Saka

Saka is the fourth planet of the Sarmatia system and the homeworld of the Lightning Chapter of Space marines. It is a world of vast plains, veritable seas of grass, and massive mountain massifs with only a couple of small landlocked seas and a scattering of freshwater lakes big enough to be called seas.



History
Archaeological evidence indicates that Saka was settled by Humans during the Stellar Exodus preceding the Age of the Technology. The Ancients were apparently attracted to the planet by its mineral wealth - long since exhausted - and built their cities in the valleys and plateaus of the great massifs near to their mine workings. Like other human worlds Saka's ancient civilization collapsed under under the stresses of Old Night, the last of her once glorious cities crumbling to ruin some time in the 29th Millenia. But humanity itself survived. The former inhabitants of the cities turned feral and drifted down to the plains to prey upon the agri-colonies along the rivers and lakes gradually evolving into warlike tribes of nomadic pastoralists roaming the 'sea of grass' mounted on Terran descended horses herding ovines and bovines of the same and hunting the native megafauna.

Saka remained undisturbed while the galaxy shaking events of the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy thundered around it and even the first Crusade of Fire left the planet untouched as the fighting centered on the more advanced worlds of the sector. This immunity ended abruptly c, 200.M36 when Saka was chosen as the homeworld for the Lightning Chapter of the Adeptus Astartes.

The Sons of the Emperor Make War On the Saka
Far from being overwhelmed or overawed by the descent of godlike warriors from heaven the Saka tribes reacted with fierce hostility - possibly rooted in ancestral memories of occasional raids by Traitor Warbands. The Saka were also, of course, pagans worshipping a feminine deity known as Our Lady of Animals.