Formed thousands of years prior to the Clone Wars, the Sith were the ancient enemies of the Jedi Order.[12] Established by a rogue Jedi, the Sith sought further knowledge and power through learning the dark side of the Force. Eventually, this Jedi was able to amass a sizable following, all of whom adhered to this new philosophy that embraced the dark side.[13] This schism in the Jedi Order led to an event known as the Hundred-Year Darkness, in which the Jedi and the newly-founded Sith Order, once brothers and sisters in the Force, fought against one another for power.[12] The civil war ended in the defeat of the Sith, who fled from known space. Unbeknownst to the Jedi however, the Sith settled on Moraband, a world of red sands, where they rebuilt in secret to wait for another chance to strike.[13]
As the Sith Order grew, they constructed massive temples and tombs on Moraband in a location known as the Valley of the Dark Lords.[3] The Sith built empires on the backs of their slaves[20] and fought wars against the Jedi for control of the galaxy. During these wars, they built massive superweapons powered by giant kyber crystals.[21][22] During one such conflict, the Jedi and Sith fought on the planet Takodana. The pirate Maz Kanata later built her castle on top of the legendary battlefield.[23]
At one point, nearly six thousand years before the rise of the Galactic Empire, the Sith built a shrine on Coruscant, which became a place of immense dark side power. Later in history, the Jedi raised their own temple over that shrine, in an attempt to contain and eliminate its power.[10] Over many years, the Sith continued to expand their empire, erecting temples on planets like Malachor, a world which would later become forbidden to the Jedi.[4]
Their quest to gain power was ultimately the undoing of the Sith, as the dark side made them turn against one another. In the end, the Jedi managed to defeat the infighting Sith, bringing what was left of the dark order to its knees. As it turned out, one Sith, Darth Bane, survived. His fellow Sith Lords destroyed, he reformed the order by establishing the Rule of Two, mandating that only two Sith—a master and an apprentice—could exist at any given time, lest they fall prey to in-fighting.[3] The Sith abandoned their traditional homeworld of Moraband after it was scarred by many wars.[24] Eventually Darth Bane was killed and was buried in the Valley of the Dark Lords on its surface, but the Rule of Two continued on through his apprentice.[3]