by Rachel Gargan

Created on: July 27, 2009   Last Updated: July 28, 2009

The Vulcans are one of Star Trek's best know aliens. Their involvement in the show spans five of the six series and most of the movies. According to the movie 'First Contact' Vulcans were the first alien civilisation to come into contact with humans. They supposedly helped us with our early large scale attempts at space travel. Vulcans are shown in the early part of the first series of Enterprise offering help and advice with the ship's construction and launch. The Vulcans are a humanoid series, superior in strength and intelligence to humans. They are strict followers of logic and try to live totally emotionless lives.

To understand Vulcan culture and behaviour one needs to understand their history. In their early history Vulcans were deeply emotional and extremely violent. Both T'pol and Tuvok attest to the dangers of Vulcan emotions. T'pol states that homicidal rage and paranoia were common on Vulcan before Surak's teachings. Surak began his teaching in an attempt to stop Vulcans from annihilating each other through constant warfare and conflict. This was known as the 'Time of Awakening'. He created and taught the meditative techniques and methods of mental discipline Vulcans use to restrain their emotions. Surak's followers swore to use these techniques to live their lives by an ethical code based purely on logic.

Yet despite this desire to remain emotionless, Vulcans did possess bonds of love and friendship. The loving bond between mother and daughter shared between T'Pol and T'Les can clearly be seen in the series Enterprise. In the Next Generation, Sarek openly professes his love for his human wives. This does not mean however that they did not possess emotional control. Although Vulcans share emotional bonds, they are rarely expressed emotionally.

A minority of Vulcans completely rejected Surak's teaching and embraced their emotions. This lead to a violent war which resulted in the death of Surak. These Vulcans ultimately left the home planet and founded what eventually became known as the Romulan Empire.

Another little known group of Vulcans also left. They did not totally reject Surak's teachings. They believed in emotional control and allowed emotions to be practised in a controlled way. This group refused to live by logic and reason alone. They eventually became an insignificant nomadic group.

The Vulcans were the first of the major Star Trek aliens (Klingons, Humans, Andorians and Cardassians etc) to develop warp drive. They made contact with countless species and started a policy of peaceful exploration.

At this point Vulcans made contact with humans and assisted us with our journey into space.

During the 22nd century the Vulcan High Command had more control over the domestic and foreign affairs of their civilisation. As a result Vulcan became less tolerant of other species and philosophies. The High Command stopped accepting opposition to its decisions and policies. They began to purge a political movement known as the Syrrannite group. This group believed that Vulcan was no longer following Surak's teachings and were dubbed terrorists by the High Command. The situation ended in a revolution which became known as the Vulcan Reformation. The teachings of Surak were re-established and Vulcans became the Vulcans we all know and love today.

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