Peter Kolosimo

by Sabrina Ruff

Biography

Peter Kolosimo is the pseudonym of Pier Domenico Colosimo, born in Modena, Italy in 1922. He attended the University of Leipzig and graduated with a degree in Germanic Philology. He soon found international fame with his book "Non e terrestre" or "Not of this World", which he went on to win on of Italy's prized literature awards for. In WWII he fought with Italy as a wagoner but deserted and fled to join the resistance in Bohemia. During this time he becomes a communist, pro-Soviet, and Stalinist, directing a radio program for a while before being forced underground during the Cold War and publishing science-fiction novels under the pseudonym Omega Jim. He published many more books, all widely popular and translated in 60 countries, including Russia, Japan, and China. In the 70s and early 80s until his death, he was the editor of many magazines, including Pi Kappa, a "fantarchaeologia" magazine covering the same topics that Kolosimo did in his books. He wrote a few books in his later wife with his wife, Caterina. He founded Italy's Association for Prehistoric Studies. His books covered many topics such as: Ancient Astronaut theories, anti-evolution theories, and atlantean theories. He died in Milan in 1984, and is remembered widely in his home country as well as by communist organizations as being a pioneer of not only space archaeology and ufology, but also his steadfast communist ideals. Kolosimo often met with other pseudoarchaeologists in his life, such as Robert Charroux and Raymond Drake, and all wrote about similar topics.

Ancient Astronaut Theory

Ancient Astronaut theory is characterized by the idea that humans in ancient times interacted with extraterrestrials and that these extraterrestrials helped civilization along to be what we are today. This in itself can take on very many sub-theories: that extraterrestrials mated with ancient women and bore a superhuman race, that these UFOs helped us build such fantastic ancient structures as the Great Pyramids, or built them themselves, or that the Gods that many ancient cultures worship were in fact aliens that visited our planet and taught the humans how to use advanced tools and weaponry. In Kolosimo's "Non e terrestre", he presents case after case of mysterious archaeological findings all over the world, and presents them to the reader as evidence of ancient aliens. Examples of this are a bison that was shot in the head with a bullet thousands of years before bullets were invented, and a theory that the Tunguska explosion was caused by an interplanetary cruiser with nuclear propulsion. He takes many examples from Soviet material, and often quotes the Soviet writer Alexander Kasanzev. As a communist himself, he believed strongly in the writings of other communists and Soviet scientists. He also calls on other works of fiction and takes them as fact, such as H.P. Lovecraft's work on Cthulhu. While he doesn't claim that Lovecraft's work At the Mountains of Madness is flat out truth, he does assert that it does have an underlying truth, although Lovecraft "dabbles in fantasies". In a review of Kolisimo's book, prolific writer and critic Jason Colavito stated that the book fabricates evidence, mistranslates sources, and conflates science fiction and fact. This is by far the least harsh treatment of this book that Kolosimo received, as many scholars deconstructed his theories and filed his claims under pseudohistory. In the book Philosophy of Science and Occult, Patrick Grim states that the ancient astronaut hypothesis, where possible, is weakly construed. They are scientifically unacceptable under even the most lenient scientific hypotheses criteria, including the standard Verstehen account, under which this theory falls short in not only the intuitive criteria as well as the philosophical. Furthermore, in an article published by H.E Legrand and Wayne E. Boese entitled "Chariots of the Gods? And All That: Pseudohistory in the Classroom", ancient astronauts establish their own rules for developing scientific theories based on archaeological evidence. Some of these rules are basing one's interpretations of the past on as broad a base of facts as possible, as well as selecting only the facts that would aid in that interpretation and ignoring others. In Kolosimo's case, the bison bullet hole was later found to be meteor shrapnel, and while scientists haven't yet found evidence of the cosmic body that struck Tunguska thousands of years ago, they have found evidence of comets that landed not far from ground zero around the same time, most likely debris from the larger body. There is a darker undertone to Kolosimo's works, and is most likely linked to his communist ideals. In Stalinist USSR, all ethnic communities were set to be purged from existence or deported, as all those who live under communism are considered one race and nationality, and any other ethnic community goes against this practice. Because of this, racist ideals permeated from the Soviet Union, and anyone pro-Stalin would have parroted these ideals. In Kolosimo's case, his claims that Native American burial mounds were built by ancient aliens and even goes so far as to say that these "redskins" are responsible for wiping out an ancient advanced civilization. He is claiming that these native populations were savages who were not advanced enough to have built such large structures as the mounds, and killed off the other, more advanced civilization of caucasians. Most, if not all, of the evidence provided by Kolosimo in his book can be debunked by simply looking at the facts. In the same way, Ancient Astronaut theorists are widely discredited due to simply looking at the full picture. The context, archaeological record, and historical record is pure fact and cannot be twisted when looked at correctly.

Theory of Atlantis and Other Vanished Races

While the majority of Kolosimo's writing was on ancient astronauts, he did write a fair bit on the theory of Atlantis.

Books

• Il pianeta sconosciuto (1957) Template:ISBN
• Terra senza tempo (1964; translated into English as Timeless Earth) Template:ISBN
• Ombre sulle stelle (1966) Template:ISBN
• Psicologia dell'eros (1967)
• Non è terrestre (1968; translated as Not of this World) Template:ISBN
• Guida al mondo dei sogni (1968)
• Il comportamento erotico degli europei (1970)
• Cittadini delle tenebre (1971)
• Astronavi sulla preistoria (1972; translated as Spaceships in Prehistory) Template:ISBN
• Odissea stellare (1974) Template:ISBN
• Fratelli dell'infinito (1975)
• Polvere d'inferno (1975)
• Italia mistero cosmico (1977) Template:ISBN
• Civiltà del silenzio (1978)
• Fiori di luna (1979)
• Io e l'indiano (1979)
• Viaggiatori del tempo (1981)
• I misteri dell'universo (1982, with Caterina Kolosimo)

Novels

• Fronte del sole or I cavalieri delle stelle (From Outer Space), De Vecchi, Milano 1979 (with Caterina Kolosimo)
• Missione uomo, Dizionari dell'Avventura n.9, Bruno Boggero e Giunti-Marzocco, 1982 (with Oscar Warner)

Editor

• Pi Kappa, rivista di mistero, archeologia ed esobiologia (director), I-II, Sugar, Milano 1972-1973
• Dimensione X, enciclopedia del mistero (coordinator), 1-10, Milano 1982
• Italia misteriosa (editor), Edipem, Milano 1984
• Scrutando nel futuro (editor), Edipem, Novara 1984