Q: Photos library does not show contents of package

I needed to restore my Mac from bare metal using a Time Machine backup.

The computer came back fine from the backup. I could see my "Photos Library.photoslibrary" (In the Pictures folder) reports the same size as before (in the Finder), and that package has subdirectories and content right up to this month, if you lift the lid on it. My photo library is about 100Gb and goes back more than a decade.

On launch of Photos, I got the dialog saying it detected I had restored from a backup and that I should to a rebuild/repair. On completion of this rebuild, I can only see photos up to 2003. Repeated “repairs” (using the Command-Option key combination on launch) fail to make Photos see the remaining content which I *know* is there in the package.

My theory is that the Photos app has a bug in the repair code which does an incomplete job of analysing the .photoslibrary package in the Pictures directory to rebuild its own content.

How can I force Photos to see the missing photos content that is clearly in the database?