The Doctor's birth
The Doctor's birth was the start of the Doctor's early life. By various accounts, the Doctor was born either from procreation between the Doctor's mother and father or from the loom of the House of Lungbarrow.
Despite its non-biological basis, the process of looming was still referred to as a "birth". (PROSE: Lungbarrow [+]Loading...["Lungbarrow (novel)"])
Dating
When asked by Organon what star sign he was born under, the Fourth Doctor said that he was born under the sign of Crossed Computers, the symbol of the Gallifreyan maternity service. (TV: The Creature from the Pit [+]Loading...["The Creature from the Pit (TV story)"])
The Doctor was born on the Holiday of Otherstide, as indicated in accounts relating to both his loom-birth (PROSE: Cold Fusion [+]Loading...["Cold Fusion (novel)"], Lungbarrow [+]Loading...["Lungbarrow (novel)"], AUDIO: Cold Fusion [+]Loading...["Cold Fusion (audio story)"]) and womb-birth. (PROSE: Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir [+]Loading...["Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir (short story)"])
In 2116, when Fisk asked the Fourth Doctor for his date of birth, the Doctor replied that it was difficult to remember but "sometime quite soon, I think." (TV: Nightmare of Eden [+]Loading...["Nightmare of Eden (TV story)"]) One history book indicated that the Doctor could have been born around the year 2116. (PROSE: A History of the Universe [+]Loading...["A History of the Universe (short story)"]) Other accounts, however, suggested that the Doctor's native Gallifreyan era existed, in absolute terms, in the distant past relative to humans' time on Earth, (PROSE: Lucifer Rising [+]Loading...["Lucifer Rising (novel)"]) or contrariwise that in absolute terms the Doctor and Susan's escape from Gallifrey had occurred as late as 30468 AD. (PROSE: "Time Line of Gallifreyan History" [+]Part of A Sourcebook for Field Agents, Loading...{"namedep":"Time Line of Gallifreyan History","1":"A Sourcebook for Field Agents (novel)"}, CIA File Extracts [+]Loading...["CIA File Extracts (novel)"])
The Doctor had the same age as the Rani, indicating they were born within the same year. (TV: Time and the Rani [+]Loading...["Time and the Rani (TV story)"])
First Doctor's birth
Biological birth
By some accounts, the Doctor was born of two parents. (TV: Doctor Who [+]Loading...["Doctor Who (TV story)"], PROSE: Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir [+]Loading...["Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir (short story)"])
The Eighth Doctor claimed to be half-human due to having a human mother and a Time Lord father. (TV: Doctor Who [+]Loading...["Doctor Who (TV story)"]) The Eighth Doctor's memory of his mother's appearance resembled Penelope Gate, a human time traveller who had a child with the Time Lord Ulysses in the generation before the Doctor's; (PROSE: The Gallifrey Chronicles [+]Loading...["The Gallifrey Chronicles (novel)"]) the Infinity Doctor remembered that his mother's name was Penelope. (PROSE: The Infinity Doctors [+]Loading...["The Infinity Doctors (novel)"]) One of the many contradictory origins for the Doctor that Maris found was that the Doctor had been born to "a human mother" and a "Time Lord father" on Otherstide. (PROSE: Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir [+]Loading...["Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir (short story)"])
The Eleventh Doctor later insisted that his mother was a Time Lord. (COMIC: The Comfort of the Good [+]Loading...["The Comfort of the Good (comic story)"])
While inside the Doctor's mind, Emily Hutchings experienced a flash of memories from an ancient monstrous being known as "the Other" who was killed in the Dark Times. The Other lived on in an unknown state for a very long time afterwards, witnessing the rise and fall of many planetary civilisations, until its consciousness was the Doctor's consciousness at the moment of birth. The pain of birth made it lose its memories, which were replaced with infant emotions as the Doctor suckled his mother's breast for the first time. Hutchings saw that the Doctor was born in rough surroundings, with a mysterious figure Hutching sensed to be a "grand power" watching from a doorway.
The mysterious figure may have been the One-Eyed One, transforming the monstrous Other into a baby through the Doctor's poem in the same manner that the Seventh Doctor would transform the Timewyrm into Ishtar Hutchings. The One-Eyed One helped the Doctor with this procedure, with the Doctor sensing that his entire life was a small part of the One-Eyed One's larger game. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Revelation [+]Loading...["Timewyrm: Revelation (novel)"])
Loom-born birth
By some accounts, the Doctor was loomed into the House of Lungbarrow on the holiday of Otherstide. (PROSE: Cold Fusion [+]Loading...["Cold Fusion (novel)"])
The Other, a benevolent founder of Gallifreyan society, was reborn through the Doctor due to his genetic material being within the loom system. (PROSE: Lungbarrow [+]Loading...["Lungbarrow (novel)"])
The Doctor screamed when he was dragged out from the Loom. (PROSE: The Blue Angel [+]Loading...["The Blue Angel (novel)","The Blue Angel"]) Upon leaving the Loom the childe Doctor's first word was "Again". (PROSE: Human Nature [+]Loading...["Human Nature (novel)","Human Nature"]) When he was only five years old, the First Doctor boasted that he could remember existing in the House of Lungbarrow's Loom before being actually born:
I can remember waiting to be born... It was like being all strung out. All unravelled inside the Loom. I was spread really thin... I couldn't think. Not put thoughts together... But I knew where I was and what was happening. I couldn't wait to get out. And then I was born. My lungs nearly burst. The first rush of air was so cold..."
The Fifth Doctor once claimed to be "unambiguously loom-born". (AUDIO: Cold Fusion [+]Loading...["Cold Fusion (audio story)","Cold Fusion"])
When Serif tried to mentally regress John Smith to the moment of his birth, Smith relived the Doctor's looming. (PROSE: Human Nature [+]Loading...["Human Nature (novel)","Human Nature"])
In one universe, the Infinity Doctor believed he had been "born of the Loom, son of the greatest explorer of his age and a human woman." (PROSE: The Infinity Doctors [+]Loading...["The Infinity Doctors (novel)","The Infinity Doctors"])
Legacy
The complicated nature of the Doctor's time stream meant that multiple versions of their birth existed. When Maris tried to investigate the Doctor's origins, she found five conflicting birth notices for him, including one claiming he was created from Lungbarrow's Loom and another that he was born to a human mother. (PROSE: Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir [+]Loading...["Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir (short story)","Celestial Intervention - A Gallifreyan Noir"])
The Eighth Doctor remembered both being loomed and having parents and a childhood. (PROSE: Unnatural History [+]Loading...["Unnatural History (novel)","Unnatural History"], The Shadows of Avalon [+]Loading...["The Shadows of Avalon (novel)","The Shadows of Avalon"], Bafflement and Devotion [+]Loading...["Bafflement and Devotion (short story)","Bafflement and Devotion"]) He knew that one of these was a dream, but he could not recall which. (PROSE: The Shadows of Avalon [+]Loading...["The Shadows of Avalon (novel)","The Shadows of Avalon"]) In the seas of Hyspero, Sam Jones encountered a group of starfish creatures who told her that the Eighth Doctor was "woven from genetic broth, a Loom, on a Patriarchial world without mothers - though sometimes he believes he was birthed of a more Earthly mother." (PROSE: The Scarlet Empress [+]Loading...["The Scarlet Empress (novel)","The Scarlet Empress"]) The boy from Faction Paradox suggested that this was because the enemy was rewriting the Doctor's past "when he wasn't looking". (PROSE: Unnatural History [+]Loading...["Unnatural History (novel)","Unnatural History"])
