I just find it strange that Vulcans do not know what a Romulan looks like. I mean presumably Romulans are a distant offshoot of the Vulcan species and just based on that fact, they already could share common traits even after so many years isolated and left to evolve on their own. Could it be Spock and other Vulcans just forgot over time what they look like? Because I don't buy this whole having no clue whatsoever story.
Spoilers The pointy eared elephant in the room
- Thread starter erotavlas
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They left and no one knew what became of them.
Kirk and Co didn't know much about to SS Bontney Bay. Now think if Khan had landed say 50 light years away (some type of Subspace thing) started a empire call themselves X. Human may not know they are human off-shoots
Also compare that to the pre-colonial Americas, and what was forgotten on both sides of the ocean.
Why not? Almost two thousand years had passed, and it took Vulcan a very long time to recover from that war during Surak's time. It's not hard to believe they lost touch or even aware of them....
Yeah I get the impression that the Vulcans didn't have any idea that the Romulans were the descendants of "those who marched beneath the raptor's wings" until they saw what they looked like.
It’s not like they could know they called themselves Romulans. They probably knew some Vulcans left, even if on the level of it fading into vague legends. But how are they supposed to know they were successful and developed an entirely different society? They likely assumed the Romulans were just another of countless species that aren’t related to them.
They split off millennia ago and have never truly been in contact since.
They had no reason to think otherwise. "Those are Romulans. Obviously, based only on the name we know they must be related to us!"
Especially given Q's line about the hundred year war between them.
Even based solely on the fact that Romulans have the pointy ears and slanted eyebrows, why would Vulcans automatically assume they are offshoots of the Vulcan species? Humans have encountered *how many* aliens that look virtually identical to humans?
Like, a Betazoid shows up and now the humans get the side eye?
Vulcans: "Why didn't you tell us Betazoids are a human offshoot race?"
Humans: "Ermmm...I don't think they are?"
Vulcans: "Yeah, but a Romulan pops up on the tv and automatically we start getting racist cracks about pointy-ears?"
Betazoids: "Oi! Why are we assuming *we* are an offshoot of *them*? Maybe they are an offshoot of us!"
Humans: "Shut up. We're obviously the center of the universe."
Like, a Betazoid shows up and now the humans get the side eye?
Vulcans: "Why didn't you tell us Betazoids are a human offshoot race?"
Humans: "Ermmm...I don't think they are?"
Vulcans: "Yeah, but a Romulan pops up on the tv and automatically we start getting racist cracks about pointy-ears?"
Betazoids: "Oi! Why are we assuming *we* are an offshoot of *them*? Maybe they are an offshoot of us!"
Humans: "Shut up. We're obviously the center of the universe."
Just because Spock was unaware in ‘Balance of Terror’ doesn’t mean that all Vulcans are unaware. I suspect that it could be a closely guarded secret, known only to those who need to know. As Enterprise showed, Romulans had invaded the Vulcan government, so I find it hard to accept/believe that NO Vulcans know.
I believe that originally ancient Vulcan was made up of many tribes. Surak came along and united the majority of these tribes through logic and emotional management/suppression, stopping the Vulcan race from destroying itself. Some Vulcan’s agreed with Surak and his ideology, and some Vulcan’s did not. Those that did not agree left in their spaceships and settled on other planets around that part of the galaxy/alpha quadrant. Perhaps some of them may even have been ‘banished’ from Vulcan? One such tribe that left Vulcan became known as the Romulan’s, I’m guessing that they were aggressive. They developed a Roman like political system, just like we used to have during the Roman Empire on Earth. Other Vulcan tribes could have been Rigelians, Halanand, Mintakans, Arretans, Romulan’s, Reman’s and the Debrune. Reman’s and Debrune could be Romulan off shoots though and not directly descended tribes from Vulcan, they could be like sub-sub-species. Is it possible that there could have been 12 Vulcan tribes originally? Some tribes could still be ‘lost’ .
Spock might be surprised to see that Romulan’s are similar to Vulcan’s as they had not made contact in a very long time, this combined with so many tribes having left Vulcan originally on their spaceships which kind of confused things? There could be more Vulcan surprises in store for our crew, they could bump in to other Vulcan offshoots unexpectedly? Some could be good, and some could be bad… it would all make for *really* good science fiction though.
Spock might be surprised to see that Romulan’s are similar to Vulcan’s as they had not made contact in a very long time, this combined with so many tribes having left Vulcan originally on their spaceships which kind of confused things? There could be more Vulcan surprises in store for our crew, they could bump in to other Vulcan offshoots unexpectedly? Some could be good, and some could be bad… it would all make for *really* good science fiction though.
Of course, that was all explored in the TNG episode, "The Chase". It's one of the biggest dropped threads in Trek ever. They really should've canonized that and followed-up on that episode.
T'Pol knows enough to correct Hoshi when she mispronounced "Romulan" as "Romalun".
And T'Pol was obviously connected to that inner circle that was in the know.
Now in the VOY episode "Death Wish," the Q known as Quinn accidentally started a war between the Vulcans and the Romulans in the late 21st-Century or so that lasted for about a hundred years. But the ENT episode "Minefield" implied that the Vulcans had only limited contact with the Romulans prior to the 22nd-Century.
So somebody's lying...
So somebody's lying...
Knowing that a species called Romulans exist isn’t the same as knowing they descended from Vulcans.
What does that means she knows? We know subspace radio is a thing and that communication could be possible that way.
On a universal scale, I wonder who was the ‘Adam’ and who was the ‘eve’ of the universe? Also, which planet or dimension were they from? I don’t mean who seeded the genesis of life on individual planets. I’m thinking bigger than this. The ‘spark’ of life in the entire cosmos.
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