For anyone who wishes to accept it.

In one of my favorite books (Web of Angels, John M. Ford - 1980) the author
posits two types of history-changing artefacts that might be found.

The first type, he names the Antikythera (a reference to the Antikythera
mechanism)

The Antikythera is an artefact which re-defines the technological capabilities
or scientific prowess of an ancient civilization.

The second type, he calls the Ozymandias. An Ozymandias is an artefact
discovered in the ruins of an ancient civilization which could not possibly have
come from that civilization.  The name comes from the poem by Percy Bisshe
Shelley, because "Nothing beside remains"

The existence of an Ozymandias ostensibly points to an even older civilization
of which there is no previous record.

So the challenge, for anyone who cares to attempt it, is to come up with an
artefact of one type or the other and put it in a suitable context.

Regards,
A.D.B.

P.S. Web of Angels is an excellent read, if you can find a copy.  It's arguably
the earliest example of Cyberpunk, prefiguring Gibson by three years, and I love
the idea of the galaxy-spanning computer network, which he calls The Web.

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