Time Lord

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Hedin, a Time Lord. (DW: Arc of Infinity)
For the role-playing gamebook by Ian Marsh and Peter Darvill-Evans, see Time Lord (role playing book).

The Time Lords and Time Ladies (sometimes called "Lords of Time" or, rarely, "Chronarchs") were the oligarchic rulers of the planet Gallifrey.

Time Lords versus Gallifreyans

It is unclear if all Gallifreyans were Time Lords, or if "Time Lord" was a title reserved for Gallifreyans who matriculated from the planet's Time Academies.

One, possibly apocryphal account, portrays a time line in which Ace, a Human, receives the power and knowledge of the Time Lords, suggesting that not all Time Lords were necessarily Gallifreyans. (WC: Death Comes to Time) The Doctor had said on another occasion that he hoped that this could happen to her, though, according to the other account, it did not come to pass. (NA: Lungbarrow)

History

See Gallifreyan history.

The Gallifreyans possessed one of the oldest and most powerful civilizations in the Universe. As the Time Lords, they would hold absolute power for some ten million years. (DW: The Ultimate Foe)

Physiology and abilities

See Gallifreyan physiology

Time Lords also have unique powers not shared by other Gallifreyans.

Time Lord brains

The Rani referred to Time Lord brains as "time brains". (Dimensions in Time) Through physiology or training, Time Lord brains were quite similar: the Doctor said, of the Master, "He's a Time Lord. In many ways, we have the same mind." (DW:Logopolis) The Timewyrm noticed that on a quantum level, the Doctor's brain could receive information from possible futures, possibly without even realizing it consciously. (NA: Timewyrm: Revelation)

The Time Lord brain was much more complex than that of a Human brain and also larger. This size differences meant brain transplants into a Human body would be impossible. (DW: The Brain of Morbius) They were telepathically linked to one another and are even capable of joining the entire Time Lord intelligence as one. (DW: The Invisible Enemy) In times of psychic or physiological stress, Time Lords may even enter a self-induced coma. Time Lords can also separate the hemispheres of their brain, allowing them to multi task easily. (PDA: Island of Death)

Time Lords have an additional lobe to their brain dedicated to mechanical and other bodily functions (BFA: Spare Parts).

The Time Lord gift of translation

Time Lords were trained in many languages and had at their disposal the translation powers of their TARDISes. This translation was not perfect, and may not work on exceptionally old and/or obscure languages, or if the speaker was not an organic life-form. (DW: The Leisure Hive, Four to Doomsday, The Impossible Planet) Shared "secret languages" or code languages deliberately created to exclude outsiders--such as Carny Parlare, a patois spoken exclusively by workers at a certain carnival--may also not translate correctly. (DW: Carnival of Monsters)

Longevity and regeneration

See Regeneration
We do not know with certainty whether other Gallifreyans can regenerate or the aging rate of common Gallifreyans. We do know that other species have often spoken of the power to regenerate as associated with the Time Lords.

Time Lords had the ability to regenerate their bodies. They could renew their bodies in case of mortal illness or injury, advanced old age, or even because they willed it. This process allows them to live for centuries, even millennia. Even without regeneration, Time Lords had considerable lifespans. Within one regeneration, Time Lords could live for hundreds of years, yet looking much younger than a Human of equivalent age. (DW: The Leisure Hive)

Rassilon Imprimatur

The cellular structure of Time Lords was marked by symbiotic nuclei, also known as the Rassilon Imprimatur, which bonds a Time Lord to his TARDIS and allows him to withstand the molecular stresses of time travel (DW: The Two Doctors).

It may also be tied in with a Time Lord's ability to regenerate.


Society and Culture

Government

By the Doctor's time, Time Lord society was governed by the High Council, consisting of cardinals representing several electoral colleges, with an Inner Council comprising of the Castellan, Chancellor, and the Lord President. The President had near absolute authority, and used a link to the Matrix, a vast computer network containing the knowledge and experiences of all past generations of Time Lords, to set Time Lord policy and remain alert to potential threats from lesser civilizations. The Castellan was in charge of security, while the Chancellor in turn oversaw the Castellan's actions and acted as the President's second. Security and law were enforced by the Chancellory Guard.

Time Lord society was generally complacent in nature, owing to their policy of non-intervention. This led to a stagnation which may have contributed to the decision by the Doctor and certain other Time Lords to leave Gallifrey. It probably also contributed to the demise of the Time Lords in the Last Great Time War.

Culture and the arts

Time Lords appreciated music, as indicated by such artefacts as the Harp of Rassilon and the use of nursery rhymes to entertain children. (DW: The Five Doctors) They also appreciated art, although painting on Gallifrey was done by computer. (DW: City of Death)

The drinking of tea may have been practised by Time Lords, perhaps brought from Earth. The question "What's for tea?" was misinterpreted by Borusa as "What is tea?" - to which he supplied a textbook definition of tea as it is normally prepared for drinking on Earth. This implies both knowledge of tea-drinking and an ignorance of the human (and particularly British) custom of a light meal called "tea" or "high tea". (DW: The Invasion of Time)

Destruction

The Time Lord race is believed to have become virtually extinct at the conclusion of the Last Great Time War with the Daleks. Although the details are unclear, it would appear that the Doctor (in either his Eighth or early Ninth incarnation) set in motion a chain of events that ended the war by destroying both Skaro and Gallifrey (it's not known if this was a physical destruction). In the aftermath, the Doctor continued to live under the belief that no Daleks survived the cataclysm and that, for reasons as yet unchronicled, he was the only Time Lord to survive. (DW: The End of the World, Dalek, Gridlock, et al)

Lone survivors

He was soon proved incorrect on the first count when he discovered, on several occasions, that some Daleks survived (DW: Dalek, et al, culminating in The Stolen Earth/Journey's End). However he remained unaware of any surviving Time Lords, stating that he would feel it if there were. However, this too was proven to be incorrect when he discovered that The Master had survived and was living in the far future under the name Professor Yana, though as he had hidden his Time Lord nature (apparently restored to him by the High Council during the War) through use of a Chameleon Arch (DW: Utopia) so he was technically not a Time lord at the time; The Master's subsequent apparent death left the Doctor believing himself to be alone once more (DW: Last of the Time Lords), although he soon discovered that it was still possible (albeit very dangerous) to encounter one of his past incarnations, an event that previously required Time Lord interference (DW: Time Crash).

Two later events resulted in the creation of three individuals with strong Time Lord ties.

In the first, the Doctor's cells were harvested, resulting in the creation of a daughter, Jenny, with two hearts and the ability to at least partially regenerate after death (DW: The Doctor's Daughter). Although Donna Noble believes her to be a member of the Time Lord race because of her second heart, specifically asking what a female Time Lord is called, it remains to be seen if she truly is; it should be noted that the Doctor believes her to be dead and does not "feel" her the way he claims he can feel if other Time Lords are alive.

The second event was caused by a meta-crisis that occurred after the Earth was relocated to the Medusa Cascade. The Doctor, in order to abort a regeneration, transferred some of his regenerative energy to his preserved severed hand. Later, when Donna Noble made physical contact with the hand, an energy transfer occurred which resulted in the creation of a half-Time Lord/half-human clone of the Doctor, while Donna also underwent a physical transformation that made her half-Time Lord as well. In both cases the transformation was not perfect; for the cloned Doctor it meant having only one heart and no regenerative ability, while Donna experienced vastly increased intelligence and knowledge for a brief time before her brain began to overload and the Doctor was forced to erase her memories of him in order to save her life. The clone, meanwhile, was exiled to Pete's World with Rose Tyler. (DW: Journey's End).

Science and Technology

Weapons

People

Other Facts

  • Several of the Doctor's more powerful foes, such as the Nestene Consciousness, the Great Intelligence, the Animus, and the Master, are stated as being survivors of a race of Time Lords which existed in the previous Universe before this one. Shunting themselves into our Universe, they found that its different physical laws afforded them godlike powers.

Appearances

Television

References and appearances

Novels

New Adventures novels

BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures

BBC Past Doctor Adventures

External links

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