Octagon Society

The Octagon Society was an organization that provided errant spacefarers with assistance.

• Please see Travellers' Aid Society (TAS) for a related successor organization.

Description (Specifications)

Society shelters were generally of an octagonal shape. Large hostels were established on major worlds, while smaller weather shelters were placed on frontier or unsettled worlds. The characteristic octagon-shaped buildings are still visible on various worlds, although none are still in use as shelters for distressed spacefarers.

Image Repository

1. General Octagon Society shelter schematic.
   
   

NOTE: Image uploaded to IISS data base by scout Adrian Ford.

History & Background (Dossier)

Established in 342, the Octagon Society was the first major distressed spacefarer assistance operation to appear in the Spinward Marches. The group thrived on public contributions and on some tax revenues for 150 years.

From the 440s the society was sufficiently funded to construct shelters in the Gvurrdon Sector.

From 445 to 470 the Octagon Society built shelters on a few worlds in the Deneb Sector.

The Octagon Society collapsed in the late 400s when scandals emerged over the quality of shelter construction and the disposition of certain funds.

• The Octagon Society was dissolved in 499, and its assets were sold at auction.
• Many, or possibly most, of the services once provided by the Octagon Society have now been supplanted by the Travellers' Aid Society.

For an authoritative account of the society's buildings, see the The Octagon Book.

Worlds & Sectors (Astrography)

The Octagon Society was located almost entirely in the Spinward Marches Sector.

• The society's headquarters were on Regina (Spinward Marches 1910).

• In 874, the Imperium purchased the assets of the Octagon Society on Vreibefger and converted the grounds of the local shelter to an Imperial Research Station. By 1105 this station was engaged in stock breeding experiments as part of a long range project to improve several of the meat-producing animals of the Imperium. The octagon remains as a small part of the grounds and is used for storage.

• The octagon on Jenghe now covers a block just outside the gate of the starport, including a bar called the Planetfall Liberty on its ground floor.

• On Djinni, the octagon structure is out on one of the equatorial islands, but now is only a rough foundation, long since broken by the storms.

• On Henoz, the octagon is used sometimes as a hunting lodge. The building is in good condition, sited in a small valley. Locals know something about it, and can comment that it was one of the last built by the Octagon Society before they dissolved.

• The Octagon Society built its shelter in the Risek System in orbit, in the form of an octahedral space station. The station is still in existence, although now under the management of the Risek Space Authority.

World Listing: 1105

This society was known to operate in the following systems and worlds:

6 of 6 World articles in Octagon Society

Dhapura  •  Fennec  •  Fulacin  •  Horizon (De 0310)  •  Redi (De 0509)  •  Wochiers  •  

startbacknext(6 listed)

References

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.

• Marc Miller. Twilight's Peak (Game Designers Workshop, 1980), .
• Marc Miller. The Traveller Book (Game Designers Workshop, 1982), .
• Marc Miller. Imperial Encyclopedia (Game Designers Workshop, 1987), .
• Martin Dougherty. Mysteries of the Ancients (Mongoose Publishing, 2023), 273.

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