Olliphane

Olliphane, nineteenth planet of the Rigel Concourse.

Planetary Constants:
Diameter 6700 miles
Sidereal day 21.836218 hours
Mass 0.9 standard

[...]

General Remarks: Olliphane is the most dense of the Rigel planets, and orbits close at the outer edge of the Habitable Zone. It has been speculated that when the protoplanet of the Third Group disintegrated Olliphane received an unduly large share of core materials. In any event, until recent astronomic times, Olliphane was subject to intense plutonic activity, and even today boasts ninety-two active volcanoes.

Olliphane is highly mineralized. An imposing relief provides vast hydro-electric potential, furnishing cheaper energy than is possible from traditional sources. A diligent disciplined population, utilizing these advantages, has made Olliphane the most highly industrialized world of the Concourse, rivaled only by Tantamount, with its shipyards, and Lyonnesse, with its monumental Gnome Iron Works.

Olliphane is relatively cool and wet, with the population concentrated in the Equatorial Zone, notably around the shores of Lake Clare. Here the visitor will find the ten largest cities of the planet, led by Kindune, Sansontiana, and New Ossining.

Olliphane is likewise nutritionally self-sufficient. Few other than natural foods are consumed, of which per capita consumption is highest in the Concourse, third highest among major worlds of the Oikumene. The alpine valleys surrounding the lake are devoted to dairying and the production of greenstuffs.

The Olphs are a mingled stock, derived primarily from a colony of Hyperborean Skaters. They are typically blond to brown of hair, large-boned, often inclined to corpulence, with fair undyed skins. They are respectful of orthodoxy, sedate in personal lives, but notoriously enthusiastic during the public fetes and celebrations which serve as emotional release to an otherwise conventional and reserved folk. A caste system, though without legal status, permeates every phase of the social structure. Prerogatives are carefully denned, jealously observed; the language has expanded and loosened to provide at least a dozen styles of address.

- From Popular Handbook to the Planets