Pern Mini-FAQ, part 2

So, I'm here for more details about Pern...

Glad you asked. Pern is a fictional planet orbiting the real star Rukbat, and it was colonized as an agrarian society by people who wanted to escape the pressures and conflicts of a highly structured and technocratic culture that controlled a large area of the galaxy. After a thousand years or so the settlers forgot their origins and the galactic society (AKA the Federated Sentient Planets, which Anne McCaffrey has written many other books about) forgot about Pern.

The settlers forgot about their past largely because they were in a struggle for their lives against Thread, which appeared just a few years after planting their colony. The original survey team had missed the fact that one of the other planets, known as "the Red Star" by the settlers, was the source of a mindless living organism that sent spores across the space between itself and Pern whenever it passed close enough, generally fifty years out of every 250. These spore cases would thaw in the atmosphere of Pern and unravel into silvery worm- or thread-shaped corrosive organisms which the settlers named, naturally enough, Thread. Once a Thread cluster hit the ground, it would burrow and begin to multiply with amazing speed, devouring everything for miles around except for metal, stone, water, and other non-organic materials. This sort of thing could ruin somebody's whole day. By coincidence the Red Star had begun a Pass shortly after the colony was founded, and the Thread soon threatened to overwhelm it.

OK, OK, so what are the Dragonriders of Pern?

I was just getting to that, really I was... ;-} Obviously some way had to be found to get rid of Thread before it hit the ground. The colonits lost the last of their spaceflight capability trying to investigate the Red Star, and most of their few aircraft were destroyed in efforts to destroy Thread in midair. Having come to Pern to form an agrarian society, they had purposely not brought along the means for large-scale industry, so they could not make new aircraft fast enough to replace their losses. By happy coincidence one of the colonists was an eminent geneticist, who devised a plan in which a native species of small, winged, semi-intelligent, somewhat reptilian-looking creature known as the firelizard would be modified to be able to carry a human rider aloft to fight the Thread.

Even before the modification, these firelizards already had several highly useful abilities. They were cooperative, they bonded empathically to individual humans at hatching, they could produce fiery breath after chewing a local phosphine-bearing mineral, and most important of all, teleport from one place to another instantly without having to travel through the intervening distance. This process was known as "going between" After the modification, they were large enough to carry a rider, smart enough to learn to work in concert with the rider and with each other, and able to produce enough flame to last through a two to six hour Threadfall. They were named Dragons, and those who bonded with them at their hatching and rode them were called Dragonriders.

By the end of the First Pass the dragons and their riders had multiplied to a fighting force large enough to protect the few remaining settlements, which tunneled into rocky caves and became known as holds. The settlers knew that the Red Star would Pass again in two hundred years, and even during the Interval they planned for the future. Those with valuable skills banded together into groups to preserve their knowledge for future generations, and these groups became known as the Crafts. Despite this, Pernese technology was already beginning to regress to a pre-industrial state. The Holds multiplied, but kept to protected areas. And watching over all were the dragonriders, now set apart along with their support staff in their own strongholds, known as Weyrs.

What makes Dragonriders so special?

When a clutch of dragon eggs is about to hatch, a Weyr will gather a group of young people as Candidates to become dragonriders. Some mature dragons are able to tell whether someone will make a good rider; generally the people chosen have latent telepathic or empathic abilities, though nobody on Pern has actual usable psychic powers. The Candidates gather for the Hatching and each newborn dragonet examines them until it finds one that he or she wants to bond with. The telempathic link forms instantaneously and sets the new rider apart from other people for the rest of his or her life. The forming of the bond is known as "Impression" and is a life-changing experience.

Dragons are sentient beings, fully conscious and possessing distinct personalities. After the bond of Impression forms, the dragon loves his or her rider unconditionally for the rest of their life, to the extent that if the rider dies, the dragon will immediately commit suicide by going between and not coming out the other side. Should the dragon die, the rider is left as a numbed husk of their former self; most cannot bear the loneliness and choose death instead. But while both are alive the dragon provides love and support to the rider, and the rider provides steadiness and guidance to the dragon. Dragons have only vague long-term memories, and also have little understanding of the complications of human culture. Newborn dragonets, though they are born knowing their names and knowing how to "speak" telepathically to their rider and to other dragons, must be taught everything else by their riders, and the pair is given extensive training while the dragon is growing to full size. During this time the young riders are known as weyrlings and are under the command of the Weyrlingmaster and his or her staff. The training is tough, especially learning to jump between and even more so when they meet Thread for the first timel and generally one-quarter of each class dies before graduation, with that many again dying in the first Turn (year) of combat.

Dragons come in different sizes and colors: the greens are the smallest and most common, and there are blues, browns, bronzes, and golds in increasing order of size, intelligence, and rarity. Greens and golds are female (though greens are sterile), and the others are male. Several times each year (generally only once or twice for golds) a female dragon will rise to mate, chased by whichever male dragons want to catch her. The emotions are strongly shared by the riders of all the dragons involved, and the results of the flight will be matched on the ground, to put it delicately. The emotions of the flight are also broadcast, more weakly, to everyone in the area, sometimes with embarrassing consequences to those unused to the feelings. This is one reason why the dragonfolk live apart from the rest of the population. Because of the constant possibility of mating flights, it is rare for dragonriders to form monogamous relationships, again in contrast to the much more traditional Holds. Because the green dragons are sterile, the gold, or queen, dragons are the only source of new eggs to replace the constant stream of dragonpairs lost in combat. The queens are in a position of dominance and no other dragon would disobey one. Within a Weyr, the queens have a strict 'pecking order' usually but not always determined by age; the rider of the senior queen is given the position of Weyrwoman, and is in charge of the entire Weyr. Once again this is in contrast to the Holds, where women are relegated by tradition to support and childbearing roles.

Bronze dragons are, in virtually all cases, the only males with the size and stamina to win a queen's mating flight. The rider of the bronze who flies the senior queen is given the position of Weyrleader, and commands the fighting Wings of his Weyr. He will also often take a leading role in negotiating with the holders, since many of them are highly uncomfortable dealing with a woman in a position of authority. Bronzeriders are always men, and if they show any ability whatsoever they are given leadership positions at various levels, most often that of Wingleader. A Wing is the basic combat unit, generally consisting of thirty to forty mature dragonpairs of all colors except gold. The wingleader is assisted by two wingseconds, most often brownriders but occasionally bronzeriders.

During a Pass the combat with Thread is relentless; over the thousands of Turns that Thread has fallen, its pattern has become known and a Weyr will generally have a Threadfall in its territory once or twice a sevenday (the Pernese term for "week".) This is less often near the beginning and end of a Pass, and much more often at the middle of it. At least three Wings will be assigned to a given 'Fall, according to the strategy and schedule assigned by the current Weyrleader. Just before the 'Fall is due to start, the dragons will begin to chew firestone, which is chemically transformed by an internal organ into a gas that ignites owhen exhaled. The Wings then jump between to the area where the Thread is due to fall, and watch for its appearance. Threadfall always begins in one area and moves westward as the planet rotates under the stream, but due to weather conditions it may be concentrated, or spread out over a wide area, or have any number of other behaviors that require experienced Threadfighters to size up and meet effectively.

When the 'Fall is over, injuries are tended back home at the Weyr, while healthy riders sweep the land looking for signs of Thread infestations. Holds and crafthalls that lie in the path of a 'Fall are responsible to get all their people and livestock under cover, and to provide ground crews armed with flamethrowers to burn out any burrows caused by Thread that slips past the dragonriders. The holds and crafts are also responsible to tithe a portion of their produce or wares to the Weyr that protects it, since the dragonriders and support staff have their hands full fighting Thread. This is yet another bone of contention between the Holds and the Weyrs.

The crafts are generally neutral in the tension between Holds and Weyr. However, since the separate crafts are autonomous, individual crafts may follow their own paths, more or less friendly with one side or the other. The Holds and Weyrs are equally autonomous, and some holds are friendlier to the Weyrs than others. Some of the more notable crafts include the Harpercraft, purveyors of education, information, and the arts, and the subject of several of Anne McCaffrey's books; the Smithcraft, producers of all sorts of technical goods; the Farmcraft, specialists in advanced agricultural practice and breeders of new varieties of food crops; the Herdcraft, knowledgeable in the science of animal breeding and healing; and others, including the Minecraft, Healercraft, Seacraft (or fishercraft), Tannercraft, Winecraft, Bakercraft, and so forth. Of course the holders also have skills in farming, herding, baking, and suchlike; but the crafts are the centers of knowledge in these areas, and the places where new research is done.

This document is under construction and will be continued!