Cosian (Jedi Renaissance)

"A Cosian in the Order will always serve as an instructor to those willing to learn."

- Horen Hote, writing about Cosians in the Jedi Order.

Cosians were a race of reptavians from the forested world of Cosia, a planet located in the of the galaxy. A recent addition to the galactic community, the Cosians only began to move beyond their homeworld in the decade before the Clone Wars. After joining the Galactic Republic in the wake of the Ruusan Reformations, Cosians and Nu-Cosians began to travel the Republic in search of greater knowledge and experience with new cultures. Forceful members of the species were recruited by the Jedi Order, seeking out teaching roles and venerating the duty of the instructor above all others.

Biology and appearance
Cosians were a sentient species of reptavians that evolved on the forested world of Cosia. Descended from a large tree-scaling lizard, Cosians gained sentience during the animals transitional period from reptile to avian. Sharing a common ancestor with many of the bird species of Cosia, Cosians had traits common to both reptiles and birds. The Cosians were bipedal beings with a bilateral symmetry, having a front and a back end, as well as an upside and downside. Their body comprised a head, neck, torso, a whip-like tail, and four limbs. The upper limbs, called arms, ended in hands which had four fingers with multiple points of articulation; one of which was an opposable thumb that allowed for fine manipulation. The lower limbs, called legs, were bent and bowed, ending in feet with four clawed toes for balance. Perched atop their hunched torso was their head, connected to the rest of the body by a long neck. Their elongated skull contained a single brain, and ended in a beak mouth which was capped by a broad nose with two nostrils. Above their nose were two large eyes, ringed by bony ridges, which gave them binocular vision. A cold-blooded species, Cosians had limited physiological means of keeping their body temperature constant and relied on external sources of heat. An omnivorous reptilian, the Cosians dined primarily on shellfish and crustaceans native to the streams and mudflats of their homeworld. Cosian hair was grown, cut, and styled for aesthetic or ritualistic reasons&mdash; both sexes generally wore their hair in loose braids down the sides of their heads. Male Cosians could grow long flowing beards from their beaked chins. Their hair color ranged from a dark blue to pearly white, growing from the crown of their heads, and the tips of their tails. In addition to those varied hair colors, their eyes came in shades of red, orange, or brown. A scaled species, Cosian scales ranged from dark green in males to a light yellowish color in females.

Cosians had two sexes: male and female, with the latter being distinguished by their overall taller stature and lighter coloration. Members of the Cosian race could not interbreed naturally with any other race. Despite overall physiological uniformity, Cosians varied greatly in appearance, and no two looked exactly alike. One of the diversity factors was height. Cosians averaged 1.8 meters in height, although females were usually taller and more agile than males. Cosians had red or orange eyes with eyelids that rose up from the bottom of the socket, color vision, and advanced visual depth perception. Cosians were sexually-reproduced animals, requiring the mating of an opposite sex couple to produce offspring. Venerating the deliverance of a clutch of eggs, Cosians incubated their eggs for four months before they hatched and were cared for in a communal nursery. According to the laws of Cosia, the legal transition from childhood to adulthood was only attained after nineteen standard years of life. Cosians had an average lifespan of 185 standard years. Those who were keenly attuned to the Force could live up to 350. At any rate, individuals past the age of 200 were considered to have reached an age worthy of veneration. Natural signs of aging in Cosians included the dulling of the scales, the loss of hair, and diminishment of motor-function. Old Cosians would experience a decline in many cognitive processes, frequently losing track of time, misidentifying people or places and, in extreme cases, momentarily forgetting about their own identity or state.

Nu-Cosians
The Nu-Cosians were a genetically-engineered sub-species of the Cosian race. Beakless and completely hunched, the sub-species possessed an extremely strong back and was capable of carrying excessive amounts of weight. Designed to be a race of indentured servants by a rogue regime circa 293 BrS, the Nu-Cosians were granted their freedom through a civil war of societal reform. Viewed as a lesser being by some because of their severely hunched gait, Nu-Cosians were nearly identical in every way to their fore-bearers save for their lack of beak.

Society and culture
The Cosians were a curious species that valued learning for the sake of learning, and viewed constant academic pursuit as a pathway to a good life. Cosians were expected to specialize in a field of study early on in their schooling, and continue it throughout their lives. A government-funded education system allowed access to schooling was free and easy for Cosians, who structured their society around a lifetime of learning, as well as participating in the economy of Cosia. Capable of speaking Basic, the Cosian language was filled with trills and chirps. Linguistically inclined, Cosians strove to learn foreign languages because they believed that it was a gateway to understanding a foreign culture. Aside from the languages of sentients, Cosians enjoyed the languages of the birds and beasts that shared Cosia with them.

Government
The Cosians abided by a social code of filial piety, respecting their elders and recognizing them for their collective wisdom and greater experiences. Cosia's villages were governed by a gerontocratic confederation of village elders and the histories of their people were used as a blueprint for future action. While no formal planetary government existed, the independent village Councils would come together in times of great crisis to make a decision and guide the planetary populace in its decision making. Otherwise, the village Council of Elders operated separately from each other, guiding their village through hardship and times of plenty. While the Council's say was highly regarded, it was not absolute and the Council lacked an enforcement arm. Instead, the Council hoped that their guidance would positively influence on the young, but also encouraged them to find their own solutions through introspection and contemplation.

Technology
Incorporating the technology found across the Core with Cosia's natural beauty, the Cosians developed their arboreal, stone age society into a thriving and modern world. A young society when incorporated in the Galactic Republic, the technology on Cosia had not developed far beyond basic tools by the time of their discovery in the wake of the Ruusan Reformations. The Cosians made their homes high in the sturdy cosa trees, forming entire villages in the boughs of a single tree. Carved into the side of the tree trunk, the homes and halls were connected by a winding stair that ringed the tree. Between the trees, carved wood walkways connected neighborhoods and were etched with stories and legends from the species' past. Cultivated vines were integrated around the village for safety and privacy purposes. The Cosians had access to starcraft and space age tech, but travel off Cosia was limited during the Clone Wars as the society continued to integrate with the wider galactic society. Starports began to be established by Republic companies interested in trading with the Cosians, though they tended to be located far from population centers so as not to mar the natural beauty of Cosia.

Customs
Because thinking and learning was integral to the Cosian way of life, storytelling and the recounting of history and legend was the greatest form of entertainment for the low-tech denizens of Cosia. Venerating the past and making legends of their wise leaders, the Cosian elders would pass on their oral traditions in a ring around the village's central Fire of Ages. The Storyteller of the ceremony wielded an honorific staff of carved wood and bone, speaking around the Fire of Ages and recounting both history and legend. The staff passed from one Storyteller to the next, weaving in new tales to the story. Beyond Cosia, many Cosians continued this tradition in some form, creating vast story archives and pouring over massive collections of information to mine for more and more data.

Religion and the Force
Because of their deep interest in the pursuit of knowledge, Cosians valued Force-sensitivity as a pathway to greater understanding of the fundamental nature of the universe. Cosians recognized the Force as the guiding power in the galaxy, and rejected the notion of gods or religion as non-academic and superstitious. When the Jedi Order began recruitment of Cosians for training in the ways of the Force, the Council of Elders rejoiced at the potential learning experience gifted to those special Cosians. Their value of collective memory and the collection of more and more knowledge made them ideal candidates for the Order and great disdain for the Sith Empire.

Homeworld
Cosians evolved on the planet Cosia, a verdant world of rolling hills and dense forests on the edge of the Deep Core. Located in the Cosia system, the planet orbited a single star, called Kla'n, and was the third of twelve planets in the star system. Populated by large insects with colorful carapaces and wings, a myriad of avian species, and vicious tree lizards, Cosia's biosphere was rich and diverse. The cosa trees were the largest and most sacred of the planet's flora, housing the cities of the Cosians high above the forest floor where dangerous predators stalked the high grasses.

Cosia was orbited by two moons, Tebu and Tabu. The Cosians had colonized the moons through the assistance of the Republic, using spacecraft donated by the ExplorCorps and the Republic Senate. Tebu was a frozen moon, of rich glaciers and verdant oases deep in the valleys that sheltered them from the heavy snows in the upper regions of the mountains. Because of the stability of the moon's atmosphere and the predictability of its weather, the Republic and the Cosians used the moon as a diplomatic retreat. Major conferences in the region were held within the terraced palaces built into the mountainsides. The icy silence and mystical feeling the beauty vistas granted to visitors ensured that conference attendees were at ease when making decisions or purchases. Tabu, on the other hand, was a dark moon, with a landscape filled with glowing plants and barren wastes. A place of meditative retreat for young Cosians just beginning their journey into adulthood, camping on Tabu for several months was considered a rite of passage.

Colonies and beyond
Beyond Cosia, colonies of Cosians had begun to crop up within the decades leading up to the Clone Wars. Those colonies that did exist were not funded by the government of Cosia; instead they were established by adventure-seeking pioneers eager to learn from other cultures and diversify their own understanding of life and the universe. With the resettling of Ossus by the Jedi Order, many Cosians flocked to the garden world, seeking out the Great Library and the treasures it held. The Cosian neighborhood in the city of Knossa worked closely with the Jedi, offering their curating skills to help repopulate the Library and its smaller satellite facilities.

History
A relatively new species, Cosians evolved into sentience circa 9,000 BrS and had been developing a vibrant and diverse society when the Republic made contact with them 8 millennia into their history. A tree-dwelling species, Cosians were not great warriors and avoided conflict when possible. Their greatest heroes of legend were the peacemakers and famed negotiators. Integrating the advanced technology brought to Cosia while maintaining the integrity of the environment and their history, Cosians were not quick to take to the stars, and private starships were not easily acquired on Cosia. With the assistance of the Republic, Cosians had begun to develop into an economically stable world, taking slow and calculated steps to grow the economy while respecting the level of development achieved by the young civilization. The interests of the Cosians was represented in the Galactic Senate by regional senators from Ojom. While not enjoying direct representation, the Cosians were well taken care of by their Besalisk representatives, who were benevolent and helpful in their leadership role.

Cosian Jedi
First discovered by the Jedi circa 1,000 BrS, the Cosian species showed a proclivity not only for the Force but for the Order's precepts of learning, understanding, and knowledge. Recruiting heavily from Cosia due to the species' yearning for their Forceful children to find revelation within the Force, Cosian Jedi trained on Coruscant up and through the Clone Wars. Finding their way to mastery quickly and humbly, Cosian Jedi often served the EduCorps, taking on teaching roles with the Order's academies. Cosian Consulars and Mystics were the most common Jedi among the species, serving as instructors and advisers, diplomats and healers. Some Cosians did walk the path of the Guardian and Warrior, despite their species' avoidance of violence. Jedi Protectors and Wardens served to protect those who could not defend themselves, and stood guard over the treasured knowledge centers across the galaxy.