Have you ever spontaneously decided to take three weeks off work to build a spaceship? That’s the premise of the episode ‘Explorers‘ (S03E22) from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993-1999). In the episode, Commander Sisko finds some plans for an ancient Bajoran spaceship in a dusty old library (where all the best stuff is found). From these plans he decides to build a replica of the Bajoran Lightship, using period-accurate tools, and retrace the steps of early Bajoran space exploration.

When watching the episode, I was immediately struck that Sisko was engaging in some experimental archaeology. Wikipedia actually provides a good explanation of exactly what experimental archaeology is…

“A field of study which attempts to generate and test archaeological hypotheses, usually by replicating or approximating the feasibility of ancient cultures performing various tasks or feats.”

Sisko certainly adheres to the basic premises of experimental archaeology in the episode. He has a historical hypothesis: That the Bajoran Lightship was space-worthy on long voyages. He then decides to test it by building one…

Sisko: “I don’t know, that’s why I’m going to build one.”

He also makes sure he uses historically accurate tools for the building of the ship, another important part of experimental archaeology…

Sisko: “I want to use the same type of tools the Bajorans had.”

Sisko’s experiment reminded me of famous instance of experimental naval archaeology within classical scholarship: The Olympias.

The Olympias is a reconstruction of an Athenian trireme that was built in the 1980s by a naval architect, a historian, a classics teacher, and a plethora of volunteers, all using the available ancient eviedence. Although some elements were changed (like substituting in steel ropes), the trireme was built as accurately as possible to ancient specifications.

And just as Sisko proved his theory, so did the Olympias. During the sea trials of late 1980s and early 1990s, the trireme reached speeds of 9 knots and and could turn 180 degrees in less than a minute. These details confirmed many of the reports of the capabilities of triremes seen in the ancient Greek sources (e.g. Thucydides).

But experimental archaeology is not just confined to exploration of ancient ships, it can also be applied to various other aspects of archaeological research. Connected to my most recent research project, a team has reconstructed a Neolithic house in southern Jordan, using the same materials that were available to those inhabiting the region 12,000 years ago.

These examples leads me to another interesting aspect of experimental archaeology that I really enjoy: the tactile experience. With reconstructed buildings like this Neolithic dwelling, or the Iron Age farm in England, and even walking the decks of the Olympias, you get to experience, for a moment at least, a semblance of the feelings of those who inhabited that moment in the past. A sentiment echoed by Sisko…

Sisko: “Imagine how the ancient Bajorans felt…”

However, while I can link the episode ‘Explorers‘ to experimental archaeology within classical scholarship, the episode is actually based on a particular instance of experimental naval archaeology.

In 1947 a Norwegian ethnographer named Thor Heyerdahl decided to prove that it was possible to sail from South America to the Polynesian islands with pre-Colombian technology. He built a raft and named it: Kon-Tiki.

The Kon-Tiki was a balsa wood raft, built from native materials, that the crew sailed on a 101-day and 8,000 km journey across the Pacific Ocean from Peru to the Tuamotu Islands. The success of this expedition proved that it would have been possible for the pre-Colombian peoples of South America could have settled the Polynesian islands.

While Thor Heyerdahl’s larger ideas of South American colonisation of Polynesia have been proven false, and his others theories criticised, a recent study of the Rapa Nui, the indigenous inhabitants of Easter Island, have revealed some interesting results. Some parts of their DNA have been shown to originate from South America and are dated to before Columbus, suggesting there may have, in fact, been some contact between South America and Polynesia in the pre-Columbian era.

But while some of the validity of Heyerdahl’s theories and methods might be questionable, it is actually his connection to both this episode and larger Star Trek that is really intriguing.

Heyerdahl provides a great mirror of Sisko in this episode. Although not native to either Peru or Polynesia, Heyerdahl decided to take on the task of proving theories he had concerning the archaeology and history of the native peoples of these regions. In ‘Explorers‘, Sisko, although not native to Bajor and essentially an outsider, decides he is the one to prove the capabilities of ancient Bajoran spacefarers.

But perhaps more interesting are Heyerdahl’s later expeditions and their relationship to the general themes of Star Trek as a whole. In 1969 and 1970, Heyerdahl built two papyrus boats based on ancient Egyptian designs in an attempt to sail them across the Atlantic. Far less interesting than the historical impetus for this is his decision to crew the vessels with a hugely diverse range of people from different races, nationalities, and religions in order to prove that humanity could live together peacefully, even in extreme circumstances. This focus on a diverse crew representing humanity is very close to Gene Roddenberry’s vision for the crew of the original Enterprise in the 1960s.

Heyerdahl continued to emphasise this aspect of his research in later expeditions. In 1978 he attempted to sail another ancient reed boat from the Persian Gulf to Pakistan, but instead deliberately burnt the boat in protest of the wars raging across the regions around the Red Sea. Like many episodes of Star Trek, Heyerdahl turned this act into an excellent metaphor when explaining his reasons…

Heyerdahl: “Our planet is bigger than the reed bundles that have carried us across the seas, and yet small enough to run the same risks unless those of us still alive open our eyes and minds to the desperate need of intelligent collaboration to save ourselves and our common civilization from what we are about to convert into a sinking ship.”

That’s a very Star Trek-y message.

Lastly, there is one more moment in this episode of Deep Space Nine that really gets to the heart of the study of both experimental archaeology and history. In it, O’Brien is wondering why Sisko is building the lightship using only ancient tools, and is puzzled why he is even doing it at all…

O’Brien: “Why go to all that trouble?”

Sisko: “Why? Because it’s fun.”

You said it Sisko. It is pretty fun.

For more about classical reception in Star Trek, have a browse through these posts.

For more about experimental archaeology James Mathieu has an very comprehensive book called Experimental Archaeology, Replicating Past Objects, Behaviors and Processes (2002).

There is a good deal more information available about the Olympias reconstruction, much of which is available from The Trireme Trust. The go-to book on the subject is: The Athenian Trireme: The History and Reconstruction of an Ancient Greek Warship (2000).

You can also see the Olympias in action in a number of YouTube videos.

If you are curious about the re-building of a Neolithic house in Southern Jordan you can read this article about it’s construction: Building WF16: Construction of a Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA) pise structure in Southern Jordan.

The Kon-Tiki expedition is quite famous and you can watch both a documentary Kon-Tiki (1950) or the Oscar-nominated movie, also called Kon-Tiki (2012).

But perhaps the best source for the expedition is Thor Heyerdahl’s book on the subject: Kon-Tiki: Across the Pacific by Raft (1950). For a less personal and more modern take on the expedition, check out Axel Andersson’s A Hero for the Atomic Age: Thor Heyerdahl and the Kon-Tiki Expedition (2010).

Heyerdahl also wrote about his other expeditions in The Ra Expeditions (1971) and The Tigris Expedition (1980). Information about these can also be found on YouTube: Expedition Ra I & II – Egyptian Era Ra II Reed Boat – The Expeditions of Ra – The Tigris Expedition.

And if you want more details on what influenced or inspired different episodes of Deep Space Nine, you can either hop over to Memory Alpha, the Wikipedia for Star Trek, or invest in the very thorough book: The Deep Space Nine Companion.