Great Jedi Library (Jedi Renaissance)

"Can you smell the history, the power here?"

- Exar Kun

The Great Jedi Library, also known as the Library of Ossus or as the Great Library of the Jedi, was a massive library erected by the Jedi Order on the planet Ossus. Commissioned by the Jedi Master Odan-Urr following the Great Hyperspace War, the Draethos Jedi assembled ancient documents and scrolls detailing every detail of sentient history and ingenuity. Home to the Order's archives after leaving their homeworld Tython in the Deep Core, the Great Library became a symbol of the Order and the greatest storehouse of knowledge in the galaxy. Over the ensuing centuries Ossus thrived as the home of Jedi wisdom, encouraging visitors from across the Galactic Republic to visit and study at the archives.

After centuries of peace and growth, the Library was raided by Dark Lord of the Sith Exar Kun and his followers. Storming the Chamber of Antiquities, the Sith stole the forbidden Sith artifact known as the Dark Holocron from Master Odan-Urr before slaying the venerable Jedi. As Kun grew stronger and gathered his forces, the Sith unleashed the devastation of Naga Sadow's ancient battleship, the Corsair, detonating the stars of the nearby Cron Cluster in 3,996 BBY. As the Jedi desperately tried to empty the library and ship its contents offworld, Kun and his minions returned in a bid to steal the last bits of knowledge from the Jedi. Before long the world was irradiated by the supernovas, eradicating the planet's major cities and entombing more than half of the library's knowledge within its halls. The Library stood abandoned for the next three millennia, while the surviving Jedi known as the Ysanna kept constant vigil in the ruined world. The Jedi who had made it offworld transported the surviving artifacts to Coruscant where they would be kept in the new Archives that would serve as a smaller version of the lost library for centuries.

Following the defeat of the last Sith Lord in 19 BBY during the Clone Wars, newly elected Jedi Grand Master Tomac Moorcé announced his plans to rebuild Ossus and restore the Great Library to its former prestige and make it even more grand then before. Following through on his promise, Moorcé saw to the rebuilding of the ruins of the library and the restoration and addition to the collection there.

Jewel of the Jedi
"I remember the last words of my master Ooroo. Perhaps I can build a great learning center. A giant library of Jedi knowledge and books on the quiet world where Master Ooroo trained me. On Ossus!"

- Odan-Urr after recovering a Sith Holocron at the end of the Great Hyperspace War.

Following the end of the Great Hyperspace War, Jedi Knight Odan-Urr, a noted Jedi Consular and lore keeper returned to the planet of his early training in the Jedi Order under Jedi Master Ooroo. From the expansive library found in the dead Celegian Jedi's praxeum, Odan-Urr began to conceptualize a massive archive of wisdom on the quiet and meditative world of Ossus. From the days of its foundation, the Library of Ossus contained the culmination of hundreds of generations of knowledge and wisdom. Odan-Urr scoured the galaxy for all attainable knowledge, eventually cataloging what was said to be data on all sentient works and history from the foundation of the Galactic Republic. Containing rare scrolls and hand-written books, many librarians and archivists recorded these text in more secure datacrons and holodisks in order to ensure their preservation and integrity. Over time, the ever-growing collection was home to many artifacts imbued with the light side of the Force including holocrons of wise Jedi Masters and ancient weapons. As a historian, Master Odan-Urr understood that it was vital to maintain a comprehensiveness collection of knowledge; to this end he created the Chamber of Antiquities to house objects and talismans tainted with the dark side of the Force. It was in this series of rooms that the Dark Holocron was kept, and like the other things kept in the chamber, accessible only to those with express permission from the Jedi High Council and the Keeper of Antiquities, Odan-Urr himself.

For over a millennium the Library of Ossus continued to grow, becoming a mecca of Jedi learning during the era. Many great Jedi Masters worked and studied within the Library's walls, tending the shelves and teaching future Knights the lessons that the past taught. Force-users from other Force-based religions also frequented the complex, studying alongside their Jedi cousins and other philosophers from around the Republic. Rivaled only by Obroa-skai's Celebratus Archive and the Halls of Knowledge on Phateem, the Great Library was the bright center of knowledge in the galaxy for nearly a thousand years.

Destruction in the Great Sith War
Approximately 4,000 BBY the Great Sith War broke out and war came to the Republic. Republic troops were funneled through Ossus and were occasional staged on the world's surface. During the war, the Library was visited by the Sith Lord Exar Kun, who seduced many young Jedi to the dark side. When he had gathered enough followers, he went to Master Odan-Urr in the Chamber of Antiquities and demanded that he turn over the Dark Holocron. When the ancient Jedi refused, Kun brutally slew him and took the Sith knowledge bank. Thus Odan-Urr died surrounded by the books he loved so much just as his own teacher, Master Ooroo, had predicted. Soon after, Kun's forces used an ancient Sith weapon aboard the Sith battleship, the Corsair, to unleash a cataclysm that would wreck the surface of Ossus. Within a matter of hours, the Jedi were aware that the destruction of the Cron Cluster by the Sith would create a supernova that would wipe out all life on the world. As special teams of Jedi hastily recorded data and transferred artifacts aboard ships fleeing the system, other Jedi tried to save themselves and the other beings studying on the world. Scrolls, datachips, antique lightsabers, and journals were loaded aboard transports while ancient mosaics and arcades were delicately removed from the floors and walls and placed in precise patterns in the vessels that would ferry them to safety. Despite these heroic efforts, only a fraction of the ancient materials were saved, with the majority of them making it to Exis Station over Teedio where they would be stored in a temporary library before being transferred to the newly built Jedi Temple on Coruscant.

As the Jedi scrambled to evacuate the scrolls and artifacts, the Sith came one last time. Jedi Master Ood Bnar, utilizing an ability unique to his species, buried a collection of ancient lightsabers and rooted himself over them, becoming a tree-like being and binding his life force to the planet's, insuring the artifacts' safety. As the supernova's wave quickly approached, the last of the evacuation ships launched and the Sith retreated. While most Jedi evacuated, some did not. In addition to the hibernating Master Bnar, several Jedi were left inside the Library and surrounding areas, as well as the countless other species that had lived on the world. While many of those who survived the planet's irradiation died off in the ensuing years, the hardier of those species persevered and formed a group of tribal primitives known as the Ysanna. Embracing the Force-based traditions of their ancestors, the Ysanna stood sentinel over the ruins of the Library, keeping out intruders and safeguarding the secrets that remained intact within.

Rediscovery
The Library sat largely undisturbed for the next several millennia. The Jedi Order relocated to their new home in the Jedi Temple on Coruscant where they erected an expansive Archives facility to store what was saved from Ossus. Stone mosaics were inlaid in the Temple's floors, and a stained-glass arcade was installed after having been salvaged. As the Ysanna stood watch, the towers of the Library crumbled and the facade, most of which was already damaged, saw further deterioration. Eventually the Library blended in with the bleak landscape of the barren world, a mountain of crumbling rock amid the wrecks of ancient star cruisers and old battleships. The Ysanna tribes eventually forgot the exact nature of the library after centuries of distant protection, and its exact location became the stuff of legends. Despite its importance in Jedi history, the Jedi seldom held recovery missions on the planet, occasionally dispatching members of the Academy of Jedi Archaeology to accompany the scientists and researchers of the Hanna Institute of Antiquities and the University of Agamar on digs.

As the worlds of the Republic spun into yet another war, one that would claim the Republic and snuff out the Jedi Order, a young Ysanna tribesman rediscovered the ruins while exploring a region governed by fallen Jedi Travgen. Despite his inclinations to the dark side, Travegn had been hiding out on the world for several years, protecting the ruins as he ruled over a Ysanna tribe. When the Clone Wars came to a sudden end the newly appointed Jedi Grand Master Tomac Moorcé declared his intentions to recolonize the old fortress world of the Jedi Order and re-inhabit Knossa. True to his word Moorcé dispatched Jedi scouts to locate the ruins of the city and clear it for reoccupation. With construction crews and Jedi teams landing constantly over the ensuing months, the encroaching foliage and debris was cleared and a suitable pathway formed to the base of the Great Library. Nothing more then a wind-blasted mountain of rock, the Jedi discovered the interior relatively intact, despite the collapse of the four archives towers and the stairwells that ran along exterior walls. Under the leadership of Master Jerec, clean up crews cleared the debris in the library and stabilized the foundations and walls. As the facility was safe for occupancy, Jedi historians and craftsmen converged on the site to began restoring the library and its once vast collection. Discovering large amounts of lost knowledge along the way, the library's exterior refurbishment moved along swiftly as archivists and librarians on the inside slowly pieced the collection back together. Nearly two years after beginning the reconstruction, the library was declared to be ready for its first visitors though the collection was deemed far from complete.

Over the next decade, under the guidance of Chief Librarian Jerec, the Stacks within the Library became fuller and more complete and the Temple Archives on Coruscant, the restored Temple of Knowledge at Kaleth on Tython and the data storage facility on Telos IV served to compliment the primary Jedi knowledge bank in the galaxy. When Jerec was killed in 6 BBY the Gossam Cet Kai took over as Chief Librarian and encouraged growth within the library until it could be said that it contained references to all known subjects in every culture past and present in the known galaxy.

Layout
Erected in the rocky foothills of the Eocho Mountains in the northern district of the city Knossa, the Great Library was a squat building carved out of unadorned dense stone, making it appear as if the complex was a natural feature of the hill. Crowned by four thick, domed towers the building's upper levels were etched with Jedi iconography which could be found on the Order's other complex's around the galaxy. Perched on top of a stone ziggurat, the complex featured four main levels, as well as three sub-levels; all of which contained material ranging from pre-Republic time to modern history. The carved stairs leading to the main gates were unbarred, as were the doors, in line with Master Odan'-Urr's belief that the knowledge prized by the Jedi should not be kept from any who sought it.

Interior
The Great Library's purpose was simply to serve as the largest collection of known information in the galaxy. Its founder, Odan-Urr, believed that any and all forms of knowledge would be used as a potential benefit for the Jedi Order. With the exception of the highest level, the building blocked out all natural light; instead artificial light kept the building at a constantly even light so the passage of the suns' light did not increase the weariness of a devoted learner. While many items were indeed stored at the library, a variety of supplementary material was housed in satellite structures across the galaxy. The closest facility was located nearby on Ossus itself, deep in the the Imhar Canyon artifacts needing to be kept in water or in moist environments were stored and maintained by the Order.

Access to the Library was granted through a large entrance way in the southern face of the complex. The first level of the Library building was dedicated to peaceful study and cool reflection, its thick utilitarian walls held a two-story arcade of stained-glass windows detailing the events of the Great Hyperspace War while holoprojector's displayed some of the archive's greatest treasures. Classrooms and lecture halls were located on the first level, as were a collection of study chambers and where Padawans and Jedi Knights alike could ponder over long forgotten lore in the still quiet of the dark stone building. On the second level, highly ranked Lore Keepers oversaw the many researchers and librarians that maintained the Stacks, the massive shelving systems that held the Order's collection of datacards and reader tapes. The Hall of Knowledge dominated this floor, containing astrogation maps and Jedi journals and personal holocrons. A stone balustrade wrapped around the balcony overlooking the arcade and main entrance below. The third and fourth floors of the building contained the vast Archives of the Order, delicately cataloged by tireless archivists in a system designed by Odan-Urr and expanded upon by Masters Jerec and Cet Kai after the library's reconstruction. These upper-most levels were housed in four squat towers which sprouted from the roof and were made accessible by spiraling stair wells. The archives level contain not only holobooks but also artifacts sorted by era, all of which spanned what would later be considered the Pre-Republic and Expansionist Eras and later up into the modern era. The southeast tower, or Pre-Hyperdrive Tower, contained information gathered from civilizations which were bound to their world or star system before the invention of the hyperdrive circa 25,053 BBY. Following the chronological order the northwest, or Pre-Republic Tower housed artifacts that detailed the political state of the galaxy before the Galactic Republic was born in the Core Worlds. The northeast and southeast towers were known as the Early-Republic and Mature-Republic Towers respectively which underwent the greatest alteration during the rebuilding of the facility.

Despite Odan-Urr's beliefs that the library should be accessible to all, he understood that some knowledge was too potent for free access. With this in mind, the Draethos Jedi ordered the construction of three sublevels which would house the Chamber of Antiquities. Not just a single room, the Chamber was divided and subdivided into a Byzantine labyrinth that was difficult to navigate. Fashioned in such a manner intentionally, the Chamber held many secrets, including Sith holocrons and other dark side artifacts. Access to the chamber was granted to the few who gained express permission from the Jedi High Council and the Keeper of Antiquities, a title later turned over to the Chief Librarian.