Space Marine Legion
From Lexicanum
The twenty Space Marine Legions, also known as the Legiones Astartes, were created by the Emperor to take part in the Great Crusade. All the Space Marines of a legion (Battle-brothers amongst themselves) were modified with help of the DNA samples of a single Primarch. As a Primarch was found, he would receive the command of his respective legion. His homeworld would also become the new homeworld of the legion itself.
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Number of Legionaries
The Legions were massive armies, and the size of each could vary tremendously. A precise number was never truly achieved and maintained. Even during the Great Crusade some legions were very numerous, while others were not. The numbers would always vary with new recruits and inevitable battle-losses, and also important was the availability of potential recruits and the administrative skills of the Primarch and his officers.
The most numerous legion of all was the Ultramarines. The Thousand Sons of Magnus the Red were of a small number as many of them had developed mutations or uncontrollable levels of psychic powers. Fulgrim's samples had been largely lost, and this left the legion of the Emperor's Children also with a very small number. Both of these legions would increase their numbers to acceptable standards only after their Primarchs were found.
Original names
One should not forget that the legions were for a very long time under the direct command of the Emperor and that originally all recruits were from Terra. The Terran marines would always remember these times and the legions had Terran traditions. Later, as the Primarchs were found, the new recruits would have very strong loyalties towards them, and some of the primarchs would re-name their legions. The Emperor saw no problems with this development; the loyalty of the Primarchs to Him was believed to be unshakable. This reasoning would be proven to be sadly mistaken.
The first Primarch to be found, Horus, was the Emperor's favorite and he and his legion, the Luna Wolves were even granted the honor of being re-named as Sons of Horus. The First Legion was given the new name Dark Angels by Lion El'Johnson, and the Dusk Raiders received the name Death Guard by Mortarion, and while its original name is unknown, the highly honorific name Emperor's Children was awarded by the Emperor only after a speech made by their Primarch Fulgrim. It is unknown if other legions were also re-named.
Half of the known legions revolted during the Horus Heresy.
Notes
There are some works of Imperial literature dealing about the Legions and the Second Founding; the known ones are:
- the Mythos Angelica Mortis, which deals mainly with the Astartes Praeses, but also provides information about the Dark Angels and its successor chapters. It reports that these chapters refer to themselves as the Unforgiven.
- the Apocrypha of Skaros and the Apocrypha of Davio, the first one tells us that there were 23 successor chapters of the Ultramarines, but fails to name them, the second source is able to provide 8 names of them.
- A De jure the homeworld of the Imperial Fists is Terra; but De facto it is the Phalanx.
Two unknown legions
Precious little is know about the Two unknown legions.
Second Founding
The loyalist legions were later re-organized by the Codex Astartes and broken up into several 1,000 marine-strong Chapters during the Second Founding.
A single chapter kept the name, traditions, rituals, homeworld, and original identity, while the new chapters received a part of their legion's gene-seed, new homeworlds, new names, and would eventually gain their own traditions and identities over time. These chapters are known as Successor Chapters, a title which is not granted to chapters created with later Foundings.
The nine 'original chapters' are, to a certain extent, more highly thought of. These chapters are called First Founding Chapters1 or something similar. Nearly three fifths of all chapters are 'descendants' of the Ultramarines. Many chapters are simply unaware from which legion they 'descend', as many records have been lost over time.
The Grey Knights are an exception as this chapter was created shortly before the Second Founding and its gene-seed is of secret origin.
Chaos Space Marine Legions
From a pure technical standpoint, the Chaos Space Marine Legions, also known as the Traitor Legions, are the only Space Marine Legions still in existence. In reality however, all of them have been broken up to some degree and now exist largely as separated individual warbands following rival Chaos Champions. On occasion a highly successful Chaos Champion, such as Abaddon the Despoiler, is able to re-unite these Traitor Legions once more and unleash them upon the galaxy.
Sources and references
- Codex: Space Marines (4th Edition)
- Codex: Dark Angels (4th Edition)
- 1Codex: Black Templars (4th Edition) page 20
- Descent of Angels (Novel) p.235, p.303
- 2Soul Drinker and The Bleeding Chalice by Ben Counter.
- 3Warriors of Ultramar by Graham McNeill.
- 4Into the Maelstrom, short-story Hell in a bottle by Simon Jowet
- 5Malleus by Dan Abnett, page 89 "...the Primarch of the White Consuls..."
- 6White Dwarf 166, preview of second edition's Codex Astartes, "Of the original twenty Primarchs only nine survived the Horus Heresy."
- 7Codex: Ultramarines (2nd Edition)
