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The Fremen are a group of people in the Dune series of science fiction novels by Frank Herbert.
The Fremen are the inhabitants of Arrakis, also known as Dune, the desert planet that is the sole source of the spice melange in the known universe. The Fremen came to Dune thousands of years earlier as a religious sect in retreat; over time, surviving the incredibly harsh conditions of Dune bred them into the ultimate example of humans in extremis: a people bred purely to survive.
Their language is based on Arabic, suggesting that they are descended from the Arabs of the forgotten planet Earth.
The Fremen are organized into sietches. Each sietch has a naib, whose word is law unless someone is willing to challenge him for leadership. The Fremen practice polygamy, apparently as a means of pinpointing male infertility. Each sietch has a sayyadina, a wise woman who serves as the native equivalent of a Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother.
Customs
Justice
The Fremen system of justice always relies ultimately on trial by combat. The naib of the tribe is someone who killed the previous naib in single combat. Anyone may challenge another in a duel to the death over matters of etiquette, law, or honour; the winner of the duel claims the wife, children, and possessions of the loser, as well as the right of the circumstances leading to the duel.
Water Conservation
The most notable custom of the Fremen is their water conservation. Living in the desert with no natural sources of water has spurred the Fremen to build their society around the collection, storage, and conservative use of water.
Collection
Water is collected from the atmosphere in wind traps that condense the humidity and add it to the underground water store. Water can also be collected from dead animals and people (especially outside wanderers) and processed in a death still which removes the water from the carcass for addition to the sietch water store. The Fremen that caused or discovered the death of the animal or person is then given a set of water rings whose markings denote a volume of water equal to the amount of water collected.
These rings are used as a form of currency (the writing device being that water is as precious, if not more so, than gold).
Storage
Each sietch has its own water store underground. This store can hold millions of liters of water and is accounted for literally to the last drop. This store is used as a bank for all the water owned by members of the sietch through water rings, as well as for the sietch's own store of water for the hopeful transformation of their planet into something other than desert.
Conservation
The Fremen spend all time out of their seitch in a stillsuit, a special skin-tight suit designed to collect and recycle all hydration the body releases, from waste and sweat to the moisture of the breath.
It is then held in a catch-pocket and made available to drink.
A Fremen in a well-kept suit can survive weeks in the desert as opposed to the hours of an outsider.
Mythology
A significant part of the Fremen mythology can be explained as caused by the Bene Gesserit's Missonaria Protectiva, manifestating a Messiah legend in a plan to support the Kwisatz Haderach, should he ever come to the planet of Arrakis.
Diverse 'failsafes' and Bene Gesserit beliefs were inserted into the Fremen culture, thus allowing one knowledgeable of the Bene Gesserit's teachings to use them to his or her advantage.
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