Tom, the main character of Mortal Engines, starts the story as an Apprentice Historian at the Museum of Natural History in a futuristic steampunk version of London. While members of the Engineering Guild, like Lord Mayor Crome, only care about excavating weapons technology from the past, the members of the History Guild care more about culture, extinct animals, and nonviolent technology. The Guild of Historians and the Guild of Engineers are the two most important Guilds for the story, representing the past and the future, respectively. The London that Tom lives in clearly values the Engineers more—they have their own impressive Guild building, and at one point the Engineers even take relics from the museum to burn in order to fuel London’s movement. But the Engineers’ focus on the future is short-sighted, and by ignoring the past example of the Sixty Minute War (a catastrophe that decimated old civilizations), Crome repeats the same mistakes as the old civilizations, accidentally destroying London when he tries to activate the ancient super-weapon MEDUSA.
The members of the Guild of Historians aren’t always heroic. Beyond their corrupt and murderous leader, Thaddeus Valentine, even regular Historians play a role in the cruel practice of Municipal Darwinism, salvaging the remains of prey cities that London devours. In many ways, the fictional Historians struggle with the same problems as real curators and archaeologists, who want to preserve the past for future generations but who, particularly during the height of colonialism, have sometimes benefitted from violence and dealt with relics obtained by force. Some of the Historians also get too attached to their work, worrying about artifacts and relics while forgetting about human lives. In the end, however, even the stern Chudleigh Pomeroy is willing to risk his life by fighting Engineers to buy Katherine time to attempt to stop MEDUSA. This shows that despite the Historians’ shortcomings, they remain a necessary counterbalance to the relentless Engineers, who only focus on forward movement. Mortal Engines imagines a future world where people fail to learn from the past and repeat the same mistakes, suggesting that preserving the past and learning from history are both important steps for ensuring a better future.
Related Themes from Other Texts
The Importance of History ThemeTracker
The Importance of History Quotes in Mortal Engines
Thaddeus Valentine was Tom’s hero: a former scavenger who had risen to become London’s most famous archaeologist—and also its Head Historian, much to the envy and disgust of people like Pomeroy. Tom kept a picture of him tacked to the dormitory wall above his bunk, and he had read his books, Adventures of a Practical Historian and America Deserta—Across the Dead Continent with Gun, Camera and Airship, until he knew them by heart.
Magnus Crome had been ruler of London for nearly twenty years, but he still didn’t look like a Lord Mayor. The Lord Mayors in Katherine’s history books were chubby, merry, red-faced men, but Crome was as thin as an old crow, and twice as gloomy.
“Nor will we have to go chasing after scraps like Salthook,” Crome continued. “In another week London will be within range of Batmunkh Gompa, the Shield-Wall. For a thousand years the Anti-Traction League has cowered behind it, holding out against the tide of history. MEDUSA will destroy it at a single stroke.”
“No!” Katherine heard herself say. “Oh, no, no, no!” She started to run across the garden, staring towards the lightning-flecked cloud which wreathed the wreckage of the conurbation. From Circle Park and all the observation platforms came the sound of wordless voices, and she thought at first that they were crying out in horror, the way she wanted to—but no; they were cheering, cheering, cheering.
She had come to think of Bevis Pod as a sweet, clumsy, rather useless person, someone who needed her to look after him, and she suspected that that was how the Historians all thought of him as well. But that afternoon she had begun to understand that he was really much cleverer than her.
He gently moves a stray strand which has blown into her mouth, and holds her close, and waits—and the storm-light breaks over them and they are a knot of fire, a rush of blazing gas, and gone: the shadows of their bones scattering into the brilliant sky.
“But we’re alive, and together, and we’re going to be all right.”
