The Clans
Five Clans, one code, and the ancestors of StarClan above them.
The Clans are the five groups of feral cats at the centre of the Warriors series: ThunderClan, WindClan, RiverClan, ShadowClan and SkyClan. They first live in a forest beside a human town and later around a lake. Each Clan has adapted to its own terrain, and relations between them are usually tense, although the idea of one Clan being destroyed deeply distresses all of them. All Clan cats follow the warrior code and share a faith in StarClan, the spirits of their dead ancestors.
Quick Facts
- Number of forest clans
- Five (ThunderClan, ShadowClan, WindClan, RiverClan, SkyClan)
- Governing law
- The Warrior Code
- Afterlife
- StarClan
Lore & Background
Dawn of the Clans tells how the Clans began: cats from a tribe in the mountains leave in search of a better home, form the Clans and settle in the forest. Their first leaders were Thunder, Wind Runner, River Ripple, Tall Shadow and Clear Sky. Every Clan has one leader, a deputy who is second-in-command, and a medicine cat who heals and speaks with StarClan; most of its members are warriors, who hunt, patrol the borders and fight, and apprentices train to become warriors or, more rarely, medicine cats.
A new leader receives nine lives from StarClan and a name ending in -star. Names follow rank: a kit's name ends in -kit, an apprentice's in -paw, and a warrior or medicine cat receives a final name. SkyClan lost its territory and was driven out of the forest by the other four; Firestar rebuilt it, and in A Vision of Shadows it joins the others at the lake. After the events of The Broken Code the Clans rewrite parts of the warrior code.
More in Clans & Groups
Elsewhere in Warrior Cats
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