Organizations of the Dune universe
Multiple organizations of the Dune universe dominate the political, religious, and social arena of the setting of Frank Herbert's Dune series of science fiction novels, and derivative works. Set tens of thousands of years in the future, the saga chronicles a civilization which has banned computers but has also developed advanced technology and mental and physical abilities through physical training, eugenics and the use of the drug melange. Specialized groups of individuals have aligned themselves in organizations focusing on specific abilities, technology and goals. Herbert's concepts of human evolution and technology have been analyzed and deconstructed in at least one book, The Science of Dune. His originating 1965 novel Dune is popularly considered one of the greatest science fiction novels of all time, and is frequently cited as the best-selling science fiction novel in history. Dune and its five sequels by Herbert explore the complex and multilayered interactions of politics, religion, ecology, and technology, among other themes.
Overview
As Frank Herbert's Dune begins, the known universe is ruled by Shaddam IV, the 81st Padishah Emperor of House Corrino, whose power is secured by his control of the Sardaukar, his brutally efficient military force. Imperial power is balanced by the assembly of noble houses called the Landsraad, which enforces the Great Convention's ban on the use of atomics against human targets. Though the power of House Corrino is unrivaled by any other individual House, they are in constant competition with each other for political power and stakes in the omnipresent CHOAM company, a directorship which controls the wealth of the entire Empire. The third primary power in the universe is the Spacing Guild, which monopolizes interstellar travel and banking through its proprietary use of melange-mutated Guild Navigators who perform the necessary computations to safely navigate "folded space".The matriarchal Bene Gesserit possess almost superhuman physical, sensory, and deductive powers developed through years of physical and mental conditioning. While positioning themselves to serve mankind, the Bene Gesserit pursue their goal to better the human race by subtly and secretly guiding and manipulating human bloodlines and the affairs of others to serve their own purposes. "Human computers" known as Mentats have been developed and perfected to replace the capacity for logical analysis lost through the prohibition of computers. The Bene Tleilax are amoral merchants who traffic in biological and genetically engineered products such as artificial eyes, "twisted" Mentats and a type of clone called a ghola. Finally, the Ixians produce cutting-edge technology that seemingly complies with the prohibitions against computers, [|thinking machines] and conscious robots put in place 10,000 years before as a result of the Butlerian Jihad. The doctors of the Suk School are the universe's most competent and trusted; those who have received the "Suk Imperial Conditioning" are incapable of inflicting harm. The Swordmasters of Ginaz are an elite group of master swordsmen whose fighting skills are prized and unmatched. Equally fierce in battle are the native Fremen of the desert planet Arrakis, known as Dune. Naturally honed to excellence in harsh conditions rivaling the planet on which the Imperial Sardaukar are trained, the Fremen are misunderstood and underestimated by the other powers in the universe.
Arrakis is the only natural source of the all-important spice melange, and by leading the Fremen to seize control of the planet in Dune, Paul Atreides is able to depose Shaddam and become ruler of the known universe. With a bloody jihad subsequently unleashed across the universe in Paul's name but out of his control, the Bene Gesserit, Tleilaxu, Spacing Guild and House Corrino plot to dethrone him in Dune Messiah. Seeing the eventual extinction of mankind through prescient vision, in Children of Dune Paul's son Leto II devises an extended plan to save humanity, but becomes a symbiote with the sandworm of Arrakis to gain the long lifespan needed to see this plan to its end.
Thirty-five hundred years later in God Emperor of Dune, Leto still rules the universe as a 'benevolent tyrant', with the help of his all-female army, the Fish Speakers. He forbids any spiritual outlets other than his own compulsory religion, and maintains a tight monopoly on melange and space travel. Through his own selective breeding program among the descendants of his twin sister Ghanima, Leto finally achieves Siona, whose actions are hidden from prescient vision. He engineers his own assassination, knowing it will result in rebellion and revolt but also in an explosion in travel and colonization. The resultant chaos and severe famine on many worlds cause trillions of humans to set off into the freedom of unknown space and spread out across the universe in a diaspora later called the Scattering.
Fifteen hundred years later, as Heretics of Dune begins, the balance of power in the Empire rests among the Ixians, the Bene Gesserit, and the Tleilaxu. The Spacing Guild has been forever weakened by the development of Ixian machines capable of navigation in foldspace, practically replacing Guild Navigators. Ixians are at their apex with their alliance with the Fish Speakers; but Bene Gesserit analysts see them as a failing power, because Ixian society has become a bureaucracy and no great inventions have come out of the workshops of Ix for centuries. The Bene Gesserit control the sandworms and their planet, now called Rakis, through their influence over the Rakian Priesthood that worships the sandworms as the Divided God, Leto II, and now actively participate on interstellar politics and even have their own standing armies. But the Tleilaxu have also discovered how to synthetically produce melange, and they are preparing to subjugate the rest of humanity. As a large influx of people begin to return from the Scattering, the Bene Gesserit find their match in a violent and corrupt matriarchal society known as the Honored Matres. A bitter and bloody war erupts between the orders, but in Chapterhouse: Dune it ultimately becomes clear that joining the two organizations into a single New Sisterhood with shared abilities is their best chance at survival against the approaching enemy, who had driven the Honored Matres into the Old Empire.
Bene Gesserit
The Bene Gesserit are a key social, religious, and political force in Frank Herbert's science fiction Dune universe. The matriarchal group is described as a secretive and exclusive sisterhood whose members train their bodies and minds through years of physical and mental conditioning to obtain superhuman powers and abilities that can seem magical to outsiders. Under the guise of humbly "serving" the Empire, the Sisterhood is in fact a major power in the universe, using its many areas of influence to subtly guide mankind along the path of their own plan for humanity's future. The Bene Gesserit also have a secret, millennia-long selective breeding program to bolster and preserve valuable skills and bloodlines as well as to produce a theoretical superhuman male they call the Kwisatz Haderach.Bene Tleilax
The Bene Tleilax, also called Tleilaxu, are an extremely xenophobic and isolationist society in the Dune universe. Genetic manipulators who traffic in biological products such as artificial eyes, gholas, and "twisted" Mentats, the Tleilaxu are a major power in the Imperium. The race is ruled by a small council of Tleilaxu Masters, whose genetically engineered Face Dancer servants have the ability to mimic any human. The Masters themselves possess a bland and diminutive appearance intended to cause other races to underestimate them. In Heretics of Dune, it is revealed that they are a secret totalitarian theocracy, ultimately seeking domination of the universe. Despite their influence, the Bene Tleilax are universally distrusted and inspire disgust because their products, though desirable, push the moral limits of what humanity at large considers acceptable and can involve extensive physiological and physical manipulation of human life. Tleilaxu Masters are the leaders and real minds of the Bene Tleilax. After Dune Messiah, they have the ability to regain their genetic memory with ease, allowing them to live forever, using their axlotl tanks to create gholas of themselves. In Heretics of Dune, it is noted that Tleilaxu sperm "does not carry forward in a straight genetic fashion... Gaps occur", and that they are "naturally immune to an Ixian Probe", an interrogation device which normally can extract information even from the dead. The Tleilaxu are described as short, dwarf-like characters with gray skin, hair and eyes, elfin features, and pointy teeth. Masters control their creations by forcing them into a hypnotic state with a predefined, implanted sound. In Dune Messiah, the Tleilaxu dwarf Bijaz controls the ghola Hayt through a specific humming intonation that renders Hayt open to implanted commands. In Heretics of Dune, the Master Waff attempts to control his perfectly mimicked Face Dancer copy of High Priest Hedley Tuek with a humming language, but fails due to the copy's complete assimilation into its new form.The original series
The Tleilaxu control a number of planets but are originally connected with Tleilax, the sole planet of the star Thalim. Herbert's 1965 novel Dune notes that the Tleilaxu are the source of twisted Mentats. Baron Harkonnen states his intent to "send at once to Tleilax for a new Mentat" after Piter De Vries is killed. The Tleilaxu themselves step into the foreground in Dune Messiah as their Face Dancer Scytale enters into a conspiracy with the Bene Gesserit, Spacing Guild, and House Corrino to topple the rule of Paul Atreides. To this end, the Tleilaxu resurrect Paul's dead friend Duncan Idaho as the ghola Hayt, trained as a Mentat. Hayt's function is to unwittingly destroy Paul psychologically and, failing that, kill Paul when triggered by an implanted command. The emotional stress of this assassination attempt unlocks Duncan's memories in Hayt, which Scytale uses to illustrate that the Tleilaxu can provide Paul with a fully realized ghola of his deceased concubine Chani, in exchange for his abdication. Paul refuses and kills Scytale. Duncan further ponders the Tleilaxu legacy of his creation in Children of Dune.Over 3,500 years later, in God Emperor of Dune, Tleilaxu Face Dancers kill and replace nearly everyone in the Ixian embassy on Arrakis as part of an assassination attempt on Paul's seemingly immortal son, the God Emperor Leto II Atreides. The Tleilaxu have been providing Leto with Duncan Idaho gholas for centuries, and their plot fails in part due to the ingenuity of the latest Duncan. Another 1,500 years later in Heretics of Dune, the Tleilaxu routinely provide the Bene Gesserit with Duncan Idaho gholas, and have also developed the ability to grow the spice melange in the same axlotl tanks they use to grow gholas. Secretly a theistic Zensunni society, the Tleilaxu believe they are on the brink of taking control of the Imperium. They have perfected their Face Dancers, who are now perfect mimics, able to copy the memories and consciousness of the people they imitate. Virtually undetectable to all but the Bene Gesserit, these Face Dancers begin to replace leaders in the Imperium as a means for the Tleilaxu to seize control. The plan fails as, over time, the Face Dancers come to believe they are the people they have copied and elude their genetically programmed loyalty to the Tleilaxu Masters. Leto II's death had spawned a widespread diaspora known as the Scattering, and in Heretics of Dune the descendants of "lost" Tleilaxu return from the Scattering. Tleilaxu leader Waff does not fully trust these newcomers, noting that "their accents were strange, their manners even stranger and their observances of the rituals questionable." And though he believes the so-called Lost Ones may be religiously tainted by their time away, he is willing to overlook this because of the valuable information they have brought with them. In particular, they have made it possible for the Tleilaxu to condition their latest Duncan Idaho ghola to possess a sexual imprinting ability to match that of the fierce, domination-hungry Honored Matres.
By the events of Chapterhouse: Dune, the Bene Tleilax have been all but eradicated by the Honored Matres save for one Master, Scytale. He is a ghola of the original Scytale of Dune Messiah, somehow having ascended from Face Dancer to Master. He tells the Bene Gesserit leader Darwi Odrade how the Lost Ones brought back captive Futars, hybrids of human and cat, which could not be reproduced in axlotl tanks. Both Odrade and Scytale realize this was a ploy of the descendant Tleilaxu to gain the confidence of the Masters and yet not divulge their secrets. Scytale's secret bargaining tool, while held against his will by the Bene Gesserit is a hidden nullentropy capsule containing cells carefully and secretly collected by the Tleilaxu for millennia, including the cells of Tleilaxu Masters, Face Dancers, Paul Atreides, Chani, Gurney Halleck, Thufir Hawat and other legendary figures. He intends to not only grow his own life-sustaining ghola, but to resurrect the rest of his order as well. In the meantime, he has given the Bene Gesserit enough of the axlotl technology to produce melange and grow their own gholas, in particular a replacement for their military genius Miles Teg.