Precursors: Difference between revisions

''The Elder Race still learn and grow''

''Their power grows with purpose strong''

 

Also known as "ancients." They are a standard fixture of much science fiction and fantasy: an ancient race whose culture and knowledge rose to its pinnacle in ages long past but which is now extinct or [[Ascended to A Higher Plane of Existence]]. In science fiction settings, they are usually considered the ''first'' race to have gained sentience in the universe or galaxy, giving them a noticeable leg up on everybody else; in fantasy settings, they will usually be the original, pinnacle sentient species created by the gods/God. At their height, they are usually rumored to have been capable of doing (and have done) just about anything, up to and including creating intelligent species and reworking entire worlds with a snap of a finger, and almost any strange and persistent mystery in the story's [[The Verse|'verse]] is usually laid at their feet. They may have been [[Sufficiently Advanced Alien|sufficiently advanced]], or just much better than everyone else with technology/magic, but either way they left their mark, a mark that remains to this day.

Sometimes the Precursors can be rediscovered; usually nobody—especially not the Precursors themselves—is happy with that. This also applies to the audience: the romance of Precursors can be easily shattered by giving too much away.

 

 

Very commonly used to [[Justified Trope|justify]] [[Rubber Forehead Aliens]]: everyone was made from a common template by the Precursors, so they look pretty similar.

 

 

{{examples}}

== Anime and Manga ==

* In ''[[The Mysterious Cities of Gold]]'' the Mu Empire and [[Atlantis]] developed highly advanced society and technology but were wiped out, along with [[Schizo-Tech|(most of)]] their technology, by a nuclear war.

 

 

 

== Film ==

* The Martians in the [[The Takeshi Kovacs Series|Takeshi Kovacs]] books. Note: not actually from Mars; it just happened to be the first planet on which humans found their stuff.

* In David Brin's ''[[Uplift]]'' universe, every intelligent race in the galaxy was Uplifted (engineered to sentience and given access to the Great Library) by a previous one, save the first. The Progenitors (self-evolved, now extinct) are [[God Guise|considered the next thing to gods]]. A race's clout in the galactic hierarchy is in part determined by how close they are to having been created directly by the Progenitors. Then along come the Humans, who have discovered hyperdrive and reached the stars alone, with no patron race and a complete fossil record that indicates they evolved naturally. It's practically heretical! It doesn't help matters (from the galactic standpoint) that humans have already Uplifted chimps and dolphins, too.

* [[C. J. Cherryh]]'s ''[[Morgaine Cycle]]'', dedicated to [[Andre Norton]], features a protagonist who—ironically—is on a mission to destroy a ''[[Stargate Verse|Stargate]]'' network, which was created originally by copying a single artifact (left on a long-dead world by [[Neglectful Precursors]]) to establish each new node in the network.

* [[Alan Dean Foster]]'s ''[[Humanx Commonwealth]]'' series has humanity and its allies expanding into a significantly used universe, with a wide variety of species at various stages of development from primitive to superadvanced to completely extinct. Several of these, most notably the Xunca, the Tar-Aiym, and the Hur'rikku, had a profound impact on the earlier history of the galaxy and left numerous [[Phlebotinum|artifacts]] [[Neglectful Precursors|lying around]] after they variously departed. The Xunca are actually still around, but they packed up and moved to a different galaxy to avoid an encroaching [[Eldritch Abomination]] that the modern day protagonists now have to deal with.

* In [[Larry Niven]]'s ''[[Known Space]]'' universe, there are ''two'' sets of precursors. First there were the Thrintun (AKA "Slavers"), who seeded the galaxy with the ingredients of life so it would grow and evolve into unique delicacies for them to eat (being hypnotic slavers, they were defeated by the [[wikipedia:Tnuctip|Tnuctipun]] in the inevitable [[Turned Against Their Masters]], and they [[Omnicidal Maniac|took all sentient life with them]]. Talk about [[Neglectful Precursors|bad parenting]]). Then there were the Pak, a race of more recent aliens with three life stages (child, breeder, Protector) only sentient in the third stage, and programmed to be homicidal to anything that could conceivably threaten their descendants (mutations were not recognized). Earth was a [[Lost Colony]] of them who couldn't advance to Protector stage when their supply of tree-of-life root ran out due to a lack of thallium in Earth's soil. They left behind lost colonies and random apelike animals all over, including {{spoiler|the [[Ringworld]], which they had built and abandoned}}.

* [[Andre Norton]] worked with this trope in both her science fiction and fantasy novels. She wrote a lot of space opera novels featuring relics of various lost civilizations, collectively called "Forerunners". She was one of the early developers of the abandoned-gateway-between-worlds idea that the ''[[Stargate Verse|Stargate]]'' films and TV series are based on; one of her Forerunner cultures left behind such a network, which younger species, including humans, have started to explore.

* Frederik Pohl's ''[[Heechee Saga|Gateway]]'' and its sequels set many of the standards for this trope. Humanity has stumbled on an space station abandoned by the local Precursors, the Heechee, and try to use the [[Faster-Than-Light Travel]] spacecraft left behind to search for alien artifacts to reverse-engineer. The destinations are pre-programmed and can only be accessed randomly, making exploration a dangerous crapshoot. Some of the survivors return rich; many return dead, if they return at all.

* In the Carl Sagan novel ''[[Contact (Literature)|Contact]]'' and the movie based on it, an unknown ancient race of aliens built the "cosmic subway system" of wormhole transportation used to bring a single human to meet the successor aliens who inherited the system.

* In Charles Sheffield's Heritage Universe novels, the Builders left behind artifacts the size of ''planets''—e.g. Cocoon, the first such artifact discovered by humans, was so named because that's what it looks like if you're far enough away from the planet it surrounds. A whole discipline of [[Adventurer Archaeologist]]s exists to study Builder artifacts.

* In the Strugatsky Brothers' ''[[Noon Universe]]'' series, the Wanderers may or may not be still active, but they fit this trope closely enough because the humans only ever find the traces of their continued and enigmatic work. They seem to be "progressing" the other civilisations, but their activities often enough utterly screw over local civilisations, though it [[Omniscient Morality License|might be for their ultimate good in some way anyway]].

** Some elven kingdoms are precursors to the people of Middle Earth.

** Numenor and Arnor. Even though Gondor [[Vestigial Empire|still exists]] and so Numenorean civilization is not completely gone. However it is gone from the Northern part of Middle Earth.

* In Terry Pratchett's novel ''[[Strata]]'', the Precursors built the titular strata machines reverse-engineered by humans for building planets, and other techology that humans didn't already develop themselves. In ''[[The Dark Side of the Sun]]'', the Precursors called "Jokers" were known only for the mark they made on the universe of building [[A God Am I|blatantly impossibly things]] for no known reason but [[Great Gazoo|the lulz]].

* Every known non-human race in Andrey Livadny's ''[[The History of the Galaxy]]'' series can be considered a precursor, as four of them are at least 3 millions of years old, while several others are ''billions'' of years old. Humanity is the youngest known race, even though their technology level means they are strong enough to kick everyone else's backsides should the need arise. It helps that most of those races have long ago passed the peak of the civilization. In fact, two of them spent several million years as slaves, degrading their technology to the point where they forgot about their former greatness.

* Sergey Lukyanenko's ''[[A Lord From Planet Earth]]'' series features the Seeders, mysterious ancient beings who have left highly-advanced artifacts, some of which are [[Black Box]]es, while others are understood and adapted fairly well. They have also left mysterious spherical temples on every inhabited world (except Earth). It is eventually revealed that the Seeders are {{spoiler|humans from the future, who have seeded their past with humanoid races and advanced technology to create an army to fight an extragalactic enemy (Earth was left undisturbed to avoid messing with history)}}.

* In [[Robert E. Howard]]'s ''[[Conan the Barbarian]]'' story "[[Iron Shadows in the Moon|Shadows in The Moonlight]]" Olivia thinks a god had been there in [[Dreaming of Times Gone By|times she dreamed of]], even though absent now.

* From ''[[Babylon 5]]'', the "First Ones", who have all mostly emigrated "beyond the rim of the galaxy," although some remain lurking about in known space; especially Lorien, the "First One," literally the first sentient being in the galaxy. Not to mention {{spoiler|the Vorlons and the Shadows}}, which drive the main plots of the entire series.

* ''[[Doctor Who]]'' sometimes paints the Time Lords like this. At the dawn of their civilisation, they sent a star supernova, and caged the resulting black hole to fuel their time travel. They fought several wars against other primordial races (notably the [[Our Vampires Are Different|Great Vampires]]), driving them to virtual extinction. They were even worshipped as gods on at least one planet, until their technological gifts [[You Are Not Ready|backfired]], and they instituted a policy of non-interference. The [[Expanded Universe]] attributes the widespread presence of [[Human Aliens]] in the setting to them (offering multiple versions of the reasons why).

* The Eidolons from ''[[Farscape]]'', who once controlled an entire galaxy through their power to induce "rationality and tranquility" in others before their near-extinction several millennia ago. For good measure, they are actually responsible for the creation of {{spoiler|the Peacekeepers and the Sebacean race as a whole, having abducted primitive humans from Earth and altered them to act as bodyguards.}}

** Subverted in the case of ''[[Farscape]]'s'' Ancients, who, despite the name and their status as a [[Dying Race]], aren't precursors at all. In fact, in spite of their impressive technology, they've actually gone out of the way to make sure that nobody knows about them unless absolutely necessary: {{spoiler|this is because they were sent from another dimension to monitor the development of wormhole technology.}}

== Table Top Games ==

* ''[[Mutants and Masterminds]]'' have this in the form of the "Preservers" in Freedom City.

** ''[[Forgotten Realms]]'' had many races that dominated Faerûn and the rest of Toril before humans: dwarves and giants, elves before them, and before the elves dragons, who appeared as invasive species and put an end to the rule of earlier "Creator Races" (called so for numerous offshots and tweaked lifeforms they left behind).

*** The creator races included the reptilian Sarrukh, the amphibian batrachians, the birdlike aeree, and [[The Fair Folk|the fey]].

* The Ancients of ''[[Traveller]]''.

* The Mnoren of ''[[The Fantasy Trip]]''. Actually, the Mnoren are probably precursors of Precursors for the above two examples, given that TFT was published first and involved a lot of the same people.

* The Thran in ''[[Magic: The Gathering|Magic the Gathering]]''.

* Iron Crown Enterprise's ''Spacemaster'' has the Sianetic Harbingers, a long dead (?) race of beings that seeded the Galaxy with humanoid life. They were powerful telepaths and had a level of technology that dwarfs modern Terran equipment. Their artifacts and ruins are both desired and feared.

** ''Privateers'' campaign setting. The Architects seeded life on many planets 4 billion years ago and guided the evolution of the seven major races until quite recently, then disappeared. Very little is known about them in-universe.

* ''[[Exalted]]'' does this several times with it's [[Crystal Spires and Togas|First Age]], [[Adventure Towns|Second Age]], and [[Earth All Along|possibly]] the [[Crapsack World|Sixth]] [[Old World of Darkness|Age]]. It even has [[Dinosaurs Are Dragons|0th Age]] and [[Eldritch Abominations|-1st Age]] civilizations that few inhabitants are aware of.

 

== Toys ==

* ''[[Assassin's Creed]]'' has subtle nods to some kind of Precursor civilization, known as "Those Who Came Before", in the form of various ancient artifacts the Templars are hunting for. ''[[Assassin's Creed II]]'' {{spoiler|outright confirms their former existence thousands of years ago, where they are said to have created humanity in their image as a slave race, along with said (highly technological) artifacts with which they used to mind-control the human race. But two humans, Adam and Eve, immune to the effects of the artifacts, started [[Turned Against Their Masters|a massive human rebellion]] which led to a war that distracted both parties from a coming catastrophe until it was to late. The apocalyptic event killed the majority of both species, forcing the remnants of each to work together to rebuild. Though they succeed in rebuilding, the humans were able to repopulate, whilst Those Who Came Before were too few. Real life gods are, in the ''AC'' universe, apparently distorted retellings of their existence.}} Also, {{spoiler|the Assassins (including Desmond's bloodline) are the result Those Who Came Before attempting to give their human servants access to their "sixth sense" of "knowledge" by creating hybrids of their DNA and that of humans.}}

* In ''[[EVE Online]],'' ''we'' are the precursors. We used the EVE wormhole to travel to the Galaxy of EVE, but when the wormhole collapsed, so to did civilization in EVE, and as new civilizations formed, their origins faded into myth and legend.

* The Zilart of ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]''. A few of them still remain but most of them are relatively insane and/or genocidal. {{spoiler|Only two Zilartians favor the current civilizations at all, and one of them Ascended to a Higher Plane of Existence}}.

* The "Ancients" from ''[[Free Space]]'' fit this trope, although for once we actually get a [[Apocalyptic Log|detailed history of their annihilation]] at the hands of the Shivans. (They recorded this so that later races would be warned not to piss the Shivans off... or, having failed that, would have some insight into the Shivans' [[Fling a Light Into the Future|weaknesses]]). The [[Big Bad|Shivans]] themselves qualify as Precursors in some respects: while not extinct, their technology is far more advanced than humans' and they've been that advanced for at least 8,000 years. There are [[Epileptic Trees]] both in-game and out about the origins of the Shivans (whether they were created as weapons by an even older race), and exactly how long they've been at their xenocidal mission (one character muses that there might be multiple Precursors extending far back in time, each annihilated by the Shivans when they grew too powerful and the later ones founding empires on the ruins of those that came before). [[Shrug of God|None of this has been confirmed nor denied by the authors.]]

** It's also revealed that the Protheans themselves had their own Precursor race to learn from. And so on, and so forth. Each cycle leaves something behind for the next one to find. The ultimate artifact appears to be the {{spoiler|Crucible}}, whose construction started millions of years ago and was continued each cycle by a new race culminating in {{spoiler|humanity ([[Multiple Endings|possibly]]) finishing the Crucible and using it to wipe out the Reapers}}.

* In ''[[Metroid]]'', although they raised Samus to adulthood and had extensive contact with faraway races like the Luminoth, Elysia, and even the Federation, the Chozo have vanished from all known space. Their entire legacy consists of decayed ruins, cryptic messages for Samus, and the odd upgrade module for her Power Suit. And, of course, the Metroids themselves.

* The Ancients from the ''[[Might and Magic]]'' universe (at least when it was in the hands of New World Computing) were creating various worlds out of the four elements and seeding them with life as part of a great experiment. Their true agenda is never entirely revealed but there are hints that they had a specific outcome in mind for most of their worlds, before the Creators and the Kreegan interfered.

** Between ''VI'', ''VII'' and ''VIII'', it was established that whatever their original agenda was, their ''current'' goal is 'Stop the Kreegans'. The settings of the games (and the novels) just happen to be in the galactic arm that was cut off from the [[Portal Network|Gateweb]], and the Ancients are a bit too busy with the Kreegan to bother restoring it (especially as the cause of the breach was Kreegan infiltration of the gate network).

* The ''[[Myst]]'' series of games gradually reveals that the long-lost civilization of D'ni was actually located on Earth; its founders originally ''came from'' an alternate universe, but they founded a city [[Beneath the Earth]]. However, the D'ni are not the ancestors of humans; the existence of a nearly identical race on the surface appears to be pure coincidence (although the Earth was specifically chosen because it was known to be hospitable to our kind of life).

* ''[[Pac-Man|Pac Man World 3]]'' features the Ancients (possibly members or ancestors of Pac-Man's spherical race), about whose lives little is known, although their deaths comprise a well-known story 'of greed, of tampering with unknown forces, and of running and screaming and dying', to quote an in-game archaeologist. As it turns out, the Ancients were wiped out when they tried to siphon energy from the Spectral Realm (the Pac-Man universe's afterlife), [[History Repeats|which is exactly what the game's villain is trying to do in the present]].

* The ''[[Star Ocean]]'' series plays with this trope. The games are filled with Out of Place Artifacts, mystical technologies such as the time gate on the apparently sentient planet Styx, and near the middle of the third game, there's even a precursor-like group of beings called the Executioners who rain havoc upon ALL the races of the galaxy. It turns out {{spoiler|that the universe is actually a video game called the Eternal Sphere, and all the Precursor like artifacts, including the Executioners, were planted by the programmer.}}

* ''[[Sword of the Stars]]'' Morrigi are actually still around -- [[Cultural Posturing|and very smug about it]]—but until the last expansion, they had to quietly limp into hiding thanks to the efforts of the [[Abusive Precursors|rather less nice variety of Precusors]]. And then the [[Space Whale|Liir]] had to go and kill off the bad kind of Precursors, allowing the Morrigi to return.

** Averted somewhat since the Titans still hang out and occasionally interact with mortals. Borders on a case of [[Redundant Researcher]] since there are multiple groups (mostly Dwarves) studying Titan relics and artifacts in an attempt to figure out their history, meanwhile players in Northrend interact with actual living Titans on a fairly regular basis.

*** [[Word of God|Chris Metzen]] has said during an interview "We will see actual titans one day", implying that what we see in Northrend and Uldaman aren't actually titans. Most likely what we have seen are just constructs built by them.

* The Steltek, from ''[[Wing Commander (video game)|Wing Commander]] Privateer''. Arguably they were Precursors of the [[Neglectful Precursors|neglectful]] variety, though they did make an effort to clean up after themselves once made aware of the problem.

* The as-of-yet unnamed race from ''[[Sins of a Solar Empire]]'' who built the Phase Jump Inhibitors and, presumably, the other obtainable artifacts.

* In ''[[Unity]]'', the creatures living in the ship are all distant descendants of Earth life. Humans built the ship, but disappeared long ago.

* [[Homestuck]]: {{spoiler|Turns out every session of Sburb creates a new universe. And the trolls created ''ours''.}}

* ''[[The Cyantian Chronicles]]'' have at least two species, the Rumuah who created the Cyantians as servants and heirs, than died out from a genetic disease. And the "Squids" who came along centuries later and [[Abusive Precursors|enslaved]] the Cyantians, until Alpha Akaelae led a successful rebellion and wiped them out.

 

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Speculative Fiction Tropes]]