Races and species in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

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This is a list of races, fauna and flora featured in various incarnations of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Races

Betelgeusians

In the Hitchhiker universe, the red giant Betelgeuse has supported two habitable planets that we know of. Betelgeuse 5, home of Zaphod Beeblebrox, and Betelgeuse 7, home of Ford Prefect. Ford and his father are actually the last surviving members of their species, as his father escaped his world after a massive hrung collapsation. However, Ford's father was never adequately able to explain what a hrung collapsation was, and always under suspicion by his new neighbors on Betelgeuse 5. Betelgeusians from both worlds appear to have multiple mothers.

Blagulon Kappans

Blagulon Kappans are methane-breathing life forms from Blagulon Kappa, which only appear in the books as the sophisticated police that attack Zaphod Beeblebrox. They die because Marvin the Paranoid Android causes their ship to commit suicide, rendering their space suits unusable, which kills them because they cannot breath in the thin oxygen atmosphere of Magrathea.

Dentrassi

Dentrassi are the cooks for the Vogons, the Galactic bureaucrats who demolish the Earth in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. Described by the character Ford Prefect as "The best cooks and the best drinks mixers, and they don't give a wet slap about anything else." In most versions of the story, they help galactic hitchhikers board Vogon Constructor Ships "mostly because it annoys the Vogons."

Dolphins

Dolphins are the second most intelligent creatures on Earth (superseded by mice) and tried in vain to warn humans of the impending destruction of the planet. However, their behavior was misinterpreted as an act of jumping through hoops while whistling the 'Star Spangled Banner'. Their story is told in So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish.

Equinusian packbeast

At the beginning of the Quandary Phase of the radio series, the voice of The Book describes any attempts to appeal to the better nature of the Vogons as "flogging a dead Equinusian packbeast." Director Dirk Maggs answered that this expression can be read as either referring to a horse[link], or a separate horse-like alien species, or both.

G'Gugvuntts and Vl'hurgs

Two species which existed in the distant past, a very great distance from our own galaxy. The G'Gugvuntt were enemies of the Vl'hurgs; at a conference between the leaders of the two sides the G'Gugvuntt leader insulted the Vl'hurg leader's mother. At the precise moment that the Vl'hurg leader challenged the G'Gugvuntt to retract the insult a chance remark uttered by Arthur Dent was carried across time and space to the table by a freak wormhole. The phrase ("I seem to be having tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle") is a horrendous insult in the Vl'hurg language, and terrible wars ensued.

After millennia of battle the surviving G'Gugvuntt and Vl'hurg realised what had actually happened, and joined forces to attack our own galaxy in retaliation. They crossed vast reaches of space in a journey lasting thousands of years before reaching their target where they attacked the first planet they encountered, Earth. Due to a terrible miscalculation of scale the entire battle fleet was swallowed by a small dog.

Little is known about appearance of the G'Gugvuntt, but their leader was described as squatting in a cloud of sweet-smelling green steam. The pronoun "it" was used, possibly indicating that the G'Gugvuntt are genderless. In the the race is spelled "G'Gugvant". Similarly little is known about the appearance of the Vl'hurgs, other than that their leader at the aforementioned conference was 'resplendent in his black jewelled battle-shorts'.

Golgafrinchans

The Golgafrinchans are an extinct race that appears in Life, the Universe, and Everything. In their ancient history, they tricked the most useless third of their population to get on a spaceship and leave the planet, by spreading rumours of the horrific fates their planet was doomed to soon undergo, such as being eaten by a giant space goat, or collapsing into the sun. The plan was to get them to crash on a "harmless" planet, thus losing any capacity for space travel; they would then be out of everyone's hair.

Soon after they managed to get rid of these people - including all the telephone sanitizers - the entire remaining population was wiped out by a plague contracted from a dirty telephone.

The survivors who left on the spaceship eventually did crash onto Earth, as planned. They managed to wipe out the primitive, but wise, population of original inhabitants, thus corrupting Deep Thought's 10 million year plan to discover the Ultimate Question to the Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything. They are also the ancestors of modern humans.

Ancient Golgafrinchan culture included a sect known as 'the great circling poets of Arium', who would abuse travellers, circle them and throw rocks at them. Afterwards, they would recite an epic poem which usually involved the rescue of a beautiful monster from a ravening Princess by five sage Princes on four horses.

See also: Listings for specific Golgafrinchan characters

Grebulons

The Grebulons are a race that appears in Mostly Harmless. They are observing the Earth, but do not know why.

They were originally a reconnaissance team in an interstellar battle. During the centuries-long spaceflight to the battlefield, while they were all in suspended animation with their memories offloaded to the ship's computer, the ship was struck by an asteroid. The collision destroyed much of the computer, and (in a parody of fault-tolerant computing) a number of sensors, ultimately resulting in the accidental loss of the backup. The Grebulons awoke with no idea where they were going or who they were. All they were able to extract from the computer was patches of their tasking, instructing them to observe. With no indication of what they were supposed to observe, they chose the nearest target: the Earth. They observed mostly television transmissions.

Meanwhile, the lack of combat intelligence led to disastrous results for the Grebulon side in the aforementioned war.

Haggunenons

The Haggunenons of Vicissitus Three were encountered in the sixth episode of the original radio series when Ford and Zaphod attempted to steal an Admiral's flagship from the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. According to the Guide, the Haggunenons "have the most impatient chromosomes in the Galaxy. Whereas most species are content to evolve slowly and carefully over thousands of generations, discarding a prehensile toe here, [...] hazarding another nostril there, the Haggunenons would have done for Charles Darwin what a squadron of Arcturan Stunt Apples would have done for Sir Issac Newton. Their genetic structure is based on the quadruple sterated octohelix...."

The Haggunenon Admiral turned out to have been sleeping on his flagship while Ford, Arthur, Zaphod, Trillian and Marvin returned it to its proper time and place at the vanguard of an invasion fleet. It then evolved into a copy of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal, from which Ford and Arthur were able to escape, but which ate Marvin, Trillian and Zaphod. Those three later made their escape when the admiral "made the mistake of re-evolving into a really neat little escape capsule."

See also: Minor characters from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Haggunenon Underfleet Commander

Hrarf-Hrarf

A race of beings whose lifespans flow backwards in linear time. Their lives begin at death, and end "in a really quite extraordinarily pleasant birth." They are also described as the "only race known actually to enjoy hangovers, because they know it guarantees that a tremendously good evening will ensue."

The race is mentioned only in The Tertiary Phase of the Hitchhiker's Guide radio series, written specially for that series by Douglas Adams in the mid-1990s.

Hooloovoo

A Hooloovoo is a superintelligent shade of the colour blue.

Little is known of them, except that one participated in the construction of the starship Heart of Gold. At the launching ceremony it was temporarily refracted into a free-standing prism. This is probably analogous to the multicoloured lab coats worn by the rest of the team.

Humans

Humans are bipedal primates from Earth, and the third most intelligent species on that planet. (Superseded by mice and dolphins, respectively.) Originally thought to have evolved from apes, humans may in fact be descendants of a race of Golgafrinchans - telephone sanitizers, account executives, and marketing analysts who arrived on the planet ca. two million BC. These Golgafrinchans apparently displaced the indigenous cavemen as the organic components in the computer designed by Deep Thought.

Interestingly, although the term "humanoid" is applied to many races throughout the galaxy, "humanity" refers specifically to the qualities of humans.

Jatravartids

Jatravartids are small blue creatures of planet Viltvodle VI with more than fifty arms each. They are therefore unique in being the only race in history to have invented aerosol deodorant before the wheel.

Many races believe that the Universe was created by some sort of god or in the Big Bang. The Jatravartid people, however, believe that the Universe was sneezed out of the nose of a being called the Great Green Arkleseizure. They live in perpetual fear of the time they call "The Coming of the Great White Handkerchief". The theory of the Great Green Arkleseizure is not widely accepted outside Viltvodle VI.

(A similar concept was used in the short story "God's Nose" by Damon Knight.)

For the feature film Douglas Adams created a new character called Humma Kavula, a missionary whose apparent mission is to spread the religion of the Jatravartids. The Jatravartids are only seen on screen during two brief (and poorly lit) shots, though their discarded aerosol cans are found all over their planet's surface. "Caveman"-style illustrations of the Jatravartids feature in one episode of the Hitchhiker's Guide TV series.

Krikkiters

This race of quiet, polite, charming and eloquent humanoids caused the most devastating war in the history of the Galaxy (with over two "grillion" casualties). Their homeworld, Krikkit, is surrounded by a black cloud, so they had no knowledge of the universe outside their world. When a spaceship crashed on the surface of Krikkit, the inhabitants quickly stripped it of its secrets and used them to create their own "flimsy piece of near-junk" craft, Krikkit One. Upon reaching the outer edge of the dust cloud and seeing the galaxy for the first time, the people of Krikkit marvelled at its beauty before casually deciding to destroy it, famously remarking "It'll have to go." The Earth game of cricket is a racial memory of the events of the Krikkit Wars. The story of these events is told in Life, the Universe and Everything.

Lamuellans

A humanoid race from the planet Lamuella. It is on this planet that a passenger starship crashes, and Arthur Dent is the only survivor. There he becomes the planet's Sandwich Maker. The Lamuellans are led, more or less, by Old Thrashbarg, the tribe's priest to Almighty Bob. Other residents of the village include Kirp, a fisher, an unnamed Baker and an unnamed Tool Maker. The planet is also home to Perfectly Normal Beasts and Pikka Birds. The complete story is found in the novel Mostly Harmless.

Mattresses

In Life, the Universe and Everything, mattresses are "... large, friendly, pocket-sprung creatures which live quiet private lives in the marshes of Squornshellous Zeta. Many of them get caught, slaughtered, dried out, shipped out, and slept on. None of them seem to mind and all of them are called Zem." Very few mattresses actually come back to life and attack the sleeper.

Mice

Mice are the physical protrusions into our dimension of a race of hyperintelligent pan-dimensional beings who commissioned the construction of the Earth in order to find the Question to the Ultimate Answer of Life, the Universe, and Everything. As such, they are the most intelligent life forms on that planet.

In their home dimension, a popular sport is Brockian Ultra-Cricket, a horribly violent game which involves hitting people and running away, before apologising from some distance - preferably through a megaphone.

Poghrils

An exceptionally pessimistic race from the star system of Pansel. Due to the Heart of Gold's Infinite Improbability Drive causing a wave of improbability when passing through the system, several thousand fried eggs landed unbidden on the surface of their home planet, unfortunately too late to save the vast majority, who had already succumbed to famine, though one did manage to survive for two further weeks, before dying of cholesterol poisoning. The Poghrils had a riddle, the asking of which was their only form of pleasurable recreation. It went like this:

Poghril 1: "Why is life like hanging upside down with your head in a bucket of hyena offal?"

Poghril 2: "I don't know. Why is life like hanging upside down with your head in a bucket of hyena offal?"

Poghril 1: "I don't know either. Wretched isn't it?"

Shaltanacs

The Shaltanacs are a race from the planet Broop Kidron Thirteen, who had their own version of the Earth phrase, "The other man's grass is always greener." Although, given their planet's horticultural peculiarities, theirs was, "The other Shaltanac's joopleberry shrub is always a slightly more mauve-y shade of pinky russet," and so, the expression, for obvious reasons, fell into disuse, and the Shaltanacs found they had little choice but to become exceptionally happy and content, which surprised everyone else in the galaxy, who had never realised that the best way not to be unhappy is not to have a word for it.

Silastic Armourfiends of Striterax

The Silastic Armorfiends were an insanely aggressive race who lived on the planet Striterax approximately twenty billion years ago "when the universe was young". They were extremely keen on fighting - one of the best ways to deal with a Silastic Armourfiend was to lock him in a room by himself, since he would beat himself up sooner or later. They wrecked the surface of their planet in constant wars, and the whole population lived within bunkers deep below the surface.

In an attempt to deal with the problems their violent nature created, the Silastic Armourfiends passed a law that anybody who had to carry a weapon as part of their normal work (including policemen, security guards and primary school teachers) must spend a minimum of 45 minutes each day punching a sack of potatoes. It was hoped that this would allow them to work off their surplus aggression. This plan worked only until the Silastic Armourfiends began just shooting the potatoes instead.

During one of their more unpleasant wars, the Silastic Armorfiends asked the great computer Hactar to design the ultimate weapon for them. The computer complied, creating a hand-held bomb which would connect the core of every major sun via hyperspace, destroying the entire universe. The Silastic Armorfiends attempted to use the bomb to blow up a munitions dump, but fortunately Hactar had built a dud weapon since it could not conceive of any occasion when the use of the real thing would be justified. The Silastic Armourfiends disagreed, and pulverised Hactar.

Eventually the Silastic Armorfiends destroyed themselves.

Strangulous Stilettans of Jajazikstak

An enemy of the Silastic Armourfiends of Stiterax.

Strenuous Garfighters of Stug

An enemy of the Silastic Armourfiends of Stiterax.

Vogons

Far back in prehistory, when the first primeval Vogons crawled out of the sea, the forces of evolution were so disgusted with them that they never allowed them to evolve again. Through sheer obstinacy, though, the Vogons survived, wrecked the planet, and emigrated en masse to the Megabrantis cluster, where they form most of the Galactic bureaucracy, most notably in the famous Vogon Constructor Fleets (which allows them a socially-acceptable way to spend their time demolishing things). The only captain of the Constructor fleet we meet is Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz.

Here's what to do if you want to get a lift from a Vogon: forget it. They are one of the most unpleasant races in the galaxy. Not actually evil, but bad tempered, bureaucratic, and callous. They wouldn't even lift a finger to save their own grandmothers from the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal without orders signed in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public enquiry, lost again, and finally buried in soft peat for three months and recycled as firelighters. The best way to get a drink out of a Vogon is stick your finger down his throat, and the best way to irritate him is to feed his grandmother to the ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal. On no account allow a Vogon to read poetry at you.

Vogon trivia

• They are greenish and other colors.
• They are known to make the third worst poetry in the universe (see Vogon poetry).
• Vogon guards enjoy shouting "Resistance is useless!" to their prisoners.
• Douglas Adams claims to have got the name from a species of fish.
• Vogons are the worst marksmen in the Universe, according to Marvin in the film version (immediately before one of them hits the back of his head).
• According to Ford Prefect, destroying a planet, in his words, "always makes them a little nuts."
• The Vogon brain is actually a misplaced, badly malformed, and dyspeptic liver.
• On the planet Vogsphere, the Vogons would sit upon very elegant and beautiful gazelle-like creatures, whose backs could not support the weight and would snap instantly, an event ignored by the Vogons. Also, in the 2005 film, Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz sits upon a throne resembling one of these creatures. This is not unlike the human tradition of shaping the feet of tables and bathtubs to resemble lion paws or bird talons gripping a ball, and this adornment is no doubt a major symbol of status for the higher Vogon officers.
• A favorite Vogon pastime is to import millions of beautiful jewel-backed scuttling crabs from their native planet, cut down giant trees of breathtaking beauty, and spend a happy drunken night smashing the crabs to bits with iron mallets and cooking the crabmeat by burning the trees. In the movie, the Vogons seem to smash the crabs for no apparent reason besides pure pleasure at killing something. Also note that in the movie, the first crab to die at the hands of a Vogon has little baby crabs that you can see, their eyeballs are sticking out of the tank.

Other species

Fauna

Babel fish

A Babel fish is a highly improbable biological universal translator. It appears as a "small, yellow and leechlike" fish. When a Babel fish is inserted into the ear canal it allows the wearer to "instantly understand anything said... in any form of language."

Damogran Frond Crested Eagle

A Damogran Frond Crested Eagle inhabites Damogran, a desert planet where Zaphod Beeblebrox steals the Heart of Gold. A Damogran Frond Crested Eagle incorporated the first two pages of Zaphod Beeblebrox's speech into its nest, which it built out of paper mâché, and "was virtually impossible for a newly hatched baby eagle to break out of." Apparently "the Damogran Frond Crested Eagle had heard of the notion of survival of the species but wanted no truck with it." Note that only this particular Damogran Frond Crested Eagle wanted no truck with survival of the species, not the species in general, thereby allowing the species to perpetuate.

Fuolornis Fire Dragon

The Fuolornis Fire Dragon is a creature once found on Brequinda, on the Foth of Avalars. It was a powerful aphrodisiac before it was hunted to extinction.

Perfectly Normal Beast

The Perfectly Normal Beasts are a species that migrate across the Anhondo Plain on Lamuella twice a year (one direction in the spring then back again in the autumn). The migration takes about 8 to 9 days during which time they form a solid mass. They appear from thin air at one end of the plain then disappear again at the other. It is known that one end passes into the Domain of the King.

The local Lamuellans capture the beasts and kill them for their meat. The method uses similar techniques to a matador but also requires use of the Pikka Birds in order to get their attention. The best of the meat is eaten straight away while the rest is salted and stored for consumption until the next migration. It was consumed on its own until the arrival of the Sandwich Maker and is now always placed between two slices of bread.

Pikka Bird

The Pikka Birds are birds native to Lamuella. They are known for being surprised by ordinary everyday objects and events such as the sun rising but completely ignoring unusual events such as spaceships landing. They are accustomed to staring blankly at a few anonymous atoms in the middle of the air. They are also used to attract Perfectly Normal Beasts.

Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal

The Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal is a creature that hails from the planet of Traal, and will eat anything. If you are to encounter one, the Guide tells you that it's impossible to slay, so you should wrap a towel around your head. This creature is so mind-bogglingly stupid that it assumes that if you can't see it, then it can't see you.

In the Infocom adventure game adaptation of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the Bugblatter Beast asks its victims their names before killing them, and carves the names on a memorial outside its cave. The game also describes the Beast as having Lasero-Zap eyes, Swivel-Shear Teeth, and several dozen tungsten carbide Vast Pain claws forged in the sun furnaces of Zangrijad, all implying that it is a cyborg.

According to the radio scripts, the Beast's eyes can turn red, green, then a sort of mauvy pink. If the adventure game is correct about its being a cyborg, the changing eye-colour may be part of the arming procedure for the Lasero-Zap beams.

In the movie version, the Guide has an entry on what to do if you face certain death at the claws of a Bugblatter Beast, but instead of mentioning towels, or merely not looking at it, it suggests the same method for "What to do if you find yourself trapped beneath a large boulder with no means of escape" from Fit the Eighth of the radio series. The entry is this: Consider how lucky you are that life has been good to you so far. Alternatively, if life hasn't been good to you so far, which given your current circumstances seems more likely, consider how lucky you are that it won't be troubling you much longer.

Scintillating Jeweled Scuttling Crabs

Scintillating Jeweled Scuttling Crabs live on the planet Vogsphere, which is the same planet that Vogons come from. Vogons eat them, "smashing their shells open with iron mallets." They cooked the crabmeat with the native trees. Although the Vogons migrated to the Megabrantis cluster, the political hub of the Galaxy, every year the Vogons import twenty-seven thousand scintillating jeweled scuttling crabs from Vogsphere and "while away a drunken night smashing them to bits with iron mallets."

Flora

Fluff

While not, strictly speaking, flora by itself, four bits of fluff collected in the Hitchhiker's Guide computer game can be made to grow into a fruit-bearing tree. The fruit gives its eater a glimpse of future foresight (necessary for winning said game).

 

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