Protoculture (Macross)

The **Protoculture** are an elder race that features in the anime Macross.

## History

They had lived on a planet of greenery and abundance where they established small settlements whilst gathering fruit and caught fish in a time when they lived in peace. In time, their kind developed metal tools and farming implements allowing them to plot the land with their numbers growing greatly. Industry and agriculture grew more developed with many political and economic exchanges among their kind. Due to being the first race to develop a culture, this species began to refer to themselves as the Protoculture. At some point thousands of years ago, their civilization encountered an even older species of galactic insectoids known as the Vajra. These large creatures possessed natural Super Dimension power with the Protoculture coming to fear, adore and even deify the Vajra. This came to the point that they began to mimic their form that became the basis of much of their technology such as Space Folds, Super Dimension weaponry along with their mecha. Hundreds of thousands of years ago, the Protoculture were responsible for establishing the **Stellar Republic** that controlled much of the Milky Way galaxy. As they ventured into space, they fell into two factions with war erupting amongst their race. The conflict eventually extended throughout the universe.

During this time, they were responsible for engineering a warrior race of giant humanoids known as the Zentraedi to serve as soldiers in their battles so that they did not stain their own hands. In addition, they manipulate the life on the planet Earth in order to bring about the evolution of humanity. Similarly, their advanced civilization also created the aquatic humanoid **Ragnans** and the **Windermerean** evolving on their world in the  **Brisingr Globular Cluster**. However, during this time, internal divisions began to form within the Stellar Republic leading to conflict among the Protoculture. This led to an escalation in the creation of even more powerful weapons. One of the factions in the war started an initiative to breed a more advanced series of warriors to fight in the war. This led to the **Evil series** of warriors but this was initially a failure as the Protoculture were unable to meet the energy requirements needed to power the creatures. The Evil project was reactivated when a new sub-universe was discovered that held abundant energy for the living weapons. However, the organs that utilized this energy suffered from an unexpected intrusion from extra-dimensional non-corporeal beings that possessed the bodies allowing them into the normal universe. These creatures were thus known as Protodeviln who went out of control and turned against the Protoculture. The conflict that erupted was noted to had been long and fierce with it seemingly lasting forever.

These newly created beings lacked the ability to produce a life force which they called Spiritia and thus developed into vampiric beings that fed on others for this nourishment. Thus, they began to feed on Spiritia of all living creatures across the galaxy. However, they became too greedy and the number of Spiritia beings diminished and nearly became extinct in the universe. The war between the Protoculture was known to had been both long and fierce which seemed to go on forever. However, a mysterious power known as the Anima Spiritia emerged which managed to seal the Protodeviln in a world that became known as Varauta where they were entombed within the ice. Ultimately, the fall of the Protoculture was attributed by the Protodeviln. Elements of the history of the Protoculture were retained within an ancient ruin located on the planet designated GGT "Rax" where it resided beneath the sea.

On Earth, an outpost of these precursors remained and left to sink beneath the ocean. In addition, a mecha was left behind on an isolated island to serve as a safeguard to ensure that mankind did not become a war-like race. If humanity went down that path, the mecha was to be activated where it was intended to urge the planet of life. Knowledge of the Protoculture was known on Earth among the isolated community on the Mayan Island who kept oral traditions of the ancient race. In 2008, scientists from the U.N. Spacy attempted to study the A.F.O.S. (Artifact From Outer Space) known as the Bird-Human. The semi-sentient alien mecha activated when a Mayan Priestess came to believe that humanity had become war-like.

In 2045, the Macross 7 Colonization Fleet encountered Protoculture ruins on the world GGT 'Rax' that explained to the human and Zentraedi crew about the history of the Protodeviln. In 2067, the **Windermere Kingdom** declared a war of hostility against the New United Government as they came to consider themselves the true heirs of the Protoculture. The Windermereans were using their abilities to orchestrate the spread of the **Var Syndrome** across the known worlds.

## Overview

One group among their people were known as the Anima Spiritia that had the ability to influence the Protodeviln. It was these Protoculture that were responsible for sealing away the Protodeviln.

According to them, they were a proud race of beings that had developed a culture before all other creatures living in the universe. It was for this reason that they referred to themselves as Protoculture. They were known to had created murals that depicted their history. Zentraedi writing was stated to be very similar to Protoculture script. The Protoculture also believed in the sign of peace which was an individual that contained the mixed blood of many different races.

## Technology

Within the ruins of a Protoculture base, an automated guardian resided that could only be awakened by the sign of peace. After its awakening, this entity detailed the experiments that led to the creation of the Protodeviln. The Protoculture also developed powerful barrier shield technology that protected their installations from attack.

Such was their knowledge of genetic engineering that they were able to create entirely new species. This allowed them to manipulate the native life of worlds such as Earth in order to shape the evolution of a resultant species like mankind. It was through this talent that they managed to form an entire race of giant humanoid warriors such as the Zentraedi. Among the height of their engineering was the **Evil** series of warriors that were living organic weapons capable of immense levels of destruction.

One type of mecha they had used was a large machine that primitive humans had called the **Birdman**. This large machine had a fluid organic design with its head capable of being separated from the main body. When a genetically compatible pilot was discovered, the two parts were able to join together. The pilot resided in an organic pod in the cockpit at the head where they were surrounded by fluid along with numerous organic-looking cables attacked to them. A type of intelligence seemingly occupied the mecha as the one on Earth asked its pilot a series of questions that went in line with its mission parameters. Once active, the Birdman was able to grow in size as it drew in materials from the air and unfolded itself into a large winged form. In this state, the Birdman had a range of abilities such as firing powerful energy beams, shooting numerous pulse weapons, firing swarms of missiles and generating a shield. In addition, they seemingly had their own FTL capabilities and were able to absorb energy from their surroundings such as those generated from reaction weapons.

## Notes

* The Protoculture were adapted by the American series Robotech to become a power source called Protoculture.

## Appearances

* *Macross*:
* *Macross Zero*: