First Contact

The two most recent posts have shown the position of Ythrians in Poul Anderson's Technic History. Their first story is about first contact when initially nothing was known about this species. Indeed, initially, it was difficult even to identify the dominant species on an obviously inhabited planet.

A Star Trek-parallel scenario: 

the (first) Grand Survey;

the starship, Olga, under Captain Gray, on a five-year mission beyond Alpha and Beta Crucis in the constellation Lupus, 278 light-years from Sol;

a golden G9 dwarf star of half Solar luminosity;

a terrestroid planet, smaller than Earth, with 0.75 G, a thin, dry but humanly breathable atmosphere, some small oceans and two small moons.

The Olga:

verifies by neutrino analysis that there is no artificial atomic energy anywhere in this planetary system;

enters orbit around the terrestroid planet;

gains every possible datum by remote observation before dispatching robot probes to uninhabited regions where the probes establish that life is chemically similar to Earth's and that microorganisms are safe.

There are woods, lakes, plains, mountains, clusters of buildings without defensive walls or streets, primitive mines and evidence of both Stone Age and Iron Age cultures.

This planet will later wage interstellar war against Terra. But not yet.