I think "ancient cultures" is a difficult concept in this context, but perhaps something like this is what you are looking for?

It would seem, too, that the Egyptians were the first people to establish solemn assemblies, and processions, and services; the Greeks learned all that from them. I consider this proved, because the Egyptian ceremonies are manifestly very ancient, and the Greek are of recent origin.

Herodotus, The Histories, II.58

Hesiod, in Works and Days, talks about different ages of the past, a golden, silver and bronze generation, then the Heroic comes after those:

...a god-like race of hero-men who are called demi-gods, the race before our own, throughout the boundless earth. Grim war and dread battle destroyed a part of them, some in the land of Cadmus at seven- gated Thebe when they fought for the flocks of Oedipus, and some, when it had brought them in ships over the great sea gulf to Troy for rich-haired Helen's sake...

While the gold/silver/bronze stuff seems pretty mythologised, the Heroic age was considered pretty historical - the buildings and ruins of the Mycenaean period were still evident in lots of places.

While the Greeks had recovered or surpassed a lot of Mycenaean architectural skill by the classical period, this was not the case c. 700 when Hesiod was writing. One of my classics lecturers thought that the grandeur or Mycenaean buildings (compared to what could be done in the first couple centuries after their decline) was one of the things that led to such heroic tales as the Iliad.