What was spice in dune

The spice germinates in the small and sparse pockets of groundwater, deep beneath the sands. Over time, the pre-spice masses release natural gasses and become highly pressurized. They explode toward the surface of the desert, killing most of the surrounding sandtrout in the process. When a pre-spice mass reaches the light and air, chemical reactions transform it into the Spice Melange. For most who can afford to consume it, the spice does little more than increase longevity and fortitude. Some see improvements in perception, and those who consume it for long enough will have their eyes turned blue.

More on that later. The Spice is still just spice. Where to stream Dune. Where to Stream: Dune More On: Dune Share Selection Facebook Twitter. Post was not sent - check your email addresses! Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email. What is Spice in Dune? Everyone wants it, the entire economy relies on it, and only one planet, Arrakis, has it. Sign in. View more in. Community Policy. Related Polygon. Early in the runtime of Dune, a curious thing happens. Duke Leto Atreides Oscar Isaac offhandedly muses about how much money it must have taken for the Emperor to send an envoy to his home planet of Caladan.

In response, his retainer Thufir Hawat Stephen McKinley Henderson rolls his eyes back in their sockets until only the whites are showing, and when he rolls them back down, his tattooed lips are able to spit out the precise monetary cost of the whole production. The spice called " melange ," or more often simply referred to as " the spice " is a dusty red substance created by monstrously large and incredibly dangerous sandworms as they burrow through the sands of their home planet of Arrakis, known colloquially as Dune.

Sandworms do not live on any other planet than the desert planet Arrakis. The sandworms of Dune have animal-like intelligence, varying only slightly in appearance between adaptations, and are so tremendously large that they can rise from the ground and eat whole buildings. Despite the danger, spice is still sought out as it's so valuable—the most important commodity in the universe due to its ability to grant longevity, vastly increase mental powers, and enable faster-than-light travel known as space folding.

Therefore, the noble family House that controls Arrakis singularly controls the harvesting of spice. Likewise, Dune is the key location of the universe, with spice getting shipped across the universe from the central point of Arrakis.

Beyond just its political power as a commodity, however, the spice also has practical applications within the narrative of Dune. Notably, all space travel is controlled by the Spacing Guild, an organization granted a monopoly on all space travel by the Padishah Emperor who rules over the noble Houses, and therefore controls the distribution of spice melange.

With the prescience granted by ingesting the spice melange, the guild's skilled and highly trained Navigators are able to fold space, essentially creating wormholes to pilot their gigantic starships instantly across the galaxy.

Unfortunately, the Navigators on those spacefolder ships take so much spice to achieve their navigational powers that their bodies mutate horribly into a sort of fish-like creature. It's a high price that some are nonetheless willing to pay. Without the spice, space journeys would be undergone by atomic rockets and take hundreds of years to move from planet to planet.