy from a high-speed nuclear reaction. The driving reaction may be nuclear fission or nuclear fusion or a multi-stage cascading combination of the two, t ...

detonated by extraterrestrial beings. Agrest was a major inspiration of later figures such as

Erich von Däniken Erich Anton Paul von Däniken (; ; born 14 April 1935) is a Swiss author of several books which make claims about extraterrestrial influences on early human culture, including the best-selling ''Chariots of the Gods?'', published in 1968. Von D ...

and

Zecharia Sitchin Zecharia Sitchin (July 11, 1920 – October 9, 2010) was an author of a number of books proposing an explanation for human origins involving ancient astronauts. Sitchin attributed the creation of the ancient Sumerian culture to the ''Anunnaki'' ...

, who in later decades popularized the idea of ancient astronauts. He has been described as the

doyen Doyen and doyenne (from the French word ''doyen'', ''doyenne'' in the feminine grammatical gender) is the senior ambassador by length of service in a particular country. In the English language, the meaning of doyen (feminine form: doyenne) ha ...

of the ancient astronaut theory. Agrest was a member of the Ancient Astronaut Society, and contributed a number of articles to the society's periodicals.

Publications

#Следы ведут в... космос? (Trail leads to... Space?), 9 February 1960 #КОСМОНАВТЫ ДРЕВНОСТИ (The Astronauts of Yore), 1961 #Des cosmonautes dans l'antiquité? (Cosmonauts in antiquity?), 1962 #Theory of Incomplete Cylindrical Functions and their Applications, co-authored with Michail S. Maksimov, 1971 #The Historical Evidence of Paleocontacts, 1994 #Paleocontact Ideas in the Middle Ages, 1994 #Experimental Proof of the Paleocontact Hypothesis, 1995

References

External links

Some of M. M. Agrest publications on his Paleocontact Hypothesis.M. M. Agrest web page.Monographs by M. M. Agrest
{{DEFAULTSORT:Agrest, Matest M. 1915 births 2005 deaths People from Mogilev District People from Mogilyovsky Uyezd (Mogilev Governorate) Soviet Jews Soviet emigrants to the United States Ancient astronauts proponents 20th-century Russian mathematicians Saint Petersburg State University alumni Soviet scientists