Jawa

Jawas (pronounced /d͡ʒɑ:wə/) were typically short rodent-like natives of Tatooine. They were passionate scavengers, seeking out technology for sale or to trade in the deep deserts in their huge sandcrawler transports. A band of Jawas were responsible for locating C-3PO and R2-D2 and selling them to Luke Skywalker's uncle, Owen Lars. Another tribe of Jawas, led by Tteel Kkak, found Jabba the Hutt's rancor. They had a reputation for swindling, as they had a penchant for selling old equipment to moisture farmers. However, they were extremely passive beings, and hardly put up any resistance to colonists of their planet unlike other natives, like the Sand People, and instead saw foreigners as an excellent business opportunity.
Jawas were easily identifiable by their traditional brown hooded robes, though it was not unheard of for them to wear other colors. Other notable features included their glowing yellow eyes, small stature, and high pitched, a quickly spoken language called Jawaese.
Through the study of corpses and skeletal remains, Baobab xenobiologists discovered that Jawas appeared to be gaunt, rodent-like creatures, with shrunken faces and yellow eyes. Conflicting research suggests that Jawas and Tusken Raiders, two native species of Tatooine, originally have evolved from the same extinct species, the Kumumgah, as both have common genetic markers, while other research suggests Jawas originated from humans.
At all times, Jawa faces remained obscured by a shroud of cloth to retain moisture, hide their identity, and dissipate their body heat. Polished orange gemstones were embedded within the fabric to protect the Jawas' sensitive vision from the bright sunlight. The only physical parts that were exposed were their hands, which had tufts of fur on the palms. Jawas were renowned for their incredibly potent odor. Repulsive to most species, this odor contained incredible amounts of information such as other Jawas' identity, health, clan lineage, last meal, maturity, arousal, and even their mood. Their odor was compounded by a mysterious solution Jawas dipped their clothes in to retain moisture, and their view of bathing as being a waste of precious water, which attracted swarms of insects to gather in the recesses of their hoods. Jawas evolved several important survival traits, such as exceptional night vision and a strong immune system. A Jawa's normal body temperature is 46°C (116°F) which resulted in a high metabolism and an efficient digestive system that drew all the needed nutrients from the Jawa staple diet of hubba gourd.
Jawas were a communal, compulsive scavenger species who spent most of their life devoted to scavenging the deserts of Tatooine in search of any scrap metal, droid or mechanical part left behind from millennia of star travel and technological advancement, where the dry climate of Tatooine preserved almost all debris. Most non-Jawas regarded the Jawas as scavengers and thieves, a description that most Jawas actually found pleasing.
The Jawa's unofficial motto was not to look for uses in a salvaged item, but rather to imagine someone else who might find a use for it. And this was evidenced in their endless search for wares with which to trade with almost any being Jawas encountered. They had a kind of instinctive feel for machinery and electronics, notorious for knowing how to get a piece of equipment functioning just well enough to sell

Additional Information

Social Structure

Jawas lived in separate clan families, each with distinct, separate territories for living and scavenging. Each Sandcrawler was led by a Clan-Chief, who was male. However, the overall operation of the Jawa clan was overseen by a female Shaman. A female Jawa became a shaman by either possessing some kind of Force ability with which to perform magic, overcoming an illness accompanied by a hallucinatory vision, or was chosen and trained as the successor to the current Shaman. The shamans were believed to possess the ability to foretell the future and performed spells, hexes, and blessings to protect the clan and ensure the well being of all clan members. This title gave them a great deal of respect throughout the clan, which was strange in the largely patriarchal Jawa society, and this allowed the shaman to assume a position where they were to be consulted upon and asked often for their wisdom. With the important position within the society, the shaman did not travel in the Sandcrawler and instead remained within the safety of the clan's fortress. Other than shamans, females were shown little respect in Jawa society.
The primary activity in a Jawa's life was scavenging and trading within their Sandcrawler vehicles. Upon reaching adulthood, Jawas were chosen to work on their Sandcrawler, and participate in the scavenger hunt, the search, trade and reselling of useful wares found within the deserts. All remaining Jawas lived within fortresses, nestled deep in the desert where their collected wares were stored, and Jawa children could be born and grow safely. The scavenging Jawas would return to their fortresses before Tatooine's storm season commenced. These fortresses had high walls made from large chunks of old wrecked spacecraft for protection against Sand People, krayt dragons, and Tatooine's sand storms.
Once a year, just before the storm season on Tatooine, all the Jawa clans would gather in the great basin of the Dune Sea for the annual swap meet. Numerous sand crawlers converged and the Jawas met to exchange their salvage. Another inter-clan business was also attended to such as the comparing of navigational data of the ever-changing desert and the arrangement of marriages to ensure cultural and genetic diversity.
Adhering to their scavenger instincts, it was quite common for different family clans to trade their sons and daughters for marriage through an intense barter or trade agreement. A common Jawa term for this was the trading of 'marriage merchandise'.Jawas found it acceptable to consummate their marriages in public.

Civilization and Culture

Major Language Groups and Dialects

Jawas spoke Jawaese, a randomly variable language which was difficult to interpret due to its extremely high speech rate, and the Jawas' use of scent to add emphasis and tone to their words. It was mainly composed of meaningless syllables, supported by pheromone produced scents, which allowed it to be understood. Jawa communication was based on these scents to such a high degree that the scent a Jawa gave out could tell others about their mood.
To enable Jawas to more easily bargain and trade with other species, they relied on a simplified form of Jawaese, the Jawa Trade language which removed the use of scent in the language and was quite easily learned by species that commonly dealt with Jawa traders.