Cowboys and Goa'uld

[vickyocean]

Okay, I'm working on a prequel to my fic Threadbare set in an AU in which the Goa'uld have invaded Earth during the 'Old West'. The fic is set somewhere around the mid 1870s to the end of the 1880s. I haven't pin-pointed an exact time yet.

Anyway, I was thinking, what would a person of that era think of or call Goa'uld technology such as Death

Comments

[a_loquita]

"After seeing those pictures of that uncontacted tribe in the Amazon a couple of weeks ago, I keep wondering what they were thinking about that plane or helicopter that took those pictures. They were throwing spears at it, so they were obviously trying to defend themselves against an unknown. But what did they think it was? Some strange bird?"

Funny, because I was totally fascinated by that news story too. And yeah, it makes for an interesting argument in terms of how primitive people react- shock, awe, etc. Do they think it's God? Do they believe in magic?

"If people in the Old West era saw Goa'uld technology would they be easily fooled into thinking it was magic?"

I think this is more than likely. Traveling salesmen selling tonics were pretty successful in those days. I would guess the more religious might think it was something sent from the devil. Maybe a test of their faith?

Interesting questions, and yes, I'd be very interested in reading your take on it in a prequel fic.

[tracey_claybon]

I'd call the Death Gliders "metal birds.", the fighting staves the Jaffa use "fire staves" and the zats "light guns" or "light Colts" or even "light Gats". I'm not so sure of the others, though.

[tracey_claybon]

And Jules Verne's work is a good place to start - it's a bit later, but Edgar Rice Burroughs would be good, and also look at the works of Louis L'Amour and William Johnstone for a grounding. I believe the people of the 1800's would be awed. They'd also be afraid more on religious grounds too - this would be similar to what the people of the time believed God, angels and devils could do.

[beatrice_otter]

It really depends on where you're going--snake-oil salesmen did well, but for the most part it wasn't because they claimed their wares were magic, but because they were "patented"--i.e. the fruit of "modern" research and scientific experience. People in the Western world (i.e. European or of European descent) had been dreaming about flying machines since Da Vinci's time, several centuries earlier. Nobody'd gotten one to actually work yet, but they were trying. We think of the Victorians as obsessed with spiritual phenomena, and they were, but they were also iron-headed practicalists with a firm belief in rationality, science, and logic--more so than most people in our post-modern world. And it was the age of metal--they made tons of stuff out of metal, in great huge factories, and called it Progress. You show most 19th century white European Americans a metal flying thing, and they're not going to assume magic, they're going to assume that someone figured out how to make a flying machine.