[AM2000]

What theories? (excuse my ignorance)

[laredo44]

Von Daniken wrote a book (it was also made into a movie or TV show) called Chariots of the Gods in which he argued that aliens settled or somehow influenced life on earth. He used various "mysteries" from around the globe to support his thesis. This iron pole being one, as well as the heads on Easter Island. Other stuff included:

1. Inca walls of irregular stone blocks weighing tons each that were fitted together with with such precision, a knife blade couldn't be slipped between them. (One wonders why the aliens came all this way to build things out of stone).
2. Aztec paintings of men in unusual costumes and headgear that he claimed were space suits.
3. Long lines etched into fields of South America that he asserted were landing strips for alien craft (even we didn't use airliner technology on our crude -- by interstellar standards -- forays to the moon).
4. Gigantic etchings, spiders, birds, etc., on the surface that could only be discerned from an aircraft. Von Daniken called them navigation markers for alien craft (they came here from another star but needed ground markings to figure out where they were?).