Efrafa
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Efrafa is the name of a brutal, prison-like warren from the novel and later animated adapted film version of Watership Down by author Richard Adams.
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[edit] General Woundwort
General Woundwort is the Chief Rabbit of Efrafa, treating the majority of his subordinates as either prisoners who need prevention of escape or those who assist him in containing them. He is very indifferent to the opinions of his captives and often treats them with a suspicion, seemingly reluctant to believe those below himself unless they are highly trusted and devoted captains.
Having a tendency to want to run his warren is a somewhat comparably elite manner, Woundwort pressures his captains under strict orders and is intolerant to disobedience. He orders a harsh punishment to those who go against himself and tried to kill Bigwig for betraying him.
[edit] Organization
Efrafa is not an ordinary, haphazard warren, but was engineered from its beginning to avoid detection by humans. When born, rabbits are given scars called Marks on specified parts of their bodies. This is used for identification of the rabbit and shows when the rabbit can and/or has to come up to silflay (silflay is the word in the Lapine language for graze) regardless of weather. Owsla sentries assigned to each shift watch for (and may even attack) elil but also prevent grazers from escaping. As a result, commoners live long lives (unless they run afoul of the Owsla) but have very little freedom. If a buck can get into the Owsla, then his living conditions are improved. The Captains are higher ranked than this, and get more privileges such as private rooms. The Council are the highest, with the exception of General Woundwort, the leader of Efrafa. There is also an Owslafa, or a secret police, that only Efrafa has. All the individual Marks have their own burrows, and these are not connected. This is to prevent the spread of both conspiracy and plague.
[edit] Life in Efrafa
Captains are allowed to select Does of their choice to mate with, whilst the other party are forced to comply.
If a rabbit attempts escape and is recaptured, (s)he is often first attacked and then brought to the Council to be told what the punishment is to be. Blackavar had both ears mauled and disfigured for trying to run away from Efrafa.
Woundwort's inflexible efforts to protect his subjects from elil have worked too well, and Efrafa has become overcrowded with long-living rabbits. Too many holes might draw human attention, thus physical expansion and even the birthrate are stifled.
[edit] The secret river
The secret river was mentioned in Tales from Watership Down, the sequel to Watership Down. The river is not a river of water, but a river of knowledge. Some of the does in Efrafa were sensitive to it. They were able to gain information about a far away warren called Thinial, which was troubled by the white blindness. The river was never explained, but a rabbit from Thinial does appear later in Tales from Watership Down.
[edit] The Wide Patrol
The Wide Patrol is a long range patrol whose purpose is to identify and, if possible, remove threats. Bigwig first encountered one trying to lose a fox. This killed one of Efrafa's best Captains.
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