Sandworm

The sandworm was an autotrophic animal that inhabited the deserts of Arrakis, the planet known to its native Fremen as Dune. It was the predominant lifeform of that world, at once honored and feared, and was the essential factor in the creation of the spice melange. Where the species originated was unknown, but the sandworms were present on Arrakis before the Butlerian Jihad, and they lived beneath the vast dunes that stretched across the surface. The Fremen called the creature the Maker and Shai-Hulud, and among the few peoples who had ever achieved any mastery over the beast, only they could ride it.

Physical characteristics#

The sandworm could grow to an enormous size by any standard. The physician Wellington Yueh cited specimens up to 450 meters long observed in the deep desert, and some believed worms of 700 to even 1000 meters existed in the southern polar regions, though this could not be confirmed. The longevity of the creature was held to be extreme, estimated in the thousands of years.

Its skin was thick, rough, and semi-metallic, serving as armor and comprised of many overlapping, interlocking scales, each a few feet across, which protected the worm against the invasion of sand into its softer interior. A sandworm's internal workings resembled a massive blast furnace, producing intense heat and flame, and this combustion supplied oxygen to the nearly plantless surface of Arrakis. The mouth, positioned at the forward end of the creature, could easily consume objects as large as spice harvesters. A strong, flinty, cinnamon smell exuded from the beast, especially from its mouth, and it was often said that a worm could be smelled before it was seen.

The sandworms were extremely territorial. As soon as two worms sensed each other's presence, they let out chuffing roars of challenge and bellowed melange-smelling exhaust from their cavernous throats.

Behavior and diet#

Sandworms lived beneath the sand and were drawn to rhythmic vibrations on the surface. They would breach in pursuit of the origin of such vibrations in an effort to defend their territory, of which they were highly protective. For this reason, to see a worm and live to tell of it was extremely rare. The main component of the worm's diet was sand and the other inorganic, dry components of the Arrakis crust, and it was believed the creatures also sifted the sand-plankton for nourishment. Humans were not part of its diet, though there were cases of worms devouring people in the act of breaching, a fate Baron Vladimir Harkonnen alluded to when he intended for Lady Jessica and her son Paul to be abandoned to the desert.

Water was fatal to a sandworm even in small doses. Water that entered the worm's body acted as a catalyst, accelerating its metabolism until it became unstable and its vital functions failed, a violent death. The rare stunted worm of the Minor Erg was a primitive form about nine meters long; one such worm was trapped in a water ditch and drowned, and the byproduct of the worm and water mixture was the highly toxic poison known as the Water of Life.

Wormriding#

The armor of the sandworm, while all but impenetrable, could be exploited. By prying open the edges of one or more scales, the Fremen compromised the integrity of the armor, allowing sand to enter and irritate the worm's softer insides. The beast would then roll itself so that the opened scale was at the highest point from the desert floor, minimizing the amount of sand that could enter. A Fremen poised to mount the worm could climb aboard as it rolled the open scale upward, and so long as the scales remained pried open the worm would not submerge. Maker hooks were then placed toward the front of the creature to control its lateral movement.

In this way wormriding became a viable and even sacred method of transport across the surface of the planet. Distances were measured in sandworms, a unit representing how far one could ride a worm before it tired and was permitted to submerge, with a twenty-worm ride counting as a far and difficult journey.

The spice cycle#

The creation of the sandworm began when sandtrout banded together after converging on a store of water deep beneath the surface of Arrakis. Water did occur naturally on the planet, but through this process it was always destroyed. The sandtrout and water mixture was converted into a liquid chemical that the worm could digest without being poisoned, and this chemical could erupt to the surface in a violent explosion known as a spice blow. The sandtrout that survived the event then coalesced and completed their metamorphosis into a young sandworm. Because the worm was essential to the creation of the spice melange, on a macro scale it exercised an enormous influence over the whole of humanity, whose commerce, space travel, and longevity depended on the spice.

Cultural and religious significance#

To the Fremen, the sandworm was a spiritual symbol of their faith, and they regarded the creatures as physical embodiments of the One God of their original Zensunni religion. Within Fremen culture the worm bore several names beyond the Maker, chief among them Shai-Hulud, variously rendered as Old Man of the Desert, Old Father Eternity, or Grandfather of the Desert. Young sandworms were used by the Fremen in special ceremonies, including the inductions of new Sayyadinas and Reverend Mothers, a role central to sietch religious life.

After the rise of the Atreides Empire and the spread of the Arrakis variant of the Zensunni religion across the known universe, reverence for the sandworm spread to other worlds. This continued under the rule of Leto Atreides II, who had himself become a hybrid of man and worm.

Decline and survival#

The terraforming of Arrakis posed a grave danger to the sandworm, which found life outside the arid desert fatal. The reversal of that terraforming had begun by the end of Leto II's reign, and at his death he himself devolved back into sandtrout. These events allowed the sandworm to thrive once more on Arrakis for roughly another fifteen hundred years. During Leto II's reign some smaller worms had been removed and shipped off with colonizing vessels during the Scattering, an exercise of questionable success.

The hostile actions of the Honored Matres later brought about the termination of all life on Arrakis, including, it was believed, the remaining sandworms. Before that destruction, however, Miles Teg and Darwi Odrade had managed to capture a worm, which was held in an artificial environment on Chapterhouse, the secret base of the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood. This worm became the key to re-seeding the species. The first place where Odrade's sandworms began a new spice cycle was Chapterhouse itself, and after their introduction the sandtrout began turning that once-lush world into a desert.