"H. Beam Piper - The Space Viking" - читать интересную книгу автора (Piper H Beam)

"Yes, for one thing, we don't have the Neobarbarians," somebody said. "And if
they ever came out here, we'd blow them to Em-See-Square in nothing flat.
Might be a good thing if they did, too; it would stop us squabbling among
ourselves."

13

Harkaman looked at him in surprise. "Just who do you think the Neobarbarians
are, anyhow?" he asked. "Some race of invading nomads, Atilla's Huns in
spaceships?"

"Well, isn't that who they are?" Gorram asked.

"Nifflheim, nol There aren't a dozen and a half planets in the Old Federation
that still have hyperdrive, and they're all civilized. That's if `civilized'
is what Gilgamesh is," he added. "These are homemade barbarians. Workers and
peasants who revolted to seize and divide the wealth. and then found they'd
smashed the means of production and killed off all the technical brains.
Survivors on planets hit during the Interstellar Wars, from the Eleventh to
the Thirteenth Centuries, who lost the machinery of civilization. Followers of
political leaders on` local-dictatorship planets. Companies of mercenaries
thrown out of employment and living by pillage. Religious fanatics following
selfannointed prophets."

"You think we don't have plenty of Neobarbarian material here on Gram?" Trask
demanded. "If you do, take a look around."



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"Glaspyth," somebody said.

"That collection of overripe gallows-fruit Andray Dunnan's recruited,"
Rathmore mentioned.

Alex Gorram was grumbling that his shipyard was full of them; agitators
stirring up trouble, trying to organize a strike to get rid of the robots.

"Yes," Harkaman pounced on that last. "I know of at least forty instances, on
a dozen and a half planets, in the last eight centuries, of anti-technological
movements. They had them on Terra, back as far as the Second Century
Pre-Atomic. And after Venus seceded from the First Federation, before the
Second Federation was organized."

"You're interested in history?" Rathmore asked.

"A hobby. All spacemen have hobbies. There's very little work aboard