Ancient Vulcan

Tropes and genres
Synonym(s)	Pre-Reform Vulcan, Pre-Surak Vulcan
Related tropes/genres	slavefic, pon farr, time travel
See also	Vulcan
Related articles on Fanlore.

To set a story on Ancient Vulcan is a popular story trope in Star Trek fanfic. These stories feature a Vulcan society without their emotional control, and often quite savage, though not necessarily primitive (it can be technologically advanced or have smaller scale societies with tribal barbarians). This can be either real Vulcan in the past at any point before Surak and Vulcan's Reform towards peace, some kind of alternate universe (mirror universes, parallel universes etc.) or a society of Vulcanoid people who are living on another planet (e.g. TNG's "Who Watches the Watchers" or those Spock mentions in TOS' "Return to Tomorrow" as having been seeded by the Preservers), or a faction of Vulcans who colonized the planet in the past.

In the original Star Trek series, the episode All Our Yesterdays had Spock and McCoy accidentally going through a time portal on the planet Sarpeidon, ending up in that world's ice age. While they were there, Spock began to behave in an increasingly irrational manner, agreeing to eat meat when there was no other food, falling in love with the woman who rescued them, and almost killing McCoy when he intervened. McCoy reminded Spock they were now 5,000 years in the past, and suggested that he was reverting to a savage state because it was how his ancestors were at this time.

Some fan fiction and profic published work such as Diane Duane's Spock's World simply explores Vulcan's past. Sometimes, "today's" characters end up encountering Ancient Vulcan. This is often used as vehicle for h/c or slavefic. In stories with sexual situations this can be used to get a Vulcan character (especially Spock, but also Tuvok) to become more emotional, facilitating the pairing of choice. It can be easily combined with pon farr fic too.

Example Fanworks

The Original Series

• "Vulcan Love Song" by Dorothy Jones Heydt (Spockanalia 2, 1968). Written in a traditional Vulcan stanza with pairs of eight lines ("The sky arched fire; my path was made. / I rose up to the sound of bells."), it's about a young bride on her wedding day.
• "Septyar" by Narda Roushdi (Spockanalia 5, 1970). Pre-Reform poem describing a beautiful crown and its jewels.
• The Hadla plays by Doris Beetem which appeared in Eridani Triad 1(1970). These are stories about Surak and how he conceived the Reforms.
• "Mimir's Well" by Doris Beetem, Eridani Triad 2 (1971). Spock is transported to the mirror universe, where the Reforms have not yet happened.
• The Lorath by Ray Newton, in Naked Times #3 (1979)
• The Time of Surak (1979), anthology zine
• The Prize by Ray Newton (1981)
• Hazan by Fiona James, first in Duet #6 (1982)
• Timelines by A.T. Bush, in T'hy'la #8 (1989)
• Echoes from the Past by Phaedra Morgan, a novel published in Matter/Antimatter #9 (1990)
• Slaveworld by Gloria Fry (1994)
• The Soul Inside (also at AO3) by Elise Madrid first in Starry Knights #1 (July 2003)

Alternate Original Series, a.k.a. Star Trek (2009)

• Oasis by kyliselle (posted Jul/Aug 2010)
• Sviksu by anon-j-anon, retelling of Verdi's Aida, non-reform Vulcan style. (2010)
• The Great Awakening by chinae (posted June 2010 for the Star Trek Reverse Bang)
• The Prophecy of Apollo by ladyblahblah, retelling of the Cupid and Psyche myth in a reality with a non-reform Vulcan culture. WIP (2010 - )

Gallery

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  illustration for "The Lorath" by Michael Verina from Naked Times 3

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  cover of T'hy'la 8 by Gayle F

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  backcover of T'hy'la 8 by DEEB

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  Charisma cover by Marilyn Cole

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  Interior art by Gayle F for The Prize

Resources

• Ratcreature's thematic list of Ancient/Non-Reform Vulcan Star Trek stories
• Works tagged [how can there not be a tag for this?] at the AO3