Planets of the Imperium

The following is a list of planets of the Imperium. The Imperium is vast and contains millions of worlds, and even an educated Imperial citizens will only be familiar with a fraction of them. Thus, this article presents a general list of planet types and a short description of some of the more well-known Imperial worlds.

Types of planet

Agri-worlds

Many planets in the Imperium, such as forge worlds and hive worlds, are completely incapable of sustaining the people who live and work on them. To feed these people, as well as the vast armies of the Imperial Guard, many planets have been completely transformed into giant farms, their entire surface (and even under the oceans) dedicated to growing food to feed the trillions upon trillions of mouths in the Imperium.

Civilized worlds

A civilized world is a planet whose development has been allowed to run (for some time) "naturally", without any specific purpose to fulfill. These worlds are generally self-sufficient in terms of food-supply and may have varying manufacturing and industrial capabilities. Many may be equivalent to modern-day Earth.

Death worlds

Death world is a term used by the Imperium to designate a planet with a climate, terrain, and even ecosystem highly dangerous, even hostile, to human life. Nonetheless, many of these worlds have large human settlements, where the people have grown strong and self-reliant. Many of the people of these worlds are inducted into the Imperial Guard, or recruited in the Space Marines, a fact which is often the sole reason for the continued habitation of those worlds. Notable death worlds include Catachan and Fenris.

Death worlds and the Tyranids

It has been theorized by Imperial biologists that many death worlds are the result of seeding by ancient advance fleets of the Tyranids. Many of the monstrous creatures inhabiting these worlds, such as the Kraken of Fenris and the Catachan Devil have many features in common with Tyranids organisms, and may in fact be descended from them.

Feral and medieval worlds

These are worlds where the Imperium has not seen fit to introduce modern technology. Feral worlds are apparently defined by the population living in hunter-gatherer societies and having technology equivalent to the Stone Age or Bronze Age societies of Holy Terra's ancient past. Medieval worlds are somewhat more advanced, perhaps having progessed as far as to discover gunpowder, and having more widespread farming. Generally, worlds of either of these classes will have little interference from the Imperium and low planetary tithes.

Governors of Feral and Medieval worlds will generally live on a space station in orbit, and only descend to the surface to deal with heresy and mutation.

Many Space Marine Chapters prefer to recruit from feral worlds, since such environments tend to produce warrior-quality men.

Forge worlds

A forge world is a term for the numerous worlds that are directly controlled by the Adeptus Mechanicus. All have in common that they are completely dedicated to the manufacture of the various machines of the Imperium, the pursuit for and preservation of (ancient) knowledge and the worship of the Machine God. Because of the Adeptus Mechanicus' monopoly on technical knowledge and expertise, the forge worlds are the Imperium's primary source of all kinds of hardware: from farming equipment to war machines such as tanks, fighters, or even Titans. Ancient pacts between the Adeptus Mechanicus and other worlds and institutions of the Imperium oblige the various forge worlds to supply other worlds and the various military arms of the Imperium, such as the Imperial Guard.

The surface of a forge world is normally completely covered in massive factory complexes that stretch across the horizon. Its ecosystem has been completely destroyed. The air is saturated with toxic gases and rivers flow with toxic runoff from factories. In many cases, even seas and oceans have been dried up to make room for more factories. However, the sheer output benefits the Imperium as a whole.

While there are hundreds of forge worlds in the Imperium, one of the best-known is Mars, home of the Adeptus Mechanicus' political and spiritual head, the Fabricator-General of Mars; and the Imperium's first forge world. Other forge worlds include Ryza, known for its advanced plasma technology; Gryphonne IV, home of the Legio Gryphonnicus; Agripinaa, a primary supplier of Cadia; Phaeton, home of the Leman Russ Main Battle Tank; and Urdesh, major forge world within the Sabbat Worlds.

Forge worlds are mostly independent from the rest of the Imperium and have their own armed forces. Each of these worlds is home to one of the Titan Legions, supported by legions of Skitarii, the Adeptus Mechanicus' cybernetically enhanced soldiers.

Hive worlds

Hive worlds are worlds that have an extremely high population, which is confined in massive hives, each of which is essentially an individual nation occupying a single massive hive city. Only the humans of the Imperium are known to live on such worlds. The world outside the hives is usually heavily polluted and desolate, and most hivers live their entire lives without ever having seen the outside of the tunnel network of their hive. Hive worlds often possess extensive manufacturing districts. It has been said that the sacrifice of over a million soldiers is worth "one day's hive world production" in weapons and armour.

Perhaps even more valuable is what at first glance seems to be a byproduct of the monolithic city's design. The population of any given world approximately doubles every 100 years. With each hive housing between 10 - 100 billion people and 5 - 20 hives per planet the sheer number of citizens is staggering. And each of those citizens is a potential soldier for the Emperor's already unmatchably vast armies. Hives manufacture far more than mere steel and silica, they are vast factories for the most useful possible resource: people. It is no accident that hive worlds contribute the vast bulk of the recruits for the Imperial Guard. The often violent gangland lifestyle which most residents are forced to live is also semi-deliberate. Almost every recruit will already know how to handle a gun. Hive worlds also serve to populate newly discovered planets. Imperial citizens are gathered from various hive worlds (willingly or unwillingly) and shipped off to distant colonies. An example of this would be Medusa V.

In common with most other Imperial worlds, hive worlds are often based on a very obvious class system, with a ruling class and a working class, although with populations so tightly packed there develops a lower class that become violent street gangs.

Some extensively developed hive worlds do not even simply consist of various enclosed arcologies surrounded by wasteland, jungle, ice, or plains. These hive worlds are completely urbanized and stacked with hundreds of layers of arcologies, covering the entirety of the planet, effectively being an Ecumenopolis. Holy Terra is an example of this "super hive world".

Notable hive worlds include Holy Terra (where the whole planet is one hive), Armageddon, and Necromunda.

Cardinal worlds and Shrine worlds

Cardinal worlds are planets ruled directly by the Ecclesiarchy and are completely dedicated to the worship of the Immortal Emperor according to the tenets of the Cult Imperialis, with sanctuaries potentially covering entire continents. Aside from being a center of the Ecclesiarchy's power and a destination for countless pilgrims, they also serve as a base of operations for many orders of the Adepta Sororitas. One example is Ophelia IV, whose spiritual significance is second only to that of Holy Terra.

Shrine worlds are worlds that are heavily focused on the worship of one or more Imperial Saints. A shrine world can also be considered to fall into another category, for example Hagia is an agri-world while Herodor is a hive world. They will have a strong relationship with the saint in question, such as being the world of his/her birth or death or the site of a major miracle.

Notable Shrine worlds include: Hagia (birthplace of Saint Sabbat) and Herodor (where Saint Sabbat rested while recovering from battle)

Dead worlds

Barren worlds that are virtually lifeless, unable to support any native or imported lifeforms. Dead worlds occur naturally, as the extreme conditions in the galaxy make many planets uninhabitable. Others however, have been created in the long history of the Imperium by catastrophic events, including an exterminatus or a successful Tyranid invasion.

Ironically, some planets classified as dead worlds have been settled by various groups specifically for their properties. For example, several Space Marine fortress-monasteries are located on dead worlds because of their harsh conditions, desolation and defensive opportunities. Dead Worlds that appear to be natural are often Tomb Worlds for the Necrons.

Tomb Worlds

Tomb Worlds are worlds that have Necron stasis tombs located on them. Such worlds are often devoid of all life, the only known exceptions being Pavonis and Kronus.

Specific planets

Specific planets will be added later.

Sources

• Wikipedia: Planets of Warhammer 40,000