Boxes of pain, the ability to tell truth from lie, and magic voices that compel people to follow orders – the Bene Gesserit sisterhood are among the spookier elements of the Dune universe.
And they’re taking starring role in Sky’s new TV show, Dune: Prophecy, which airs in the UK next week. Set 10,000 years before the events of the books (and films), it’s set to explore the origins of the secretive order, as well as the prophecy that leads to the birth of Paul Atreides, played in the recent films by Timothée Chalamet.
But what is this reclusive sisterhood, and what do we know about its members?
Where do they first appear?
In the books, they’re introduced in Frank Herbert’s original 1965 novel Dune. The Bene Gesserit are a secretive matriarchal order who have superhuman powers – which they achieve through rigorous training and use of the drug Spice.
Though they pretend to “serve” the Empire, they are in fact major power players within it, using their positions as advisors, spies and wives to influence politics among the great Houses from their base on the planet of Wallach IX.
Herbert returns to the Bene Gesserit sisterhood throughout the original Dune books, where they mostly serve as antagonists, who struggle with Paul Atreides and his family for control over the Empire and Arrakis, the home of the superdrug Spice (or melange).
In Denis Villeneuve’s films, our first introduction to the sisterhood is via Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), who is a member of the order. She trained in the sisterhood before marrying into the Atreides family, and she has passed many of their skills along to her son, Paul.
Who are they?
They’re a group of women recruited from across the Empire. Many of them come from noble houses – such as Valya Harkonnen (Emily Watson) in Dune: Prophecy – but others are taken in from lower classes if they show promise.
Aside from being the most powerful people in the Empire, Frank Herbert’s books describe them as being incredibly powerful physically, too. Initiates are trained in the power of Voice, which allows them to control other people; they receive martial arts training during their time studying, and have the ability to control the make-up of their bodies.
That, in turn, lets them control things such as the ageing process, if they fall pregnant, and even allows them to neutralise poisons within their own bodies. Funnily enough, these skills are prized by the nobility too, and daughters of noble houses are often sent to the sisterhood for training – only to return sworn to the Bene Gesserit cause.
Some of them are trained as Truthsayers (funnily enough, their job is to distinguish truth from lies) who serve as advisors to the powerful houses; all of them are conditioned to be loyal to the Bene Gesserit order first, and their own families second.
The Bene Gesserit also undergo a process called the spice agony, which involves ingesting poison derived from the sandworms that haunt the desert planet Arrakis. Those who survive gain access to the memories of their ancestors, and ascend to a higher position in the order. People who have survived the spice agony (such as Jessica and Paul, both of whom undergo the process) are called Reverend Mothers.
What do they believe?
The sisterhood believe fanatically in using the power of breeding to control the flow of power in the empire.
They aim to create a (male, obviously) superbeing who can access powers that even the order cannot – which they hope to use to exercise more power in turn. This superbeing is called the Kwisatz Haderach, and the Bene Gesserit goal for thousands of years has been to perfect the bloodlines that would lead to his creation.
This has direct consequences for Dune: Paul Atreides’ mother Jessica was supposed to have a daughter, who would be married to Feyd-Rautha (played by Austin Butler) and produce the Kwisatz Haderach.
Instead, Jessica fell in love with Leto and had Paul, who proves himself to be the prophesied Messiah, a generation early. Unfortunately for the Bene Gesserit, he’s not in their power, and instead sets off a galactic war in his quest for power.
What will Dune: Prophecy cover?
The series promises to dive back 10,000 years into the past, to a time when the sisterhood was just starting out on its breeding programme. As the title implies, it’s also set to be the story of how they created the prophecy that ultimately leads to Paul’s birth.
Dune: Prophecy will air on Sky from November 18
