Knaves in space

On our Earth, we've perforce learned all the knavery there is to know.

Poul Anderson, The High Crusade

Contrasting advanced civilizations with more primitive ones has long been a staple of fantasy fiction. Mark Twain set the standard with A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. Most time-travel stories are of this sort, in whichever direction the time traveler goes. Eric Flint's 1632 and its sequels explore this theme, as do any number of other books.

One of the classics is Poul Anderson's 1960 novel The High Crusade. Here the plot revolves around space travel, not time travel. A spaceship from a distance planet lands in 14th century England. The Wersgorix empire, having already conquered many other planets, is scouting out Earth as another possibility for expansion. They plan to turn Earthlings into slaves.

Sir Roger, about ready to set out on a Crusade to the Holy Land, takes over the spaceship, but then is tricked into loading virtually the entire village, including horses and livestock, into the ship, which instead of taking them to France, as Sir Roger believes, heads out to the planet Tharixan.

Yet Sir Roger is not defeated yet. The Wersgorix may have sophisticated technology and weaponry, but they are no match for Sir Roger's knights on horseback and especially his knavery. Sir Roger and his men prove more capable of understanding Wersgorix technology than the Wersgorix are of understanding close combat with swords and spears. Instead of the Wersgorix conquering Earth, the tables turn in the opposite direction.

Anderson's plot has a few twists and several interesting characters, and 60 years later the novel still makes amusing reading.  It was one of the author's most popular books, and one can see why.