Polis

Lore & Background

The Mountain Tribe built Polis as both a fortress and a statement. In the decades after the surface became viable again, the tribe carved a permanent seat of power into the Pacific Northwest's dense, mist-laden landscape. The city's thick walls and elevated central structure were designed to be defensible against any rival tribe or external threat, and over time they became symbols of the Mountain Tribe's rigid social hierarchy. Those who live within the walls occupy a clearly defined place in the tribe's order, and the architecture itself—tiered platforms, watchtowers, a dominant central keep—mirrors that hierarchy in stone and timber.

Polis is more than a military garrison. It functions as the Mountain Tribe's administrative heart, where decisions about trade, territory, and the treatment of outsiders are made. The city's leaders enforce strict codes governing technology, resource use, and conduct, and the walls serve as a literal and metaphorical boundary between the tribe's world and the chaos beyond. For members of the 100 who arrive in Polis, the experience is stark: a society that has rejected the old world's excesses but has replaced them with its own form of rigid control.

The city's significance escalates as the series progresses. It becomes a focal point for alliances, betrayals, and power struggles that ripple outward to every other faction on the surface. Whoever holds Polis holds a strategic advantage over the Pacific Northwest, and the city's fate becomes entangled with the larger question of whether humanity's scattered groups can coexist or are doomed to cycle through dominance and collapse.

In Their Own Story

The fog rolled in off the coast and swallowed the outer walls whole, so that Polis looked less like a city and more like a grey silhouette pressed against the treeline. Clarke stood at the base of the gate, mud caked to her boots, and felt the weight of the wood above her—thick, scarred, reinforced with iron brackets that had long since rusted to a deep orange. Inside, the tiered platforms hummed with quiet industry: blacksmiths tapping rhythmically, children running between the legs of guards, the low murmur of a council session echoing from the central tower. The air smelled of pine resin, woodsmoke, and something sharper—ozone, maybe, or the faint metallic tang of the river that fed the city's cisterns. A guard at the gate studied her with flat, patient eyes. No welcome. No threat. Just the slow, deliberate turn of a key in a lock the size of a man's torso, and the groan of the gate beginning to part. Polis did not open its doors. It permitted entry. The distinction, she was learning, was everything.

Reader's Guide

You approach Polis from the forest road, and the first thing that hits you is the silence. Not true silence—the river still gurgles, birds still call in the canopy—but the ambient noise of the outside world just… stops. Then the walls appear, and they are enormous. Dark timber lashed with iron, rising well above the treetops, with watchtowers at intervals where a single archer can cover a wide arc of the approach. The Pacific Northwest light filters through the mist in pale green-gold shafts, and the walls catch it like wet bark.

Inside, the city is tiered. The lowest level is market and workshop—smelling of tallow, hammer-strike, and damp wool. Above that, residential platforms built into the cliff face, their doorways small and practical. The central tower rises through all of it, a multi-storey stronghold where the Mountain Tribe's leadership holds court. The architecture is functional, almost brutal: no ornament, no wasted space. Every beam is load-bearing. Every step is deliberate. You learn to read the city the way you'd read a social ladder—where you stand tells you who you are.

The surrounding forest is thick, old-growth, and the river that feeds the city runs cold and fast. In winter, the mist never fully lifts and the walls blur into the sky. In summer, the light pours in and the whole structure glows amber. The Mountain Tribe's presence is everywhere—their marks on the gates, their laws posted in plain script, their guards moving in pairs with a quiet, practiced economy. You are a guest here. The city does not change for you, and you will change for it.

Did You Know?

• Polis is one of the few locations in The 100 depicted as a true permanent city rather than a camp or village, making it a visual and narrative contrast to most other settlements.
• The Mountain Tribe's strict codes and hierarchical structure are physically reflected in Polis's tiered architecture, with social rank mirrored in vertical position within the city.
• Polis's location in the Pacific Northwest places it in a distinctly different bioregion from many other settings in the series, giving it a misty, old-growth forest atmosphere that sets it apart visually.
• The city's walls and central tower are designed to be defensible, underscoring the Mountain Tribe's emphasis on security and control over expansion.