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Ordune This article or section refers to elements from Original Dune
There are separate pages for this subject as it appears in the other canons such as Alia Atreides in Expanded Dune and Alia Atreides in the Dune Encyclopedia


"The Fremen see her as the Earth Figure, a demi-goddess whose special charge is to protect the tribes through her powers of violence. She is Reverend Mother to their Reverend Mothers. To pilgrims who seek her out with demands that she restore virility or make the barren fruitful, she is a form of anti-mentat. She feeds on that strong human desire for the mysterious. She is living proof that the 'analytic' has limits. She represents ultimate tension. She is the virgin-harlot - witty, vulgur, cruel, as destructive in her whims as a coriolis storm."
―St Alia-of-the-Knife as taken from The Irulan Report[src]


Alia Atreides (November[1] 10191 AG - 10219 AG), also known as Saint Alia of the Knife and later Coan-Tean ("the female death-spirit who walks without feet") to the Fremen and called Hawt the Fish Monster on the outer worlds, was the posthumous daughter of Duke Leto Atreides I and his Bene Gesserit concubine Lady Jessica, born on the planet Arrakis. She was the younger sister of Paul Atreides. As regent of the Atreides Empire, she established an autocratic government based on the cult of her personality. She later leapt to her death in defiance of the possession by the spirit of a younger Vladimir Harkonnen retained in her Other Memory.

Biography[]

Early years[]

Alia was still in the womb when Jessica took the Water of Life. Thus she was pre-born, and highly susceptible to Abomination from before birth. After living with the Fremen for several years, she was present in the palace on Arrakeen when her brother and his forces successfully conquered the combined forces of the Emperor's Sardaukar and House Harkonnen.

During the invasion she poisoned Baron Vladimir Harkonnen with a Gom Jabbar, although not before revealing to the latter her familial ties to Harkonnen, and slew dying soldiers on the battle field for their water, earning her the title "St. Alia of the Knife."

Regency[]

Establishing Her Rule[]

When the blind Paul walked to his death in the desert, both his children Leto and Ghanima were infants. As such, Alia, as the revered sister of the Emperor, became the logical choice of Regent of the Atreides Empire during the twins minority. She was eventually corrupted by power and established a cult of personality, using rich trappings and grandiose titles such as the Mahdinate to build considerable political weight.

Into Abomination[]

Shortly thereafter, Alia fell fully into Abomination, and was secretly tormented by the ego-memories of countless ancestors. Chief among these was the personality of Vladimir Harkonnen, who sought to use his granddaughter as a tool to reclaim power from beyond the grave.

Relationships[]

Alia's first words to her Fremen nurse, were "I love you, Harah." But while her relationship with Harah was warm, many of her other relationship with Fremen as a child were strained. Her unique abilities and maturity made her an object of fear and superstition in her sietch. Her relationship with her mother was strained at best, and simmered with deep resentment. As an adult, she found "nothing strange in loving and hating her mother simultaneously.”

While it's fair to say that Alia, as pre-born, understood Leto II and Ghanima better than most, their relationship was challenging. While recognizing that they, like her, were never really children, she was frustrated that they refused to experiment with the spice. They, in turn, could only pity her as they understood the psychological and social strain she experienced throughout her life.

Though she loved and admired her brother, she also felt the burden of being the sister of an emperor worshiped as a god. And while her love for the original Duncan Idaho ghola may have been genuine, her gradual descent into Abomination, and her affairs with Javid, among others, slowly destroyed this relationship.

After increasing pressure and control from the internal council of Vladimir Harkonnen, Alia orders the assassination of The Preacher, despite knowing it was her beloved brother. Upon Leto's return from the desert and a subsequent battle, he gives her a choice, the Trial of Possession or suicide. In a final act of defiance against the surmounting internal control from the Baron, Alia throws herself from a high window to her death, a death that was witnessed by her mother Jessica, the Atreides twins, and Farad'n Corrino.

Legacy[]

Alia's religious influence was long-lived. Revered in life, she was still worshiped by some thousands of years after her death. In the months prior to Leto II's death, a Cult of Alia was discovered on Giedi Prime by Duncan Idaho's agents. Ultimately, however, Alia's influence vanished after Leto's death, some three and a half thousand years after her own death.

Images[]

Behind the Scenes[]

  • In the Children of Dune TV mini-series, Alia kills herself with a crysknife, instead of committing suicide by autodefenestration.
  • Alicia Witt portrayed Alia in the 1984 movie. While still directly responsible for Harkonnen's demise, her method of killing him is slightly different, as she instead telekinetically shoves him out of a window and has a sandworm devour him.
  • Laura Burton portrayed the child Alia in the Dune 2000 miniseries, while Daniela Amavia took over the role of the teenaged and adult Alia in the 2003 Children of Dune miniseries.
    • Amavia is actually nine years older than Alec Newman who played Alia's much older brother Paul.
  • In Dune: Part Two the book's two-year time skip is removed, and Alia remains unborn at the end of the film. However, an adult Alia, played by Anya Taylor-Joy, briefly appears to Paul in a vision after he takes the Water of Life.

Trivia[]

The name Alia (also spelt Alya or Aaliyah) means "sky, heaven, loftiness" in Arabic and "other, another, else" in Latin. In the 1984 filmAlicia Witt portrays the character wearing a Hijab, a headscarf commonly worn by Arab and Muslim women.

Though it was not shown in the miniseries, in the books Alia was stated to have begun to gain weight toward the end, A "plumpness which had begun to bulge her body", showing she might have been overindulging due to the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen's influence.

Appearances[]

References[]

  1. Book II of Dune ends in mid-autumn, which is late October or early November. Alia has still not been born. Early in Book III, Alia is stated to be about two years old. We also know that it is still 10,193 at the end of Book III, due to Appendix IV. It seems very unlikely that Book III covers just a month, so we can make a fair assumption that Alia was born in November 10,191.
Preceded by
Paul Atreides (Emperor)
Regent of the Atreides Empire
10210 AG - 10219 AG
Succeeded by
Leto Atreides II (Emperor)



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