Characters from the planet Lusitania as introduced in the book Speaker for the Dead
Figueira family
- Pipo Figueira (PEE-po fee-GAY-ra; born João Figueira Alvarez; died 1948) is the first xenologer of Lusitania. He is one of the few people on the planet who treats Novinha as a real person, and becomes her beloved father-figure during her teenage years. He is the first human killed by the piggies, an alien species, and his death prompts Novinha to call for a speaker for the dead.
- Conceição Figueira, is Pipo's wife and the archivist of Lusitania.
- Libo (LEE-bo; Liberdade Graças a Deus Figueira de Medici; 1931-1965) is Pipo's son and the xenologer after his death. Libo is Novinha's first love. Unfortunately, like his father he is vivisected by the pequeninos. His apprentice, Miro, calls for a speaking of his death, which Ender performs. Libo is the father of Novinha's children.
- Pipinho (João) is Libo's sibling.
- Maria (d. 1936) was Libo's sibling who died of the Descolada.
- Bimba (Abençoada) is Libo's sibling.
- Patinha (Isolde) is Libo's sibling.
- Rã (Tomãs) is Libo's sibling.
- Bruxinha (Portuguese for "little witch"; born Cleopatra Figueira) is Libo's wife.
- Ouanda Quenhatta Figueira Mucumbi (b. 1951), is Libo and Bruxinha's eldest child and a xenologer, who falls in love with Miro.
- China Figueira is Ouanda's sibling.
- Prega Figueira is Ouanda's sibling.
- Zinha Figueira is Ouanda's sibling.
Os Venerados family
- Gusto (Vladimir Tiago Gussman; d. 1936) was Cida's husband, Novinha's father, and a xenobiologist of Lusitania. He helped cure the Descolada virus before succumbing to it. He and his wife Cida were known as Os Venerados after their beatification.
- Cida (Ekaterina Maria Aparecida do Norte von Hesse-Gussman; d 1936) was Gusto's wife, Novinha's mother, and a xenobiologist of Lusitania. She helped cure the Descolada virus before succumbing to it themselves. She and her husband were known as Os Venerados after their beatification.
- Novinha (no-VEEN-ya; born Ivanova Santa Catarina von Hesse; b. 1931) is the daughter of Lusitania's xenobiologists. Orphaned, Novinha became distant and formal until finding a scientific sanctuary with Pipo and Libo. Though she and Libo are in love, she refuses to marry and give him legal access to her xenobiology files, which she believes caused Pipo's death. She instead marries the abusive Marcão. Her pain, sorrow, and isolation draws Ender Wiggin to Lusitania, and the two eventually marry. Despite this, Novinha never loses her fragility and fear of losing those dearest to her.
- Mingo (d. 1936) was Novinha's sibling who died of the Descolada.
- Amado (d. 1936) was Novinha's sibling who died of the Descolada.
- Guti (d. 1936) was Novinha's sibling who died of the Descolada.
- Marcão (mar-COWNG; born Marcos Maria Ribeira; aka "Big Marcos"; d. 1970), is Novinha's late husband. He is known for his fearsome stature, surly temper, and habit of beating his wife, traits which earned him the epithet "cão", dog; he dies a few weeks before Ender arrives at Lusitania, of a congenital disease which caused his glands to turn to fatty tissues. Among other things, this rendered him sterile, and it is revealed during Ender's speaking of his death that none of Novinha's children are actually his, but rather Libo's; the two agreed to this form of cuckoldry before getting married.
- Miro (MIE-roe; Marcos Vladimir Ribeira von Hesse; b. 1951) is Novinha's eldest child. He follows Libo into xenology and falls in love with Ouanda, Libo's firstborn daughter by his (actual) wife. In response to this and other factors, he attempts to cross the nerve-stimulating fence separating the piggies from the human compound, suffering brain damage and becoming crippled. He is sent out into space to greet Valentine Wiggin and her family, and later becomes a key player in the events leading up to the almost-second Xenocide. Miro is later healed by Jane.
- Ela (EH-la; Ekaterina Elanora Ribeira von Hesse, b. 1952) is Novinha's second child. Like all the females in her line, she becomes a xenobiologist, and is one of the first members of the Ribeira family to warm to Ender. Later in life, she is instrumental in the destruction of the descolada virus, and its replacement with a far-more-benign variant, the recolada.
- Quim (KEENG; Estevão Rei Ribeira von Hesse; b.1955) is Novinha's third child. He is extremely pious and at first resists Andrew Wiggin on grounds of his atheistic avocation, but later warms to the Speaker, partially for his reputation as a crusader. He later becomes the first Christian evangelist to the pequeninos and holds great respect among them, but is martyred by a particularly heretical forest who believe that the descolada is the Holy Ghost and that it is the pequeninos' duty to judge all humans with it.
- Olhado (ol-YAH-doe; Lauro Suleimão Ribeira von Hesse, b. 1958) is Novinha's fourth child. He is also called "the guy with the eyes", because a freak laser accident blinded him in his youth, requiring the implant of metal replacements. He has reduced binocular vision and depth perception but can plug a computer jack directly into one eye to upload visual recordings. Due to the resulting ostracism, he becomes a keen observer of human nature and interaction. Later in life he becomes a brickmaker (or at least a manager of them) because, to him, family is a far more important calling than the sciences that took his relatives; nonetheless he has revolutionary ways of looking at physics and metaphysics, and is crucial in the development of faster-than-light travel (via a modified hyperspace mechanic related to philotic theory). Like Ela, he quickly warms to Ender; as he relates to Valentine in Xenocide, his greatest secret is that, while alone with Ender, they call each other "Father" and "Son".
- Quara (KWA-rah; Lembrança das Milagres de Jesus Ribeira von Hesse, 1963) is Novinha's fifth child. Throughout her life she exhibits stubbornness and contrariness, generally doing whatever the people who love her don't want her to do. She also becomes a xenobiologist, and assists Ela in "truncating" the descolada, despite discovering that the virus is quite possibly sentient and is certainly able to communicate with other individuals of its species.
- Grego (GRE-goe; Gerão Gregorio Ribeira von Hesse, b. 1964) is Novinha's sixth child, only six years old when Ender arrives. As a child he showed a disturbing capacity for destruction, modeled on his father's habit of domestic violence, a temper which does not subside during later years. After Quim's death, he attempts to whip a mob into a frenzy to attack the responsible forest, only to have them jump on the nearest one to hand Human and Rooter's forest after being chewed out by Valentine, Grego tries to end the massacre with as little bloodshed as possible, eventually placing himself between the surviving piggies and his own riot. He later collaborates with Olhado on faster-than-light travel.
Other colonists
- Bosquinha (Faria Lima Maria do Bosque) is governor of Lusitania and mayor of the colony Milagre.
- Peregrino (Armão Cebola) is the Bishop of the Catholic church of Lusitania.
- Dom Cristão (Amai a Tudomundo Para Que Deus Vos Ame, Portuguese for Ye Must Love Everyone So That God Will Love You) is the abbott the Filhos de Mente de Cristo, Children of the Mind of Christ.
- Dona Cristã (Detestai o Pecado e Fazei o Direito, Portuguese for Hate Sin and Do the Right) is the principal monk of the order of the Children of the Mind of Christ.
Pequeninos
The Pequeninos (Portuguese for "Little Ones"), also known as Lusitanian Aborigines or piggies, are an alien species in the category ramen, or sentient non-human. They are forest-dwelling and technologically primitive, but incredibly intelligent species able to learn languages extremely quickly. They are given the nickname "piggy" by the colonists of the planet Lusitania where part of the series is set due to their pig-like appearance.
- Rooter: One of the first pequeninos introduced in the series, Rooter was the most inquisitive of the piggies and had a strong relationship with Libo before he was abruptly brought into his third life as a father-tree.
- Mandachuva: When Pipo discovered that the Descolada virus, which had nearly destroyed the human population of Lusitania, was a part of the pequeninos' normal physiology, he went to share that information with the pequeninos. The pequenino Mandachuva brought that news back to the wives, along with the implication that the humans were not all-powerful and godlike, and that in some respects pequeninos were even more powerful than humans. It was a revelation to be rewarded, but when Pipo was asked to bring Mandachuva to the "third life", Pipo, not understanding the nature of pequenino transformation, thought he was being asked to kill Mandachuva. He refused, preferring to lose his own life in the process. Mandachuva, and the pequeninos in general, thought that they were rewarding Pipo by killing him, bringing him on to his third life, not understanding that no such thing existed for humans. The first crisis in human-pequenino relations occurred with the death of the first xenologer, Pipo Figueira, at the hands of the pequeninos.
- Leaf-eater: Seventeen years after the incident involving Pipo and Mandachuva, the new xenologer and Pipo's son, Libo Figueira, suffered a similar fate. The piggy Leaf-eater had convinced the wives to let many more little mothers conceive than normal and then convinced Libo to help them out with the famine that they were sure to face. It was an enormous risk because if Libo refused to help that whole generation of pequeinos would have starved, but the humans did in fact step in and provide assistance. After the first amaranth harvest, Libo was, like Pipo before him, asked to bring Leaf-eater to the third life, and, like his father, refused, thinking that he was saving Leaf-eater's life. Leaf-eater killed Libo, thinking on his part that he was helping Libo achieve his third life even though humans did not have a third life.
- Human: One of the sons of Rooter. Human was offered a chance to be brought into the third life as a fathertree, but only if Ender performed the ritual. Like Pipo and Libo before him, Ender showed extreme distaste at the concept, but he managed to do so with a full understanding of the consequences of his actions. Soon after, Ender wrote a biography called "Life of Human" in memory of his friend. The name "Human" was given to him by the Pequeninos "because he was very smart".
- Star-looker: One of the wives. She represented the pequeninos in their treaty with the humans. She is also called "Shouter" by the brothers behind her back because of her loud voice.
- Warmaker: A pequenino that died and entered the "third life" as a tree. He convinced a tribe of Pequeninos that the Descolada virus was a form of the Holy Ghost of Christ and that it should be spread to all humans on the Hundred Worlds. The tribe kidnapped and tortured Father Estevão, Ender's stepson, by exposing him to the virus for several days without medication. This event triggered a massacre of the pequeninos by the humans of Lusitania.
- Planter: A pequenino featured prominently in Xenocide. When it was revealed to him that the descolada was manipulating pequenino behavior, he became almost suicidal, insisting that he be deprived of the descolada until death to prove that the pequenino's sentience was not caused by the descolada. Although he never entered the third life as a fathertree, he was awarded the honor of retaining his name after being planted, something which no other brothertree was given.
- Glass: Similar to Planter, Glass was the subject of a descolada deprivation test. However, Glass's experiment was the testing of Ela's new recolada virus. He successfully made the transition into the third life as fathertree.
- Fire-quencher: The pequenino representative who travels to the planet of the descoladores with Miro, Val, and the others in Children of the Mind.
- Arrow: A pequenino mentioned in Speaker for the Dead. His name shows how humans affected pequenino culture.