Why does pegasus appear to have more "ancient leftovers" than the milky way?

[rgritt]

I have never understood why pegasus has ZPMs and ancient outposts all over the place but the milky way really doesn't, in SGA we learn the the ancients left pegasus and went back to earth when they realized they couldn't win the war, presumably they stayed in the Milky Way until they eventually ascended, so my question is why doesn't SG1 find ancient technology all over the Milky Way, is it because the Ori and the Gould have already found it all?

[Starsaber]

The Goa'uld were scavengers and had a fairly wide galactic presence, so I think they found a lot of it.

And Atlantis had an Ancient database they could access (while SG-1 had to settle for Jack giving them some addresses that weren't from the Abydos cartouche), so it might just be that they were able to target their searches a bit better.

[thekillman]

The Goa'uld were scavengers and had a fairly wide galactic presence, so I think they found a lot of it.

And Atlantis had an Ancient database they could access (while SG-1 had to settle for Jack giving them some addresses that weren't from the Abydos cartouche), so it might just be that they were able to target their searches a bit better.

That, and Pegasus had more recent ancient occupation

[garhkal]

THough you would have thought the Wraith during their war destroyed a lot of it.

[ChekovsWig]

I think the more valuable ancient 'leftovers' were found in the milkyway, the ancient databases, dakara super weapon and so on. But, IIRC the ancients were at war with the Ori in the milkyway and being wiped out by a disease, so the majority of out posts may have been destroyed or simply not developed. They abandoned the milkyway for Pegasus where they were left in peace until they created the wraith, because the wraith werent on level footing as the Ori were the ancients were able to create weapons to defend their outposts take into account as well that once the wraith had won the war they were hibernating for large periods of time, cutting out time for exploration and discovery. Also in the MW the Goa'uld destroyed anything they couldnt use.

[thekillman]

THough you would have thought the Wraith during their war destroyed a lot of it.

Well the places we found all had still-active defense capabilities. The Wraith likely did not bother to sacrifice people to get it.

[Xaeden]

presumably they stayed in the Milky Way until they eventually ascended

They did, but they didn't stay and build things. The Pegasus galaxy last had a thriving galaxy wide Ancient civilization 10,000 years ago. The Milky Way last had one 5-10 million years ago. That's a significant amount of additional time for things to be raided or destroyed by the elements. Just look at how many things were on their way out in the Pegasus Galaxy:

Atlantis was due to run out of power within a few years and had Earth never gone there in the original timeline that meant that it would have been destroyed when the shields came down because it wouldn't have risen.

The city from "The Tower" was severely damaged from earthquakes and the elements would have taken it out completely in time. It's not like the two outposts that we saw in the Milky Way which were build like bunkers and therefore became protected once buried. Those cities are rather fragile without their shields.

The ZPM from "Hide and Seek" is running of fumes.

You also have things that were destroyed either directly or indirectly as a result of Earth's presence, which you could replace with any number of cultures that have come and gone in the Milky Way: The Aurora, the facility from "Trinity," the underwater mining platform, the last satellite guarding Atlantis, etc. The Goa'uld harvested a lot of technology, but there's also been the suggestion that there were other pre-human civilizations that the Goa'uld has warred with in their rise to power and I'm sure they found and lost a lot of technology trying to save themselves.

As to the status of the Ancients who returned to the Milky Way 10,000 years ago: They were hoping to find the remnants of their previous civilization and use that technology to rebuild. Instead having only what they were able to carry through the gate with them from Atlantis, they were dismayed because they would have had to rebuild much of their civilization from scratch. As a result, they took three paths. Some wandered the earth integrating themselves into human lives and helping to spread the seeds of civilization. Supposedly they died out naturally and "lived" on only in the human gene pool. Others spent their lives mediating in hopes of reaching ascension (like Merlin). Others still left through the Stargate never to be seen from again with one exception: Janus, whose second time traveling jumper was found.

Most of that was explained by Morgan le Fey in "The Pegasus Project." From that we can assume that the first two groups likely had little need for technology, so the lion's share of what they carried through from Atlantis probably went to the third group. Although anything that the first two groups did leave on earth after they died/ascended could have been found by Ra. For example, was that ZPM of his something he found on earth? We have no way of knowing, but it's possible. As for the third group, again, we know that Janus was in possession of a jumper and he had access to enough tools and supplies to rebuild his time machine, so he clearly got some of the things that came through the gate with them. The rest is up in the air because we never found out what happened to anyone else in the third group.

Thor once said that the Ancients long ago left this region of space. For awhile it was assumed that he was talking about the move to the Pegasus galaxy, but then in season 5 of Atlantis the rogue Asgard said that they had a 100,000 year old civilization (plus they weren't very advanced 30,000 years ago). So was the alliance of four races made between the survivors of Atlantis 10,000 years ago before they left with everything they could? That's one possibility. Another is the fan theory that they became the civilization that created Reese. Another possibility that I have personally considered is that that's what the Clava Thessara Infinitas (the storehouse of Ancient riches that they supposedly made before ascending which may or may not actually be real) is. They clearly didn't have time to safeguard their technology when they ascended to save themselves from the plague. However, they could have had time to safeguard everything they brought over from Atlantis before ascending 10,000 years ago. Some Ancients stayed on earth and ascended, but the third group could have simply ended up ascending elsewhere for all we know and they could have had the foresight to (for once) hide their technology.

[jackisback]

The wraith like to wipe out all growing civilizations and appear to have little need for other technologies, so this is a perfect reason for Ancient technology to be left over as well.