| When the Gods Died | |
| Title Orig: | Als die Götter starben |
| Author: | Günther Krupkat |
| Cover Artist: | Martin Kotsch |
| Language: | German |
| Genre: | Science fiction novel |
| Publisher: | Das Neue Berlin, Berlin |
| Release Date: | 1982 |
| Media Type: | Print (Hardcover & Paperback) |
Als die Götter starben (When the Gods Died) is a 1963 science fiction novel by German author Günther Krupkat about contact between humans and an alien race from the distant planet "Meju." After the discovery of alien diaries on the Martian moon Phobos in the 21st century, a frame narrative tells the interconnected stories of human power struggles in ancient Mesopotamia and alien flight from a distant planet following a cataclysm. A 1989 poll ranked it as the seventh most popular East German science fiction novel.[1]