Imperium of Man (Warhammer 40,000)

Imperium of Man

Seal of The Emperor and the Imperium of Man
Form of government	Oligarchical dictatorship; strong elements of theocracy
Official language	Imperial Gothic, High Gothic, Lingua Technis
Capital	Holy Terra (Earth)
Head of state	The God-Emperor of Mankind
Established	before 30,000 A.D.
Governing body	High Lords of Terra
Population	Unknown but vast, likely hundreds of trillons
Military forces
Primary
Imperial Guard The Holy Fleet (Imperial Navy) Adeptus Astartes Titan Legions Inquisition Ordo Malleus Grey Knights Ordo Hereticus Adepta Sororitas Ordo Xenos Deathwatch
Other
Adeptus Custodes Adeptus Arbites

The Imperium of Man is a fictional galactic empire of over a million planets that contains the vast majority of humanity in the forty-first millennium, set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe created by Games Workshop.

The Imperium in the 41st millennium

In the 41st millennium, the Imperium is nominally ruled by the "most beneficent God-Emperor of Mankind". However, since his ascension to the Golden Throne following his confrontation with Warmaster Horus, the duties of actually ruling the Imperium are carried out by the Senatorum Imperialis, the nine High Lords of Terra. Those include the Fabricator General of the Adeptus Mechanicus and the Paternova of the Navigator Houses (Navis Nobilitae).

The immense amount of worlds under current imperial control display a huge variety of conditions and ecosystems. Many worlds are huge polluted ecumenopoleis, housing the vast bulk of humanity, that are completely reliant on external support to sustain their huge populations. Forge worlds housing continent spanning factories sating the inexhaustible demand for arms and war machinery exist in every sector of the galaxy, often serving as bases for vast Imperial navy squadrons and legions. Many worlds’ surfaces have been completely given over to the production of crops and agriculture in order to feed humanities teeming trillions, while other planets have been completely strip mined for raw materials.

Other worlds cut off from normal interstellar traffic through war, warp storms or other means have been isolated from most of humanity for decades or even centuries, the general populace ignorant of the Imperium's existence, their technology base slowly deteriorating until their society resembles that of pre-technological Earth. Feudal civilizations develop, with visiting Imperial Administration officials or cartographers being considered gods by the primitive locals, due to the decade even century gap between their visits.

The challenges for any human government controlling a galaxy 100,000 light years across has led to the development of an extremely brutal totalitarian theocracy. The sheer size of the Imperium means no meaningful existence can be applied to the majority of humans, prime Imperial concern is the survival of the species tenuous hold on the majority of habitable worlds in the galaxy, so individual freedom and liberty are of no concern as the Imperium constantly wages war against the numerous alien enemies humanity has made during the aggressive colonization of the stars over the last 40 millennia. Life is cheap and plentiful, so the existence of the Imperium is largely concerned with the vast numbers of troops and material they have at their disposal. In this parellels may be drawn with the early 20th Century totalitarian States, where, in Mussolini's view, everything must be for the survival of the State, and no individual may exist outside of it. As the Imperium's Vindicare Temple motto puts it, 'Exitus actum probat' -the outcome justifies the deed: the Imperium's self-preservation, as a collective entity, is its only concern.

Despite the overall dystopian theme of the Imperium, humanity enjoys a high technology base, a brutalised and battle ready society of trillions, the largest military force the galaxy has ever witnessed, and a xenophobic stubbornness that has allowed the Imperium to stand for over 10,000 years

The Emperor of Mankind

The Emperor of Mankind is the leader of the human Imperium, and in the Imperial creed, the Father, Guardian and God of Mankind. He was once a living man, possessing incredible intelect and physical strength and easily the most powerful psyker the galaxy has ever seen. Only he had the vision and the power to unite all the tribes of man into one vast galaxy spanning empire. It was he who created the space marines and taught humanity how to use the warp to travel the stars. When his son, Horus, turned traitor the Emperor fought him in single combat and though he killed Horus he was himself mortally wounded and has been bonded to the Golden Throne, which sustains his life. He has sat immobile within the Golden Throne of Earth for ten thousand years. His shattered body can no longer support life, and remains intact only in spirit, itself sustained only by the soul-sacrifice of countless millions. He has sacrificed his immortal life in the service of Man.

The Adeptus Terra

The Adeptus Terra, the great Priesthood of Earth, is the central governing organisation of the Imperium. It is an enormous and bureaucratic organisation whose scriptoria, continent-sized archives and pilgrimage sites occupy nearly all of the holy hiveworld of Terra that is not taken up by the Sanctum Imperialis, the Emperor's vast throne room, which itself takes up the better part of the northern hemisphere. The Adeptus Terra seems to be largely synonymous with its largest component organisation, the Administratum. The Adeptus Terra is so immense, and operates so slowly, that whole departments of it still service agencies which no longer exist and worlds dead for thousands of years.

The Administratum

The Adeptus Terra's main bureaucratic body and largest division is the Adeptus Administratum. This organization's purpose is the administration of the Imperium at all levels, its tasks include the assessment of planetary tithes: the goods, war materials and Guard regiments each Imperial world is regularly required to provide for the Imperium. It is a vast organisation involving the efforts of countless billions of adepts, who for the most part are hereditary slave workers, bureaucratic officials and petty scribes. The estimate that ten billion adepts are involved in the mere administration of the Imperial Palace gives some idea of the Administratum's massive size. Of all the organisations of the Imperium, the Administratum is considered the least prestigious, but its highest ranking members are among the most powerful men in the Imperium. The Administratum is based in the Imperial Palace on Terra but its adepts are found throughout the Imperium.

The Ecclesiarchy

The Adeptus Ministorum, also known as the Ecclesiarchy after its head, the Ecclesiarch, is the Church of the God-Emperor. The Adeptus Ministorum administers the official religion of the Imperium, the Imperial Cult. Its governing body is the Holy Synod of Terra, a council made up of the organisation's Cardinals.

The Departmento Munitorum

The Departmento Munitorum is the central command of the Imperial war machine, organizing the logistics of planetary tithes, troop movements and troop deployment. The Departmento is one of the many departments of the Administratum, but is far more decentralized than the other divisions of the Adeptus Terra, establishing a presence on any world with a significant tithe-grade. Distress calls from an invaded world are processed by the Munitorum, and will be passed up the ladder of system-subsector-sector-Segmentum-Imperium HQ until a division with enough reach can raise the armies needed from neighboring systems and respond. Thus, the harder a foe strikes at the Imperium the greater the retribution will be.

Due to the vast distances of space, combined with the internal bureaucracy of the Departmento Munitorum, decision making tends to be very slow, and calls for help may not be acted on for years or even centuries. It is not uncommon for war fleets to arrive at warzones to discover that the war they were dispatched to fight is long since over.

The Adeptus Mechanicus

The Adeptus Mechanicus, the Tech-Priests of Mars, are the engineers and technicians of the Imperium, and create most of the Imperium's more advanced machinery and weaponry, among other things, despite the fact that their understanding of the technology they use is limited at best, with much of their procedure based on ritual and religious dogma rather than genuine engineering or mechanical skill (though there are exceptions, such as the high-ranking Mechanicus officials who possess and experiment with a more scientific mindset).

The Collegia Titanica (sometimes abbreviated to Adeptus Titanicus), another organisation within the Adeptus Mechanicus, is charged with the duty of building and maintaining the greatest war machines of the Titan Legions. Titans are usually supported by Skitarii or Tech-Guard, who are a military arm of the Adeptus Mechanicus (roughly equivalent to cyborg Imperial Guard Legions).

The Inquisition

See main article: Inquisition

Independent of the rest of the Adeptus Terra are the Holy Orders of the Emperor's Inquisition. Its jurisdiction is all-encompassing, its agents responsible for uncovering and dealing with any potential threat to the Imperium or humanity.

Each Inquisitor bears a seal that grants him the right to command any citizen or resource within the Imperium to the end of carrying out his duties, from individuals or single vessels, all the way up to entire Imperial Guard regiments or Imperial Navy fleets in times of dire danger.

"I carry with me an Inquisitorial seal. It is a small, unassuming object contained in a neat box of Pluvian Obsidian. It is a modest thing. Relatively plain, adorned with a single motif and simple motto. Yet with this little object I can sign the death warrant of an entire world and consign a billion souls to oblivion." -Inquisitor

Officio Assassinorum

An inconspicuous, highly secretive, but vital part of the Imperial machinery of war, the Officio Assassinorum trains and deploys assassins all over the galaxy, to seek out and exterminate dangerous individuals. The product of lifelong training at one of the Assassinorum Temples, each Temple specializing in a particular facet of the art of death-dealing, Imperial assassins are incredibly effective at their vocation.

The Imperial Commanders

In addition to the Adeptus Terra and the militaries, the High Lords also command the Segmentum Commanders, who each oversee one of the five galactic regions known as the Segmentae Majoris: Segmentum Solar, Segmentum Pacificus, Segmentum Obscurus, Segmentum Tempestus and Ultima Segmentum. Each Segmentum Commander oversees his sector Commanders, who in turn oversee subsector Commanders, who oversee Imperial Commanders, also known as planetary governors. The higher ranks in this system are usually combined with a basic planetary governorship as well as interplanetary duties. This system is the means by which the Imperium maintains control of the separate planets that make it up.

Forces of the Imperium

In the Warhammer 40,000 universe, the Imperium represents Mankind's only hope for survival in a grim, merciless future set in the forty-first millennium. The Imperium is surrounded by alien species, and is also under continual attack by the forces of Chaos and by extragalactic species such as the Tyranids.

The Imperium's defense forces consist of the:

• Imperial Guard
• The Holy Fleet (Imperial Navy)
• Adeptus Astartes (Space Marines)
• Adeptus Custodes (Emperor's bodyguard and guardians of the continent-spanning Imperial Palace on Terra)
• Adeptus Arbites (the police force of the Imperium)
• Adepta Sororitas (female warriors belonging to the Ecclesiarchy)
• The Inquisition
• Adeptus Titanicus (the Titan Legions; giant mecha warmachines created by the Tech Priests)

In addition, every populated world in the Imperium is required to possess its own government military forces for the planet's own defense. Individual Planetary Defense Forces vary widely from planet to planet, even more so than Imperial Guard regiments, because they adhere far more to the culture and traditions of their homeworld. Some are of the lowest quality, whilst others are better trained and equipped than most regiments in the Imperial Guard (such as the PDF of Cadia).

Background to the Imperium in other Science Fiction

The dystopian Imperium has been compared with other fictional empires. Its rigid social system is somewhat similar to the strictly feudal Empire found in Frank Herbert's Dune. It also closely resembles Isaac Asimov's Galactic Empire in the Foundation Series, with millions of star systems only loosely connected with the governing center, where technology is becoming a myth rather than a science, with extreme persecution of those questioning the morality or validity of the endless conflicts and divine rule of the Emperor.

A number of institutions and policies of the Imperium reflect the influence of seminal British SF comic 2000 AD; the "Arbitrators" of the Adeptus Arbites, as heavily armed law enforcers, have a similar role to the Judges in Judge Dredd (and indeed resemble them in some artwork), whilst the nature of the Imperium as a theocratic, human-centred society, revering Earth and despising aliens and those who traffic with them and kept in line by a secretive and paranoid Inquisition, is highly reminiscent of the empire of Termight (or "Mighty Terra") in Nemesis the Warlock. Games Workshop and 2000 AD have, in fact, had a long association, with 2000 AD writers John Wagner, Alan Grant, Gordon Rennie and especially Dan Abnett writing fiction for Games Workshop and the Black Library over the years.

References

• Warhammer 40,000. Glen Burnie, MD: Games Workshop, 2004.
• Chambers, Andy, Haines, Pete, and Hoare, Andy (2003). Warhammer 40,000 Codex: Imperial Guard, 4th Edition, Nottingham: Games Workshop. ISBN 1-84154-410-8.