The Master's early life

The young Master looks into the Untempered Schism. (TV: The Sound of Drums)

Incarnations of the Master+
Original regenerative cycle+
Interim+
Renewed regenerative cycle+
Ambiguous+
Other realities+

There existed a variety of different and largely irreconcilable accounts of the Master's early life before the incarnation which became the Third Doctor's nemesis. These accounts differed on details including the physical appearances of the Master and the names they used during their early exploits.

Origin and career

"Childhood" of duty

The Master grew up on Gallifrey in the House of Oakdown. (PROSE: Divided Loyalties) The name he was born with consisted of thirty-two letters; (PROSE: Lords and Masters) it was "mellifluous" and, as per the Gallifreyan custom, could never be revealed to a non-Time Lord. (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Terror of the Autons) He had a father and mother. (AUDIO: I am The Master) He would later comment to Wilfred Mott that growing up on Gallifrey was not something one could call childhood, but "more a life of duty". (TV: The End of Time)

Like all Time Lords, the Master was taken from his family at the age of eight for the selection process. (PROSE: A Brief History of Time Lords) During the ceremony in which he gazed into the Time Vortex through the Untempered Schism, he went mad, (TV: The Sound of Drums) due to a rhythm of four beats being implanted into his head. (TV: The End of Time) This malady manifested itself as the constant drumming he heard ever after, worsening with time. (TV: Utopia, The Sound of Drums, Last of the Time Lords)

Academic career

The Master and a young Doctor became friends on their first day at the Academy, (TV: World Enough and Time) with both being tutored by Borusa, (AUDIO: Masterplan) and the Doctor quickly developing a "man-crush" on his new friend. (TV: World Enough and Time; AUDIO: The Bekdel Test) The duo also made a friend in the War Chief on their first day at the Academy. (PROSE: Divided Loyalties)

Sharing the same heritage and upbringing, (AUDIO: Dominion) the Master developed a strong bond with the Doctor. (TV: The Sea Devils, The Sound of Drums, World Enough and Time) The Second Doctor recalled that he and the Master had everything in common, except that the Master enjoyed being scared of the dark "a little too much", (PROSE: The Menagerie) while the Third Doctor told Jo Grant that the two were "inseparable" due to their shared interests, such as a desire to break the non-interference policy. (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Sea-Devils) The Twelfth Doctor recalled how he and the Master had a pact to explore every star in the universe together. (TV: World Enough and Time) The Master and the Doctor enjoyed building "time flow analogues" to disrupt each other's experiments. (TV: The Time Monster)

The two youths would play in the fields near the Master's father's estates, with pastures of red grass near Mount Perdition. (TV: The End of Time) They would also sneak out of the Capitol and drink with the Shobogans, (PROSE: The Eight Doctors) with the Master picking a fight with six drunken Shobogans during one of these outings. (PROSE: UNIT Christmas Parties: Christmas Truce) The Master also taught his friend hypnotism, and would often hypnotise people as a joke, (PROSE: The Dark Path) but would go unpunished for it, as well as other misdemeanours, always finding a way to avoid his comeuppance. (PROSE: First Frontier)

During their childhood, the Master and the Doctor were mercilessly and viciously bullied by a boy called Torvic; the Doctor was eventually forced to kill the bully to save his friend's life. The Doctor was later confronted by the personification of Death, who insisted he become her disciple, but the Doctor refused and suggested Death make the Master her champion instead. Death agreed, and the Doctor subsequently forgot about their deal. (AUDIO: Master)

According to a dream the Fifth Doctor had under the control of the Celestial Toymaker, the Master went by the name "Koschei" at the Academy and belonged to a clique of ten young Time Lords with the collective name of the Deca. (PROSE: Divided Loyalties) He was also part of the "Gallifrey Academy Hot Five" band, in which he played the drums. (PROSE: Deadly Reunion) The Master was in charge of organising end of term parties, although the Eighth Doctor later noted that they weren't very good. (COMIC: The Glorious Dead)

Some accounts alleged that the Master chose his title while he was beginning to "hone his talents" at the Academy. (AUDIO: The Destination Wars) The Doctor chose his around the same time. The Master felt that the name the Doctor chose was "sanctimonious", (TV: The Sound of Drums) while the Doctor thought the Master's new name was a sign of his ambition and arrogance. (AUDIO: The Destination Wars) The Tenth Doctor once stated that it would be a "psychologist's field day" understanding why he chose to call himself "the Master", (TV: The Sound of Drums) with one account claiming he gained the nickname of "the Master" in his Academy days because he was a bully to less domineering students than himself. (PROSE: The Legacy of Gallifrey) However, according to other accounts, the Master's early travels as a Renegade Time Lord were under the name of "Koschei"; it was only after swearing vengeance on the Second Doctor that he rejected that name and became "the Master". (PROSE: The Dark Path, The Face of the Enemy)

Whilst at the Academy, the Doctor and the Master travelled into Gallifrey's past in search of Valdemar. They found nothing of the Old Ones except for warnings. The Master was fascinated by the power that Valdemar represented, while the Doctor was horrified. (PROSE: Tomb of Valdemar) The two friends also journeyed to Machasma, where they encountered trouble. (AUDIO: Darkness and Light) The Master also showed a fascination with the Necronomicon. (PROSE: The Nameless City)

At the Academy, the Master was a "teacher's pet" and won gold stars, while the Doctor was the class dunce, (PROSE: Time and Relative) though the Doctor was Borusa's favourite. By other accounts, the Master did not perform well at the Academy (AUDIO: Masterplan) and was a "rubbish" schoolboy. (TV: The Power of the Doctor) Despite being better at metabolic control, (AUDIO: Masterplan) and earning a higher degree in cosmic science than the Doctor, (TV: Terror of the Autons) he was not skilled in practical matters, (PROSE: The Legacy of Gallifrey) and the Doctor's grades were overall better than his. Because of this, the Doctor received the prizes and praise that the Master so desperately wanted. The Seventh Doctor theorised that this may have been the cause of the Master's hatred towards him, (PROSE: Survival) with the Eighth Doctor believing that his jealousy over Borusa was the cause of the Master's hatred towards him. (AUDIO: Masterplan)

When the Time Lords created the Consolidator to conceal various dangerous historical secrets from the rest of the universe, unwilling to destroy the items or races in the ship in case they proved useful later, the Doctor and the Master were assigned to come up with a solution where their peers had failed. The Master had the idea of using a black hole to tear a rift in time and send the Consolidator into the distant future, where the future Time Lords could deal with it, but the Doctor declined to have his name put down on the calculations as he questioned the ethics of the assignment. However, when the experiment was actually attempted, the Consolidator was apparently destroyed by a mistake in the calculations when it struck the edge of the black hole, leaving the Time Lords to hush the matter up. (PROSE: Harvest of Time)

As the Doctor grew up, he came to understand that he and his friend were not the same. (TV: Death in Heaven) Following an incident at the Academy in which the Master did not keep his word, he and the Doctor had a falling out, (PROSE: Last of the Gaderene) eventually leading the Doctor to realise that the Master stood against everything he believed in. (AUDIO: The Destination Wars) The Master was on an Academy research project when the Doctor was expelled from the Academy. (PROSE: Divided Loyalties)

In one of his earliest schemes at the Academy, the Master befriended one of his professors, Salyavin, to gain access to Gallifrey's most restricted libraries and find The Worshipful and Ancient Law of Gallifrey. The Master himself failed to find the book, and ended up letting the innocent Salyavin bear the consequences of his breach of Gallifrey's laws; Salyavin ended up stealing the book anyway, reasoning he might as well if he was to be blamed for it, (PROSE: The Legacy of Gallifrey) and was imprisoned on Shada, from which he later escaped, renaming himself "Professor Chronotis". (WC: Shada)

Life on Gallifrey

The Master during his early, respectable life on Gallifrey. (PROSE: CIA File Extracts)

After graduating, the Master was involved in "field work" studying historical interplay and temporal structures. However, he was reprimanded for various minor breaches of the non-interference policy. (PROSE: CIA File Extracts) Still maintaining a "friend[ship] of sorts", the Master and the Doctor were pioneers and inventors among their people, (AUDIO: The Destination Wars) agreeing that Gallifrey should be more interventionist, although the Master's theories in this regard seemed excessive even to the Doctor. (PROSE: CIA File Extracts) Missy claimed she had a daughter and that, while still on Gallifrey, the Doctor gifted the Master a dark star alloy brooch, after an event which involved his daughter occurred. (TV: The Witch's Familiar)

Following the Morbius Crisis, however, the Master was recalled to Gallifrey and assigned to the Prydonian Academy as a teacher of mathematics and computer science. (PROSE: CIA File Extracts) According to what Missy once implied, the young Master and Doctor became involved in the Cloister Wars. (TV: The Magician's Apprentice)

Eventually, the Master had the job of truant officer, and he performed his job with punctuality, self-discipline, and meritorious conduct. (PROSE: Time and Relative) He also came to know the Doctor's granddaughter, Susan, who came to understand that the Master was troublesome (AUDIO: The Destination Wars) and was afraid of him. (PROSE: Time and Relative) The Master once attended a ritual in Arcadia with Susan and the Doctor. While in the city, he gave Susan a toy that was actually a disguised communication node that would locate the Doctor if he ever left Gallifrey. (AUDIO: The Toy)

According to the writings of Postar the Perfidious, the War Chief, (PROSE: The Legacy of Gallifrey) who according to some accounts would later became the Master, (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon) had once been on the High Council of Gallifrey alongside the Doctor. (PROSE: The Legacy of Gallifrey)

Fleeing Gallifrey

On the day that the Doctor left Gallifrey, the Master was desperate to know where he went. (PROSE: Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir) He used the node he gave Susan to locate the Doctor, but found that the node had established a connection with Nyssa, a companion of the Fifth Doctor. The Master tried to take control of Nyssa but was stopped by the intervention of the Doctor. (AUDIO: The Toy) When retired CIA agent Maris was hired to find the Doctor, the Master, helped by the First Rani, used a chronal mine to kidnap her. They interrogated Maris on the whereabouts of the Doctor, and were displeased when she told them she didn't know. They were about to kill her when her employer extracted her from the area. (PROSE: Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir)

The Master ultimately left Gallifrey on the same day the Doctor did, (COMIC: The Glorious Dead) in a Type-45 TARDIS, (PROSE: The Dark Path) that he had also stolen (COMIC: The Glorious Dead) when the Quadriggers were still working on it. (AUDIO: The Destination Wars) One Time Lord stated that the Master left Gallifrey because, like the Doctor, it was "too peaceful for [him], [with] not enough happening". (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon) The Fifth Doctor believed that the Master left Gallifrey because he was also leaving. (AUDIO: The Toy)

According to one account, when the Doctor escaped Gallifrey, the Master was in line for a promotion to Head Truant Officer, but his career depended on catching the Doctor and Susan and preventing any violations of the non-interference policy. (PROSE: Time and Relative) The Second Doctor was once nearly captured by a Time Lord "truant officer" going by the name of "Pavo" who used a small silver baton as a weapon and had hypnotic abilities. However, after Pavo's own law-abiding nature was compromised in the course of the mission, Pavo let the Doctor go, erasing his and his companions' memory of the encounter. (AUDIO: The Black Hole)

The Master shooting Slann, as told by his "Tremas" incarnation. (PROSE: Birth of a Renegade)

According to another source, during a period of civil unrest on Gallifrey, the Master led many students of the Time Lord Academy in a revolt against the corrupt Lord President, Pundat the Third, and attempted to convince the Doctor to take the position as President. When Pundat died of stress soon after the revolt, his chosen successor was the evil Chancellor Slann. The students had found the last of Lord Rassilon's descendants, Lady Larn, a seven-year old child adopted by Councillor Brolin, who was being groomed as a future president. They decided on a second coup, but were overheard by the authorities when trying to convert the Doctor again, and bloody reprisals against the students followed. The Doctor and Larn escaped from Gallifrey after this. Believing the students ready for another coup, the Master assassinated Lord President Slann. However, the students weren't ready and he took this opportunity to steal a TARDIS and flee Gallifrey as a renegade. (PROSE: Birth of a Renegade)

Early exploits

As "Koschei"

This section's awfully stubby.

The Schizoid Earth

According to some accounts, the Doctor's friend had yet to choose the name of "the Master" when he ran away from Gallifrey. Known only by the name "Koschei", he was of medium build with a high forehead and swept-back hair that was greying at the temples. He had a neatly trimmed dark beard with streaks of grey at the comers. Although he already had an "unstable obsession with order", he travelled in an intact TARDIS without any specific plans of conquest, instead taking on human companions like the Doctor. (PROSE: The Face of the Enemy)

As punishment for "a silly prank gone wrong", the Superiors locked Koschei and a friend of his in the bathroom of a bar on an underlevel of the Tower; after an argument, the friend escaped, leaving Koschei behind. He was later found by Chris Cwej and Frey; by this point Koschei had green eyes and a dark beard. Frey was dying because, as an Ephem, she needed regular infusions of Superior biodata: Koschei offered to give her his own and lead them out of the dungeon, on the condition that Cwej promise to listen to Koschei's words on a future date. Later, when Cwej was using the Tree of Life to undo the Cwejen Uprising, Koschei spoke through Frey telepathically, distracting Cwej; as a result, only half the events of the Uprising were undone, resulting in an unstable new status quo. (PROSE: Rebel Rebel)

Koschei, not yet "the Master", as he appeared during his fateful square-off with the Second Doctor over the Darkheart. (PROSE: The Dark Path)

Some time after he left Gallifrey, Koschei had a Time Lady named Ailla planted on him by the Celestial Intervention Agency to monitor him, posing as a human. In a new incarnation, Koschei caught up with the Second Doctor at the Darkheart colony; the temptation posed by the Darkheart device, capable of altering timelines without causing paradoxes or attracting the attention of various "higher beings", proved too much for him, and the revelation that Ailla was a spy killed the last traces of good in him. He swore that the Doctor would one day call him "Master". After the Doctor left him to die in a black hole, Koschei swore that he would take revenge. (PROSE: The Dark Path) The Master later reflected that Koschei's death had been the end of Koschei as a person, with the Time Lord that existed afterwards being only "the Master". (PROSE: The Face of the Enemy) Throughout these encounter, Koschei had been in a physical form identical (PROSE: The Dark Path) to the form he would go on to wear as the Master in his rivalry with the Third Doctor, (TV: Terror of the Autons, etc.) although his encounter with the Second Doctor seemed to end in this body's apparent death and the loss of several regenerations to the Darkheart, suggesting that they may not have technically been the same incarnation. (PROSE: The Dark Path)

As "the Inventor"

Main article: The Master (The Destination Wars)

The Master poses as "the Inventor". (AUDIO: The Destination Wars)

According to one account, an incarnation of the Master with brownish-grey hair and a short beard, who already went by the name of "Master", was the one who first ran away from Gallifrey. (AUDIO: The Destination Wars) The Fourth Doctor speculated that he was on his second or third regeneration. (AUDIO: Blood of the Time Lords)

As "the Monk"

Main article: First Monk

The Master's sixth incarnation, who went by the nickname of "the Monk". (PROSE: CIA File Extracts)

According to the Celestial Intervention Agency's research, the Master's sixth incarnation had yet to take on the name of "the Master". He was a short, clean-shaven man, quite different from how the Master had looked on Gallifrey. He decided to begin experimenting with temporal nexuses in the hope of manipulating them to take control of all History, altering it for the better so as to favour civilisation. Calling himself a "Monk", the Master's first experiment had him aiming atomic bazookas at the Viking ships of Harald Hardrada to see if he could alter the history of England. However, the Doctor intervened and damaged the Master's TARDIS. The two again crossed paths after the Master had made his way to the planet Tigus, where he forged an uneasy alliance with the Daleks. Though the Master fulfilled his part of the bargain by leading the Doctor to the Daleks, the Daleks, having no further use for him, turned on him. The Master regenerated into a new incarnation with different features, who was more ruthless and began to use the name of "the Master". (PROSE: CIA File Extracts)

The Seventh Doctor once made a statement which may have placed the Monk as an earlier incarnation of the Master:

"I can’t rewrite the script... Do you think I would have let the Master grow into the twisted megalomaniac he is if I could have prevented it? It’s not as simple as that. [I can't unmake a real piece of space-time]. I wish I'd understood that when I had to deal with that meddling Monk."Seventh Doctor

Similarly, the Eighth Doctor once reflected that if he crossed his personal "line in the sand" of not upending Earth's history, even though he sometimes interfered in other planets', he would "end up just like the Master. Meddling for [his] own purposes". (PROSE: Interference - Book One)

However, other accounts of the Doctor's early life treated "the Monk" as a different childhood associate of the Doctor's, previously known as Mortimus. According to these accounts, no known connection existed between the Monk's and the Master's respective incarnations. (PROSE: A Brief History of Time Lords, Divided Loyalties, No Future)

As "the War Chief"

"The War Chief" as encountered by the Doctor shortly before his trial. (TV: The War Games)

Some accounts suggested that it was an incarnation of the Master, albeit not yet using that name, (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Terror of the Autons, Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon) who participated in the organisation of a warmongering species' War Games, acting as their War Chief (TV: The War Games) after regenerating in front of the War Lord in a Trastevarian jail. (PROSE: Save Yourself) Similar to "the Monk", however, other accounts treated "the War Chief" as yet another childhood associate of the Doctor's, previously known as Magnus. (PROSE: A Brief History of Time Lords, Divided Loyalties) Although rumours that the Master had been implicated in the "War Chief incident" existed on Gallifrey, Rowellanuraven believed them to be fanciful fabrications, much like the "obviously" false claim that Goth had been an associate of the Decayed Master. (PROSE: CIA File Extracts) The Third Doctor was aware that the Time Lords had once almost captured him, but was told by the Time Lords' messenger that, "unlike the Doctor", the Master had managed to slip away before his TARDIS could be de-energised. (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Terror of the Autons)

Undated early events

Regardless of the Master's identity upon leaving Gallifrey, at some point in their early life, the Master regenerated for the first time. His new incarnation found himself at the Scoundrels Club during the Great Fire of London. Becoming a member of the club so that he could recover from the regeneration in comfort, the Master organised fireworks on the roof to celebrate the occasion. He would later go on to visit the Scoundrels Club after each regeneration to recover as a tradition. (PROSE: Dismemberment)

When they believed that the Decayed Master had died, the Fourth Doctor explained to Borusa and Engin, who were surprised that he was already at the end of his life cycle despite being relatively young, that the Master that he had "always [been] a criminal (…) throughout all his lives", facing "constant pressure, constant danger". He mentioned that the Master had used "accelerated regenerations" as a form of disguise. (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Deadly Assassin)

One way or another, the Master caused "several interstellar wars" prior to his square-offs with UNIT. (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Terror of the Autons)

Behind the scenes

Although not explicitly stated in The Black Hole, Simon Guerrier intended for the two Pavos to be earlier incarnations of the Master. "Pavo", Latin for "peacock", was chosen to fit the Master's personality. Hints towards this identity in the story include the "curious silver baton" wielded by Pavo as a weapon, as well as the hypnotic abilities she displayed. The Master had earlier been suggested in the novella Time and Relative to have originally been an agent of Time Lord law enforcement tasked with tracking down Renegades, much as Pavo does in The Black Hole.