Deneva (also known as Deneva Prime or Kappa Fornacis III) was Class M planet in the Kappa Fornacis system in the Beta Quadrant. A lush and hospitable world, it was colonized by humans in the 22nd century and despite several major setbacks, it eventually became one of the core worlds of the United Federation of Planets. (TOS: "Operation -- Annihilate!"; FASA: The Federation; Decipher: Worlds; Spaceflight Chronology; ENT novel: A Choice of Futures, et. al)
History[]
First charted and named by the Vulcans, Deneva's ecology was fairly undeveloped until the first colony was established on the planet in the late 2140s as a support base for asteroid miners in the system. Terraforming was minimal, as most Earth plants and animals grew and flourished easily in Deneva’s warm, equable climate. For the first decade, the colony’s only troubles came from the occasional Orion pirate or Terabian raider, which the colonial militia could usually fight off using converted freighters and mining lasers. However, Deneva’s position along a major trade route led to contacts with not only the Tellarites and Andorians, but other races as well. Unusually for such a (then) relative backwater planet, Deneva came to supply many of Starfleet’s best-educated and most cosmopolitan officers. After the founding of the Coalition of Planets, Deneva became a member as a United Earth protectorate.
In 2155, Deneva was conquered by the Romulan Star Empire, bypassing its early-warning system and destroying its patrol ships, including the USS Yeager. After they took the world, the Romulans massacred the colonists.
The following year, in June of 2156, Captain Jonathan Archer led a large Coalition fleet to retake the planet. After the successful campaign, the Earth Starfleet established a base to defend the system's resource-rich asteroids, but it had no expectation that another civilian colony would ever be established on the planet. Yet soon thousands of new settlers arrived, drawn by the asteroids' minerals, Deneva's natural beauty, and by the determination not to let the Romulans frighten humanity into submission.
In November 2159, the Romulans conquered the system again, but all the colonists had been evacuated or retreated underground in the asteroid mines, waging a guerrilla campaign to redirect small asteroids toward the planet in hopes of driving the Romulans off. The occupying forces had deflected most of the asteroids, but enough small ones had gotten through their defenses to keep the Romulans from solidifying their position, until the war ended eight months later with the Battle of Cheron.
In the following years, the colonists had returned to the planet and rebuilt their homes better than before, and the resurgent mining operation had continued to draw new colonists seeking to make their fortunes, especially with the founding of the United Federation of Planets in 2161. (ENT novel: Beneath the Raptor's Wing, A Choice of Futures)
In March 2163, Deneva's capital city served as the location of a conference between representatives of the Federation and several non-aligned world regarding the Federation participation in the Vertian crisis. (ENT novel: A Choice of Futures)
The colony continued to grow over the next century, supporting a stable population of one million by the mid-2240s. The planet became a hub of scientific inquiry, drawing great minds from all over the Federation to its research facilities. From the beginning, Deneva served as a kind of “laboratory of colony building,” where specialists from all fields would come to get some hands-on experience on a world with plenty of room for error. Deneva Station supported top-flight research institutes in biology, agronomy, metallurgy, hydrology, kinesthetics, and most recently xenobiology. Denevans’ Starfleet alumni often retired to the planet, and even families of other officers move to Deneva after hearing about the perfect weather, great natural beauty, and interesting work available there. Well satisfied with its lot, Deneva remained a colony until the early 24th century, its governor was appointed by the Federation Council, but was usually a former Starfleet official with family ties to the planet. {Spaceflight Chronology; Decipher: Worlds)
The colony's first major crisis since the Earth-Romulan War came in 2267, when ships from Ingraham B brought an infestation of neural parasites, which attempted to take control of the entire population of the planet in order to produce spaceships and spread their influence. The parasites had destroyed civilization entirely on Beta Portolan five centuries before, and caused epidemic madness on Levinius V and Theta Cygni XII before reaching Ingraham B in 2265. The USS Enterprise, investigating the phenomenon, reached Deneva barely in time to prevent another tragedy. Deploying 210 trimagnesite satellite flares, Starfleet managed to neutralize the parasites by drenching the planet in strong ultraviolet radiation, the parasites’ weakness discovered by Enterprise chief medical officer Leonard McCoy. Although the planetary cancer rate briefly climbed, aggressive treatment returned Deneva to its peaceful, prosperous state shortly thereafter. Deaths from the invasion numbered close to twenty-one thousand, including Deneva's governor Newton Armitage, and Sam Kirk and his wife Aurelan. In the aftermath, Deputy governor Helena Albrecht took over leadership of the colony. (TOS: "Operation -- Annihilate!"; Decipher: Worlds; TOS novel: Crucible: Provenance of Shadows)
Following the end of the parasite crisis, the citizens of Deneva got back on their feet and the colony continued. By the 2380s, two Denevans had served as President of the United Federation of Planets: Alohk Ixan from 2281 to 2284, and Adam Zagrin from 2301 to 2308. By the 24th century, Deneva had become a Federation member state in its own right. (Template:Rpg; ST novel: Articles of the Federation)
By 2379, Otamad had been elected President of Deneva. (TNG novel: A Time to Heal)
Alternate timelines[]
In the Destiny timeline, Deneva was a target of the Borg invasion of 2381. Its entire population was exterminated and its surface was reduced to ash. (Star Trek: Destiny novel: Lost Souls)
In one branch of the mirror universe, Deneva became the headquarters of the Galactic Commonwealth following the Tripartite Armistice which ended the war between the Terran Rebellion and the Klinogn-Cardassian Alliance. (Star Trek: Mirror Universe novel: Rise Like Lions)
Environment[]
Deneva had almost no axial tilt, and therefore very equable weather and almost no seasonal variation. The main city on the planet, Deneva Station, could claim to have some of the best weather in the Galaxy, resembling a smog-free Los Angeles spring afternoon year round. In the northern oceans, circulator currents kept temperatures mixed, which could cause rough weather and even hurricanes on occasion, but most of the storms never crossed the equator onto the southern continents.
Almost all of Deneva’s northern hemisphere was ocean; the three large continents were all in the south. The long, kidney-shaped southernmost continent, Sibir, is cold and mountainous, and almost completely uninhabited. The two other continents, Bolshoi (the largest) and Menshoi (the smaller) had low mountains along their southern flanks and large rivers flowing north into the ocean. Both continents supported large ranches and farms, which served primarily as research centers into efficient organic agriculture and testing grounds for new fertilizers or counter-pest organism release programs.
Deneva Station was on the southwestern coast of Bolshoi, about a mile and a half inland. Up country, a fully-functional spaceport welcomed freighters and trading ships without transporters or otherwise dependent on ground services. (Decipher: Worlds)
Geography[]
Bodies of water[]
- Aurelius Ocean • Bealtaine Strait • Bolsibir Sea • Iapetus Ocean • Terringen Ocean • Toran Sea
Continents[]
- Bolshoi
- Sibir
- Menshoi
Regions[]
- Argo Islands • Borders Mountains • Malcom Island • Northstar • Randall Mountains • Sibiran Range • Summer Islands
Points of interest[]
- Deneva Station • Deneva Research Station • Denevan Colonial Museum • Norris Farm • Rose Farm • Scj Ranch • Sol's Ranch • Summer Island Playhouse • Tate Spaceport
Cities and settlements[]
- Archer • Jet City • Mallarashtra • Norris Farm • Scj Ranch • Sol's Ranch • Tellerton • Lacon City • Rose Farm
Notable Denevans[]
- See also Category:Denevans.
- Helena Albrecht
- Newton Armitage
- Jasminder Choudhury
- Alohk Ixan
- Aurelan Kirk
- George Samuel Kirk, Jr.
- Katherine Seton
- Adam Zagrin
External links[]
- Deneva article at Memory Alpha, the canon Star Trek wiki.
- Deneva article at Memory Beta, the non-canon Star Trek wiki.
- Deneva article at Star Trek Expanded Universe, the fanon and fanworks Star Trek wiki.