Talk:Gallifreyan

Can all Gallifreyans regenerate?
Dr. Corpuscle: Regarding the claim that all Gallifreyans have the capacity for regeneration - I don't have any evidence to back me up, but I was under the impression that regeneration was a discovery of Rassilon's, or at least made around Rassilon's time, and that its use is one of the things that defines the difference between a Time Lord and a Gallifreyan. It's entirely possible that I am mistaken, or that I got this information from a noncanonical source (possibly the Doctor Who role-playing game.)

Well, the only only example I can think of is from the novelisation of Underworld I was reading lately. It says "The regeneration method of the Time Lords was largely a natural one. A combination of genetic coding..." Again, that's just about a Time Lord, but I think Time Lords and Gallifreyans are still the same species. Of course, I'm not sure how canonical you want to count the novelisations. Azes13 10:13, 3 June 2006 (UTC)


 * you might want to record that information under the heading "Apocryphal information" and note under Behind the Scenes where you got this information, as I did in the Andromeda Galaxy entry in which I presented information from the DW Roleplaying Game which a previous editor had added. --***Stardizzy*** 12:09, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

For regeneration information, and a lot of the stuff relating to the Loooms and whatever you need to look outside the TV series and into the novel ranges (particuarly the New Adventures and Missing Adventures, and many of the EDAs/PDAs as well).


 * On Gallifrey there was a revolution / debate or something between Rassilon's faction (which supported science) and the Pythia faction (which supported amongst many things magic).

Rassilon overthrew Pythia (who's followers fled to Karn). As Pythia died (or something) she cursed Gallifrey with sterility (Rassilon lost a daughter to this sterility).
 * Pythia was the ruler (through prophecy and magic) and knew of time travel only through mental/psychic means.


 * To get around the sterility curse Rassilon created / invented the Looms which would weave a Gallifreyan from genetic material. The Houses (such as The House of Lungbarrow, or The House of the Redlooms) were born at this same point in Gallifreyan history.

(Most of this information comes from NA: Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible, Lungbarrow, Interference Books One and Two.)

The single heart prior to first regeneration...I can't remember where it's citied for the Doctor, but Gander (or Cavis), one of them is on their first regeneration (they appear in EDA The Shadows of Avalon, and she hasn't regenerated so only has one heart.

As far as the difference between Time Lords and Gallifreyans, Time Lords have attended one of the acadamies; such as the Patriexies, Arcallaen...and all that sort of thing. Time Lord is a term for the Gallifreyan 'elite', or something like that. --Tangerineduel 12:38, 6 February 2007 (UTC)


 * pretty sure that the one heart->two hearts comes from The Man in the Velvet Mask (who I've not read).


 * where does it say that when you graduate, you turn into a Time Lord? (I like that idea, by the way, I just wonder where it says this.) --***Stardizzy*** 16:44, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Change the picture?
for this article we could do with a non-Time Lord Gallifreyan. or, rather, a Gallifreyan not identified as a Gallifreyan. though the line gets blurry, we have a half-human, half-Gallifreyan Time Lord in the picture box at the moment! --***Stardizzy*** 12:09, 6 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree, maybe one of those group shots such as; from The Five Doctors, or one of the bunch of outcasts and whatever from Invasion of Time, or from The Deadly Assassin, something line that. --Tangerineduel 12:51, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * the outcasts, I think. non-Time Lord Gallifreyans. as opposed to Time Lords.--***Stardizzy*** 16:41, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

list of apperances
I think the list of appearances should go like this:


 * Gallifreyans (list of appearances)
 * Time Lords (list of apperances, theoretically contained in list of Gallifreyan appearances)
 * The Doctor (list of appearances, theoretically contained in list of Time Lord appearances)
 * The Master (list of appearances)
 * Romana/Rassilon/the Monk/etc. (individual lists of apparances, as needed)

so... you work out the Gallifreyan appearances by subtracting the Time Lord and individual Time Lord lists from that... does that make sense? --***Stardizzy*** 00:53, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, but has there been an episode where no non-Doctor Time Lords have appeared as well as regular Gallifreyans? 08:20, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * yes. Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible. not an "episode", but the novel features pre-Time Lord Gallifreyans. also, some comics stories set entirely during that era that don't have the Doctor in them. --***Stardizzy*** 12:49, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Ah, ok. 14:08, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Deletion recommended
This article is filled with supposition and nothing of any real, citable substance. The fact is, everything in this article could be reduced to a footnote in the Time Lord article. Time Lord is the race. It's clearly and directly stated in televised episodes of Doctor Who (School Reunion and The End of the World to name but two). Produce actual evidence of a difference between Time Lords and Gallifreyans or withdraw this article.  Czech Out  ☎ | ✍  03:28, 26 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm totally against this (and had a long discussion some where back about it). Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible features Gallifreyans who aren't Time Lords (okay they're from the past, but it's still relevant), The Infinity Doctors has Gallifreyans (in that they are natives of Gallifrey but not Time Lords). In I think Neverland or maybe The Apocalypse Element Romana says something like something, something "Gallifreyans... Time Lords even" (I'll have to chase it down), but there's a definite line made between them. Lungbarrow has something about Gallifryans. Additionally there's the whole Gallifrey (audio series) where there are numerous mentions of Gallifreyans and Time Lords.


 * 'Definitive rather than vague examples; Everyone from before the time that Omega detonated Qqaba is a Gallifreyan (because by definition they weren't Lords of Time). In The Infinity Doctors the founders of Gallifrey are definitely called Gallifreyans. In The Infinity Doctors (again) "Over ten percent of the Gallifreyan population was female, but no more than a dozen of the thousands of Time Lords were women." (page 47). --Tangerineduel 14:22, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I was under the impression that Time Lords had evolved from Gallifreyans, after thousands of years of exposure from Untempered Schism.
 * I was under the impression that being a Time Lord was a sort of title to start with. They all were originally Gallifreyans.I thought it was explained that Rassilon and Omega were Gallifreyan and when the discovered how to travel time they became known as Time Lords. Thus being able to go to the Academy to become a Time Lord. This is furthered by knowing that you can also go to the Academy to become a Scientist/Researcher (see Professor). And maybe after Time Lords reproduced it became common for the acristocracy (ie the Gallifreyans who came from a long line of Academy graduates who graduated as Time Lords) to just simply call themselves Timelords because their children would eventually go to the Academy to become Timelords. And possibly even farther down the (time)line they upperclass would become known as the TimeLords.

Dialogue in The Deadly Assassin clearly indicates that there are non-Time Lord residents of the Capitol. (Spandrell is surprised to learn that the biog-data extracts of Time Lords are colour-coded by chapter, and Engin replies that Spandrell's duties usually involve "more plebeian classes". That means that Spandrell is accustomed to working with the biog-data extracts of non-Time Lords.) Now, I admit that the word "Gallifreyan" is not explicitly used to refer to these non-Time Lord residents of the Capitol, but since at this point "aliens" aren't allowed on Gallifrey, logically they must be Gallifreyans.

In light of this and Tangerineduel's pertinent remarks about Gallifreyans before Omega detonated Qqaba, I suggest that the deletion template be removed from this page. —Josiah Rowe talk to me 17:53, May 20, 2012 (UTC)

Melody
The article says that Melody was partially Gallifreyan. Was that actually stated in the episode? Being conceived in the vortex made her part timelord, but since there are seperate articles for Time Lord and Gallifreyan, that means that they are not the same thing. It seems more likely that Melody is a Human Timelord.Icecreamdif 06:16, June 12, 2011 (UTC)

Not all Gallifreyans are Time Lords
I've found the clincher proving that not all Gallifreyans are Time Lords. The Doctor says as much, in Interference - Book Two. Sarah Jane and the Third Doctor are talking with I.M. Foreman:


 * 'Wait a moment,' said Sarah. 'I sort of thought... you were a Time Lord, as well.'
 * 'No,' I.M. Foreman told her. 'I'm a Gallifreyan.'
 * Sarah looked at the Doctor. He'd raised his eyebrows again, and his hand had frozen on his chin.
 * 'Not all Gallifreyans are Time Lords, Sarah,' he murmured. 'The Time Lords are just the elite of the planet's society. The creme de la creme. Or so they say.'
 * 'They like to think they're the only ones who can make an impression,' I.M. Foreman added.

Unless you're going to argue that the events of The Ancestor Cell invalidate all of Interference, I think that's fairly unimpeachable. So I'm going to remove the merge template. —Josiah Rowe talk to me 01:25, July 13, 2012 (UTC)

Non-Gallifreyan Time lord exampled
Of the four examples given, only River and Jenny inarguably displayed the biological attributes of a Time Lord. "Handy" had only one heart and the Doctor explicitly said he would grow old with Rose. Donna presumably had it even worse: her body wasn't even able to sustain a Time Lord's mental capacities for long. Interestingly, Jenny seems to have continued the trend (shared by River and Romana) for Time Ladies to have more conscious control over the regeneration process than the Doctor does. --Irrevenant ☎  02:37, December 6, 2013 (UTC)

"He'll never make a Time Lord."
Not that I want pour oil on the fire of this age-old debate, but I wanted to point out something interesting that was said in the recent TV story Listen. During the barn scenes, the male unseen adult who come to check on the young Doctor says: Well, he's not going to the Academy, is he, that boy? He'll never make a Time Lord. Unless I'm mistaken, it seems to confirm that not all Gallifreyans are Time Lords, but only those who attend the Academy. However, I presume you could also interprete this as a mere manner of speech similar to that of a (mean) human father saying We'll never make a [proper] man out of you. English isn't my first language though, which is why I'm not pretty sure of it all. -- Lelal Mekha  (Parlour) 18:48, September 14, 2014 (UTC)


 * I suppose it was a metaphor/figure of speech. As all inhabitants of Gallifrey are Timelords, I think.   Original Authority (talk) 19:16, September 14, 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't think the Outsiders are Time Lords and it's just one instance (TV source). I agree ith LelalMekha. -- HarveyWallbanger ☎  19:26, September 14, 2014 (UTC)
 * Gallifreyans and Time Lords are not the same. Time Lords are Gallifreyans that have gone through numerous tests and training. In fact, Gallifreyan families put their children forward in the hope that the Academy takes them on and trains them to be Time Lords. It's like comparing muggles to wizards in Harry Potter. Sort of. :) The  Farty  Doctor   Talk  20:27, September 14, 2014 (UTC)

'pretensions to godhood'?
The article says that before time travel and regeneration the Gallifreyans were "already a proud spacefaring civilisation with pretensions to godhood". Do we have a cite for that? --Irrevenant ☎  23:16, July 1, 2020 (UTC)
 * We do. From near the beginning of The Legacy of Gallifrey, we have this fairly explicit statement:

"Gallifrey is old. Very old. In fact it is so old, any details of its early history have been long lost in the chambers of the Capitol. In the years of before Rassilon's Laws of Time, the Gallifreyans didn't really keep good records, preferring to concentrate their efforts on interstellar travel to underdeveloped planets, proclaiming themselves as Gods."

- The Legacy of Gallifrey


 * (All emphasis mine.) --Scrooge MacDuck ☎  23:22, July 1, 2020 (UTC)