Despoilers of the Golden Empire

Despoilers of the Golden Empire is a short story by science fiction author Randall Garrett, which appeared under the pseudonym formed from two first names Garrett David Gordon in March 1959 in the magazine Astounding Science Fiction.

The short story was written by Garrett as April Fools. While the story is supposed to sound through the use of concepts from the science - fiction genre and Unusual translations and paraphrases as a future story of the conquest of an alien world by an expedition of the story becomes clear only in the last line that Garrett his readers by unusual for a historical story concepts has misguided and in fact described the conquest of the Inca Empire in Peru by Francisco Pizarro.

In an afterword Garrett discusses the techniques of his writing, so it was about the mighty mineral, after the expedition was on the lookout for gold, whose power was more in economic than in the technological field. Another example is the Universal Message (Universal Assembly), which turns out to be a correct translation of Ekklesia Catholicos, but without being so taken by readers with the more common term Catholic Church in connection.