A battle was fought on the planet Ossus between the Jedi Order and the faction of dark side–adherents known as the Legions of Lettow as part of the First Great Schism in 24,500 BBY. The Jedi repulsed the Lettow attack and subsequently pursued them to the Core Worlds, and, according to a legend, the battleground on Ossus became the site of the structure known as the Eye of Ashlanae.
In 24,500 BBY, disagreements arose between the Jedi Order of Force-users and the Jedi splinter faction known as the Legions of Lettow, members of which advocated using the dark side of the Force.
Eventually, open conflict—which came to be known as the First Great Schism—between the two organizations became unavoidable. The Legions of Lettow, led by General Xendor and his lover, Arden Lyn, decided to take the fight to the Outer Rim Territories planet Ossus, the remote headquarters of the Jedi Order, to prevent the worlds of the Galactic Republic from being drawn into a potentially bloody war. The Jedi, however, repulsed the Lettow attack.
The Jedi subsequently pursued the Legionnaires to the Republic-controlled Core Worlds, which was followed by engagements at Chandrila, Brentaal IV, Coruscant, and Metellos. Lyn was eventually placed into a state of stasis that lasted until 4 BBY. In that year, she was awakened by agents of the Galactic Empire, and she mentioned the battle on Ossus in a debriefing, selections of which were filed by Grand Inquisitor Laddinare Torbin.
According to legend, the Eye of Ashlanae was erected on the site of the Ossus battle.
According to a legend that existed by the time of the Galactic Civil War, the site of the battle on Ossus took on sacred importance to the Jedi Order. In the planet's Eocho Mountains, the Jedi survivors of the First Great Schism allegedly each carved a block of stone the size of a bantha—a creature from the planet Tatooine averaging 2.5 meters in height—and, over the span of several weeks, levitated them to the site of the battle.
There, the Jedi further shaped and fitted the boulders, constructing the fifty meter–tall ziggurat-shaped structure known as the Eye of Ashlanae as a monument to their comrades who had perished in the battle. It was also said that a simple stone platform situated at the center of a chamber that was located deep beneath the structure coincided with the spot where the last blow of the First Great Schism was landed—although the conflict had actually ended with the Jedi forces being victorious over the Lettow at the Core planet of the same name. The High Council of the Jedi Order deliberated on various issues at the chamber, and the stone platform was also supposedly a powerful vergence in the Force.
The battle on Ossus was first mentioned in the 2009 reference book The Essential Atlas, which was authored by Daniel Wallace and Jason Fry.
- The Essential Atlas
- The Essential Guide to Warfare
- Nexus of Power