Glossary

This article is a list of definitions that are used in the Daybreak project. Both Covenant and human terms are featured. Most of the Covenant terms are English translations of the original Covenant words unless otherwise noted.

A

 * Actua: Translated classical Covenant term for normal space or realspace; the physical universe.
 * Aether: common Covenant name for wavespace, the layers of slipspace used for faster-than-light communication
 * Agora: the most common type of information network used by Covenant citizens; usually exclusive to city, station or world. Most Covenant civilian networks were also top-down in nature rather than interactive, with interactive networks usually being exclusive to guilds, governmental organizations or military units.
 * Artificer: An emerging class of Covenant priest-mechanics following the Covenant War, specializing in syncretic technologies, or more specifically combining Covenant and human technologies.
 * Archkaidon (also Arch-kaidon): a title used in some Sangheili planetary and regional regimes for a feudal lord in charge of multiple lesser states. Analogous titles, such as High Kaidon, Kaidon Paramount, as well as various unique titles are also used regionally, often with various differences in their responsibilities and level of power over their subordinate lords. Usually, such nobles hold authority on a level ranging from a planet to several star systems, albeit with considerable devolution of power to their vassals.

B

 * Bauble: A type of spherical Covenant space habitat, sometimes mobile, with artificial gravity on most of the inner surface and lighting provided by a central plasma ball or shaft. Baubles range in size from under a kilometer in diameter to twenty kilometers or larger, though the vast majority fall within the sub-ten-kilometer range.
 * Blinker: a generic term for Covenant slipspace drives that trace their heritage to pre-Covenant Sangheili counterparts; also refers to early Sangheili FTL vessels. For details, see Covenant drive types.
 * Borer: Covenant slipspace drives derived from Forerunner technology, considerably more powerful than blinkers. Standard on most military and governmental vessels.

C

 * Chameleoflage: a blanket term for photoreactive, non-field-based active camouflage technologies developed by humanity.
 * CMC: the Chikri-Merkaa Conflux, a post-Covenant polity.
 * Concord: the Concord of Reconciliation, a league of several dozen post-Covenant groups championed by the Arbiter Thel 'Vadam; a kind of alien United Nations, and often just as effective at preventing conflict.
 * Crimson Realms: a collection of Sangheili core system states considered to be in the direct cultural and political sphere of Sanghelios.
 * Crimson League: a longstanding political alliance of many noble houses from the Crimson Realms. Has fractured considerably in the wake of the Great Schism, though remains powerful enough to form the core of the Concord.

D

 * Dai'nos Yll: see Liturgical language
 * Dead fleet: a term that refers to deactivated or dissolved UNSC Navy fleets which are retained in bureaucratic records for later resurrection.
 * Diocese: a type of Covenant domain directly governed by a Lesser Prophet and other religious authorities, established at many key reliquaries or industrial centers producing entrusted technology to ensure compliance to High Charity.
 * Domain: a general term for Covenant territorial units. The most common type were known as primary domains, and were defined by both their direct administrative relationship to High Charity and generally standardized government structure. Primary domains could comprise up to 500 officially-recognized worlds and various lesser domains ranging from Sangheili lordships and their vassals to thrall-worlds, merchant republics and freeholds.

E

 * Entrusted technology: a class of Covenant technology understood and manufactured only by High Charity or industrial centers under the direct supervision of officials of the High Council or Ministries; includes key strategic technologies such as Borer slipspace drives, long-range wavecaster communicators, and most high-end types of weaponry and countermeasures. See also Sanctioned technology and Native technology.
 * Esoterica: the name given to Covenant-developed technology where knowledge on its underlying principles has been lost; however, the ability to construct them is retained, at least on an extremely-limited basis. Their adoption is extremely spotty, often only being used in specific design patterns of warships, stations, equipment, and vehicles.
 * Exaltationists: a human ideological movement at its most prominent in the 22nd to 23rd centuries. While specifics varied over time and between discrete groups, the Exaltationists were transhumanists and social utopians pushing for de-regulation of technological progress, particularly in areas of AI, cybernetics and genetic and bio-engineering.

F

 * Fabricary (plural Fabricaries or Fabricaria in the case of connected fabricary clusters that are part of the same complex): A Covenant factory, often one specialized for a given product (e.g. weapons, ships).
 * First Saints: The 70 San'Shyuum and Sangheili individuals of note who laid the groundwork for the Covenant faith and the Writ of Union, reconciling the myriad differences between the San'Shyuum and Sangheili religions into a unified theological framework; perhaps the most revered historical figures in the Covenant.
 * Forgeship: A type of Covenant industrial vessel housing assembly forges and/or fabricaries
 * Frankenship: A descriptor or insult used by UNSC Navy sailors; refers to a starship that is fitted with mismatched components and superstructure.

G

 * Great Enemy (also the Enemy): Covenant theological concept representing, simply speaking, universal chaos, entropy and oblivion, the antithesis of the Great Journey. Most notoriously embodied by the Parasite and its many manifestations, though encompasses Mendicant Bias and other converted ancillas, internal strife, as well as wider moral and spiritual decline.
 * Great Spiral: Common Covenant name for the Milky Way Galaxy
 * Gryunjalla: an old Jiralhanae name for "Prospectors"; an elusive migratory civilization, elements of which supplied the Jiralhanae means for interstellar travel for a time in exchange for mining rights and labor; left the known regions of the Orion Arm centuries ago, though some suspect them to have kept an eye on the UNSC and possibly the Covenant up to this day.

H

 * Hab: A habitat, usually space-based; also classically used to refer to habitation modules in older ship designs with clearly divided functional components
 * Habiforming: A non-anthropocentric counterpart term to "terraforming"; the modification of an environment (natural or otherwise) with the purpose of making it inhabitable for a given species
 * Hades Gulf (also the Black Gulf): a relative cavity in the interstellar medium partly adjoining the Local Bubble, which houses most of the human sphere. The Hades Gulf is also located between the human and Covenant spheres in the Orion-side half of FLEETCOM Sector 1. Home to the crossing routes Pleiades Corridor and Stygian Ingress, as well as an increasing number of both human and post-Covenant colonies and activity in the post-war decades.
 * Halcyon Rift: Covenant designation for the larger interstellar void comprising the Local Bubble and the Hades Gulf; as the region is located at the very fringes of Covenant space, they have no established nomenclature for its constituent elements.
 * Holy Ecumene: a common Covenant name for the Covenant's religio-cultural sphere of influence.

I

 * Ikjuttar: a secretive and isolationist fringe culture confined to their home system in the anti-spinward side of the Covenant Empire, they have evidently never been seen or interacted with in person. In their few transmissions to the Covenant, the Ikjuttar claimed their system to be home to a von Neumann threat of interstellar proportions, which their entire civilization had devoted themselves to containing. Despite them seemingly lacking a slipspace capability of their own, the Ikjuttar system was fortified with exotic defenses of such power as to stymie the Covenant's attempts at contact, assimilation or invasion, eventually leading to the Covenant simply leaving a listening post nearby and leaving the Ikjuttar to their own devices.

J

 * Jehioi: Sangheili word for "Wayfarers"; a pre-Covenant civilization that evidently established outposts within the Orion Arm approximately 40,000 years ago, all of which have long since been abandoned and reduced to ruins.
 * Joint-Occupation Zone: A formally-defined region of space with shared jurisdiction between the UNSC and the post-Covenant polities allied with it, mainly the Concord of Reconciliation

L

 * Lamesai Unesh Nok: A Covenant liturgical tongue term for the Enemy; see Great Enemy
 * Lekgoforming: a process engaged in by some Lekgolo meta-colonies in which a world is gradually shaped to fit that colony's preferences, typically involving extensive excavation processes. The process can take centuries or longer, and rarely truly stops.
 * Lensor field: A type of energy field used to bend light. Such fields were used by the Covenant, among other things, to create magnifying devices, components of various sensors and communication systems, and active camouflage.
 * Life engine: A type of Covenant terraforming (or habiforming) machine, derived from a Forerunner equivalent
 * Liturgical language (Dai'nos Yll): a Covenant language used in religious and high-level political contexts. Rich in nuance, depth and complexity, it traces its roots to the ceremonial language once spoken by the San'Shyuum Reformists, itself a bastardization of a Forerunner archival language.
 * Lobber: colloquial name for a payload-delivery mass driver, usually civilian/commercial
 * Looters: a hypothesized, presumably migratory pre-Covenant civilization whose most notable act was to strip a considerable number of Forerunner reliquaries clean of usable technologies and data millennia before the rise of the Covenant; may actually have been more than one civilization.
 * Lostech: a term used by humans for some high-end technologies that are no longer possible or feasible to manufacture following the Human-Covenant War, due to the loss of the relevant infrastructure or expertise.

M

 * Magistrate: the chief San'Shyuum governor of a primary domain.
 * Merfolk (also Phibians): A conspiracy theory purporting the existence of one or more self-modified populations of humans adapted to aquatic or amphibian life, originally centered around the subsurface ocean of the Jovian moon of Europa but later expanded to extrasolar worlds with the Domus Diaspora. Supposedly has its roots in aquatic-oriented 22nd-23rd century Exaltationist movements.
 * Missive: Covenant term for a formal wavespace transmission

N

 * Native technology: technology originally developed by each client species, which (barring cases of forbidden technologies like AI) often remains in use well after that species' incorporation to the Covenant collective and may, in select rare cases, become adopted by the Covenant at large. However, most native industry is eventually drowned out as a byproduct of the assimilation process and replaced by Covenant mainstream technology.

O

 * O'Neill: An O'Neill cylinder; a type of human space habitat based on Gerard O'Neill's 1976 Island Three concept.
 * Outer Vigil: signatory polities of the Concord of Reconciliation close to the Covenant periphery that engage in relatively close military and security cooperation with the core Concord. In some cases, the Concord's authority over Outer Vigil polities is more symbolic than anything.
 * Outliers: rogue societies that existed outside the Covenant's hierarchy, usually having escaped the hegemony's grasp by fleeing beyond the Covenant's peripheries. Outlier communities were rarely larger than a single planet and not often successful in the long term, most of them either falling to internecine conflict and/or being re-assimilated as the Covenant expanded.
 * The Others: A possible alien civilization potentially of equal power and reach to the Covenant inferred from various Covenant records throughout history; as contact with them was rare, information on them or their current status is extremely scarce

P

 * Paragravity: a type of artificial gravity induced via field-based means, i.e. not thrust or centrifugal force. Became commonplace on human ships in the 25th century.
 * Parallel and perpendicular: the two major types of human spacecraft deck arrangements; one parallel to the ship's main thrust axis and one perpendicular to it. Perpendicular deck arrangements used to be the norm until the advent of reliable artificial gravity in the late 2300s, which gradually saw parallel-style layouts being adopted in the design of commercial vessels, then eventually military ones. Still, some shipwrights have continued to favor the classic perpendicular layouts well into the 26th century.
 * Pax Humana: A much-romanticized period of human history marked by expansion, prosperity and optimism, generally agreed to have begun following the Inner Colony Wars in the early 25th century and lasted up until the Insurrection in the 2390s.
 * Peripates: (also Migrants) the segment of the Covenant population that remain largely on the move aboard ships or mobile habitats, rather than fixed worlds; can also apply to those ships or habitats in question. Despite their eclectic nature, the Peripates are sometimes understood as a distinct subculture and/or faction.
 * Phalera (plural Phalerae): a Covenant translation device, often ornately decorated and worn as jewelry. As the Covenant's empire is vast an encompasses dozens of languages, such translation devices are necessary to facilitate communication.
 * Phoenix Initiative: the reconstruction and resettlement strategy adopted by the United Nations Space Command after the Human-Covenant War
 * Phyle: (plural phyles or phylae): One of the ancient tribal/cultural groupings that are regarded by tradition as the populations all Sangheili today descend from. The concept has also found its way into broader Covenant xenoanthropology and is sometimes applied to other species' (especially the Kig-Yar's) "root" ethnic groups.
 * Pleiades Corridor: the most widely trafficked slipspace route used to cross between the human and Covenant territories post-war, named as such for its proximity to the eponymous star cluster. Known to the Covenant as the Kelsac Passage after the Kelsac Periphery, its starting point within the Covenant sphere.
 * Ploughship: a category of Covenant vessels equipped with Forerunner slipspace drives, designed to drag flotillas of smaller vessels in their wake much faster than normal ships.

Q

 * Quarter: one of the divisions of space used by the Covenant, with the entirety of the Covenant Empire being split into four quarters.

R

 * Raan-Uchaal Bridge: the Covenant name for the Orion Arm; the Raan Spine and Uchaal Wing are the Sagittarius and Perseus Arms, respectively.
 * Relic-reader: a monastic class of archaeologists responsible for deciphering the purpose and nature of Forerunner relics or reliquaries, as well as interpreting Forerunner records. Most were in the employ of the Ministry of Etiology.
 * Retrograding: (also retrograde burn, reverse thrust) A maneuver in which a spacecraft applies thrust to counter its existing velocity. As most ships lack large forward-facing engine units, this is usually accomplished by flipping the entire ship around and using the main drive(s) to brake.
 * Revanchists: a post-war human political movement pushing for retribution against the post-Covenant, particularly the Sangheili. Rather than a single group, the Revanchists are a broadly-defined movement encompassing groups of varying size and political influence.
 * Rock: A habitat built into an asteroid or similar object. Also burrow or warren.

S

 * Sanctioned technology: Covenant technology that can be manufactured or repaired by the Holy Ecumene at large with the blessings of the Prophets. Includes most non-strategic technology; the majority of mundane technological appliances, Blinker slipspace drives, short-range FTL communicators, and so on. Most sanctioned technology originates in the realm of entrusted technology; how long it takes for entrusted technology to become sanctioned is decided entirely on a case-by-case basis.
 * Schismatics: General term for the individuals and groups who stood in opposition against the Hierarchs during the Great Schism; largely encompassed Sangheili or Sangheili-led groups and forces; initially known to the UNSC as Separatists.
 * Scuttlers: A (sometimes derogatory) name for several centuries-old populations living in massive warrens within the ice sheets of the Jovian Moons of Europa and Ganymede. Many wouldn't leave their dark, damp and cramped homes even with the advent of slipspace travel and the possibility of settling earthlike garden worlds.
 * Siakar: an avian creature native to Nesarok, one of the Sunlit Worlds; also the name of a constellation on that world, which inspired the naming of the Siakar Expanse.
 * Siakar Expanse: a Covenant primary domain notable for its proximity to the human sphere beyond the Pleiades Corridor crossing route.
 * Skyfall: A mythologized (but evidently historical) cataclysm in the Sangheili's ancient, planet-bound history which instilled in the species a widespread taboo against tampering with Forerunner artifacts
 * Sliplane: a pathway between two points in normal space through the hyperspacial interstices of slipstream space; a slipspace route. The "higher" the "layer" of slipspace, the more efficient will the lane be in terms of speed, energy expenditure, and strain on the drive.
 * Slipliner: early human term for a slipspace-capable craft, especially a large one (usually a colony ship at the time)
 * Slipwave: an EM-spectrum broadcast propagated through wavespace; used in reference to wavespace communications.
 * Solar Millenary: the 1000-LY-radius-bubble around Sol; arbitrary as a division of space outside its relevance to humanity in the post-war era, with human settlements being established further and further across this region
 * SolCore: Humanity's home system, Sol, and its immediate surroundings within a five-light year radius; one of the three main categories of human colonies, the other two being the Inner and Outer colonies. In both academic and colloquial use, "SolCore" also refers to the people (sometimes the political and/or commercial elite) of said system
 * SolNet: Sol's internal communication network
 * Solipsist: A broad term used by the Covenant for religions or philosophical movements which explicitly emphasize immaterial pursuits such as meditation, rather than technology, as a means to salvation or enlightenment. Such movements were, virtually without exception, regarded as heretical by the Covenant ecclesiarchy, as they were deemed to disregard the "instruments of the divine", which were understood as a necessity for salvation in all officially-sanctioned brands of the Covenant faith.
 * Spindle: A name sometimes given to cylindrical space habitats, either classical O'Neill cylinders or variations thereof (see also O'Neill)
 * Starshield: (also Starbinder) A type of Forerunner device used to arrest a star's life cycle, typically for the purposes of preventing it from entering a giant or supernova state. Toward the end of the Forerunners' struggle against the Flood, many such machines failed, either deliberately or by sabotage, leaving in their wake systems scorched by novae.
 * Sundering Years: a common name for the post-Covenant War decades, encapsulating the general trend of splintering among both post-Covenant and the human sphere.
 * Sunlit Worlds: the oldest and most powerful Sangheili (and by extension, Covenant) worlds, named as such for their relative proximity to Urs, whose light can still be seen with the naked eye from these worlds. The Sunlit Worlds are mighty indeed, and several of them are of an equal standing to Sanghelios as political and cultural centers.
 * Suspensor: Covenant term for an anti-gravity unit.
 * Swarmworld: Covenant term for a category of worlds reserved for, and mainly colonized by, Lekgolo. The Lekgolo societies on swarmworlds largely existed across vast underground caverns, and were largely isolated from even the rest of the Covenant at large; outsiders stepping foot on such worlds was considered both exceedingly rare and hazardous.
 * Swords of Sanghelios: a martial order based on Sanghelios, which acted as the de facto government of that world for a time. One of the core polities that comprise both the Crimson League and the Concord.
 * Synod: the administrative council of a primary domain, consisting of local aristocracy, representatives of the Ministries, as well as the domain's Magistrate

T

 * Techary: a class of priest-mechanic within the Covenant capable of repairing or constructing entrusted technology within their fields of speciality.
 * The Tribulations: A latter-day historical name given to the turbulent first decades of the Concord of Reconciliation and its struggles to establish itself.
 * Torchdrive: Old name for the predecessors to the modern fusion drives; early ships with such drives were special for their then-unmatched speed, and known as torchships
 * Trih Xeem: Covenant term for the act of prematurely inducing a supernova, or alternately a Forerunner device (or array of devices) designed for doing so. The term is based on an archaic Sangheili dialect, and supposedly means "Absolute Cleansing".

W

 * Wavecaster: Covenant name for a wavespace transmitter, a device enabling faster-than-light communication.
 * Wavespace: Collective term for infinitesimal slipspace pathways optimal for the transmission of electromagnetic radiation, but unsuited for matter transit. Like normal slipspace, there are many (perhaps an infinite number) of "layers" to wavespace stacked atop one another, each more efficient than the last. Interface resolution, energy, and computing power are the main limitations to accessing higher layers. While humanity has had the theory of wavespace for centuries, communication through it only became viable on a mass scale in the mid-26th century with the capture of Covenant technology.
 * Wayfarers: See Jehioi.
 * Wayfinder: A class of Forerunner navigation computers as categorized by the Covenant; however, seems to refer to more than just one type of discrete computer system.
 * Worldship: (also megaship): A large Covenant ship or mobile station housing the population of a small world; typically, such ships have other functions besides habitation, such as resupply, refit and mining. By far the largest and most notable example is High Charity, though there were numerous smaller city-stations within the Covenant. Refit and replenishment stations with habiformed recreational areas (such as the Unyielding Hierophant) are also often regarded as worldships.
 * Worm-lords: Covenant term (sometimes derisive) for Sangheli clans acting as attendants for a Lekgolo lineage. The bonds between such clans and their Lekgolo charges were deep and often ancient, and they formed their own kind of secret subculture within the Covenant.

X

 * Xar-Shaa: an aquatic species with a minor interstellar sphere of influence in the antispinward Sagittarius-side edges of the Orion Arm, partly overlapping with the Holy Ecumene proper. Part of the Covenant fringe. Slow, difficult to communicate with, and requiring cumbersome environment suits to operate in a normal atmosphere, their contribution to the Covenant largely involved handing over the few Forerunner artifacts they discovered, to which they exhibited a curious disinterest.

Y

 * Yonhet: a species of amphibious tripods native to the moon of Yonhe. Part of the Covenant fringe.

Z

 * Zenither: demonym for the Covenant hub world Radiant Zenith.