![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png) simont |
Mon 2015-08-03 09:57 |
Hmmm, I think I did read that once, but a long time ago and it didn't stick in my head.
Since my (not really well articulated) initial point was to try to avoid the trope that the only way archaeology can possibly be interesting in fiction is to have it conclude 'OMG all our ancient cultures' myths and religions were true after all!' (not to mention the bits about having to shoot lots of people and dodge rolling boulders), I think archaeology on alien planets is perhaps not disqualified for this exercise but probably ought to fall into a separate category.
('But wait,' you object, 'your own example of Nightfall is set on an alien planet!' Well, yes, but it's not alien to the characters – they're doing archaeology on their own home planet and investigating their own civilisational history, regardless of whether that planet and civilisation is also that of the readers.)
I can't remember what the Revelation Space archaeologist(s) found out, but I think that if they were to dig up massively powerful and still working (or fixable) SF tech from a departed alien civilisation, that's definitely out of scope for much the same reason as digging up the Ark of the Covenant, because that too would push the idea that archaeology that only finds out information is too boring to bother with. (The IPX digs in Babylon 5 are also disqualified on this basis, come to think of it.) |
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