Physical Characteristics:

From casual study, Solamenti appear to be hairless, earless, large-eyed humanoids. Only upon more careful examination do they reveal their reptilian origins. Their olive skin is slightly shiny, from micro-scaled skin; their earless, hairless skulls are oddly wedged shaped, with lipless, slightly beaked mouths (like a truncated turtle's mouth), small, sharp teeth, lidless, wide-set eyes. Their bodies are compact and muscular, with nearly palmless, 4-fingered, taloned hands, and splayed feet. Average height for a male: 5'0" to 5'9"; average female height: 5'3" to 6'0". Men tend toward a whipcord physique; women are a bit larger and heavier. All Solamenti are incredibly strong, fabulous climbers and astonishing jumpers.

The Solamenti seem somnolent in their movements normally: slow, cautious, graceful. When at rest, they seem unnaturally still, like a statue (or a predator). Their voices are hissing whispers. But when in attack, they move with blinding speed, preferring to leap high into the air, and land on their targets with their razor-sharp talons.

Culture:

It is a curious blend of matriarchal and patriarchal society. The females own all property, even the clothes the men wear. They are the center of the culture, the motive force behind every action. Every action is designed to protect and impress these females. But the females take NO active part in Solamenti government or military life; they seldom leave their fiefdoms at all. They rule their households with ajealous strength,raising their babies, accepting or banishing men -- including their own children -- as suits them. It is not uncommon for them to destroy their own daughters, to prevent rivalries.

In theory, the men are in thrall to their females, doing only what they are told to increase the demesne and power of that female; a male's surname is actually the given name of his primary female (mother or mate). But in practice, it is much more complicated. Men do EVERYTHNG: they are the warriors, the policy-makers, the active force of Solamenti culture. Every action they do is motivated by a complex structure of relative rank and ascendancy.

Each House (female line) is in absolute, bloody rivalry with every other House; there is NO compromise. Within each House, all the men are in absolute, bloody rivalry with every other male, trying to gain primacy, and therefore gaining the right to be consort to the ruling female.

These deadly rivalries are subtle, however; political machinations, assassinations, and paranoia are the order of the day, not necessarily dueling and blood feuds (though that does happen, too). This paranoia is extended to alien races, in the form of a rabid xenophobia. Aliens are the ultimate rival, a threat both to the men's primacy,and the women's absolute power.

Technology:

The Solamenti are highly advanced, in some ways more advanced than the Federation or the Romulan Empire, particularly in the subtlety and sophistication of their weaponry and military hardware. Their ships are NOT as advanced, though they have colonized a significant portion of their sector of the RNZ. Personal weapons (guns, swords, etc),are on a level with our own. But they have made incredible leaps in nanotech, mind manipulation, computer development, and sabotage techniques.

The curious thing is that the Solamenti will NOT openly attack interlopers or those they consider threats; that is dangerous, and counter to the subtle nature of their own culture. Instead they will attack by subterfuge, trying to hide their hand in various vicious attacks.

Solamenti Homeworld:

Star: Salome Spectral :
Class: F0
Mass: 1.5 solar masses
Luminosity: 4.9
Planets: 6

Planet: Haven
Distance from Star: 2.18AU
Satellites: 3
Mass: 1.7 Earth masses
Gravity: 1.5 Earth normal
Radius: 1.1 Earth normal
Axial Tilt: 15 degrees
Day: 19 Earth hours
Year: 2.14 Earth years (781.1 days)

Salome is a hot, blue-white star, deep in the Romulan Neutral Zone. It is part of a binary system, its partner being a protostar that never reached critical mass and 'ignited.' This unequal pairing is orbited by 6 planets: four terrestrial, and two gas giants. The two outermost terrestrials both support life.

The Solamenti originated on the SM3, the inner of the two habitable planets, called Haven, by the inhabitants. Haven is hot by human standards. It most closely resembles Cenezoic era Earth, with shallow, hot seas, and low, landmasses stirred by much tectonic activity.

The atmosphere is much like Earth's, with a slightly higher oxygen content. Due to the high gravity, that atmosphere feels thick and hard to breathe for a human, with a lower average humidity. The high revolution rate of the planet, (and the high insolation of the star) means that much of the time, that atmosphere is boiling with high winds, and fierce storms.

The oceans are similar to prehistoric Earth as well, being warm, shallow seas, covering 4/5 of the planet's surface. The seas teem with life, as does the land.

Species 8472 are tripodal creatures with a gray-green skin. Their bodies appear to be nearly three meters tall when fully extended. The creatures walk in a crouched over position on three legs, and sometimes crawl using all five limbs. Their heads are an elongated conical shape, with widely spaced golden eyes that have an unusual cross-shaped pupils. Parts of their skeletal structure are barely concealed by muscle tissue. Their necks for example apear to have "holes" around the spinal column. This could explain the extreme flexability the creatures display. They are also incredibly strong as witnessed by their ability to rip trough bulkheads and fight off humanoids with incredible ease. The creatures move quickly, bobbing up and down as if in their native liquid environment even when they are in our universe. They are, however able to survive the normal vacume of space as well as in artifical enviroments found on spacecraft.

Society

Even less is known about the culture and philosophy of species 8472. In the one known telepathic contact with them the message 'the weak shall perish' was transmitted; although worrying given their numbers and level of technology, the outlook of a whole species can hardly be judged from one contact with one individual. For the moment contact with 8472 has been broken off after their retreat back into their own space at the end of the war with the Borg. VOY "Scorpion, part 1"