Bajor

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Bajor

Bajor was the inhabited eleventh planet of the Bajoran system. This system was located in the Bajor sector, a region of space in the Alpha Quadrant. This was the largest planet in the system and had five moons, including Derna and Jeraddo. The planet was the homeworld of the Bajorans, a warp capable humanoid species. After decades of Cardassian rule, the planet regained its independence and became affiliated with the United Federation of Planets in 2369.

Location

In 2372, the location of Bajor was labeled on a tactical cartography map that was displayed in the wardroom of Deep Space 9. The planet was located near the Badlands and the Demilitarized Zone. (DS9: "For the Cause", okudagram)

In 2375, the location of Bajor was labeled on a tactical cartography map that was displayed in the wardroom of Deep Space 9. Bajor was located approximately five light years from Cardassia Prime, twenty-five light years from Starbase 375, and sixty light years from Ferenginar. (DS9: "When It Rains...", okudagram)

According to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual, (pg. 3) the exact distance between Cardassia and Bajor was 5.25 light years.

History

See also: Bajoran history

Early history

Icon painting of the ancient Bajoran city of B'hala

Bajor was the homeworld of the Bajorans, one of the oldest civilizations in the Alpha Quadrant which began to flourish about half a million years ago and undertook its first interstellar flights around the 16th century. (TNG: "Ensign Ro"; DS9: "Explorers")

Cardassian occupation and recovery

From about 2319 to 2369, Bajor was occupied by the Cardassian Union. During this time, the Cardassians not only decimated the Bajoran population and destroyed large parts of its infrastructure, but also poisoned several areas of the planet in order to compromise the food supply after their withdrawal. Affected regions included the Dahkur and Rakantha Provinces as well as the Northwest peninsula. Following the occupation, the Provisional Government took steps to revitalize the planet's agricultural sector, such as using special grain processing centers and irrigating the Trilar Peninsula. In 2371, the Bajoran Agricultural Ministry developed soil reclamators that could detoxify the soil, but their number was limited, causing quarrels about their usage. (DS9: "Dramatis Personae", "Shakaar", "Sanctuary")

The Federation also assisted in reclaiming the planet's full natural potential, e.g. in 2369, when the USS Enterprise-D assisted in the reconstruction of the Bajoran aqueduct system. (TNG: "Birthright, Part I") Later measures included conducting an agrobiology expedition to the Janitza Mountains in 2371 during which it was discovered that the ecosystem was much more diverse than the orbital scans had indicated. (DS9: "The House of Quark", "Fascination") Signs of progress in healing Bajor's wounds included the opening of a new nature reserve in Hedrikspool Province in 2370 and the fruitful Katterpod season of 2373. (DS9: "Shadowplay", "Rapture")

Political structure

During the occupation, the Cardassians installed a puppet regime called the Bajoran Occupational Government. Following their withdrawal from Bajor in 2369, a Provisional Government was established which consisted of Ministers who were organized in the Bajoran Council, the Board of Ministers, the Chamber of Ministers and the Council of Ministers. (DS9: "Emissary", "The Collaborator", "Dramatis Personae", "The Alternate", "The Homecoming", "Rapture", "In the Cards") Some Bajoran organizations like the Kohn-Ma or the Alliance for Global Unity also criticised or even openly opposed the Provisional Government. (DS9: "Past Prologue", "In the Hands of the Prophets", "The Homecoming", "The Circle", "The Siege")

The planet was also further divided into different Provinces. Additionally, nation-like factions, e.g., the Paqu and the Navot, continued to exist on Bajor after the occupation and maintained clearly defined borders between each other. (DS9: "The Storyteller", "Shakaar", "What You Leave Behind" et al.)

Although Bajor maintained a secular government, religious leadership personified by the Kai as the head of the Vedek Assembly was also an important aspect of social cohesion on Bajor and, thus, also held great political influence. (DS9: "Emissary", "In the Hands of the Prophets", "Shakaar" et al.)

Provinces

Faren Kag's village amidst a Bajoran jungle

• Dahkur Province
• Eastern Province
• Hedrikspool Province
• Hill Province
• Kendra Province
• Lonar Province
• Musilla Province
• Rakantha Province
• Tozhat Province

Settlements

File:Dahkur2375-2.jpg

City on Bajor

• B'hala
• Hathon
• Ilvia
• Jalanda City
• Janir
• Jo'Kala
• Kran-Tobal
• Lasuma
• Relliketh
• Tamulna
• Tempasa

Internment centers

• Batal
• Gallitep
• Kran-Tobal prison
• Singha refugee camp

Points of interest

• Bajoran Archaeological Institute
• Bajoran Center for Science
• Bajoran Institute of Science
• Calash Monastery
• Dakeen Monastery
• Jalanda Forum
• Temple of Iponu

Environment

Geological

File:Firecaves2375.jpg

The Fire Caves on Bajor in 2375

A painting of a Bajoran landscape

• Cliffs of Undalar
• Dahkur Hills
• Fire Caves
• Janitza Mountains
• Kendra Valley
• Kola Mountain
• Northwest peninsula
• Perikian Peninsula
• Ratosha Pass
• Sahving Valley
• Southern islands
• Tanis Canyon
• Trilar Peninsula

Hydrological

The oceans of Bajor have a greenish tint when seen from space. (DS9: "Past Tense, Part I")

• Glyrhond River
• Holana River
• Yolja River
  • Qui'al Dam

Botanical

File:KendraProvince2375.jpg

The Kendra Province on Bajor in 2375

• Alvas
• Boton
• Jumja tree
• Katterpod
• Kava
• Lilac
• Makara herb
• Moba
• Moreka
• Salam grass
• Spiny basil
• Wheat

Zoological

• Barrowbug
• Bat
• Carnivorous rastipod
• Hara cat
• Palukoo (moon)
• Shrimp
• Sinoraptor
• Snake (various)

Parallel universes and alternate timelines

In an alternate timeline, Bajor defeated the Cardassian Empire. Following their success, the Bajorans became more aggressive towards the Federation. In 2370, they destroyed a subspace telescope, believing that it was being used to spy on them. (TNG: "Parallels")

Terok Nor orbiting Bajor in the mirror universe

In the mirror universe, Bajor was occupied by the Terran Empire before being liberated by the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance. Following the end of the occupation, Bajor petitioned the Alliance for membership, was accepted, and ultimately became an influential member world. The space station Terok Nor orbited Bajor. In 2370, the Intendant of Bajor was Kira Nerys. (DS9: "Crossover")

Appendices

Appearances

• TNG:
  • "Chain of Command, Part I"
  • "Birthright, Part I"
• DS9:
  • "Emissary"
  • "The Circle"
  • "The Siege"
  • "Cardassians"
  • "The Collaborator"
  • "Past Tense, Part I"
  • "Shakaar"
  • "Rapture"
  • "The Reckoning"
  • "The Changing Face of Evil"
  • "What You Leave Behind"
• VOY:
  • "Maneuvers"
  • "Nothing Human"
  • "Flesh and Blood"

Background information

Name

In a personnel file displayed for Ensign Ro Laren in TNG: "Conundrum", her place of birth was listed as "Bajora". This term was also used to refer to the Bajorans as a race in TNG: "Ensign Ro" and some early episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. For the remastered "Conundrum", for Ro's personnel file, the name of the planet was changed from Bajora to Bajor.

"BAY-jor" was the pronunciation for this planet's name from the script pronunciation guide for DS9: "Emissary".

Depictions

In the pre-production stages of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, series creators Rick Berman and Michael Piller worked on the idea of a starbase on the surface of Bajor, before deciding to set the series aboard a space station. "We wanted to center the show around Bajor," recalled Berman, "which was part of the Cardassian Empire." The creative duo even considered building a live-set Bajoran refuge camp on location, though the cost of leaving the Paramount studio lot was ultimately decided to be prohibitively high. (Star Trek - Where No One Has Gone Before, paperback ed., pp. 154 & 155)

The planet model first used for Bajor would be later used for Rakhar ("Vortex"), an Yaderan colony ("Shadowplay"), a Hur'q planet ("The Sword of Kahless"), and Risa ("Let He Who Is Without Sin..."). Robert Hewitt Wolfe, and later Bradley Thompson, made and continually updated a map of Bajor which featured the places mentioned in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion)

Bajor may have a 26-hour day, according to various mentions throughout the series and at the startrek.com database for places. [1] This was never fully confirmed in canon.

Bajor was to have featured in a scene deleted from DS9: "Emissary". (Cinefantastique, Vol. 24, Nos. 3/4, p. 101)

For DS9: "The Storyteller", a Bajoran village was depicted on Paramount Stage 18. A set for the Sirah's living quarters therein was in the same room as had been used as a meeting place for Commander Sisko and Kai Opaka on Bajor in "Emissary". (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 48) "We had [...] wind, lighting, and it had a couple of major effects going on," David Livingston reflected. "They were really difficult working conditions [....] The actors had to have big wind machines blowing in their faces, and it was very debilitating, but we got through it." (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 51) Livingston also remembered, "We had a big set and [...] we had wind and lightning effects that created a lot of noise." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 48) Ira Steven Behr liked how Bajor is depicted in "The Storyteller". "It [...] shows that Bajor is indeed a very strange place," he remarked. "There are things happening in those little hamlets and villages that are certainly not your average Federation attitude towards life, religion and spirituality." (Cinefantastique, Vol. 24, Nos. 3/4, p. 102) An establishing shot of the Bajoran village in "The Storyteller" had previously been used in TNG: "Birthright, Part II", portraying a Romulan prison camp on Carraya IV.

Bajor was repeatedly embellished with a statue which was designed by Ricardo Delgado. The statue appeared as part of the Monastery of the Kai in DS9: "In the Hands of the Prophets" as well as in Kai Winn Adami's residence in series finale "What You Leave Behind". (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 69)

In DS9: "The Circle", a matte painting of Bajor was used to depict the planet, including a large pool of water which appears to ripple and sparkle on-camera, and a set designed by Ron Wilkinson was used as a war room for the Bajoran Militia. The matte painting was created non-digitally, by Illusion Arts, Inc.'s Robert Stromberg. Regarding the pool in the illustrated vista, Syd Dutton, also from Illusion Arts, explained, "We did that through an old technique developed by Albert Whitlock [....] It's a gag created by backlighting two sheets of glass with holes scratched in them and filming them as they are rubbed against each other." The sparkles were double-exposed over the footage of the painted water, bringing light and movement to what otherwise would have been a static part of the painting. The image additionally incorporated a foreground miniature and a camera pan. (Cinefantastique, Vol. 25/26, No. 6/1, pp. 97, 71 & 73) In DS9: "The Siege", another matte painting of the planet, done by Syd Dutton, was incorporated into an in-atmosphere battle over Bajor. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 84)

In DS9: "Cardassians", yet another matte painting was involved in depicting Bajor. This illustration, showing a suburban home on the outskirts of the Bajoran capital city, was the second Bajor painting which Robert Stromberg created for DS9. This time, moving elements included Cardassian pedestrians, played by Illusion Arts staff, and a waterfall. It was Stromberg who decided upon detailing the picture with a waterfall. He discovered the embellishment was required to make the illustration more interesting while painting the image. "The waterfall was animated by Lynn Legerwood, who used a combination of salt and very fine baking soda of the type that's used in fire hydrants to create the right look for it," Stromberg remembered. "We shot that element with a high-speed camera and then superimposed it over the painted waterfall to make it look real." (Cinefantastique, Vol. 25/26, No. 6/1, p. 72)

Originally, an area of Bajor's war-plundered terrain was intended to be rejuvenated by terraforming Genesis technology, in a story that developed into the DS9 episode "Second Sight". The planet was thereafter conceptually replaced with Epsilon 119. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 103)

At one point around season two, Paramount asked the DS9 writing staff to focus less on stories featuring the planet Bajor, as market research had suggested that fans of the show found those stories least interesting. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 244; Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 97) "The studio doesn't like Bajor stories in general," commented René Echevarria. "And Bajor's religion is one aspect of Bajor to which they really don't respond." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 319)

The DS9 writers felt it was important for Bajor to reappear in DS9 Season 3 installment "Shakaar". "We [...] wanted to continue playing out some of the stuff going on on Bajor," recalled Robert Hewitt Wolfe. (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 97) At first, the narrative involved a new massive library or museum, a "great cultural relic," in the words of Ronald D. Moore. (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 97; Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 244) He added, "It was going to be about a museum on Bajor that was being reopened for the first time since the occupation." Also, production on the episode, a script for which was written in the second season, was set back when, in compliance with the request from Paramount, the producers opted to concentrate on stories further away from Bajor. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 244) When they revived the narrative towards the end of season three, they focused on the notion of it being a kind of homecoming for Kira Nerys. (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 97)

Updating developments for Bajor was also a concern during the development of DS9 Season 4 outing "Crossfire". Ron Moore recalled, "We started feeling we had lost sight of Bajor and some of the issues that were going on there." (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 113)

The status of Bajor was also a concern during the writing of subsequent fourth season offering "Accession". "It went through a lot of permutations of what is the impact, politically, on Bajor," said Ron Moore. (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 115)

At the end of DS9 Season 5, Bajor seemed safer, at least to the show's writing staff, than when it had first been introduced. Robert Hewitt Wolfe remarked, "Bajor is pretty much stable now, which was not true [at the start of the series]." (Captains' Logs Supplemental - The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, p. 102)

Trivia

Viewers of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine were largely uninterested in Bajor. Kira Nerys actress Nana Visitor clarified, "There's a hard-core group of people out there who are interested in Bajor and then there's a lot that aren't." (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 256)

Writer David Weddle once joked Bajor's "seventh hemisphere became more influential," centuries after ancient Bajoran times. (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion, p. 389)

According to Star Trek: Star Charts (pp. 34, 42-43 & 46), Bajor was the seventh planet in the Bajoran system. The planet's government was named the "Third Republic of Bajor", and the planetary capitals of this planet were based in the cities of Dahkur and Sahving. 3.8 billion Bajorans lived on Bajor in 2378. The Bajorans have been warp capable since 2328, and their first interstellar flight was in 1571. Bajor was admitted into the Federation in 2374, but the process was not ratified. Bajor was listed as having five moons and, in the system map, the five moons are depicted in orbit about the planet.

Apocrypha

According to Star Trek Online, Bajor joined the Federation in 2393. During a temporary occupation of Deep Space 9 by rogue Dominion forces in 2409, the city of Hathon served as an organizational hub for the Federation and the Klingon Empire to retake the station. In 2410, Starfleet, the Klingon Defense Forces and the military of the new Romulan Republic united to rout out disguised members of Species 8472 who had infiltrated Hathon. Even when not playing through the relevant missions, players can use Hathon as a social hub.

External links

• Bajor at Memory Beta, the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• Bajor at Wikipedia
• Re-Used Planets in DS9 at Ex Astris Scientia