Mos Eisley

"Mos Eisley Spaceport. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious."

- Obi-Wan Kenobi to Luke Skywalker

Mos Eisley was a large spaceport town on the planet Tatooine. It was the largest settlement on the planet.

Geography


Mos Eisley was located roughly 80 kilometers north of Anchorhead, near the desert palace of Jabba the Hutt.

From a distance, the spaceport appeared as a haphazard collage of low-grade concrete, stone, and plastoid structures that spread outward from a central power and water distribution plant. With no central docking facility, the smooth circular depressions of Mos Eisley's 362 docking bays pockmarked the landscape like craters.

The town was really larger than it looked, as a good portion of it lay underground. In fact, it had a population of around 40 to 60 thousand people, varying seasonally.



The city was divided into the "New Quarter" and the "Old Quarter". The Old Quarter contained the wreckage of the Dowager Queen, the original hub of the city, and Chalmun's Cantina. Jabba the Hutt also maintained a residence there, since it was difficult to make business from his palace. The New Quarter was more tourist friendly and was a merchant district where tourists could relax (though there was still much crime). Each quarter had individual neighborhoods, such as the rough-and-tumble Tar Mass area.

During the Galactic Civil War, the Empire established a small garrison in Mos Eisley, although this did not help with the city's massive crime rates. Whenever an expansion of the base was required, the Empire would simply bulldoze surrounding houses.

To support the constant flow of spacers, Mos Eisley featured a large number of hotels, casinos, and cantinas.

History


Mos Eisley was built from the beginning with commerce in mind. It was founded as a substitute for the nearby, yet more expensive, Anchorhead. Located around the crash site of the Dowager Queen, the survivors of this crash originally named it simply "Eisley". They later renamed it to fit with other towns such as Mos Espa, and Mos Gamos. These same immigrants would later found the planet's future capital, Bestine.

During the Galactic Civil War, the "hive of scum and villainy" became a target of notorious Imperial officer Grand Moff Wilhuff Tarkin, who had been tasked with controlling the Outer Rim by Emperor Palpatine prior to the Battle of Yavin.

He began his conquest on the outskirts of Mos Eisley, seeing the city as an ideal outpost for their operations. Unfortunately for the Imperials, the Rebel Alliance had their own outpost station in nearby Anchorhead, and moved to intercept the Empire, thus the |First Battle of Tatooine ensued.

Though the Empire emerged victorious from the desert battle, their task force was considerably diminished, and their eventual presence in Mos Eisley was less than had been expected. This came back to haunt the Empire, as R2-D2 and C-3PO slipped through the cracks in what would otherwise have been a mighty security force. The Rebel presence in Mos Eisley was finally routed during the latter part of the battle.



Chalmun's Cantina played a crucial role in these times, as the establishment was where Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi met Han Solo and Chewbacca in their quest to get to Alderaan in order to deliver the Death Star plans to the Alliance. The Imperials also searched Mos Eisley for R2-D2 and C-3PO, the holders of the missing Death Star plans.

Jabba the Hutt was said to own a townhouse in the city.

After the collapse of Imperial order and the death of Jabba the Hutt, Tatooine came under the control of the V'ez-Tcha crime syndicate. In 6 ABY, the Empire, under Bacharan Valak, clamped down on Tatooine in an attempt to crush the V'ez-Tcha. Following a massive orbital bombardment, Imperial Stormtroopers hunted down the remaining criminals in Mos Eisley and arrested them. The leaders of V'ezh-Tcha were rounded up, shipped to Kessel, and Tatooine became garrisoned by the Empire. Mos Eisley would become a hot spot for Imperial activity, where Stormtroopers and pilots off-duty would come and relax - and usually find themselves in a bar fight. In 8 ABY, sometime after the Caspian Annexation Campaign, Tatooine would be liberated by the New Republic set free once again.

In 13 ABY, during Warlord Darth Malign's hunt for Ezkhil i'Falzin, Vassily Korolov had Mos Eisley bombarded from orbit - the result was the destruction of a significant portion of the city. Reconstruction efforts would ensue, but Mos Eisley would never fully recover.