Reverend Mother

A Reverend Mother is a woman who has taken an awareness spectrum narcotic into her body, converted it there, and come out of it with her genetic memory unlocked. Within the Bene Gesserit the attempt follows years of intellectual, physical and emotional training, and is permitted only to Sisters the Proctors judge ready: the ritual is the Spice Agony, it involves the Water of Life, and it kills some of them. Reverend Mothers of the order usually carry three names, a Latin male name, an English female name, and an Arabic or otherwise exotic one, as with Gaius Helen Mohiam, Marcus Claire Luyseyal and Tertius Eileen Anteac. Not all Reverend Mothers come out of the order. Fringe cultures produce what the Sisterhood calls wild ones, the Fremen among them, who also keep lower-ranking priestesses called Sayyadinas.