Majipoor

The planet Majipoor is shared by humans and several alien races, including four-armed Skandars, three-eyed Liiman, and the native, shape-shifting Metamorphs. All are watched over by the King of Dreams, the labyrinth-dwelling Pontifex, and the priestess of the Isle of Sleep, while the Coronal officially rules from atop Castle Mount.

History
The giant world of Majipoor, with a diameter at least ten times as great as our own planet's, was settled in the distant past by colonists from Earth, who made a place for themselves amid the Piurivars, the intelligent native beings, whom the intruders from Earth called Shapeshifters or Metamorphs because of their ability to alter their bodily forms. Majipoor is an extraordinarily beautiful planet, with a largely benign climate, and is a place of astonishing zoological, botanical, and geographical wonders. Everything on Majipoor is large-scale–fantastic, marvelous.

Over the course of thousands of years, friction between the human colonists and the Piurivars eventually led to a lengthy war and the defeat of the natives, who were penned up in huge reservations in remote regions of the planet. During those years, also, species from various other worlds came to settle on Majipoor–the tiny gnomish Vroons, the great shaggy four-armed Skandars, the two-headed Su-Suheris race, and several more. Some of these–notably the Vroons and the Su-Suheris–were gifted with extrasensory mental powers that permitted them to practice various forms of wizardry. But throughout the thousands of years of Majipoor history the humans remained the dominant species. They flourished and expanded and eventually the human population of Majipoor game to number in the billions, mainly occupying huge and distinctive cities of ten or twenty million people.

Government
The governmental system that evolved over those years was a kind of nonhereditary dual monarchy. The senior ruler, known as the Pontifex, selects his own junior ruler, the Coronal, when he comes to power. Technically the Coronal is regarded as the adoptive son of the Pontifex, and upon the death of the Pontifex takes his place on the senior throne, naming a new Coronal as his own successor. Both of these rulers make their homes on Alhanroel, the largest and most populous of Majipoor's three continents. The imperial residence of the Pontifex is in the lowest level of a vast subterranean city called the Labyrinth, from which he emerges only at rare intervals. The Coronal, by contrast, lives in an enormous castle at the summit of Castle Mount, a thirty-mile-high peak whose atmosphere is maintained in an eternal springtime by elaborate machinery. From time to time the Coronal descends from the opulence of the Castle to travel across the face of the world in a Grand Processional, an event designed to remind Majipoor of the might and power of its rulers. Such a journey, which in Majipoor's vast distances could take several years, invariably brings the Coronal to Zimroel, the second continent, a place of gigantic cities interspersed among tremendous rivers and great unspoiled forests. More rarely he goes to the torrid third continent in the south, Suvrael, largely a wasteland of Sahara-like deserts.

Two other functionaries became part of the Majipoor governmental system later on. The development of a method of worldwide telepathic communication made possible nightly sendings of oracular advice and occasional therapeutic counsel, which became the responsibility of the mother of the incumbent Coronal, under the title of Lady of the Isle of Sleep. Her headquarters are situated on an island of continental size midway between Alhanroel and Zimroel. Later, a second telepathic authority, the King of Dreams, was set in place. He employs more powerful telepathic equipment in order to monitor and chastise criminals and other citizens whose behavior deviates from accepted Majipoor norms. This office is the hereditary property of the Barjazid family of Suvrael.

Geography
Despite Majipoor's massive diameter compared that of Earth, its gravity is Earth-like owing to comparatively low planetary density caused by a near-absence of metals in Majipoor's crust. This lack of metal has contributed to Majipoor's relative isolation and stunted technological development. The entire planet is covered in ocean, save for three major continents, eastern Alhanroel, western Zimroel, and southern Suvrael. The Inner Sea lies between these three major continents, along with a smattering of smaller islands–including the Isle of Sleep–and the Great Sea encircles the rest of the planet. The Great Sea remains uncharted due to its vast size and impenetrable tracts of floating sea weed mats. Monstrous, semi-intelligent sea-dragons inhabit the oceans of Majipoor, circumnavigating the planet in their annual herd migrations.