- For the CCG expansion by a similar name, please see CCG: The Borg.
- "We are the Borg. Lower your shields and surrender your ships. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is futile." file info
A group of Borg drones, lit by their eyepieces
The Borg were a pseudo-race of cybernetic beings, or cyborgs, from the Delta Quadrant. No truly single individual existed within the Borg Collective (with the possible sole exception of the Borg Queen), as they were linked into a hive mind. Their ultimate goal was perfection through the forcible assimilation of diverse sentient species and knowledge. As a result, they were among the most dangerous and feared races in the galaxy.
The Borg insignia
Physiology
A trio of Borg drones, including one of Klingon origin
The physiology of each Borg drone varied according to the species from which it was assimilated. (Star Trek: First Contact) Drones were typically humanoid, although the Collective has demonstrated a willingness to assimilate non-humanoid life forms. (VOY: "Scorpion")
Infant Borg
Upon assimilation, a drone would cease to grow body hair and develop an ashen, grayish skin coloration. Cybernetic implants would be either surgically attached to the body or grown internally by nanoprobes injected into the bloodstream. (TNG: "The Best of Both Worlds"; Star Trek: First Contact) The nature of these implants varied from drone to drone, depending on its intended function. In certain cases, parts of the body such as an eye or an arm would be amputated altogether to make room for the cybernetics. (VOY: "The Gift", "Dark Frontier") The implants of a fully assimilated drone allowed it to function for extended periods without shelter, food, water, or even air. A drone's only requirement would be a supply of energy to maintain the implants that in turn maintained its biological functions. This energy would be supplied during regeneration cycles within a Borg alcove. (TNG: "Q Who", "I Borg")
Borg drones were equipped with a myriad of technologies integrated into their bodies which enabled them to perform their duties within the Collective, several of which were universal to all drones. A neural transceiver kept them connected to the hive mind. (VOY: "Scorpion, Part II") A personal force field protected each drone from most energy-based attacks. (TNG: "Q Who") As of 2373, each drone possessed a pair of assimilation tubules embedded in one hand for the purpose of instantly injecting individuals with Borg nanoprobes. (Star Trek: First Contact) A cortical processor allowed a drone to rapidly assimilate visual information.
Drones also contained failsafes designed to deactivate and even vaporize their own bodies, thereby allowing the Collective to eliminate damaged or dead drones without leaving remains to be exploited by outsiders. (TNG: "Q Who") The captured drone Third of Five also made comments indicating that this vaporization may have been a form of resource reabsorption. (TNG: "I Borg") One of these failsafes was intended to automatically deactivate drones experiencing strong emotional states, which the Borg interpreted as a sign of disconnection from the hive mind. (VOY: "Human Error")
History
- Main article: Borg history
A Borg skeleton on a ruined planet
The precise origins of the Borg are unclear. As of 1484 they were reported as controlling only a handful of systems in the Delta Quadrant, but by 2373 they had assimilated thousands of worlds. In addition to this stronghold in the Delta Quadrant, the Borg also dispatched vessels throughout the galaxy via transwarp conduits. (VOY: "Dragon's Teeth", "Scorpion", "Endgame")
A Borg vessel traveled back in time from 2373 in an unsuccessful attack on Earth in 2063. (Star Trek: First Contact) Drones which survived this defeat were discovered and reactivated by Human scientists in 2153, and transmitted a subspace message to Borg space before being destroyed by the Enterprise (NX-01). (ENT: "Regeneration") In 2293 the Federation offered aid to El Aurian refugees fleeing the Borg. (Star Trek Generations) However, each of these incidents contributed almost nothing to the Alpha Quadrant's awareness or understanding of the Borg Collective.
By the 2350s rumors of an alien race called "The Borg" had reached the Alpha Quadrant, inspiring exobiologists Magnus and Erin Hansen to set out in search of them. Their research took them all the way to the Delta Quadrant before their assimilation in 2356. (VOY: "The Gift", "The Raven", "Dark Frontier") Borg activity in the Alpha Quadrant went undetected until a series of unexplained attacks along the Romulan Neutral Zone in 2364. (TNG: "The Neutral Zone") The Collective's true nature was finally revealed to the Federation in 2365 when Q took the USS Enterprise-D to meet a Borg cube near the J-25 system. (TNG: "Q Who")
In late 2366 a Borg cube invaded Federation space and assimilated Jean-Luc Picard, whose tactical information contributed, along with the Borg's own vastly superior power, to Starfleet's disastrously one-sided battle with the cube, called the Battle of Wolf 359. A fleet of 39 starships assembled to combat the cube was completely destroyed, with the cube emerging unscathed. The Enterprise-D recovered Picard and used his connection to the hive-mind to disable the cube before it could attack Earth. (TNG: "The Best of Both Worlds ", "The Best of Both Worlds, Part II")
During the 2370s, the Borg were beset by several major setbacks in the Delta Quadrant, all witnessed by the crew of the USS Voyager. The Borg-Species 8472 War decimated the Collective from 2373-2374. Voyager's liberation of Seven of Nine allowed Unimatrix Zero to create an active resistance movement in 2377. In 2378, a crippling blow was delivered to the Borg when Voyager discovered one of their transwarp hubs and destroyed it, killing the Borg Queen (again) and devastating the Unicomplex in the process. (VOY: "Scorpion", "Unimatrix Zero", "Endgame")
- After this, there is no canon information on the state of the collective. However, since the Borg controlled thousands of star systems and worlds, there would be no reason the destruction of the unicomplex would destroy the entire collective, or the queen for that matter, since she has been shown to have several bodies.
Quantum realities
In one quantum reality, the Borg conquered the Federation, with a battered Enterprise-D one of the few remaining ships. (TNG: "Parallels")
Culture
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A group of drones in 2153
The Borg Collective is made up of at least trillions of humanoids referred to as drones. (VOY: "Dark Frontier") Through the use of their cybernetic implants, the Borg interacted by sharing one another's thoughts in a hive mind. Upon assimilation, these trillions of "voices" would overwhelm the drone, stifling individual thought and resistance to the Collective's will. (TNG: "Family") To some drones these voices could eventually become a source of comfort, and their absence a source of pain. (TNG: "I Borg"; VOY: "The Gift")
Borg philosophy was governed by a primary directive to add the biological and technological distinctiveness of other species to that of the Borg. In this manner the Collective sought to achieve its definition of perfection; all other pursuits were deemed irrelevant. Accordingly, Borg drones did not engage in any activities except their duties and regeneration. (TNG: "Q Who", "The Best of Both Worlds"; VOY: "Scorpion, Part II")
- It is unclear whether these principles were simply the consensus of the majority of Borg drones, or if they were "hard-wired" into the technology that links the hive-mind together.
Having no regard for individuality, Borg drones were identified with designations rather than names. A drone's designation typically described its position within a group, e.g. "Third of Five." To more specifically identify a drone, its function could be appended to this designation, e.g. "Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 01." In the same manner, the Borg refer to alien species by number rather than by name. (TNG: "I Borg"; VOY: "Scorpion")
If a drone was sufficiently injured or otherwise in distress, other drones would offer assistance. (TNG: "I Borg"; VOY: "Dark Frontier") However, if a drone was deemed irreparable by the hive-mind, the Borg would deactivate it and redistribute any salvageable components throughout the Collective. (TNG: "Q Who")
Juvenile Borg drones
The Borg did not procreate; they added to the Collective's population only by assimilation. (VOY: "Drone") Assimilated infants and juveniles would be placed in maturation chambers until adulthood. (TNG: "Q Who"; VOY: "Collective")
The Borg typically operated in an atmosphere with a constant temperature of 39.1 °C (102.38 °F), 92% relative humidity, an atmospheric pressure of approximately 102 kPa, and trace amounts of tetryon particles. (Star Trek: First Contact) These conditions were presumably conducive to the operation of their cybernetics.
Borg drones ignored alien species until they demonstrated the potential to be a threat or a suitable candidate for assimilation. When addressing a small number of individuals, drones would simply attempt to assimilate them without comment. Before assimilating a larger population, such as a starship or an entire culture, the Borg would collectively transmit a standard announcement of their purpose and the futility of resistance. (TNG: "Q Who"; VOY: "Dark Frontier") Species the Borg found unremarkable would be deemed unworthy of assimilation. As of 2374 the Borg considered the Kazon beneath their notice, and by 2376 they only took interest in the Brunali if they detected sufficiently relevant technology. (VOY: "Mortal Coil", "Child's Play")
Representives of the Collective: Locutus with a Borg Queen
On the rare occasions that the Borg were willing to open a dialog with individuals, they chose a single drone to speak for the Collective. Jean-Luc Picard was assimilated and given the name Locutus in the misguided assumption that such a representative would lower the Federation's resistance to assimilation. (TNG: "The Best of Both Worlds")
Seven of Nine speaks for the Collective
When Kathryn Janeway successfully negotiated a truce with the Borg and refused to discuss the terms via a neural transceiver, the Collective agreed to communicate via Seven of Nine. (VOY: "Scorpion, Part II")
The Borg Queen also spoke for the Collective, acting not as a mere liaison but as a physical manifestation of the hive mind. The exact nature of her role is unclear. (Star Trek: First Contact)
The Borg possessed a near-reverence for particle 010, which they considered to be an expression of perfection. The Collective's fascination with assimilating this molecule has been compared to a religion. (VOY: "The Omega Directive")
Technology
- Main article: Borg technology
Borg technology was a combination of technologies assimilated from other cultures and technology developed within the Collective in order to overcome obstacles to its goals. When confronted by a problem it could not solve with its existing resources, the entire Collective would work in concert to consider all possible solutions and implement the one determined to be the most efficient. By applying the unique skills of each drone to a task, the hive mind could engineer new technologies at a pace that would astound an individual. (TNG: "Q Who", "The Best of Both Worlds, Part II")
Spacecraft
- Main article: Borg starship classes
Borg vessels were highly decentralized, with no discrete bridge, living quarters, or engineering section. Each ship was collectively operated by its complement of drones, under the general direction of the hive mind. Owing to the Collective's disregard for aesthetic considerations, the architecture of Borg ships took the form of basic shapes such as cubes and spheres. (TNG: "Q Who")
Each Borg spacecraft was equipped with a vinculum to interconnect its crew, which was in turn connected to a central plexus that linked the ship to the Collective. (VOY: "Infinite Regress", "Unimatrix Zero") In addition to warp drive, vessels were fitted with transwarp coils that could achieve even greater speed by opening transwarp conduits. (TNG: "Descent"; VOY: "Dark Frontier") When critically damaged or otherwise compromised, a Borg ship would self-destruct to prevent outsiders from studying Borg technology. (TNG: "The Best of Both Worlds, Part II"). However, USS Voyager encountered several damaged Borg vessels, notably including the cube carrying Icheb, Mezoti, Azan and Rebi, and a sphere carrying a transwarp coil, which Voyager stole. (VOY: "Collective", "Dark Frontier")
- That the Borg seem to have changed their attitude toward destroying damaged ships was not explained. It may have simply been a change in general policy between the last encounter in TNG and Voyager's first. Alternatively, the Borg may have felt more comfortable allowing damaged vessels to limp home within the Delta Quadrant, much of which is Borg space, and virtually devoid of major threats. A specific rationale for the cube carrying the Borg children (which was critically damaged) may be because they were released from their maturation chambers early, and did not have the complete set of protocols and capabilities full drones would implement.
Appendices
Related topics
- Borg species designations
- Borg species
- List of Borg
- Borg spatial designations
- Borg starships
- Borg philosophy
- Borg language
- Borg Collective
Appearances
- TNG:
- DS9:
- "Emissary"
- Star Trek: First Contact
- VOY:
- "Blood Fever" (corpse)
- "Unity"
- "Scorpion"
- "Scorpion, Part II"
- "The Raven"
- "Living Witness" (holograms)
- "One" (hallucinations)
- "Hope and Fear"
- "Drone"
- "Infinite Regress"
- "Dark Frontier"
- "Survival Instinct"
- "Tinker Tenor Doctor Spy" (holograms)
- "Collective"
- "Child's Play"
- "Unimatrix Zero"
- "Unimatrix Zero, Part II"
- "Imperfection"
- "Flesh and Blood" (hologram)
- "Shattered"
- "Q2"
- "Endgame"
- ENT:
In addition to their appearance in Star Trek: First Contact, the Borg are also mentioned in each of the other TNG films.
Background
- The Borg were initially conceived by Maurice Hurley as a race of insects (which were shown in the TNG Season 1 episode "Conspiracy"), but were changed to the more budget-friendly cyborgs that went on to become so famous.
- They made their first appearance in the Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 2 episode "Q Who". Chronologically, however, their first appearance in the Star Trek universe was made in the 1996 motion picture Star Trek: First Contact, in which the Borg traveled back to the year 2063 to enslave the Human race.
- While "Q Who" featured the first appearance of the Borg, their influence could be seen as early as the TNG Season 1 episode "The Neutral Zone", in which Federation and Romulan starbases along the Romulan Neutral Zone were mysteriously wiped out. This was intended to lead into a series of episodes that would have introduced the Borg as replacements for the Ferengi as TNG's villains. Unfortunately, the Writer's Guild strike in 1988 prevented this, as well as many concepts, from coming to fruition in TNG's early days.
- The Borg were considered as an enemy for the Deep Space 9 crew, along with the Klingons, Cardassians and the Romulans, when Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was being created. Rick Berman commented "... the Borg are not the kind of bad guys that are practical to use on a regular basis". The Cardassians were eventually chosen for the main villain role and the Borg made no further appearances in Deep Space Nine after "Emissary", although they were mentioned in episodes such as "The Storyteller", "Playing God", "The Search, Part I", "The Way of the Warrior", "Let He Who Is Without Sin..." and "In Purgatory's Shadow". (Where No One Has Gone Before)
- While it is not explicitly stated in "Q Who", the overall ambition of the Borg seemed to be the acquisition of technology, not the assimilation of other species as in later episodes. While "The Best of Both Worlds" (the next TNG episode to feature the Borg) dealt with this changed premise by stating in dialog that their objectives had changed, subsequent Borg episodes would ignore it entirely.
- Similarly, Star Trek: Enterprise's "Regeneration" and Star Trek: Voyager's "Dark Frontier" episodes indicated that not only was Earth Starfleet previously aware of the existence of the Borg, Federation scientists actually pursued them – even if they were considered mere rumor. While it is not impossible to imagine that humans might have been aware of the Borg prior to "Q Who" (especially considering the events of Star Trek: Generations and Star Trek: First Contact), it is nonetheless a strange continuity situation. Of course the problem can be vaguely explained away, stating that the events of First Contact and "Regeneration" had changed the timeline for future (Voyager) episodes, this was by no means an intention of the creators. Another explanation is that references or encounters with the Borg prior to "Q Who" were classified by Starfleet.
- The Borg were considered by some to be the greatest villains of Star Trek: The Next Generation. However, they were featured in only six episodes throughout its seven-year run. The creators have stated that this was due to the fact that the Borg were so powerful, it was not easy to come up with solutions for beating them. However, as time passed and future series went into production, the concept of the Borg would evolve to include inherent flaws that could be exploited in many different ways – leading them to be used in nineteen episodes of Star Trek: Voyager.
- It is this generous use of the Borg as villains on Voyager that caused many fans to complain that they were being used too often. TNG, DS9 and one-time VOY writer Ronald D. Moore once said of their perceived overuse, the Borg had been defeated so many times, they had "lost their teeth". (It should be noted, though, that only a fraction of these nineteen appearances actually had them as the main villains; many episodes had them in supporting or otherwise non-outright antagonistic roles.)
- It is no wonder that even more fans were outraged by their appearance in an episode of the next Star Trek series, Enterprise. However, though there was criticism for the anachronism, that appearance actually lent itself to established continuity, though the creators dodged a bullet by simply keeping the Borg from identifying themselves.
- The Borg Queen (Star Trek: First Contact) later claimed to be present at the Battle of Wolf 359, despite the fact that she acknowledged the destruction of that ship and all the Borg on it. Her only explanation is that "You humans think in such three-dimensional terms."
- The existence of the Queen herself was a controversial change made to the Borg during the writing of First Contact. While the writers had intended to stay true to the original concept of the Borg as a collective hive, they found it difficult to maintain the dramatic impact of villains without a central face. Thus, they created the Queen.
- While the Queen appeared to be killed at the climax of First Contact, the Borg would appear to have survived unaffected by their next appearance in Voyager's "Scorpion". While many fans have attempted to reconcile this, there has never been an official explanation for the Borg's survival (save for the Queen's enigmatic comment, as seen above), and the appearance of relatively identical Borg Queens in later episodes. Some, though, have theorized that the Borg Collective contained many queens that served as focal points to different branches of their society. Still another explanation is that the Borg were in possession of innumerable copies of the Borg Queen and that the superficial death of one version simply resulted in the activation in a similar version to take her place, in a similar fashion to the Vorta. This latter theory was corroborated by Rick Berman in an interview in Star Trek: Communicator. (citation needed • edit)
- In 2006, the Borg were honored with their own DVD box set Star Trek: Fan Collective - Borg, featuring a number of their more memorable appearances in the Star Trek universe.
Apocrypha
In the alternate timeline seen in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine book series Millennium, the Borg forged an alliance with the Federation to defeat Weyoun. The entire Borg collective was destroyed along with the universe. This entire timeline was later reset thanks to Benjamin Sisko.
In an alternate timeline in Star Trek: Armada, the Borg succeed in conquering the Alpha Quadrant. Using a clone of Locutus, the Borg manage to assimilate Spock, kill Worf, and assimilate Earth. The timeline was reset thanks to Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the Enterprise-E.
In the game Star Trek: Legacy, an alternate explanation was given to the creation of the Borg which states that the probe V'Ger created the Collective to serve as its heralds in its search for the creator. However, the creation of the Borg Queen resulted in the creation of an entity that abandoned the original intent of V'Ger. This is also similar to the Shatnerverse version of events.
In the current volumes of the Next Generation Relaunch series of novels, the Borg have been driven to near extinction as a result of the starship Voyager's destruction of the Queen and the transwarp conduit network. However, they begin to reconstruct the Collective by building a massive cube in the Alpha Quadrant, in order to launch a vengeful new offensive against the Federation.
In Star Trek: Destiny a history of the Borg was presented. They were survivors of the Caeliar Gestalt and the crew of the Earth Ship Columbia thrown back in time and into the Delta Quadrant following an attack on a Caeliar City Ship. The Caeliar forced the humans into a perverted form of their Gestalt (a mental linking of the Caeliar) based upon the will of the last surviving Caeliar and not the whole. They launched a final attack of Federation space with over 7,000 cubes at their disposal; however, they were stopped after the Caeliar were made aware of their responsibility for the Borg's actions. The Collective was dismantled and the assimilated Borg Drones were accepted into the Caeliar's gestalt. Former drones fully regained their individuality (as evidenced by Seven of Nine's remaining implants dematerializing).
The comic book series Star Trek: Countdown says that Nero's ship the Narada was enhanced with a mixture of Romulan and Borg technology.