# Age of Yoda in Star Wars **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 5, 2005, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971 "2005-10-05T23:46:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bob\_Loblaw\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@Bob\_Loblaw\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bob_Loblaw_1)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2005, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/1 "2005-10-05T23:46:07Z")
I’m a newbie here, so apparently I can’t search. I’ve always enjoyed things Star Wars, but I cannot find anywhere why Yoda is so old. Is it because his species is very long lived? Is it because he is strong with the force? A combination of the 2? Something else? Does his bad breath kill all disease? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/2 "2005-10-06T00:31:25Z")
Well, why do humans live 70-80 years on average? Whatever species Yoda is, it might be natural for that species to rack up 800+ years. Since we have no information to go on (well, from the movies; one of those canon novels I never read might contain some nuggets), the question is unanswerable. ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/3 "2005-10-06T00:47:19Z")
Don’t forget that in the Bible, many major characters live for several hundred years. I’m not exactly sure why, or why Yoda has lived for so long. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/4 "2005-10-06T01:23:48Z")
And keep in mind, Yoda’s species is not the only one with such longevity. Chewie is, I believe, 300 years old. ---
**Author:** ![Bob\_Loblaw\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@Bob\_Loblaw\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bob_Loblaw_1)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/5 "2005-10-06T01:33:08Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > And keep in mind, Yoda’s species is not the only one with such longevity. Chewie is, I believe, 300 years old. I didn’t know that about Chewbacca, even though “good relations with the Wookies, I have.” Does anyone know if there are any other members of Yoda’s species and how old they are? Whether they are Jedi, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/6 "2005-10-06T01:38:20Z")
[Here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=265020&highlight=yoda) is a thread in which I asked the same question. ---
**Author:** ![Bob\_Loblaw\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@Bob\_Loblaw\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bob_Loblaw_1)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/7 "2005-10-06T01:46:13Z")
> [@Khadaji](#): > > [Here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=265020&highlight=yoda) is a thread in which I asked the same question. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/age-of-yoda-in-star-wars/324971/8 "2005-10-06T04:03:49Z")
> [@Bob Loblaw](#): > > I didn’t know that about Chewbacca, even though “good relations with the Wookies, I have.” > > Does anyone know if there are any other members of Yoda’s species and how old they are? Whether they are Jedi, etc. There was Yaddle, who was one of the Jedi Masters in the prequel movies. I don’t think that she had any lines, and it appears that she got whacked with the other Jedi. In one of the novels, Luke tries to find out what Yoda’s species was, but he can’t find any record of them. The Empire/Republic has thousands of inhabited worlds, so I imagine that it’s easy to get “lost in the crowd,” but still, it’s hard to believe that _nobody_ knew where Yoda came from. It’s almost like there was a coverup. My theory is that Yoda was a Sith, one of the beings that the Sith Lords used to rule over. According to EU sources, the Sith were a race of beings that were enslaved by Dark Jedi. (This is where the title “Lord of the Sith” came from.) The Sith were supposedly all wiped out centuries ago, but perhaps a few survived. To protect these refugees, the Galactic Republic helped them to conceal their origins, erasing or altering the pertinent records in the official databases. Due to their extremely long lives, Yoda and Yaddle eventually outlived anyone who remembered what the Sith looked like, so now no one knows what race Yoda was.