Zecharia Sitchin was born on July 11, 1920. He graduated from the University of London and worked as a journalist and editor in Israel for many years. He was an author of books promoting an explanation for human origins involving ancient astronauts. His first book, The Twelfth Planet, was published in 1976. He also wrote the Earth Chronicles series. He died on October 9, 2010.
Zecharia Sitchin (1920-2010), an eminent Orientalist and biblical scholar, was born in Russia and grew up in Palestine, where he acquired a profound knowledge of modern and ancient Hebrew, other Semitic and European languages, the Old Testament, and the history and archaeology of the Near East. A graduate of the University of London with a degree in economic history, he worked as a journalist and editor in Israel for many years prior to undertaking his life's work--The Earth Chronicles. One of the few scholars able to read the clay tablets and interpret ancient Sumerian and Akkadian, Sitchin based The Earth Chronicles series on the texts and pictorial evidence recorded by the ancient… civilizations of the Near East. His books have been widely translated, reprinted in paperback editions, converted to Braille for the blind, and featured on radio and television programs.