Dhuna Cult

The Dhuna Cult of Eternal Ecstasy is a religious practice started on Gursa (Dagudashaag 1801) by Sharik Dhuna in -5877.

Description

The Dhuna cult had a strong practice of assassinations and blood sacrifices.

The cult was originally part of the Vilani Khuraashii faith. In -5,879, two years after the death of the Prophet Khuras, confusion over who should be the successor led to the religion separating into two distinct factions. One faction believed that the leadership -- the Khimaan -- should fall to a qualified priest elected by the faithful while the other sect held that a member of the Prophet's family (specifically Shannash Dhuna, the Prophet's son in law) should be elected as Khimaan. This became the cause of much contention and great animosity between the two sects.

Over the centuries, the cult changed its focus and tactics. It no longer focused its assassinations only on followers of the elected Khimaan but seemed to attack victims apparently randomly. It is believed that the cult began to worship Guurakhira, an ancient Vilani Goddess of death and destruction. The spirit of Shannash, previously supposed to have reincarnated into the current cult leader, was now supposed to have fragmented, residing within the Temple Priestess Caste.

History and Background

At the time of the founding during the Long Night in -5877, their practices were restricted to Gursa, resulting in an ongoing terror campaign between the cultists and the local hunter clans.

With the resumption of regular space flight and access to other worlds, the cult spread their practices. On Daridura (Dagudashaag 1605), the Imperial authorities made the connection between an epidemic of ritual murders and the cult. Over the next 20 years members of the cult were systemically hunted down and either jailed or killed.

Timeline

• Local legend on Nukaush claims that in -9 a Solomani smuggler named Tarliesin Euphrates tracked a Dhuna Assassin for almost a thousand kilometres and single-handedly assaulted their Temple, killing the High Priestess. It is believed that the surviving Dhuna saw the assassination as a bad omen and fled the planet.
• On Daridura (Dagudashaag 1605), Third Imperium authorities first became aware of the cult's involvement in a local epidemic of ritual murders. It took them a further twenty years to trace the cult back to Gursa. A systematic campaign of extermination was undertaken by Imperial authorities.
• It was thought the cult was extinct, but it resurfaced in 562 and again in 986. Both times the members were systematically hunted and captured or killed.
• In 997 Ghari Mesu, a neo-Dhuna priest, successfully campaigned in the Imperial courts to allow the cult to reform on Gursa providing it did not resume its murderous practices.
• As of 1116 the cult still exists on Gursa. The tensions between cult members and the hunter clans have forced the Gursa government to declare martial law, to little effect.

Worlds

The cult has been active on the following worlds:

3 of 3 World articles in Dhuna Cult

Daridura  •  Gursa  •  Nukaush  •  

startbacknext(3 listed)

References and contributors

This list of sources was used by the Traveller Wiki Editorial Team and individual contributors to compose this article. Copyrighted material is used under license from Mongoose Publishing or by permission of the author. The page history lists all of the contributions.

• Jae Campbell. "Port of call: Nukaush." Signal-GK 10 (1995): 9.
• Jae Campbell. Encyclopaedia Dagudashaag (Signal-GK, 2017), 88-89.