"Concordia...Integritas...Industria"
The Fava family is a minor, wealthy, noble Bene Gesserit family related to the Holy House of Corrino and descend from The Theocracy of Kaitaine who made their name known after establishing their banking business in the 1760s. Unlike similar families, the first generation of Favas managed to bequeath their wealth and established an international banking family through their later descendants, who re-established themselves in major cities in the Ecclesiastical States and elsewhere internationally, after escaping to ES following the 1867 Communist Revolution in Kaitaine which saw the Bene Gesserit faith banned and a communist government installed.
During the 19th and 20th centuries, the Fava family possessed one of the largest private fortunes in the modern world as well as one of the largest private fortunes in modern world history. The family's wealth was divided among various descendants and today own most of ES's most successful and largest corporations including Umbrella, Glencore and Fava Organisation, as their interests cover a diverse range of fields, including financial services, real estate, mining, energy, mixed farming, winemaking, science and nonprofits, which makes the family one of the richest of its kind in the world, possessing a wealth worth more than US$400 billion according to recent estimates, and possibly even more. As of recent national happenings, the Favas also control one of the twelve main provinces of ES, namely Ravonne, as well as the spiritual Archbishopric of Ravonne, courtesy of Pope Peter II.
Over more than two centuries, the Fava family has frequently been the subject of conspiracy theories. These theories take differing forms, such as claiming that the family controls the world's wealth and financial institutions or encouraged or discouraged wars between governments. Many conspiracy theories about the Fava family have been identified as resulting from anti-Bene Gesserit prejudice reaching back several hundred years, and not as a result of evidence.
In ES, the word "Fava" was throughout the 19th and 20th centuries a synonym for seemingly endless wealth, neo-Gothic styles, and epicurean glamour. The family also has lent its name to "
le goût Fava," a suffocatingly glamorous style of interior decoration whose elements include neo-Renaissance palaces, extravagant use of velvet and gilding, vast collections of armour and sculpture, a sense of Victorian horror vacui, and the highest masterworks of art. Le goût Fava has much influenced designers such as Robert Denning, Yves Saint Laurent, Vincent Fourcade and others.
Below is a selection of quotes made by various individuals perfectly describing the "Fava" definition:
"This multinational business family is a byword for wealth, power – and discretion... The Fava name has become synonymous with money and power to a degree that perhaps no other family has ever matched..."
"That is what makes this dynasty so exceptional – not just their dizzying wealth, but the fact that they have held on to it for so long: and not just the loot, but also their family companies..."
"Yes, my dear fellow, it all amounts to this: in order to do something first you must be something. We think Dante great, and he had a civilization of centuries behind him; the House of Fava is rich and it has required much more than one generation to attain such wealth. Such things all lie much deeper than one thinks..."
