Gozzo the archaeologist

by Kujivunia

2 Gozzo-the archaeologist and the stone inside the head

Gozzo, an archaeologist, loved to dig into history. Garbage and trash were for him clues and keys to the mysteries hidden in the centuries.

For the third month, together with the young, he dug up the settlement of ancient ploughmen-brewers. But while his students were digging in the ground, he himself was digging in huge stacks of paper. The story flashed before his eyes.

The dump grew, dugouts were replaced by log cabins, stoves and barns appeared — then the earthlings mastered more and more land around, and the more extensive the fields were, the larger the village became, and the larger the village became, the more extensive the fields became.

A slagged plot of land, fragments of rust and a furnace — they even had their own forge to repair numerous plows.

And suddenly the number of potsherds began to grow exponentially, and not only on the landfill that had moved a lot since the settlement was founded. Yes, and a new landfill has appeared — chemically contaminated land in a ravine. Coins began to be found everywhere. The grain growers were refined to the point that brewers had to work to dispose of mountains of grain. And the villagers obviously could not master the intoxicating rivers, so the beer was on sale.

The beer idyll lasted for two hundred years. Coins, as well as shards, became more and more. Houses were compacted. The skeletons were getting smaller and smaller.

And suddenly, in place of the chemical ravine, a powerful layer of large shards appeared, and above it and to the surface — only the earth. In the village, a layer of a large fire was blackening, and a large burial ground appeared near the dump. Someone lived over the fire for some time, but there was less and less garbage, and after another two hundred years the cultural layer completely disappeared.

Everything was perfectly clear... and extremely incomprehensible. Gozzo could not get rid of the idea that something was wrong here. Where could a huge settlement for its time have gone? Where did the ploughmen go first, and then the brewers?

Crop failures? On chernozem? Excluded! A fire? It's easy for such a large and rich settlement to rebuild. Overproduction crisis? But the situation in the archives is the opposite — an acute shortage of beer in that era! Even the topical song “Give the pony a beer!” it dates from about the same time as this conflagration! An environmental disaster? In favor of this, the ravine is clearly chemically contaminated with beer pellets and the grinding of the skeletons of the population. A ruinous raid by neighbors? It is quite possible that the conflagration corresponds to this, and the burial ground too. On the other hand, the burial ground looks too stretched out in time, and there are too few traces of wounds on the bones.

Gozzo puzzled over this riddle for days and nights. Even a pipe with excellent buffalo tobacco did not help.

Another unremarkable, routine day was pierced by the surprised and delighted cry of the intern:

— Unicorn!

Gozzo fell out of oblivion and immediately found himself at the scene of the crime, namely at the dump of a beer pellet. Of course! Unicorn — in the village of earthponies metaculture of early post-windigos? Nonsense! But a skull with a horn pushed inside was clearly sticking out of the pile of shards. No one doubted his reality.

The early post-windigosis an era when all three races have already stopped fighting among themselves, firmly and clearly, but they have not yet begun to live together. So what made the unicorn come to the Earth ponies and die from a skull fracture?

The most capable students of Gozzo moved to the landfill. Soon the skeleton was carefully excavated and described. An elderly unicorn in magnificent robes (judging by the number of precious stones), with numerous bone fractures from blows with a heavy blunt object.

And next to him are two of his comrades with similar injuries and an earth pony with a beautiful golden tiara and a stone in the intracranial space.

Gozzo the archaeologist was grinning happily and puffing like a steam locomotive. Finally, he looked up from the pipe for a second, wiped a tear and spoke hoarsely:

— My chicks! Yes, this is the murder of the nobility on the basis of hatred right on the mysterious border of the two layers!

Barry and Emerald, two of Gozzo's students, earth and unicorn, exchanged meaningful glances.

— So it was a raid? But then why are there so few combat wounds in the burial ground, but so many underdeveloped skeletons?

— Please pay attention, dear students, to this cute scene! Once again! What do you see here?

"Four stoned merchants or lords?"

— Here you are! Remember the Rampant Redpoll, may Celestia keep his depraved carcass! What did he say? The cobblestone is a weapon of the proletariat! That's what he said!

Gozzo blew a very beautiful ring of smoke, admired it and returned to the story.

— And the case, dear students, was like this! A successful agricultural district turns to brewing and finds the most extensive sales markets throughout the district. The welfare of the population is growing. Merchants and owners of breweries are singled out, the governing bodies are moving from the council of elders to the trading house, because it is there that there are levers of economic influence!

Demand is growing, we clearly see this from the documents of the Early post-windigos, which means that the production of beer products is also growing. But agriculture at that time was still underdeveloped, and the growth of harvests did not keep pace with the growth of demand. In addition, the beer pellets, which they simply throw into a pile, do not go to the needs of the national economy, do not fertilize the land, but rot and emit toxic substances. Diseases. Mortality.

The level of population health is declining. And here you are! Economic growth is slowing down, labor productivity is falling, bread is getting less, food is getting scarce, labor productivity is falling and we are falling into a vicious circle! Hence the crushing and degradation of skeletons in the burial ground. Hence the shortage of beer! Remember, dear students, the folk song of the early post-windigos: “Give the pony a beer!".

Meanwhile, the merchant's house is obliged to maintain trade turnover, and here you are — the neighbors come to negotiate, and the hungry crowd decided to grind a few heads instead of bread.

"And the ashes?" — Emerald cautiously asks the dispersed teacher.

Gozzo looks at the youngsters with a triumphant look:

— So here it is!

Comments

[Str8aura]

You tell me, YOU wrote it

[Kujivunia]

11355329
Didn't I say it? Maybe it's a bad translation... Is it even possible to read? I'm good at translating from English into Russian, but from Russian into English it's the other way around, heh

[Starswirl the Beardless]

This story has an interesting premise, and from what I can understand, it seems to have an interesting little mystery to it. Unfortunately, the prose is so confusing that I can barely understand what is happening. I can understand this if this story was a translation, but it still makes it difficult to appreciate.

[Far-Eastern_Ponyfag]

Chel, ya tebya lublu, no ty silno palishsya, chto ty russkiy.