Aurebesh/Legends

Aurebesh was an alphabet commonly used to represent the Basic language. The name comes from a combination of the first two letters, Aurek and Besh.

The origins, as well as the time it was implemented are not known. It existed at least as early as the Jedi Civil War and afterwards.

Behind the scenes
The word "Aurebesh" is similar to the word Alphabet, which is derived from the first two letters of the Greek alphabet (Alpha and Beta).

The Aurebesh-like writing that appears in the original trilogy, however, is totally random and it is believed that the filmmakers did not intend to put any meaningful text. The assignment of the letters to some English equivalent was first developed by writers at West End Games for Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game.

This original Aurebesh is occasionally used in electronic and board games such as Star Wars Monopoly. Since the letters in the movies are random, the assignment of the West End Games-values to the inscriptions of the movies, produces nonsensical results &mdash; most words seen in the movies appear to consist solely of consonants, and some letters appear on screen that are absent from the West End Games Aurebesh.

In the prequel trilogy and in Special Edition releases of the original trilogy, the inscriptions use the West End Games mapping, and can be transcribed to English.

There are some slight indications that the Galaxy also used the Roman alphabet (in the way that Basic is English) along the Aurebesh. This is seen in some in-universe inscriptions (Jedi Code) or emblems, like that of the Jedi Order. While we can say that these instances are 'translations' for the Earth readers, some instanecs show both Roman and Aurebesh (Corporate Sector Authority). It is not known if those appearances should be considered mistakes and/or non-canonical.

Appearances



 * During The Phantom Menace, when Anakin Skywalker is flying an N-1 Starfighter in the Battle of Naboo, a screen reads "Anakin turn the ship around and go back home right away." This is presumably a message to Anakin from R2-D2. It occurs just before Anakin's line, "Go back? Qui-Gon told me to stay in this cockpit, so that's what I'm going to do."
 * In the 2004 DVD release of A New Hope, the words displaying information as Obi-Wan Kenobi deactivates the tractor beam on the Death Star I, which were written using the Roman alphabet in previous releases, are now in the Aurebesh. Note that this particular instance was the only scene in the whole series to clearly show Roman letters (though highly observant viewers note that a needle on an IT-0 interrogation droid in an earlier scene is marked "Made in England").
 * In Return of the Jedi, Aurebesh is seen on the monitors of the Death Star II control center, when Darth Vader's shuttle is about to land. These graphics predate the West End Games description of Aurebesh, and produce gibberish if those letter assignments are used.
 * In a few instances, such as Jedi Knight: Mysteries of the Sith, inscriptions appear mirror-inverted. It is unknown whether this is a blooper or a variant of the script.
 * The main screen menu of Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II also appears in Aurebesh.
 * On the menu of Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy it is seen scrolling in the background, and when you move the mouse over the choices they turn to English.
 * In the mission briefings of Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, Aurebesh text accompanies the depicted places.
 * In Attack of the Clones, Aurebesh can be seen on the walls of the buildings of Coruscant as Jango Fett flies away after killing Zam Wesell. One of the walls can be translated as saying "Warren".
 * In Star Wars: Galaxies, blue screens appear repeatedly scrolling Aurebesh text.
 * In Star Wars Republic 49: Sacrifice in the first panel showing Aayla Secura on The Wheel is a neon sign that contains the text "TOSHE STAT[page ends]" and below that the word "KIFFEX."
 * "VOS" appears in Aurebesh on Quinlan Vos's chest.
 * In Star Wars: Empire at War, the Aurebesh word for $ appears above the total amount of credits.
 * In the Rhen'Var citadel level from Star Wars: Battlefront, there is a secret message written on the wall, next to the stairs at the observatory.
 * Some objects in Star Wars: Droidworks (for example, a water tank) are labeled in Aurebesh.