Hundreds, maybe even thousands of low-class Saiyans alive?

[Xyex]

And how there used to be a Saiya-jin that was strong enough to become a SSJ a thousand years ago or so.

Btw, there's actually nothing that proves there was a Super Saiyan a thousands years ago. At least, perhaps not in the "blond-hair/transformation" way that Goku and Vegeta do it, since Freeza arc Vegeta and the SSj legend seems to treat it as basically a Saiyan that has surpassed the limits of a Saiyan, with no mention of a physical change or transformation, which is why Vegeta thought that he or Goku was a Super Saiyan a number of times.

And I don't imagine Saiyans noting down every instance of a super-strong Saiyan appearing once every thousands years. Would a Saiyan even live that long? It's only a legend, after all.

Incorrect. Vegeta does refer to a transformation. Durng his musings about Goku, after Goku arrives and starts treating the Ginyu Force like weaklings, he thinks to himself how the last Super Saiya-jin could only maintan that status in the 'transformed state' or something along those lines. The anime super imposes the Oozaru over the musings, but that's only becuase the Oozaru is the only 'transformed state' Vegeta yet knows exists. So he does know that a transformation is/was involved, but as it's been so long the actual details have long been lost and he's not really sure what's what.

And all legends are based in some level of fact.

[Piccolo Daimao]

And how there used to be a Saiya-jin that was strong enough to become a SSJ a thousand years ago or so.

Btw, there's actually nothing that proves there was a Super Saiyan a thousands years ago. At least, perhaps not in the "blond-hair/transformation" way that Goku and Vegeta do it, since Freeza arc Vegeta and the SSj legend seems to treat it as basically a Saiyan that has surpassed the limits of a Saiyan, with no mention of a physical change or transformation, which is why Vegeta thought that he or Goku was a Super Saiyan a number of times.

And I don't imagine Saiyans noting down every instance of a super-strong Saiyan appearing once every thousands years. Would a Saiyan even live that long? It's only a legend, after all.

Incorrect. Vegeta does refer to a transformation. Durng his musings about Goku, after Goku arrives and starts treating the Ginyu Force like weaklings, he thinks to himself how the last Super Saiya-jin could only maintan that status in the 'transformed state' or something along those lines. The anime super imposes the Oozaru over the musings, but that's only becuase the Oozaru is the only 'transformed state' Vegeta yet knows exists. So he does know that a transformation is/was involved, but as it's been so long the actual details have long been lost and he's not really sure what's what.

And all legends are based in some level of fact.

Incorrect. Vegeta doesn't refer to a transformation, at least in the manga.

Chapter: 280 (DBZ 86), P3.1-2
Vegeta: “A Super Saiyan appears once every thousand years… a Saiyan who overcomes the wall which no warrior, no matter how gifted, can overcome…That’s supposed to just be a stupid tradition…And even if the legend were true…only I would have the potential to become a Super Saiyan.”

The Super Saiyan's not once referred to or portrayed as a transformation until after Goku becomes a Super Saiyan. Vegeta's constantly believing that he himself is a Super Saiyan, despite no physical change or transformation. Just getting stronger.

And maybe all legends are based in some level of fact. But, to me, the story indicates that the Super Saiyan was treated simply as a Saiyan who had surpassed the normal limits of a Saiyan, making him a "super" Saiyan. Again, there's nothing that actually proves that there was a Super Saiyan a thousand or thousands of years ago, in the vein of Goku and the others.

And, needless to say, that "SSj once every 1,000 years" thing is just legendary bullshit as well, since Super Saiyans are popping up one after the other in a couple of years between them. Vegeta becomes a SSj anywhere from 1 to 3 years after Goku; Gohan becomea a SSj in less than a year after Vegeta; Goten and Trunks become SSjs anywhere from their birth to 7 years.

[Kaboom]

You could take it as meaning that a new "generation" of Super Saiyans pops up every thousand or so years. It'd go with what we see in the story... Goku and Vegeta are normal Saiyans who end up scaling unbelievable heights of power and transforming, then their offspring end up even stronger... This goes on for another generation or two until it starts to "wear off" again, and eventually we've got Goku Jr.

[Rocketman]

Without the Get Out Of Death Free card, there wouldn't be any Super Saiyans.

[Piccolo Daimao]

You could take it as meaning that a new "generation" of Super Saiyans pops up every thousand or so years. It'd go with what we see in the story... Goku and Vegeta are normal Saiyans who end up scaling unbelievable heights of power and transforming, then their offspring end up even stronger... This goes on for another generation or two until it starts to "wear off" again, and eventually we've got Goku Jr.

Well, I won't. Because it doesn't say that. It says, "A Super Saiyan appears once every 1,000 years". I'm not going to twist some legend crap to make it fit a story that was made up as the author who went along.

Without the Get Out Of Death Free card, there wouldn't be any Super Saiyans.

That's true.

[hleV]

Maybe 1,000 or whatever years ago some random Saiyan with a battle power of let's say 5,000 got some 33x Zenkais and went Super Saiyan, thus the legend was born. Noone else survived such injuries, so everyone assumed that that Saiyan was unique.
This could go if Super Saiyan has a power requirement.

[Piccolo Daimao]

Maybe 1,000 or whatever years ago some random Saiyan with a battle power of let's say 5,000 got some 33x Zenkais and went Super Saiyan, thus the legend was born. Noone else survived such injuries, so everyone assumed that that Saiyan was unique.
This could go if Super Saiyan has a power requirement.

It's all completely vague. It could be anything. I'm not ruling out the possibility that there was a typical blond-haired Super Saiyan a thousand years before Goku. I'm just saying that, to me, the legend's completely vague and it could've just been an extraordinarily strong Saiyan, who was far stronger than the rest, and then other Saiyans called him a "Super Saiyan" based on his power.

[hleV]

It's all completely vague. It could be anything. I'm not ruling out the possibility that there was a typical blond-haired Super Saiyan a thousand years before Goku. I'm just saying that, to me, the legend's completely vague and it could've just been an extraordinarily strong Saiyan, who was far stronger than the rest, and then other Saiyans called him a "Super Saiyan" based on his power.

Yes. My story works even if that Saiyan didn't transform. Basically there's a fair chance that a Saiyan who was called a Super Saiyan because of his seemingly incredible power did really exist.

[Pantalones]

I think it's possible that a small handful of Saiyans might still be out there somewhere, but probably not many, and I really doubt there'd be any really super-strong ones around. Not every planet has the Senzu beans and healing tanks and such that you'd need to take advantage of the ridiculous near-death boosts, after all.

It's possible that some Saiyans could have been presumed dead by Freeza's army because they got in a fight on whichever planet they were sent off to and the other guy destroyed their scouter with a blast that just barely didn't kill them, or something along those lines. Freeza probably sent thugs to kill Saiyans that he knew were still out there, but there's plenty of ways a few could've slipped through the cracks. It took them, what, something like 30 years just to go check up on the planet Goku was sent to? So there's definitely a chance that some other Saiyan got sent out, nearly got killed and lost his scouter, and then was presumed dead by Freeza and company... and they just never got around to checking that planet to see if that Saiyan really was dead before Freeza got killed and that whole empire just kind of collapsed.

You've got to remember that Raditz, Nappa, and Vegeta aren't all-knowing. Just because they say there's no way any other Saiyans could be left doesn't mean that's absolutely true, it only means that as far as they know there aren't any others left. Which means Freeza hasn't mentioned any others still being around, they haven't bumped into any when they were sent on more of Freeza's wipe-out-a-planet missions (which probably included a few planets where a Saiyan had been sent to and failed before), and they weren't able to find any survivors who fled the planet in spacepods or anything like that. Yeah, that does cut down the possibilities a lot, but it doesn't make it completely impossible that there's a few others around.

====

About the Super Saiyan thing, I think the obvious explanation for why nobody mentioned it being a transformation until right before it actually happened is that Toriyama hadn't thought of the exact appearance of a Super Saiyan yet at the time.

As for an in-universe reason, well... it's been 1000 years. Saiyans don't live any longer than humans (they just stay physically "young" longer.) Do humans have perfect records of what people 1000 years ago looked like? No. Not even for major historical figures, in a lot of cases; we might have drawings or paintings from the period, but sometimes those aren't even all that accurate to what the real guy looked like. And most humans don't devote their entire lives to blowing things up (as opposed to Saiyans, who probably don't have a word for "wartime" because that's all the time), we actually tend to put some effort into recording history. The Saiyans probably only recorded the stuff that was important to them--that the Super Saiyan who showed up 1000 years ago was really, really strong, way stronger than any other Saiyan of the time, and was actually different enough from "just a really strong Saiyan" that they bothered to come up with a different name to call it. The Saiyans don't really care much about what something looks like, at least not compared to how powerful it is, so of course they didn't mention any specifics as far as appearance.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

Could be that Freeza intentionally arranged a time where Sayains wouldn't be active, or simply found a good one. We know he'd been plotting something like that for years, the way he talks to Zarbon about it even after he knows where every remaining sayain is by that point.

And most humans don't devote their entire lives to blowing things up (as opposed to Saiyans, who probably don't have a word for "wartime" because that's all the time),

Permission to sig?

[Piccolo Daimao]

It's all completely vague. It could be anything. I'm not ruling out the possibility that there was a typical blond-haired Super Saiyan a thousand years before Goku. I'm just saying that, to me, the legend's completely vague and it could've just been an extraordinarily strong Saiyan, who was far stronger than the rest, and then other Saiyans called him a "Super Saiyan" based on his power.

Yes. My story works even if that Saiyan didn't transform. Basically there's a fair chance that a Saiyan who was called a Super Saiyan because of his seemingly incredible power did really exist.

Yeah, I think that there was an extraordinarily strong Saiyan, far stronger than the rest, a long, long time ago, who would've been at least around 60,000 (what I think is the power requirement for a Super Saiyan) and was dubbed a "Super Saiyan" based on his power, although he hadn't physically changed or transformed. And he loved bloodshed and battle, moreso than a normal Saiyan, and eventually died for one reason or another.