sons of royal concubines.
OIL LENS: hufuf oil held in static tension by an enclosing force field within a viewing tube as part of a magnifying or other light-manipulation system. Because each lens element can be adjusted individually one micron at a time, the oil lens is considered the ultimate in accuracy for manipulating visible light.
OPAFIRE: one of the rare opaline jewels of Hagal.
ORANGE CATHOLIC BIBLE: the “Accumulated Book,” the religious text produced by the Commission of Ecumenical Translators. It contains elements of most ancient religions, including the Maometh Saari, Mahayana Christianity, Zensunni Catholicism and Buddislamic traditions. Its supreme commandment is considered to be: “Thou shalt not disfigure the soul.”
ORNITHOPTER (commonly: ’thopter): any aircraft capable of sustained wing-beat flight in the manner of birds.
OUT-FREYN: Galach for “immediately foreign,” that is: not of your immediate community, not of the select.
PALM LOCK: any lock or seal which may be opened on contact with the palm of the human hand to which it has been keyed.
PAN: on Arrakis, any low-lying region or depression created by the subsiding of the underlying basement complex. (On planets with sufficient water, a pan indicates a region once covered by open water. Arrakis is believed to have at least one such area, although this remains open to argument.)
PANOPLIA PROPHETICUS: term covering the infectious superstitions used by the Bene Gesserit to exploit primitive regions.
PARACOMPASS: any compass that determines direction by local magnetic anomaly; used where relevant charts are available and where a planet’s total magnetic field is unstable or subject to masking by severe magnetic storms.
PENTASHIELD: a five-layer shield-generator field suitable for small areas such as doorways or passages (large reinforcing shields become increasingly unstable with each successive layer) and virtually impassable to anyone not wearing a dissembler tuned to the shield codes.
PLASTEEL: steel which has been stabilized with stravidium fibers grown into its crystal structure.
PLENISCENTA: an exotic green bloom of Ecaz noted for its sweet aroma.
POLING THE SAND: the art of placing plastic and fiber poles in the open desert wastes of Arrakis and reading the patterns etched on the poles by sandstorms as a clue to weather prediction.
PORITRIN: third planet of Epsilon Alangue, considered by many Zensunni Wanderers as their planet of origin, although clues in their language and mythology show far more ancient planetary roots.
PORTYGULS: oranges.
PRANA (Prana-musculature): the body’s muscles when considered as units for ultimate training.
PRE-SPICE MASS: the stage of fungusoid wild growth achieved when water is flooded into the excretions of Little Makers. At this stage, the spice of Arrakis forms a characteristic “blow,” exchanging the material from deep underground for the matter on the surface above it. This mass, after exposure to sun and air, becomes melange
PROCES VERBAL: a semiformal report alleging a crime against the Imperium. Legally: an action falling between a loose verbal allegation and a formal charge of crime.
PROCTOR SUPERIOR: a Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother who is also regional director of a B.G. school. (Commonly: Bene Gesserit with the Sight.)
PRUDENCE DOOR or PRUDENCE BARRIER (idiomatically: pru-door or pru-barrier): any pentashield situated for the escape of selected persons under conditions of pursuit.
PUNDI RICE: a mutated rice whose grains, high in natural sugar, achieve lengths up to four centimeters; chief export of Caladan.
PYONS: planet-bound peasants or laborers, one of the base classes under the Faufreluches. Legally; wards of the planet.
PYRETIC CONSCIENCE: so-called “conscience of fire”; that inhibitory level touched by Imperial conditioning.
QANAT: an open canal for carrying irrigation water under controlled conditions through a desert.
QIRTAIBA: see Ibn Qirtaiba.
QUIZARA TAFWID: Fremen priests (after Muad’Dib).
RACHAG: a caffeine-type stimulant from the yellow berries of akarso.
RAMADHAN: ancient religious period marked by fasting and prayer; traditionally, the ninth month of the solar-lunar calendar. Fremen mark the observance according to the ninth meridian-crossing cycle of the first moon.
RAZZIA: a semipiratical guerrilla raid.
RECATHS: body-function tubes linking the human waste disposal system to the cycling filters of a stillsuit.
REPKIT: repair and replacement essentials for a stillsuit.
RESIDUAL POISON: an innovation attributed to the Mentat Piter de Vries whereby the body is impregnated with a substance for which repeated antidotes must be administered. Withdrawal of the antidote at any time brings death.
REVEREND MOTHER: originally, a proctor of the Bene Gesserit, one who has transformed an “illuminating poison” within her body, raising herself to a higher state of awareness. Title adopted by Fremen for their own religious leaders who accomplished a similar “illumination.”
RICHESE: fourth planet of Eridani A, classed with Ix as supreme in machine culture. Noted for miniaturization. (For a detailed study on how Richese and Ix escaped the more severe effects of the Butlerian Jihad, see
RIMWALL: second upper step of the protecting bluffs on the Shield Wall of Arrakis.
RUH-SPIRIT: in Fremen belief, that part of the individual which is always rooted in (and capable of sensing) the metaphysical world. (See Alam al-Mithal.)
SADUS: judges. The Fremen title refers to holy judges, equivalent to saints.
SALUSA SECUNDUS: third planet of Gamma Waiping; designated Imperial Prison Planet after removal of the Royal Court to Kaitain. Salusa Secundus is homeworld of House Corrino, and the second stopping point in migrations of the Wandering Zensunni. Fremen tradition says they were slaves on S.S. for nine generations.
SANDCRAWLER: general term for machinery designed to operate on the Arrakis surface in hunting and collecting melange.
SANDMASTER: general superintendent of spice operations.
SANDRIDER: Fremen term for one who is capable of capturing and riding a sandworm.
SANDSNORK: breathing device for pumping surface air into a sand-covered stilltent.
SANDTIDE: idiomatic for a dust tide: the variation in level within certain dust-filled basins on Arrakis due to gravitational effects of sun and satellites.
SANDWALKER: any Fremen trained to survive in the open desert.
SANDWORM: See Shai-Hulud.
SAPHO: high-energy liquid extracted from barrier roots of Ecaz. Commonly used by Mentats who claim it amplifies mental powers. Users develop deep ruby stains on mouth and lips.
SARDAUKAR: the soldier-fanatics of the Padishah Emperor. They were men from an environmental background of such ferocity that it killed six out of thirteen persons before the age of eleven. Their military training
