The people who were to become the Colonials, evolved on the planet of Kobol.

Little is actually known about Kobol and the people who lived there. Not many actual recorded facts exist on the planet, and nearly everything about it is known only through ancient writings and texts that have been handed down and copied over the millenia. The location has certainly been lost. From what is known, this lack of information is intentional, a message to the Colonials not to make the same mistakes their ancestors did.

Some of the religious texts that are used today were written before Kobol was doomed though, and these texts have been handed down through the millenia. These texts were a blue print of how man should live, but one that is and was constantly ignored by those who they were created to guide.

Human life evolved on Kobol. This much is known. Life was good, and the humans there developed space travel and a high level of technology. However, they became a wasteful people, and did not care for their planet. Waste piled up, the air and seas became polluted, and many species of animals died out.

The end result was that the planet was doomed to an ecological disaster and all life on the planet would be doomed. For some reason, the people of Kobol did not really care about this, nor act on it until it was almost too late. Some writings also say that the star that Kobol revolved around was unstable as well, which may explain why the people of the planet did not care about what happened to it. They became a doomed race, almost literally.

However they did act, and they built great space arks to transport the majority of their population to other worlds, and they set out across the galaxy in search of a new home. This they found in the way of a system which had twelve habitable planets circling three stars, and it was here that the Twelve Tribes of Kobol settled, and these worlds were to become the Colonies.

Kobol was ruled by thirteen tribes, but the thirteenth did not follow the other twelve. Instead, it left Kobol before the other tribes and went it is own way. Ancient writings do not tell much of the planet that the Thirteenth went to, only that it is a far away blue-green planet orbiting a yellow star, and the planet is called 'Earth'. Why this tribe went its own way, and why it went to 'Earth' is unknown, even to the ancient texts.

Once the twelve tribes landed, they turned on the technology that had saved and corrupted them - destroyed it along with the great arks - and returned to a very simple life without it. Most records of the time before this were also destroyed or lost, and soon Kobol was just a legend and a myth.

It took several hundred yahrens for this technology to begin to be rediscovered.

Separated for two millennia, the different colonies developed sharply contrasting cultures. The Aerians quickly separated into a number of hostile groups, and their colony was torn by petty wars among them for hundreds of yahren.

The Gemons, blessed with a fertile planet and a gentle climate, devoted their lives to the pursuit of art, music and pleasure.

On cold and bleak Scorpio, political tyranny ruled the people to create an emotionally bland and oppressed people.

The Sagittarians became a contemplative people, and through the modern era produced humankind's greatest philosophers, while the practical Capricans retained much more of the ancient scientific learning than the other colonies.

Consequently, it was the Capricans who led humankind into the scientific renaissance during the fifth millennium. Space flight was rediscovered, and with it, the door was opened to establishing contact between the colonies once more.

However the initial fact that there was life outside Caprica was an initially shock that actually caused the space program to be halted for a period, whilst the impact of this discovery could be conceived.

It would take another couple of hundred yahrens for all the Colonies to be re-contacted with each other, but once cultural differences were sorted out, trade and help would be forthcoming amongst the various worlds, and a new era of peace and prosperity would be established.

Unfortunately, one of the 'cultural differences' would actually be what historians have dubbed the Unification War. Up until this point, all the Colonies had developed with their own governments, cultures and way of doing things. As such, many misunderstandings would occur before the Colonies reunited, and as a result of this, there would be many small skirmishes between the various planets. None of this could be called a war as such, and indeed most of the action would take place within the political theatres, but sometimes it spilled out, and a lot of lives would be lost before the Quorum of Twelve could be established, ending the strife and bringing on a new era of peace and prosperity.

During the sixth millennia, with technology at its peak, the colonies slowly developed supralight drive and started to launch probes and expeditions to explore the galaxy that they lived in, and it was then that the colonies established new settlements on other planets and asteroids, and made peaceful contact with intelligent life from other worlds.

Some of the races that were contacted by the Colonials included the Hasaris, a peaceful amphibious race, and the Orions, traders and merchants, making and selling goods. They used their own money but became very important to the Colonials, providing technology and luxury goods.

It was during this time that a central Colonial Government was established.

This happy time is remembered as the Long Peace, although with the advent of extra outposts and trading links, piracy soon got itself wired up, and the Colonial Fleet had to be developed to try and counter this threat.

The Colonials technology became greater, and artificial intelligence was soon common place, the goal being that of robots doing all the boring and dangerous jobs that society did not want to do. However this backfired when the computers and robots revolted against their human masters.

A short 'war' against the machines was instigated, and when the revolt was finally put down, the Colonial Code was passed, limiting the sort of intelligence that could be programmed into a computer, and effectively meaning the end of AI for the Colonies. While each world was free to define exactly what that meant, Caprica was the harshest in it is ruling, and had to be restrained from banning computers all together. Scopria on the other hand, was the least firm in implementing the Code, and continued to use robots and artifical intelligence to almost the same levels as before.