Record: the document says itPattern: documents line upKilled: failed the testCode: a stated code
Year: 1206 · Places: Central America, Africa
SUMMARYVimanas: what holds and what fails [Connections: old-world tech, Nov 6, 2026]
CODEThe Pushpaka Vimana flies in the Ramayana: a text describing a flying chariot; no physical craft found
KILLED (as ancient)The Vaimānika Shāstra. Dictated by Pandit Subbaraya Shastry (died 1941), written down by G. V. Sharma, drawings by Ellappa; an Indian Institute of Science team (H. S. Mukunda et al., Scientific Opinion, 1974) found it "cannot be dated earlier than 1904" and that the craft could not fly ("poor concoctions"). Keep it as a 20th-century CODE source only
RECORD (real ancient machines)Antikythera mechanism (gear computer, c. 150–60 BCE); Hero of Alexandria's steam aeolipile (1st c. CE); Zhang Heng's seismoscope (132 CE); Delhi Iron Pillar (c. 400 CE, rust-resistant); wootz steel with carbon nanotubes (Reibold et al., Nature, 2006); Roman self-healing concrete (Science Advances, 2023); Banu Musa (850) and al-Jazari (1206) automata
PATTERNGreat Zimbabwe got the same "mystery race" treatment as the mounds (P542): Rhodesia pressured archaeologists to deny Africans built it
SOURCEIISc study PDF (Mukunda et al., 1974); oldtech.json.