Was there such a thing as atheism in ancient times....? Or were they only considered as false religions...?

Blessings to all. Although the term atheism originated in the 16th century—based on Ancient Greek ἄθεος "godless, denying the gods, ungodly"[1]—and open admission to positive atheism in modern times was not made earlier than in the late 18th century, atheistic ideas and beliefs, as well as their political influence, have a more expansive history.

The spontaneous proposition that there may be no gods after all is logically as old as theism itself (and the proposition that there may be no God as old as the beginnings of monotheism or henotheism). Philosophical atheist thought appears in Europe and Asia from the 6th or 5th century BCE.

Will Durant explains that certain Pygmy tribes found in Africa were observed to have no identifiable cults or rites. There were no totems, no gods, no spirits. Their dead were buried without special ceremonies or accompanying items and received no further attention. They even appeared to lack simple superstitions, according to travelers' reports. The Vedahs of Ceylon, only admitted the possibility that gods might exist, but went no further. Neither prayers nor sacrifices were suggested in any way began in the Greek world in the 6th century BCE. The first philosophers were not atheists, but they attempted to explain the world in terms of the processes of nature instead of by mythological accounts. Thus lightning was the result of "wind breaking out and parting the clouds,"[9] and earthquakes occurred when "the earth is considerably altered by heating and cooling."[10] The early philosophers often criticised traditional religious notions. Xenophanes (6th century BCE) famously said that if cows and horses had hands, "then horses would draw the forms of gods like horses, and cows like cows."[11] Another philosopher, Anaxagoras (5th century BCE), claimed that the Sun was "a fiery mass, larger than the Peloponnese;" a charge of impiety was brought against him, and he was forced to flee Athens.[12]

The first fully materialistic philosophy was produced by the Atomists, Leucippus and Democritus (5th century BCE), who attempted to explain the formation and development of the world in terms of the chance movements of atoms moving in infinite space.

Euripides (480–406 BCE), in his play Bellerophon, had the eponymous main character say: “Doth some one say that there be gods above? There are not; no, there are not. Let no fool, Led by the old false fable, thus deceive you.”[ In the 5th century BCE the Sophists began to question many of the traditional assumptions of Greek culture. Prodicus of Ceos was said to have believed that "it was the things which were serviceable to human life that had been regarded as gods,"[15] and Protagoras stated at the beginning of a book that "With regard to the gods I am unable to say either that they exist or do not exist."[16]

Diagoras of Melos (5th century BCE) is known as the "first atheist". He blasphemed by making public the Eleusinian Mysteries and discouraging people from being initiated.[17] Somewhat later (c. 300 BCE), the Cyrenaic philosopher Theodorus of Cyrene is supposed to have denied that gods exist, and wrote a book On the Gods expounding his views.

Euhemerus (c. 330–260 BCE) published his view that the gods were only the deified rulers, conquerors and founders of the past, and that their cults and religions were in essence the continuation of vanished kingdoms and earlier political structures.[18] Although Euhemerus was later criticized for having "spread atheism over the whole inhabited earth by obliterating the gods",[19] his worldview was not atheist in a strict and theoretical sense, because he differentiated that the primordial gods were "eternal and imperishable".[20] Some historians have argued that he merely aimed at reinventing the old religions in the light of the beginning deification of political rulers such as Alexander the Great.[21] Euhemerus' work was translated into Latin by Ennius, possibly to mythographically pave the way for the planned divinization of Scipio Africanus in Rome.

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I couldn't say for sure but my best guess is that there was. And it depends on how ancient you are talking about.

Some of the ancient religions depended on trickery to get the population to believe in them.

The ones performing the trickery couldn't be said to be true believers, could they?

Using the era when the Holy Bible was written, and the book itself, atheism was simply never mentioned. But since the books were written as scripture and with a specific agenda in mind (conversion) then there is really no reason why they would have mentioned it.

That scripture lumps EVERYONE into 'us' and 'them' without making any distinction between the various 'thems'. And the primary objective was to wrest people away from the existing religions.

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Ancient civilization like China had always been atheistic, though there were religions like Taoism but it was not adopted nationwide/empirewide since religion was never forced onto the population. Buddhism was introduced into China in the 5th century AD, and again, there was freedom of religious beliefs in China. That is the reason that most literatures, music, folk songs for the past couple of millenium did not have any religious connotations.

Socrates was an atheist. According to records, the govt first arrested him for teaching people that the gods are not real, but the stories are myths to teach us something. They let him go with a warning that if he continues, he'll be in bigger trouble. He continued... they arrested him and supposedly forced him to drink poison. It is said he drank Hemlock - highly poisonous. If that is so, that poor man died a horrible death that probably took a couple of days.... all because he was telling people that the stories are meant for us to learn something.... not to worship gods.

So there were plenty of atheists. And, by the way, during the 1st century, Christians were called atheists because they didn't believe in the Roman gods. Ironic how upset so many get today over atheism.

The ancient civilizations were charting the stars and predicting the eclipses.

Science was their understanding of nature and its energies. There was no need for Atheism.

Religion came like a sore thumb and threw everything out of balance.

There are no ancient times in kNOW

There are no they in US-WARD

There is no false in PURE RELIGION

So stop being "double minded" = "unstable",

and notably unstable both "ways" in James 1.

Get above making sides, taking a side

to avoid the side effects of a sides war.

A more excellent way, of three, is

neither broad nor narrow mindead.

Even though I was alive in ancient times I am pretty certain there were atheist then as well as there are today.

'theism' as we know it came later

but as sentience evolved superstition and spiritual beliefs evolved with it because people didn't have a clue about anything. I doubt there were any hardcore objective rational thinkers back then.

"false" relgions have a way of morphing into "true" religions over the passage of time--look at Judism and it's babylonian and sumerian origins.

Religion came long after cavemen and women went about their day...