Glossary

Terminology, acronyms, abbreviations, words and frases on this site relating to costuming, 501st Legion and Star Wars.

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501st Legion (club): Worldwide costuming and charity organization, cosplaying as “the bad guys” in Star Wars. The club was founded in 1997.

501st Legion (fictional regiment): An elite clone trooper/ stormtrooper legion under the command of Darth Vader. Dates back to the Clone Wars. Also refered to as 501st clone battalion and later “Vader’s Fist”.

The name was added to the Star Wars canon by the makers of Star Wars: The Clone Wars as a nod to the 501st Legion costume organization. (See: 501st Legion (club))

Aurebesh: The Galactic standard alphabet in the Star Wars universe.

Some of the other known scripts: Outer Rim Basic (often used to transcribe Hutteese), Futhark/Futhork (mostly seen on Naboo), High Galactic (looks exactly like our the real-world latin alphabet)

These scripts mostly have the same letters as basic English, so you could argue that they are fonts rather than alphabets. But the scripts do have some letters that don’t exist in English.

The invention of High Galactic is a retcon.

BH-: Trooper ID prefix for a Bounty Hunter costume.

BHG: See: Bounty Hunter Guild.

Bounty Hunter Guild: A sub-unit of the Legion specializing in bounty hunter costumes. Also known as The BHG. (See: Detachment)

Bucket: Slang word for helmet.

CRL: See: Costume Reference Library.

Celebration: See: Star Wars Celebration.

Centurion: Third and highest level of costuming excellence as defined in the Stormtrooper CRL. Optional, not required for membership. (See: Costume Reference Library)

Challenge coin: Small metal medallion (usually around 3-4 cm in diameter) with an insignia, logo or text. (See: Merch.)

Con: See: Convention.

Convention: An organized gathering of fans to celebrate their common interest. Events range from panel discussions, early screenings of upcoming material, meet-and-greet with famous personalities, cosplay contests and more.

Cosplay: Costuming hobby. Cosplayers make and/or wear costumes and try to represent/role-play a specific character or type of character, often from films, games and books in the genres Fantasy and SciFi or similar works of fiction.

Costume Reference Library: A document with a description of each part of a costume and notes for the Legion requirements. Membership approval is based on these documents. They also have notes for optional levels of excellence. Also known as CRL.

DZ-: Trooper ID prefix for a Denizen costume.

Detachment: Non-administrative sub-unit of the Legion. A community doing research on and specializing in a specific costume type, sharing knowledge and experience and helping new recruits with their build. Members can be affiliated with many detachments.

E-11: Blaster rifle used by stormtroopers. Also known as “BlasTech E-11 Standard Imperial Sidearm”.

This was a movie prop based on the british Sterling MK IV submachine gun

EE-3: Blaster rifle used by Boba Fett. Also known as “BlasTech EE-3 Carbine Rifle”.

This was a movie prop based on the Webley & Scott No. 1 Mark 1 flare gun.

EIB: See: Expert Infantry.

Expert Infantry: Second level of costuming excellence as defined in the Stormtrooper CRL. Optional, not required for membership. EIB is short for Expert Infantry Badge. (See: Costume Reference Library)

FISD: See: First Imperial Stormtrooper Detachment.

Fire team: Local, non-official sub-unit of a Detachment, for troopers with the same costume type in the same area. (See: Detachment)

First Imperial Stormtrooper Detachment: FISD for short. A sub-unit of the Legion, specializing in Stormtrooper costumes. (See: Detachment)

GML: Garrison Membership Liaison. Your contact person when you apply for membership with a Garrison.

From Wikipedia: «The GML is responsible for reviewing and processing applications for membership and maintaining Garrison member information in the Legion database. »

Garrison: Local branch of the 501st Legion with at least 25 members. Most of the activities in the Legion happens locally, organized by the garrison in that area. Garrisons can be furthered divided into squads.

Greeblie: Items decorating a costume or prop without having any function. A greeblie could be anything, such as switches, knobs, cables, tubes, springs from pens, model kits and so on. The greeblies are only there to make the item more visually interesting. The term is said to have been originated with George Lucas.

Infamous: Second level of costuming excellence as defined in the Boba Fett CRL. Optional, not required for membership. (See: Costume Reference Library)

K-11: Blaster pistol used by Boba Fett. Also known as “Sacros K-11 Disintegrator Pistol”.

This was a movie prop based on the Technisub Pulce 40 spearfishing gun

Legion: See: 501st Legion. It could also mean Rebel Legion, but on this site it’s mostly the former.

Logo, Letter (501st Legion): The 501st Legion has two logo variants. The letter logo has the words “501st Legion” in a font called “Vader’s Fist”. The “0” and the “o” has an outline of a stormtrooper.

Above “st” in “501st”, in a regular sans-serif font, it say’s “Vader’s Fist”.

There’s two version of the letter logo, a banner version and a square version where the letters “Legion” is slightly smaller in size and placed below “501st”.

Logo, Round (501st Legion: The 501st Legion has two logo variants. The round logo has a stormtrooper holding an E-11 blaster, standing in front of the Imperial Cog symbol. Aurebesh letters above the trooper reads “Vader’s Fist”, and below it says “501st Legion”.

Makerspace: Community-operated workspace where people gather to share tools and knowledge in various crafts and hobbies. Costuming, beer brewing, painting and programming are a few examples.

Merch: Merchandise — non-costume, branded items and memorabilia, often limited to members only. This could be anything from T-shirts and pillow cases to embroidered patches and jacket pins.

Nidaros Imperial Squad: Local group of troopers in Trondheim, Norway. Also known as Nidaros Imperials. They are part of Norwegian Garrison. (See: Squad)

Nordic Garrison: Former local branch of the 501st Legion in Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway.

Denmark left to form Danish Garrison in 2017.

Sweden and Finland left to form Swedish Garrison and Finnish Garrison in 2022.

Nordic Garrison became Norwegian Garrison in 2022. (See: Garrison)

Norwegian Garrison: Local branch of the 501st Legion in Norway. Previously known as Nordic Garrison. (See: Garrison)

Outpost: Local branch of the Legion in areas with too few troopers to form a Garrison. An outpost needs at least one member. (See: Garrison)

RPG: Role-playing game

Retcon: Facts or plot points in newer works that adjusts established facts from older works, sometimes because the newer work contradicts the older work. Also known as “Retroactive continuity”.

E.g. in Return of the Jedi, when Obi-Wan tells Luke that his earlier statement in A New Hope – that Vader killed Anakin – was true “from a certain point of view”.

From WikiPedia: “…a literary device in which established diegetic ‘facts’ in the plot of a fictional work are adjusted, ignored, or contradicted by a subsequently published work which breaks continuity with the former”.

SL-: Trooper ID prefix for a Sith Lord costume.

SWC: See: Star Wars Celebration.

Screen-accurate: Item or costume part built to accurately look like an item from a film.

Screen-used: Item or costume part that was acctually used in a film.

Squad: Local sub-branch of a Garrison. A squad needs at least 10 members, and operates in a smaller geographic territory within the Garrison’s territory. (See: Garrison)

Star Wars Celebration: The official Star Wars convention.

It is not held annually. It has previously been held in Denver (US), Indianapolis (US), Los Angeles (US), London (England), Chiba (Japan), Orlando (US), Essen (Germany), Anaheim (US) and Chicago (US). (See: Convention)

Supporter: A non-costumed helper or a helper in a non-restrictive costume. Functions as the eyes and ears during a troop, making sure that the troopers (and those around them) stays safe. Also refered to as handler, wrangler, helper, squire or crew.

TDH: See: The Dented Helmet.

TI-: Trooper ID prefix for a TIE Pilot costume.

TK-: Trooper ID prefix for a Stormtrooper costume.

The Dented Helmet: An online costume community specializing in Boba Fett and other Bounty Hunters. Also known as TDH. The Dented Helmet is not affiliated with The 501st Legion.

Troop: An appearance at an event, organized through a Garrison, Outpost or through the Legion.

Trooper: A member of the 501st Legion. The member could have any approvable costume type, including but not limited to a Stormtrooper costume.

Trooper ID: Unique member ID number within the 501st Legion.

The Trooper ID prefix tells you what type of costume that trooper has. I’ve listed the most common prefixes on this site here, but there are dozens more.

My trooper ID is 32700, and my prefixes are TK and BH.

Trooping: A member of the 501st Legion participating in an official troop while wearing an approved costume.