MUDIR NAHYA: the Fremen name for Beast Rabban (Count Rabban of Lankiveil), the Harkonnen cousin who was siridar governor on Arrakis for many years. The name is often translated as "Demon Ruler." MUSHTAMAL: a small garden annex or garden courtyard.
MUSKY: poison in a drink. (See Chaumurky.)
MU ZEIN WALLAH!: Mu zein literally means "nothing good," and wallah is a reflexive terminal exclamation. In this traditional opening for a Fremen curse against and enemy, Wallah turns the emphasis back upon the words Mu zein, producing the meaning: "Nothing good, never good, good for nothing."
Na-: a prefix meaning "nominated" or "next in line." Thus: na-Baron means heir apparent to barony.
NAIB: one who has sworn never to be taken alive by the enemy; traditional oath of a Fremen leader.
NEZHONI SCARF: the scarf-pad worn at the forehead beneath the stillsuit hood by married or "associated" Fremen women after birth of a son.
NOUKKERS: officers of the Imperial bodyguard who are related to the Emperor by blood. Traditional rank for 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. (
See Missionaria Protectiva.)
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 and virtually impassable to anyone not wearing a dissembler tuned to the shield codes. (
See Prudence Door.)
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. (
See Bindu.)
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 (
See also Melange and Water of Life.)
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. (
See Pentashield.)
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. (See 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. (See 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 anitdote 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." (
See also Bene Gesserit and Water of Life.)
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
The Last Jihad by Sumer and Kautman.)
RIMWALL:
second upper step of the protecting bluffs on the Shield Wall of Arrakis. (
See Shield Wall.)
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.
