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I'm very familiar with the Ancients, but I can't remember if they came from planet Earth, originally? I remember an episode about an ancient device that may have been used to create life on Earth when the now human civilization grew and that they are based off of the Ancients. The one Ba'al tried to use to "recreate" the life in the galaxy.

But does that mean that the Ancients didn't come from earth originally? Or am I misreading something somewhere, and they really did come from earth, traveled to Atlantis, then traveled back to Earth and ascended?

I'm referring to SG1, primarily.

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    Ball? You mean Baal?
    – R. Martinho Fernandes
    Apr 25, 2011 at 19:21
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    Don't look too hard for consistencies; the writing was more focused on spinning a good yarn than being consistent. That said, Altera->Dakara->Earth->Atlantis->Earth->Ascension. Plus whenever they visited the Asgaard. There's no reason to assume they all got off the ship from Altera on the same planet anyway.
    – Phil Lello
    Apr 26, 2011 at 0:59
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    @PhilLello the last Earth in your sequence is when they should have dealt with the Asgard, Furlings, and Nox. This is when they also fought the Goa'uld.
    – user1027
    Apr 26, 2011 at 1:55
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    @Keen When did actually fighting the Goa'uld come up? I know the non-responsiveness of the 'learning devices' to Teal'c & Carter (post-Jolinar) was explained away like this at one point, but that was before the Ancient gene 'discovery'
    – Phil Lello
    Apr 26, 2011 at 2:15
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    @PhilLello it's from the Alliance of Four Races from the S1 episode The Torment of Tantalus. The Goa'uld were one of the reasons they allied.
    – user1027
    Apr 26, 2011 at 2:25

2 Answers 2

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I may be wrong but as I understand it:

  1. Alterans/Ori evolve on a planet in a galaxy far away.
  2. A religious and philosophical difference occur between the religious Ori and "science minded" Alterans.
  3. Ori persecute and kill Alterans, the Alterans do not want to fight and choose to leave the galaxy.
  4. Alterans end up in the Milky Way and create a great civilization that include Earth.
  5. Millions of years...
  6. The city ship Atlantis is built on Earth. (Stargate Atlantis)
  7. Destiny is built, and launched from milky way (Earth?). (Stargate Universe)
  8. A great plague kills most of the life in the Milky Way, some Alterans survive by Ascending but most die. A few last survivors use Atlantis to flee the galaxy and end up in the Pegasus Galaxy. As the ascenders of Atlantis they call them self Atlantians.
  9. The Dakara super weapon is activated on Dakara and kills everything in the galaxy, including the plague. Life in the galaxy starts over.
  10. Once more a great civilization springs to life in the Pegasus Galaxy that lasts for a long long time.
  11. The Wraith appear after an accidental(?) merge between Atlantians and a bug on the planet Iratus, usually called the "iratus bug".
  12. A conflict starts between Wraith and Atlantians, Atlantians win every fight but Wraith keep coming, more and more, in greater numbers. Finally the Wraith win and most Alantians are killed or "eaten". Some Atlantians survive by ascending.
  13. Atlantis is the last standing city, the great city shields can take the beating of the Wraith weapons. They submerge the city below the sea to reduce the force of the weapon fire.
  14. A decision is made to use the stargate to return to Earth (which is once more habitable). Atlantis is abandoned on the bottom of the sea.
  15. The year is now 8000 BC, the Atlantians found early human civilizations. Some decide to merge with the natives and create families. That is the reason why some humans possess the ATA gene. Others decide to ascend (The High Councilor of Atlantis, Moros is one of them). A third group leaves Earth through the stargate and found a civilization on other worlds. The last group are usually referred to as "the ancients". They too later ascend.
  16. When Moros ascends he finds out that Ori too have ascended, and they see the ancients/atlantians/Alterans as "the devil" and want to destroy them. Moros starts to build a weapon but against the will of the other fellow ascended beings. He later "deascended" so he can work secretly without anyone's knowledge. The deascended Moros goes by Myrddin (usually referred as Merlin).
  17. Ganos Lal or Morgan le Fay are sent down to stop Myrddin, she succeeds and destroys the weapon but she does not kill Myrddin but saves him in an ancient cryogenics chamber.
  18. Atlantis is found.
  19. Ori find the Milky Way, SG-1 finds Myrddin with a little help from Ganos Lal.
  20. Destiny is found.
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    Wow, thanks for that summary. I think I already knew most of the facts on there individually, though some had been forgotten, but seeing it all written out in a 'timeline' really provides a whole new perspective on things.
    – Asmor
    Jun 5, 2011 at 4:55
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    Guh, didn't know hitting Enter is a submit. Anyway: Small addition to terminology: Once they arrived in the Pegasus galaxy, the planet they landed on was named Lantea, and they referred to themselves as Lanteans from then on. Also don't forget, sometime between 19 and 20, Zelenka completes the Wormhole Drive (the point humans surpass the Lanteans, as they never managed to get it working), and Atlantis now sits on Earth's oceans again.
    – Izkata
    Jul 24, 2011 at 16:06
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    Wormhole Drive, aka "yet another lazy convenient plot device". Sometimes I feel like the writers phoned it in at the end of Atlantis.
    – Chad Levy
    Nov 6, 2011 at 8:35
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    @Justin it was only mentioned in the Atlantis series finale, and fairly briefly at that.
    – Andy
    Apr 10, 2012 at 21:33
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    @Andy: Well, it wasn't so much a brief mention, more of an epic usage.
    – Williham Totland
    Apr 21, 2012 at 9:03
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Prior to Season 9, it was heavily implied that yes, the Ancients were originally from Earth (see the Beta gate for one of these hints). Season 9 introduced some Ancient backstory where they're called Alterans and they're from another galaxy that at the start of Season 9 the Ori controlled. In this other galaxy there are many humans, presumably seeded by the Ancients before they left for Dakara, and eventually Earth. Afterwards, they did all the things referred to mostly in Atlantis. Left for the Pegasus galaxy, fought the Wraith, and then some came back to Earth. Then some ascended, whereas others mingled with humans.

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    One of the stories also claims Dakara was the original landing place of the ancients in the milky way.
    – Phil Lello
    Apr 26, 2011 at 0:56
  • I thought they were from elsewhere, and that a small number of them later settled on Earth.
    – Teknophilia
    Apr 26, 2011 at 1:09
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    @Teknophilia yeah, eventually they did that. See my last sentence. Atlantis added a ton of backstory to the Ancients.
    – user1027
    Apr 26, 2011 at 1:53
  • I was under the impression that the galaxy the Ori currently reside in was separate from the one they and the Alterans both originally came from. Did I misunderstand?
    – Izkata
    Nov 6, 2011 at 23:35
  • @Jakarta You misunderstood. Basically The Ancients fled their home galaxy, leaving behind the Ori who've ruled it since.
    – user1027
    Nov 7, 2011 at 0:52

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