Taris/Legends

"So Carth, you've been all over the galaxy right? How would you rate Taris?" "To be honest, Mission, Taris would rate pretty low. The prejudice, the rich spoiling themselves while the poor are crushed beneath them. Not a pretty picture."

- Carth Onasi to Mission Vao

Taris was an urban planet in the Outer Rim Territories. It was the place of several key events during the Jedi Civil War, including the Battle of Taris. Taris was the target of a massive planetary bombardment which severely damaged the reputation of Darth Malak's Sith Empire and, more importantly, decimated the planet's surface. Over the next few millennia the planet managed to rebuild and recover, though never to the extent of its former glory. Similar to other ecumenopoli like Coruscant and Nar Shaddaa, the upper levels of Taris were magnificent and prestine, while the lower levels rotted in filth and decay. While the Upper City was safe and secure, inhabited by the wealthy, the lower levels were frequently plagued by gang warfare, inhabited by thugs and the poor.

Growth
"Taris was once a beautiful place of gleaming skyskrapers. But that was a long time ago."

- Carth Onasi

Circa 4,300 BBY Taris was situated on a major hyperspace transport hub not far from the Perlemian Trade Route, and was called the "Coruscant of the Outer Rim". Taris became a ecumenopolis, with all landmasses eclipsed with a world-spanning city. The city's grandeur was once said to rival the galactic capital, Coruscant, itself. However, the planet wasn't truly a planet-wide city, since much of it was actually a large ocean, thus differentiating Taris from both Coruscant and Nar Shaddaa another ecumenopolis.

Civil War and Anti-Alien Prejudice
"Famine spread across the planet. The Tarisian nobles hoarded the food for themselves. A civil war broke out."

- Rukil

Since there were no land areas dedicated to agriculture, the native populace harvested kelp and sea life from the ocean. However, industrial waste polluted this once pristine ocean, destroying the kelp farms and killing off the marine life. Famine swept the planet. Panicking, the greedy Tarisian nobles hoarded the remaining food for themselves. In 4,156 BBY, the starving lower-class, largely comprised of alien species, engaged the nobles in a massive civil war. Ultimately, the human nobles triumphed, yet the Tarisian prisons couldn't hold all the rebels, so the nobles began the tradition of banishing criminals to the Under City. Also, because the rebels had been largely comprised of aliens, the human nobles became prejudiced against non-Humans, and banished them from the Upper City, punishing any that dared to enter the upper levels. Thus began the long oppression by the human-centric Tarisian nobility of the non-human lower class.

It was believed that the swoop bike first originated on Taris. It was here that swoop racing captured the imagination of the galaxy around 4,000 BBY. Using an intricate system of hyperspace beacons, Tarisian race organizers broadcasted the results of their swoop races throughout the galaxy which eventually gave rise to a huge and profitable gambling operation. Taris remained a hub for swoop racing for decades, becoming the center of the Galactic Swoop Racing Circuit.

Decay
"They say Taris is the Coruscant of the Outer Rim. All I see is crumbling buildings and urban waste."

- An outraged Quarren

In 4,086 BBY Taris also received an extremely harsh review in Trampeta's Star Guide, being given the lowest possible recommendation. According to the author, T3 droids working in one of Taris's starports stole his baggage. While probably not having any influence on the development of the planet itself, it was nonetheless a reflection of the decay that Taris was undergoing. Soon, new hyperspace routes rendered Taris largely obselete in terms of its relevance to intragalactic trade.

By 3,966 BBY Taris had obtained a seat in the Galactic Senate.

Mandalorian Wars
"Taris, this planet so close to the stalemated Mandalorian front--"

- A Tarisian broadcaster

Around the year 3,964 BBY, Captain Saul Karath commanded the Republic fleet that protected Taris during the Mandalorian Wars. Due to Taris' close proximity to the Mandalorian War front, the planet served as a staging point for dissident Jedi and their allies for campaigns against the Mandalorians.

Meanwhile, Taris had compensated economically for its decaying importance to trade routes by negotiating with Lhosan Industries, which employed over half of the Lower City residents in its mining activities. However, due to increasing swoop gang activity, Lhosan was considering pulling it out, and going to a world that was safer domestically. The local authorities assured Lhosan Industries that they had the swoop gangs fully under control, and would take care of them with the assistance from the local Jedi. However, after a fugitive Jedi Padawan named Zayne Carrick was accused of murdering the entire graduating class of new Jedi Knights and escaped twice from Jedi custody in the Jedi Tower, Lhosan made its decision, and abandoned Taris.

This left a massive amount of Tarisians unemployed, and angry citizens began rioting all over Taris, setting entire sections of skyline on fire. The riots soon spilled out into the Middle City, and the Jedi on Taris also abandoned Taris. Taris was also largely abandoned by the Republic military, maintaining only a small military base on the planet's surface. It was made largely apparent that neither the Jedi nor the Republic cared whether the Mandalorians invaded Taris or not.

Battle over Taris
"The Sith fleet must have been waiting to ambush us over the planet."

- Carth Onasi



Though the Republic held a small military presence on Taris, it had not been viewed with any military importance since the first First Battle of Taris. This changed when the Republic ship Endar Spire arrived above the planet.

In 3,956 BBY several important members of the Republic war effort were onboard the Endar Spire such as Carth Onasi, Bastila Shan, and an amnesiac Revan (currently under the impression that he is a Republic soldier. While over Taris, the Endar Spire was attacked by a Sith warship. While Bastila Shan was famous for her affinity to the force and her adeptive skill at Battle Meditation, she was unable to use her powers during the ensuing battle. The Sith troops quickly overran the ship in an attempt to capture Bastilla (and her talents) for themselves. Bastila and several others were able to escape the ships in escape pods. Shortly after, the Spire was destroyed.



Several of the escape pods, including Bastila's pod, landed outside the Undercity of Taris, while others crashed in the Upper City. While many Upper City citizens gave over injured Republic soldiers to the local healer, Zelka Forn, the Black Vulkars, a swoop gang of the Lower City, swarmed over the Republic escape pods in the Under City, salvaging what was left of them. Bastila had been unable to exit her escape pod in time and was subsequently captured by the Vulkars. Revan and Carth Onasi's pod had landed in the Upper City and they were able to find an abandoned apartment to hide out in.

Sith Conquest
"The Sith have conquered the planet, declared martial law and initiated a planet wide quarantine."

- Carth Onasi

Meanwhile, the rest of the Sith fleet had arrived above Taris, and began landing their troops on the planet. Their was little to no resitance from the Tarisians, and the Sith were able to take the Republic military base without much trouble.

Now master of the planet, Darth Malak, leader of the Sith armada, inacted a planet-wide quarantine, preventing any ships from landing on or leaving Taris. The Sith also programmed their orbiting fleet to auto-target any ships that attempted to do so. This was all part of Malak plan to capture Bastila. Sith troops questioned the Upper City residents about the escape pods in the Upper City, searching for any surviving crew from the Endar Spire. Malak also sent Sith patrols into the Undercity to look for Bastila, using the rakghoul serum to protect them from a mutating disease spread by rakghouls, vicious mutants that made their home in the Undercity.

"Had I known of the Tarisian prejudices against aliens, I would have never come here in the first place!"

- An outraged Quarren

Meanwhile, the quarantine kept many off-worlders who were on business on Taris from leaving the planet. Since aliens were forbidden to live in the Upper City, off-world aliens were ordered into a slum while the quarantine was active. Although, when aliens did venture out into the city, it was obvious that the Sith did little to enforce this edict.

Meanwhile, a local gang war between the Hidden Beks and the Black Vulkars further hindered the Sith's efforts to find Bastila. In an attempt to encourage recruiting into his gang and crush the Beks once and for all, the leader of the Black Vulkars, Brejik had a prototype accelerator stolen from the Beks, which would allow the Vulkars to win the swoop season opener on Taris, even offering Bastila up as a prize to raise the stakes.

This was Carth and Revan's opportunity to rescue Bastila. Cooperating with the Hidden Beks, Revan stole back the swoop accelerator and won the Taris swoop champion. Brejik, unwilling to give up his prize, retracted Bastila from the competition. While Revan protested, Bastila freed herself and a brawl erupted. In the end Brejik was killed, and Revan escaped with Bastila.

Canderous Ordo, a Mandalorian enforcer for Davik Kang, the local crime-lord and subordinate of the Exchange, and future leader of the Mandalorian clans gave Revan a droid, allowing him to break into the Sith military base and steal the codes necassary to bypass the Sith blockade. Canderous then took Revan and company to Davik's estate, meaning to steal Davik's ship, the Ebon Hawk.

Destruction of Taris
"The search for Bastilla is taking too long, Admiral. Destroy the entire planet. Wipe this pathetic planet from the face of the Galaxy!"

- Darth Malak

Meanwhile, greater events unfolded in space. On his flagship, the Leviathan, Darth Malak, impatient with the search for Bastila and fearing her possible escape, ordered his fleet to bombard the entire planet, in what was arguably the most horrific event during the Jedi Civil War.



As the city, and billions of people, went up in flames around them, Revan and company escaped Taris in the Ebon Hawk, just some of the few survivors that made it off-planet after the Taris bombardment, the only other known survivor that made it off-planet being the bounty hunter Calo Nord.

Although it was believed that the Outcasts in the Undercity and some of the Lower City citizens might have survived the destruction, the vast majority of the inhabitants on the world's surface were killed.

Rehabilitation
Many millennia following the planet's devastation, Taris was finally resettled by Human colonists. These settlers were famed for their ship-building. The settlers rebuilt some of the planet's former cities, though much of the surface was left in ruins.

Historians attempted to excavate ruins across the planet, looking for proof that the swoop bike originated on Taris. By the Rise of the empire era Taris's corruption that had began in 4,156 BBY had been forgotten. It was believed by most historians that its prosperity was cut off by the orbital bombardment in 3,956 BBY. In reality its two hundred year long corruption had been brought to an end with the orbital bombardment and subsequent destruction of Taris.

It is unknown if the Human colonists made any attempt to restore the oceanic environment. Thus it is unknown if the new Tarisian food and water system relied on its own natural resources or if it used imported resources, similar to the methods of Coruscant.

There is evidence that a battle was fought on Taris during the Galactic Civil War.

By 3 ABY, much of the planet had been rebuilt, but the scar left on the planet by Darth Malak would never go away. Taris escaped the notice of the Yuuzhan Vong and emerged from the war unscathed.

As of 40 ABY, the famed bounty hunter Boba Fett owned a private residence on Taris. He had once taken a bounty down in the Undercity and obtained bad memories from the experience. He returned to the planet to research the possible whereabouts of the Kaminoan Taun We, and unknowingly met his granddaughter.

City Levels
The city of Taris was usually divided into four levels: the Upper City, the Middle City, the Lower City and the Undercity. Each one with its own unique inhabitants, lifestyles and problems.

The Upper City
"The upper city has got some nice shops and all, but it's boring."

- Mission Vao



The Upper City was a beautiful area inhabited by rich and powerful people, dwelling in the highest reaches of the towering skyscrapers that dominated the planet's landscape. Here, the privileged classes surrounded themselves with the trappings of prosperity, oblivious to the suffering and oppression of those forced to dwell far below them. Access to the Upper City was restricted so that only Humans were allowed, although notable non-Humans found in the Upper City included a Twi'lek droid merchant Janice Nall, Ajuur the Hutt, and a Rodian duelist named Twitch.

At some point prior to or during the Mandalorian Wars, the Jedi Order established a satellite training academy on Taris, ostensibly as a means of preparing its students for the more rigorous duties of patrolling the Outer Rim. Such was the mutually-beneficial relationship between the Jedi and the Tarisian authorities that the planetary constabulary sought in vain for even more Jedi to be stationed there. The pressing threat of the Mandalorians, however, rendered this wish untenable, with all enclave graduates earmarked for front-line combat duty. It is presumed that the academy&mdash;under the leadership of headmaster Lucien Draay&mdash;was either destroyed or abandoned at some point during or after the year 3,964 BBY, before the later Sith occupation.

The Upper City featured a cantina famous for its dueling ring owned by Ajuur the Hutt, and Zelka Forn's medical facility, which possessed a reputation for being able to heal all diseases but the infamous rakghoul plague. During the Second Sith War, a Sith military base was also established in the Upper City, and its roads were heavily patrolled by Sith troopers.

The Middle City
"This table was Taboon hardwood! Do you know how hard it is to get that in the Middle City?"

- A Basilisk businessman

The Middle City was the most populous level of Taris. It contained the middle class and working citizens of the planet's Human population. Many small business owners lived here, and most average people came to the Middle City to conduct business. Swoops and air speeders traversed through the air-traffic ways that cut through the many avenues of the Middle City towers. The Middle City was also the largest area, since a large portion of buildings were included in the juristiction of the "middle area". After the second escape of fugitive Jedi Zayne Carrick, massive riots rocked the Middle City, causing extensive damage. Although not entirely devoid of crime, the Middle City was more notably peaceful than other levels of Taris, though not to the extent of the Upper City.

The Lower City
"Be careful down there, those swoop gangs will shoot at anything, even some of our Sith patrols have come under fire."

- a Sith gaurd to Revan

The Lower City was home to the lower class people who had not been born into the privileged classes of Tarisian society, and aliens were common here, as this was one of the few areas on Taris where they were legally allowed to live. A popular lower city attraction was Javyar's Cantina run by Javyar. Here, another Hutt named Zax placed bounties and rewarded successful bounty hunters on behalf of his de facto boss, Davik Kang. Control over the Lower City streets was the subject of rivalry between swoop gangs&mdash;gangs whose pilots competed in swoop racing, a popular sport on Taris and some other planets (among them Tatooine and Manaan) since 4,000 BBY. The most notable swoop gangs were the Hidden Beks, led by Gadon Thek, and the Black Vulkars, led by Gadon's adopted son Brejik, who was characterized by Mission Vao as a traitor because he was a former Hidden Bek. Mission and Gadon believed Brejik to be responsible for the ongoing street war between the Beks and the Vulkars. Descending into the slums of the Lower City, the signs of urban decay became undeniable. Filth and refuse littered the streets, and burned out vehicles and shattered windows served as stark reminders of the violent wars of the swoop gangs fighting for control. Denizens of the Lower City struggled to survive amidst the urban wasteland.

The Undercity


"Anyone who wants me to go down there again can pay triple."

- Boba Fett

The Undercity, a village on the ground level beneath the immense skyscrapers of Taris, was a dark, wild area inhabited by the Outcasts&mdash;people whose predecessors were banished from the city for their crimes. The Outcasts never saw the sky in their miserable lives, and nobody hoped that their lives would ever turn for the better&hellip;except Rukil, an old man who was considered crazy by the rest of the village because of his stories about the Promised Land, a self-sufficient colony built long before the founding of the Undercity. Nobody believed in these stories, and most villagers considered them tales created with the purpose of giving people false hope. According to one account, though, the amnesiac Revan assisted Rukil in discovering the location of the Promised Land, allowing a great number of the Undercity's people to travel there. Having said that, many Outcasts died from starvation and disease, and the rakghouls killed even more.



The wilderness around the Undercity village was extremely dangerous because of rakghouls, semi-humanoid beasts that could infect Humans with the rakghoul disease. The Outcasts had to keep infected people isolated from the rest of the society because they would inevitably mutate into rakghouls.

Circa 4,000 BBY, Taris became a base of smuggling operations for the Exchange and its representative, the local crimelord Davik Kang. Davik was quick to send his personal bounty hunters&mdash;among them such notable figures as Calo Nord and Canderous Ordo&mdash;to deal with those who could not pay what they owed him.

Fauna

 * Rakghoul
 * Feathered dog
 * Tach

Behind the scenes
The name of the planet "Taris" may have been inspired or derived from the French city of Paris, given the similarity of the names and the fact of Taris as predominantly a planetwide city with a "cultured" sector (being the Upper City).

The class system imposed by the dominant Humanocentric Tarisian Humans on the alien population of the planet seems to be reminiscent of the real-world Apartheid system imposed in South Africa from 1948 to 1994. In both situations, different races or species were kept segregated from each other with one group having access to privileges (in this case the Rights of Sentience) and the better of living conditions while the rest being denied these on grounds of looking different or coming from another species.

In Taris, the planet's alien population was confined to the crime-filled ghettos of the Lower City whereas the Tarisian Humans resided in the more affluent and richer Upper and Middle Cities. Under Apartheid, South Africa's non-white population were required by law to live in townships which often had little electricity or running water.

The story concept of two classes of citizen, one living in better physical conditions than the other, is also a classic thematic element in science-fiction&mdash;see, for example, H.G. Wells's "The Time Machine" and the Eloi and Morlocks of that novel, or Phillip K. Dick's "Do Androids Dream of Electronic Sheep?" (filmed as Ridley Scott's "Blade Runner" and featuring humans opposed to replicants).

Appearances

 * Shadows and Light
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 0: Crossroads
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic: Commencement
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic: Flashpoint
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 9: Flashpoint Interlude: Homecoming
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic: Reunion
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic: Days of Fear
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 16: Nights of Anger, Part 1
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 17: Nights of Anger, Part 2
 * The Taris Holofeed: Invasion Edition
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 20: Daze of Hate, Part 2
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 21: Daze of Hate, Part 3
 * The Taris Holofeed Special Proclamation
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic: Knights of Suffering
 * Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic: Vector
 * Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
 * Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords
 * Star Wars: Empire at War
 * Star Wars: Empire at War: Forces of Corruption
 * Bloodlines

Notes and references
Taris Taris