What Happened To Earth? | Terra's History Explained | Dune Lore Explained

An exploration of the mystery of what happened to Earth and how its history continues to echo throughout the pages of Frank Herbert’s Dune legendarium. When the story of Frank Herbert’s Dune saga begins we are thrust some 20,000 years into the future. In this rich mythology it can be easy to forget that this is not a tale set in some distant galaxy far away, rather we are presented with an alternate projection of our own future in which humanity has spread across numerous planets, forming an interstellar feudal society. But What happened to Earth, the birthplace of humankind? Earth or Terra is seldom mentioned in the original six Dune novels. However, the history of this once vibrant planet continues to influence the Dune universe significantly. Spoiler warning if you are unfamiliar with Dune.

Music Credits:
Background Music: Marion - Sadness in Your Eyes

Intro Track: Honey Juice by Harris Heller

Art Credits

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[JessWLStuart]

Setting the Dune-iverse 20, 000 years since our time was a brilliant move by Frank Herbert. This separation allows Herbert to introduce any sci-fi element as believable in the Dune-iverse.

[Jacob-Ironside]

Always thought it was cool that in the Dune universe earth is a myth like Atlantis. Great video!

[kuckoo]

This is very similar to how cites like Uruk, Ur, and how Mesopotamia civilization has largely disappeared from contemporary consciousness. It is the birthplace of human civilization but most people have either never heard of it or don't care, and is rarely talked about.

[ArrakisHeir]

>i can trace my family line back to Agamemnon
>i have no idea who that is

[thatotherguy]

The non-canon "Earth got devastated, we turned it into a park to recover, and... um... kinda forgot about it." is the one that I like the best. It sounds like something I would do - I can't count the number of Very Important Things that I had to put aside for one reason or another... and then a few years later I run across one again and go "Oh yeah... I forgot about that."

[kineticstar]

Earth has the worst luck in sci-fi books. It's alway lost or destroyed and needs to be abandoned.

[jeremyevans]

I love the idea of a remote, ancient, and mysterious Earth. I like to think that humanity will, in fact, spread out across the universe over tens of thousands of years. I like to think of myself as a an ancient man living in an ancient civilization. And that our civilization will one day be as remote and mysterious as early man is to us now.

[patrickleitzen]

I definitely like Frank's simplistic (and shrouded) views on Earth's fate/status

[sontohartono]

The "Mysterious Earth" trope was pretty common by the time Herbert came up with Dune. Asimov's Foundation had it almost two decades before Dune. It is, after all, a very easy and useful tool to not get bogged down in the details of centuries or millenia of history, and instead just focus on the interesting part of just the actual story.

[jay-]

The fact that in our time we’ve forgotten lessons 3, 000 years, it’s no surprise that in Dune earth is hardly ever mentioned.

[kdog]

Thanks again Elaine.

It's heartening to think the films may send people to videos like yours and subsequently make them realise what a gigantic, rich and varied canon they've just scratched the surface of.

[ScaryBaldMan]

Would be interesting if Earth was just renamed and after all those millennia no one remembers it was ever called that. It’s been called Verde-Azul for as long as anyone can remember.

[Greengeist]

Maybe Herbert wanted his hypothetical human experience to be unbound by the geography of earth. As I understand it, DUNE is a meditation on the trajectory of human civilization and how our flaws inevitable lead to a break down in said civilization. Herbert wanted the entire focus of his stories to be on humans as a species and not merely sentient inhabitants of singular planet.

[nfboogaard]

I remember one of the final books has a scene with a Van Gogh painting in it.
Thanks for making this video, you've made my day a little nerdy today :D

[AGL.]

The idea of ​​the Earth as a great natural reserve seems wonderful to me.

[manwiththeredface]

Some things are better left covered in mystery. Earth's fate and location are such things. The Duniverse's appeal lies in its distance from (yet similarity to) our time, location, society etc. Earth is out there somewhere, that's all we needed to know.
BTW if humanity survives long enough we will sooner or later "forget" Earth, just like we forgot that we once came from the savannahs of Africa. We sailed the globe many times over before we rediscovered our place of origin on it.

[vickytaspartan]

I didn't read the saga (I have a pending reading on them) but I watched some of its film adaptations (including the later one). It's interesting how we, humans, tend to forget very quickly the lessons from History; in fact, I feel like it's one of our most dangerous traits since History is repeating itself in some aspects.

Have a great day!

[richardmcgowan]

I do like sci-fi stories were Earth is either not in the story at all or so far gone (or so far in the future) that it is no longer the Earth we know. You can still use Earth cultures but you can use it to tell much more interesting stories. I used to read some Warhammer 40k books and in one of them they run into a old Earth map and none of them know or even remember the names. The Earth on the map being lost to time.

[zr]

i realllly love your wealth of knowledge about dune as ive only recently been getting into it, and its great to have deeper explanations.

[johnedgar]

Hi NerdCookies, thank you for this one. I've always wondered what became of poor Earth in the Dune universe. I always felt like it was a half-forgotten relic of humanity's past that no one even visits anymore, like a sad, lonely place that never gets its due. this always felt poignant to me somehow.