Background Races

The Milky Way galaxy has existed for several billion years. In that time, countless races have attained sentience, forged civilizations, explored the depths of space, and then became extinct. These background races are often barely understood by the contemporary galaxy, which has pieced together scant details of a mere handful of ancient races through ruins and artifacts.

Arthenn
The arthenn flourished across multiple worlds in the Zelene system some 300,000 years ago. Their homeworld appears to have been Helyme, a dead planet where all complex life was wiped out in an unknown cataclysm. The third planet in the system, Epho, was mined or otherwise settled before these settlements were wiped out by kinetic impacts. The system's outer gas giant, Gaelon, was the location of a complex helium-3 mining infrastructure. Material debris suggests arthenni technology was equal to the current galactic state-of-the-art.

Inusannon
Little is known about the inusannon except that they warred with the thoi'han over colonization rights to the garden world Eingana 127,000 years ago. The wreckage of starships from both races litter the planet.

Thoi'han
Little is known about the thoi'han except that they warred with the inusannon over colonization rights to the garden world Eingana 127,000 years ago. The wreckage of starships from both races litter the planet.

Zeioph
The zeioph were an ancient spacefaring race that built millions of elaborate crypts on the surface of the planet Armeni. Archaeological excavations of these crypts have been prohibited by the Citadel Council law, which holds grave sites as sacrosanct.

Unidentified Races
Many ancient races discovered across the galaxy are even less understood. While the ruins and artifacts they left behind may hint at their biology or technological advancement, in many cases the origins and even names of these races are not known. These unidentified races are listed here by the worlds their ruins were discovered on.

433 Spidau
Charted in 2185 by a deep-space mining vessel exploring the Nubian Expanse, the planet 433 Spidau was formerly inhabited by a sapient race which destroyed itself through nuclear warfare around 1,000 years ago. Scans show the ruins of over ninety cities on the planet are still radioactive. Prior to this discovery, the contemporary galaxy knew of six other races which likewise perished in conflicts with nuclear weapons.

Aphras
Aphras was once inhabited by a sentient terrestrial avian race in its Bronze Age, before a series of massive impacts vaporized habitation centers and killed off most flora and fauna. The only trace of contemporary life on the planet is that of single-celled organisms in its seas. Of note, Aphras' sister-garden world, Tosal Nym, was also devastated by impacts similar to those on Aphras; however, it is not believed that Tosal Nym was inhabited by anything more complex than invertebrate sea life.

Bothros
The remains of a primate-like spacefaring race have been found on the rock and ice world of Bothros. While the origins of this race are unknown, it has been confirmed that the race's habitation centers on Bothros were destroyed by orbital bombardments. Artifacts found on the planet range from melted metal fragments to the frozen remains of members of the race still wearing suits for extravehicular activity.

Cyllene
An automated helium-3 refueling station orbits the gas giant Cyllene. The Phi Clio system's remoteness from the nearest mass relay and the fuel station's archaic design imply that this system was once inhabited by a race who did not arrive through the relay but discovered it in independent FTL exploration. This same race may have built the geothermal and solar power stations found on the system's only other planet, Parnassus.

Etamis
Once a habitable garden world, Etamis is now completely barren, the oceans having dried up and the atmosphere lost. Regular crater patterns on the surface are evidence that Etamis was bombarded by dreadnought-class kinetic weapons. Relics found on Etamis show that an advanced spacefaring race lived there 20 to 40 million years ago. It is unclear if Etamis was the race's homeworld or a colony.

Jartar
The legendary "Leviathan of Dis", the corpse of a genetically-engineered living starship, was discovered by a batarian survey team in a crater on Jartar's surface. While nothing is known about the race that created the Leviathan, the ship itself was noted as being nearly one billion years old.

Joab
Joab was originally inhabited by a spacefaring primate-like race. This race was wiped out thousands of years ago when all civilization centers were targeted in a massive orbital bombardment. Dust from the blasts blotted out light from the planet's star, killing all photosynthetic life and the fauna dependent on it. Contemporary scholars only know what they do about Joab's race through the discovery of time capsules buried by the race far from their cities.

Junthor
Junthor was once a colony of an ancient spacefaring race. Ruins of this race's civilization, consisting of arcologies and other megastructures, still stand at a site near Junthor's equator. A pillar at the center of the ruins was covered in elaborate inscriptions which defied translation for centuries. When finally deciphered by asari linguists, the writing said only, "Walk among these works, and know our greatness." Crude scratches on the other side of pillar said, "Monsters from the id."

Gamayun
The outermost of the gas giant Gamayun's six moons, Gigula, is the site of the well-preserved wreckage of an ancient alien starship. Thus far, the only information released to the public about the starship is that its internal layout suggests that the race that built it was horizontally-oriented.

Mnemosyne
Orbiting Mnemosyne was a Derelict Reaper. Cerberus estimates that 37 million years ago, this Reaper was disabled by a mass accelerator round fired by a weapon built by an unknown spacefaring race.