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r/AskHistorians

819 upvotes

Jul 24, 2026, 5:28 AM UTC

Posted by /u/LurkingTamilian

Have there examples in history of a society forgetting how a particular technology is created but only know about maintaining it?

It is a common trope is Sci-fi for an ancient advanced civilization to collapse leaving behind artifacts that newer people can use and maintain but not develop themselves. Do we have documented cases of this in real-life? I am not counting cases like the pyramids which might hav…