Earth (RDM)

Earth, home of the Thirteenth Tribe, from orbit.

Earth is the believed destination of the Thirteenth Tribe of Kobol, as attested in the Sacred Scrolls. Prior to its discovery, its existence is considered purely mythical and legendary among Colonial, and even Cylon, society. Earth is also the name of a planet Colonial survivors eventually settle after a long, and arduous journey across space after the Fall of the Twelve Colonies.

Earth: Home of the Thirteenth

Beginnings

Earth, as it appeared before its destruction.

Main articles: History of the Twelve Colonies and Thirteenth Tribe (RDM)

The legend of Earth begins at least 4,000 years ago on Ancient Kobol, where Scriptures tell of the exodus of a Thirteenth Tribe of man during a period of great turmoil across the planet. It is said that "they traveled far and made their home upon a planet called Earth...which circled a distant and unknown star". While not many previously believed in Earth, there are however, supposed artifacts are rumored to point the general bearing to the planet. These rumors are later confirmed after the destruction of the Colonies (TRS: "Miniseries", "Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I").

Settlement and Development

For nearly 2,000 years, the Thirteenth Tribe flourished on the planet, creating a contemporary civilization comparable to the Twelve Colonies before their fall, including development into their own robotics and artificial intelligence. Unbeknownst to the Colonials (Or even Modern Cylons), the Thirteenth Tribe was a race of artificial beings, much like the Significant Seven humanoid Cylons, that were created on Kobol thousands of years ago. They relied on Organic Memory Transfer technology to download into new bodies after their deaths, however sometime after leaving Kobol, they gained the ability to reproduce sexually, and the technology fell out of use (TRS: "No Exit").

The fact that the Tribe was artificial in nature is never fully revealed to the civilians of the fleet. To them, they were a society of humans that were destroyed by their robotic creations much like their society was four years prior.

Apocalypse

Main article: Final Five

Approximately 2,000 years BCH, the Tribe's robotic creations rebelled against their creators, in an act of mutually assured destruction. The attack caught the population off guard, with many at work, or enjoying leisurely activities. Evidence of people going about their lives is still visible on the remains nearly 2,000 years after the holocaust.
However, prior to the apocalypse, five persons started seeing visions of strange people warning them of the upcoming cataclysm. The five worked hard to recreate the lost Organic Memory Transfer technology, and built a ship in orbit to carry their experiments. After their deaths, the five were resurrected on this ship, and opted to follow the Tribe's original course back to Kobol, leaving Earth behind (TRS: "Revelations", "Sometimes a Great Notion", "No Exit").

Earth's Fate

Earth's ruins, two millennia after the Fall of the Thirteenth Tribe.

At the conclusion of the destructive attacks, Earth was left burning, and poisonous. Survivors (if any) were left to die a slow and painful death, as the planet's weather absorbed and spread deadly radioactive particles through the atmosphere, and ground water. Despite residual radiation remaining in the soil, Earth had shown signs of recovery at the time of discovery. Abundant plant life had returned, and had already started reclaiming Earth's ruins.
Without a population to maintain the effects of nature, many of the ruins were also being reclaimed by changing weather patterns and rising ocean tides. A large city on the planet visited by both Colonial and Cylon authority was largely submerged in water, with many artifacts and remains buried in sand or submerged completely. Earth's ultimate fate is unknown, however the surface will continue to evolve and recover much like Kobol did, with the ruins and any evidence of the once thriving civilization, eventually disappearing and becoming lost forever to history.

Unable to support human life, the planet is abandoned by the Colonials days after its discovery (TRS: "Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I", "Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part II", "Revelations", "Sometimes a Great Notion").

A New Earth: The Promised Land

The Colonial's new home, as it appears from the moon's orbit.

By an infinitesimal chance, a habitable planet is found by pilot Kara "Starbuck" Thrace, after she is able to extrapolate FTL Jump coordinates from a song she used to play as a child. The vision came to her after notes from the song were drawn out for her by the child Hera. Lt. Thrace inputs these FTL coordinates into Galactica's FTL computer after it needed to make a quick escape from the Cylon Colony. Galactica, damaged from battle, nearly comes apart at the seams as the ship drifts over a moon, and into the system.

As depicted in "Crossroads, Part II", this planet is located relatively close to the Ionian Nebula, however, the FTL coordinates Lt. Thrace uses to jump to the planet would only work from the location of the Cylon Colony.

Diverse Wildlife

Earth's diverse wildlife.

After Colonial recon of the planet, Earth is discovered to have a diverse range of wildlife, more than the Twelve Colonies put together. It also features a race of primitive humanoids, having evolved here separately from those on Kobol. Upon further study, these humanoids are discovered to be compatible with Colonial DNA, which opens up the possibility of Colonials and Cylons interbreeding with them. These humanoids have evolved to set up a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, and are seen moving on foot to their next hunting ground.

Colonial/Cylon Settlement and Future Evolution

Survivors heading for shelter.

With Galactica in pieces, and the Colonial Fleet not fairing any better, it is decided that the planet will be settled, with the remaining Cylons soon joining them. Plans begin for new cities to be built, however, those plans are soon abandoned in favor of starting fresh in an attempt to break the cycle of violence. Colonial units scout the planet, and eventually determine the best possible chance for survival is to split the survivors up into groups, and spread them across different sites around the globe. These locations are documented, and presented to each of the groups for future use. After the survivors set up their camps, the fleet and any remaining technology were then scuttled. The settling Colonials christen this new planet Earth, in honor of the promised land they've been chasing after for the last four years.

Eventually, surviving Colonial and Cylon settlers, and their descendants begin intermixing with the indigenous humanoids already living on the planet, creating a new race of humankind, with Hera Agathon becoming "Mitochondrial Eve" - the most recent common matrilineal ancestor of all living humans. Her fossilized remains are uncovered nearly 150,000 years after the arrival of the surviving fleet (TRS: "Daybreak, Part II").

Over 150,000 years later, humankind has once more built an advanced society on the brink of major technological breakthroughs, much like the Twelve Colonies, Earth, and Kobol before them. The series ends detailing modern day robotics, with Jimi Hendrix's version of "Along the Watchtower" playing in the background.

Notes

• Gaeta comments in "Revelations" that the constellations seen from orbit of the Earth they'd just found match those seen in the Tomb of Athena. This was later proven incorrect, as those constellations are actually visible from a different Earth over one hundred centuries later (Daybreak, Part II). It would have been extremely improbable that the constellations visible from the Earth found in "Revelations" would have looked the same as those of New Earth. That being said, while on the first Earth, all of the constellations of Zodiac could all be seen at once, this is not possible on the current Earth.

• From what we know of the nature of navigation in FTL jumps, the odds of the coordinates used by Kara Thrace to jump Galactica from the Colony to the new Earth, and actually achieving the end they did are no less than infinitesimal. One of the elements in FTL navigation is the point of origin. A point of origin is a necessary factor in many navigational forms in order to plot direction and distance to a required destination, and FTL navigation is no different. Essentially, what this means is that the coordinates entered by Kara Thrace into the FTL computer aboard Galactica would only jump the ship to its new Earth destination from the precise astral location of the Galactica when it initiated the jump from the Colony. Given the coordinates origins in The Music and the revelation that a divine entity is in some way shaping the events which have taken place in the series, as seen by Pythia, it could be suggested that the attack on the Colony, the resulting success and retreat, were in some way destined – while this may seem logical it is purely conjectural, the way these events have took place can not be explained by rational means.

Official Statements

• Edward James Olmos jokingly describes how he thinks the Fleet could find Earth:

I personally — this is not [from] any of the writers, but my thing — I wanted to come into [the present day], find Earth, cruise on top of it, see it for what it is, and as we're coming down to it, we're blown up, we're nuked. And then [someone says to] the President of the United States, which is [George W.] Bush, "They've been taken care of. Thank God you saved the world again." And you turn, and you see who told him that, and it's one of the Cylons. [Laughs]

References

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• See Also
  • Sacred Scrolls#The Origin of Mankind|Origin of Mankind theories
• Other Series
  • Earth (TOS)|Earth from TOS
  • Earth (1980)|Earth from "Galactica 1980"

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