Early attempts at Human Spaceflight

In the early Christian era, a Greek satirist named Lucian wrote a book on space flight called True Histories. The book was full of tall, unbelieveable tales and travelogues on visits to the sun and the moon. Today, the book could easily be discarded as the fantasy of a people of a bygone era. But it was significant in the sense that it kindled the curiosities of the people of the day and stimulated interest in outer space and space travel.
In 1638, a Christian writer from England named Wilkins wrote a book on moon travel and suggested four methods to accomplish it. Firstly, he said, the divine soul could take man to the moon; secondly, some large and powerful birds could transport man to the moon; thirdly, man himself could make the journey by tying wings to his arms and fourthly, he said, a flying machine could transport man to the moon.
American author Herbert S. Zim claimed in 1945 that there is a Chinese legend where a scientist named Wan Hu in the early Ming dynasty attempted to travel through space with the help of rockets. In the story, Wan tied 47 rockets filled with explosives to the chair in which he was sitting and ignited them. There was a large explosion, but when the smoke cleared Wan Hu was gone and never seen again.