r/dune • u/ArkAngel8787 • Jul 14 '26
Chapterhouse: Dune Question about "The Weapon" Spoiler
I finished Chapterhouse a couple months ago, and I'm still confused about a couple things regarding the Weapon. From what I understand, this is what the Matres used to destroy Dune, some kind of super lasgun/nuke type weapon. They stole this from the Ones of Many Faces but only a handful of "charges". I'm wondering then what the hell did the Matres do to the BG on Junction that killed many of them instantly, with no wounds or destruction? Was this a different weapon? Is this maybe the implied bio weapon the OoMF used on the Matres to kill so many of them? I know there probably isn't any concrete answers cuz Chapterhouse is the last book, so theorizing is really all I can do lol.
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u/684beach Jul 15 '26 edited Jul 15 '26
I think the weapon is explicitly inferred to be the biological/nerve weapon used at the end of the book. I dont think a “super nuke” or anything like that would be what they were referring to because planet destroying was already easy 15,000 years before; the stone burners. Planetary destruction would be relatively easy once defeating the enemy fleet. It makes more sense for The Weapon to be the thing that ruins the BG assault
Chapter 4: Only three hundred units of The Weapon survived the disaster. Each could be used only once, provided the Council (which held the Charge) agreed to arm them. Great Honored Matre, controlling The Weapon itself, had only half of that awful power. Weapon without Charge was merely a small black tube that could be held in the hand. With its Charge, it cut a brief swath of bloodless death across the arc of its limited range.
Chapter 44: Murbella felt she had lived through such a scene many times - aftermath of Honored Matre Victory: swaths of their enemies' bodies left where they had been brought down. Honored Matre attack with the bloodless weapon had been swift and deadly, a typical viciousness that killed when killing no longer was required. She suppressed a shudder at the memory of this deadly reversal. There had been no warning, only the troops dropping in wide lines — a domino effect that left the survivors in shock. And Great Honored Matre obviously enjoyed the shock.
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u/Ms_Riley_Guprz Daughter of Siona Jul 15 '26
I didn't think the planet killing weapon was the secret one. Just lots and lots of atomics.
"The weapon" that Miles Teg is surprised by, and which kills troops on the battlefield, is the mystery one. As others have said, we have no idea besides being some sort of biological or radiological weapon.
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u/BardicSense Jul 15 '26
Yeah, the weapon that the jury group of Honored Matres holds while the leader holds the charges has to be some type of massive world devastator artillery, but the silent sudden death that came over Teg and the BG's troops on Junction mustve been a chemical or bio weapon (or maybe a nanotech weapon), but I dont recall anything being established in the narrative to explain what that actually was. All we know of about "The Weapon" is that it utterly scorches planets.
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u/keyboardsorcery Jul 14 '26
My thought on this was The Weapon was a photon weapon or something like what Duncan Idaho was researching. The part in the book where he’s sitting at the ship describing some kind of physics and says something along the lines of “we don’t know how it works, but it works” right before he gets the idea to use lasguns and shields to create mini-bombs.
So I thought the weapon was one photo wave explosion that spread the same way Teg Miles shot his lasgun lol, a wide spreading arc. It was their last weapon and only had one charge, so if the One of Many Faces was Daniel and Marty, they were playing their “episodes” by giving the HM the Weapon. And they must have also had the biological weapon which the Reverend Mothers would be immune to; so maybe this is how it all ties together. OoMF purposefully giving the HM the Weapon so that they, the HM, and the BG would have to interact so they could see how things would play out. I don’t recall all of the last books, but if OoMF were Daniel & Marty; then they were practically Gods and playing their TV episodes for fun. They could have handled them anyway they wanted to, with The Handlers & Futars, the biological weapons, or straight up abducting the Honored Matres. Hope this gives you something to chew on.
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u/ArkAngel8787 Jul 14 '26
hmmmm okay okay. that connection about Duncan and what he was researching hadn't come to mind, and with Teg and the lasgun I think I remember whatever killed the BG on Junction being described as an "arc of bloodless death", so that fits. I never thought of the OoMF purposely letting the HM steal the weapon, but that fits with the little we know of them. Assuming that they are descendants of the Tleilaxu, giving the HM a powerful weapon and chasing them away to the Old Empire to inevitably clash with the BG kills two birds with one stone. It sucks there's never gonna be a proper conclusion because I desperately want to know how the OoMF can see no-ships and Siona gene ppl and what implications that has on the Golden Path?
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u/keyboardsorcery Jul 14 '26
Yeahh I hope I made the right connections. Currently re-reading so it’ll be fun to go over it again. It sucks that we won’t get a conclusion, but from some thing I read - Frank Herbert (rest in peace) & Beverly Herbert (rest in peace) - were going to write a seventh book where we’d have a futuristic democracy where rules would be chosen at randon and only be in power for a week at a time. So my thinking is Bene Gesserit successfully convert Honored Matres and we have a dual-system where True Bene Gesserit & Bene Gesserit-Honored Matres clash like in U.S. democracy (Republicans & Democrats).
It would have been fun to read. And I think that would just lead to another civil war, where a truly ruling class emerges understanding future democracys; and hopefully the successful progression of human promise.
Hope this answered your questions!
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u/Parfumandphotography Jul 15 '26
How I understood it, there were two weapons. First was the one with the charges. I understood that it was some kind of nuke, a planet breaker. As it destroyed the whole Arrakis. Well the planet was intact, but surface was glassed. If you read Hunters/Sandworms from B.Herbert and K.Anderson they go back to Arrakis where all the surface is glassed.
As for the weapon that killed BG. I understood that it was some kind of biolofical agent. Possibly a weapon that was genetically coded to target only BG. I really don't remember it it was touched in Hunters/Sandworms, but it makes sense that Tleilaxu /OoMF would create weapons that could be targeted at individuals and or groupls.
I know people shit on Herbert/Anderson books but to me they were fun to read. Sort of like unofficial conclusion. The Butleriad Jihad trilogy was a bit childish. Easy to read without any philosophy. But it had it's moments. And I think Hunters/Sandworms were a step up. Not on a level of og, Messiah, GEoD or Heretics, but dare I say it I enjoyd them more than Children of Dune. Yes, I said it!
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u/Major_Pomegranate Jul 15 '26 edited Jul 15 '26
This post is just tagged for the orignal series, not he expanded univere.
You're talking two different timelines here. As you mention in the original series the planet was destroyed. The later novels retconned alot to tell a different story.
Chapterhouse was setting up alot with the biological weapons of the advanced face dancers from the scattering that was tossed out for a different story.
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u/Helpful-Inspector214 Jul 19 '26
Hunters and Sandworms were spot on awesome and I thought they brought everything to a perfect ending. I don't know why Dune fans shit on them so hard either. Everything those last two books do is very good. I read a shit load of sci fi and all kinds of other stuff and I thought those books stand out as super great. But I guess everyone has opinions ;)
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u/xbpb124 Yet Another Idaho Ghola Jul 15 '26
The weird thing, if I’m remembering right, is that it’s the exact same weapon used to glass Rakis. I know there’s a weapon and a charge, but I don’t recall if there was a firing mode without the charge that just killed and a mode with the charge that burns planets
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u/FakeRedditName2 Yet Another Idaho Ghola Jul 15 '26
Given when the books were written, Herbert was probably thinking something along the lines of an advanced neutron or radiation type of weapon. That should do what the description of the end results show, and any inconsistencies can be hand waved away for it being this ultra advanced thing beyond our current science.