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Yes.

Giger's Necronom V (the main inspiration) could be based on that.

I also remember of some old French book,I forgot its name but I remember the cover of it having some old man sitting on the ground, looking throught the telescope with some boiler on his back and some tube going from the boiler to his beard,thats simmilar to the SJ design.

Absolutely, I recall seeing this before and linked to Giger's inspiration for the Jockey. I believe a lot of the Alien and Prometheus concepts were drawn from ancient Egyptian culture if I'm not mistaken.

More Egyptian references:

Here's some Greek/Roman reference from the set of AC that I just noticed.

Those walls and temple with humanoids climbing do look very Egyptian,Mayan and Greek.

Well the Engineers did come to Earth and taught humans alot of things like building temples etc.Weren't they?

@Dark Nebula

Terribly fascinating!

I encourage everyone do add on to this discussion, the mythic resonance of the ALIEN franchise is a truly awesome subject to explore and dwell upon.

Indeed i remember there was some other references from Ancient Cultures that are similar to the Space Jockey.  This could be just coincidence however..  but regardless when Prometheus picked up with the Space Jockey/Engineers being who Mankind interpreted as Ancient Gods from all Cultures then these references could now fit and even be explored upon.

There are a lot of similar themes in man ancient cultures which also include the Serpent/Dragon being depicted and the Eagle.

Here are some Mayan pieces that you could connect to the Space Jockey.

And this image next is similar to some Giger Work

I think you know the one, the Serpent with Xeno ish head in the chair that may inspired the Hammerpedes

some Carvings taken from Mayan Gods, that have been recreated via Wood and Stone Carvings.

These are actual carvings made to depict ancient Mayan Gods, and i am sure you could make a Engineer Connection, and also maybe Sacrificial Cup that creates Life... and also look at the Hat/Helmet and other elements... very Xenomorph you would agree.

Yet these are just coincidence surely... but since Prometheus went the route it did all these Ancient things can now fit into context of actual Engineer and Xeno Tech references.

Diving suit drawn by Hans Talhoffer back in the 15th century for the Thott manuscript

Yeah its interest and fun that we can find Ancient things that we could fit into Prometheus Movie Plot ;)

You could interpret this image as being Engineers and Creation, or even the Race above the Engineers who created them and the Top.. well like the Star Map/Orrey Room LOL

I wander if we are getting a re-design on the Hierachy above the Engineers that may have elongated heads? 

Some of the Prometheus Concepts, well work done while the first drafts was being done did feature such designs with the Engineers.

interesting, they're based off of Egyptian art

The Engineer temple

Mayan temple

The head 

The African statue of Mussolini's head

Egyptian Sphinx

Humanoids on the steps of the temple

Victims of Pompeii

The rest of the ruins

And I could go on forever

The works of Dali like shown above seem also to be an influence. Nice catch.

Indeed Dark Nebula some good comparisons and the Steps at the Scene of Disaster and then the Mayan Temple is a good point and could be the steps to a very similar Temple.

I did a Topic Called Paradise that was to cover mainly the look of Paradise from not only its lush environments that are very Tropical Rain Forest meets more Wooded Land Forest like Endor lol...

In this Topic i also posted Mayan Temples that had now been partially covered within the Jungle and Vegetation and some of these are under so much Vegetation that many had gone years without being discovered.

To me the set photos showed we would uncover more about the Engineers Culture and Civilization or at least the ruins of it.

The statues due have that Greek look to them but i would assume our Engineer Statues will remain Bald.

And so this image that Facehuggers posted fits the bill very much for how that toppled and headless Statue would have looked and indeed also how the beings in that Scene of Disaster Looked.

I think this scene is interesting one, as some speculated its very Pompeii.... and so maybe people discover just the remains of Petrified Engineers that this Scene shows... i.e they are Frozen in time like the Pompeii ones .... they was due to hot ash etc.... and its a wander what would cause the same to those beings in Alien Covenant..

I however am on the side of the fence that wanders if this is a action shot, and not a still..  First of all if it was a still they would have be best to use props and not Actors/Actresses etc. But some of the positions in the other scenes could be hard to position standing still... but they could be Props still that are bolted to the ground.

However what would be the purpose of this scene unless it was something discovered by David or the Covenant Crew which then we have to wander about the Scale...  If these are Engineers then having Props with Humans walking near them would not work for the scale of the Engineers who was revised to 10ft for Prometheus but of course we only got 8ft Tops impression.

But if they are Props they could be made larger... but then looking at these beings and actual people on set (Production Crew) in some of the images... these beings are Human Height but maybe they could be a earlier kind of Human?

I think this is going to be a flash back scene myself, and i still hope it would feature Action in some way... another thing is if it was the remains of beings killed even within 10 years of the Covenant arriving never mind thousands of years ago, we have to ask what means would make them become preserved like statues?

If the movie is revolving around the Black Goo, this does not add up to a disaster that can leave bodies frozen solid for years if not thousands.

@BigDave

Interesting hypothesizes! You raise many good points, especially with the "flashback disaster" scene.

Perhaps it isn't even a flashback at all, maybe David hacked into an engineer's dream sequence!

this is a wild thread!  :D

@Hawley Griffin

Hahaha!!! Indeed!  :)

We have to think how a Flash Back could work..

It could have no reason but to try and Narrate Visually something important that happened to the Audience such as the Sacrificial Scene... it was there so latter when Shaw finds the DNA Match and then we can connect the Clues like Cave Paintings the Sacrificial Scene is then where we look back and Go.... Thats how we was created!

So it could be a scene like that...

Or it could be a sign set up from a Question...  Maybe Shaw asks, maybe one of the Covenant Crew asks.....  That David knows the answers a little from what he has studied or maybe seen as written reccord by the Engineers.

So they ask David, what does that writing say, or what happened here?

David would then start to tell them something... and then we go to the Flash Back as a Visual Narrative to support what David is saying.

Thats what i feel we would be in for.... but who knows.

@BigDave

To add to what you said about the importance of this scene compared to the sacrifice scene in Prometheus...  It could be the opening scene, kind of mirroring the sacrifice scene in that it would be the first thing we see and could be relevant to a later point in the plot.  

I wonder if they knew about these things when they designed the space jockey scene for Alien at least it seems interesting.

Good points

BigDave:

That tan statue of a man in robes, bald, looks like an Engineer. Is that a Covenant set photo? If so then they are showing the origins of the Engineers for sure. Same with the bodies at the temple. We're going to be shown everything about the Engineers imo.

In regards to your flashback ideas. I highly doubt that there will be actual flashbacks. It depends on what you mean by flashback.

In Prometheus we're shown "flashbacks" by with the aid of technology (David watching Shaws dreams)(Holograph recording of LV223 incident). I think the story of the engineers will be shown in real time with the characters watching it all happen via some technology or spaceship recorder. When you show it to the audience this way, you can get away with extreme vaguity, fog, haziness such as Shaws dreams. When shown this way, scale may not be a factor. The bodies on the temple may not even be ash statues. It could all have been created for a 2 second fuzzy shot that wont mean anything or can't be scrutinized closely. Such as the burial procession in Shaws dream, her and her father are near water but I couldn't tell you much about the background such as boats or rowers etc...the eye is directed away from the negative space background.

All these leaked set photos are just negative space, back ground filling, totally irrelevant to the plot and the movie. We won't even notice that they were in the movie probably it will happen so fast, like one second, but some set designer spent 2 weeks building a statue that no one will notice lol.

Anyway, to everyone, they haven't given too much away yet. A few photos and a poster aint going to ruin it. Ive been purposely avoiding some content because I don't want the movie ruined for me.

Trailers ALWAYS ruin movies. I will not be watching the Covenant trailer period, Ill turn my head, close my eyes and block my ears.

Furthermore, after Ive seen it at theatres, I will not being visiting fansites or reading reviews etc for atleast a Year. I want to fully take it in. Buy the DVD, watch it 40 times. Form a theory and then talk with others.

When I saw Prometheus, I was BLOWN AWAY and in LOVE with the movie. I made the mistake of going online and people absolutely ruined it for me! All the criticism and hate for such a brilliant movie. It hurt me bro. It took time to re-love that movie from how I felt the first time.

With Alien Covenant, I'd like to love the movie for a while before some jerk ruins it for me. Watch the trailer all you want brothers but Id rather go in blind and come out blind so that it can brew inside me.

"That tan statue of a man in robes, bald, looks like an Engineer. Is that a Covenant set photo?"

No its some ancient Greek one i think, someone posted it on here the other week.

I do however think it would be what the Engineers or at least those beings in that Temple Staircase scene/Disaster would look like.

I think we would get Flash Backs... as in the Sacrificial Prologue from Prometheus. So it would be detailed.

This Set Photo... features Human Height beings.... Why make Human Sized Props that are like Statues?  For just a short scene?

Why make them if they are to be shown as frozen that way some how.... and have interaction with the Human Crew?

If these are Engineers then why not build larger Models?

If they are Actors and its a Action scene then again, i doubt it would be a scene where Humans interact.

it will be a scene like the Sacrificial One... feature a event from the past related to the Engineers and what became of them

all these people that we see in theo leaked photo they are human to me not engineer,considering covenant carring lots of people , I would say they all covenant passenger .

Yes, the material about the Sokar Funerary Barque, the Salvador Dali drawing, and Diving suit drawn by Hans Talhoffer back in the 15th century for the Thott manuscript and their possible connections with the Space Jockey were explored a good while back at my blog Alien Explorations. Giger loved Egyptian imagery, he loved Dali's imagery and I don't know if he saw the Thott manuscript or not, but it was interesting for me to find. Meanwhile the Necronom V painting does seem to have echoes of the Sokar Funerary Barque in it and indeed that painting goes in several other directions as well http://alienexplorations.blogspot.co.uk/2009/02/paintings-that-inspired-space-jockey.html

Very interested to read about that French book cover design, Dark Nebula, I wish you could remember what it was from.

Found it.

Its called Les Exilés de la Terre by french author André Laurie,from 1888.

That's a wonderfully interesting and fascinating book cover. So it's a man with a beard like breathing mask connected to an air tank and this would have been a 19th Century idea for moon walking equipment.  I've looked at already how Giger would have directly referenced a dozen different things for his Space Jockey, but this ought to be something in the background of his thoughts if he had the chance to see it. I would say that Dali based his "Dali Martian Muni D'un Double Microscope Holoelectronique" illustration seen amongst the images the top of this thread on this wonderful illustration.

@Wmmvrrvrrmm Nice to see you on the boards again, been a while!

Well, the cover from Les Exilés De La Terre and it's relationship with the Dali illustration and its relationship with the Space Jockey design through Dali's work is now blogged at my AlienExplorations blog. http://alienexplorations.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/salvador-dalis-martian-dali-equipped.html