The History of the Betazoid Emblem
by Jörg Hillebrand and Bernd Schneider
Appearances of the EmblemOrigin of the Emblem
Until 2020, no emblem of Betazed (the planet) or the Betazoids (the species) had ever appeared on screen. At that time, there were at least two fan-created designs readily available online, however. One of these fan-creations was made canon by Star Trek Picard, probably by accident, and has since appeared in other Star Trek episodes and series.
Appearances of the Emblem
Picard
One of the trophies seen in Picard's quantum archive in Star Trek Picard's "Remembrance" is a Betazoid Loyalties award. The trophy was visible up close in the "Remembrance" Ready Room episode. Notice the Betazoid emblem on the trophy (clearly evoking the Holy Rings of Betazed of Lwaxana Troi fame). This is a first time. In canon Star Trek, meaning all of the episodes and films up to that point, no Betazoid or Betazed emblem had ever appeared. The award is inscribed: "Betazoid Loyalties -go to- Jean-Luc Picard - for his Healing and Enveloping New Nations - 2350".
The prop was on display at several Star Trek exhibitions before the first season of the show came out in early 2020. The trophy can clearly be seen in Trekcore's gallery of the SDCC exhibition.
Two years later, in 2022, the Betazoid emblem also appeared on one of the Federation member flags seen at Starfleet Academy in Star Trek Picard's "The Star Gazer", giving the species an official flag! Hopefully, this flag is still somewhere in the Star Trek archives!
Lower Decks
In the summer of 2023, the Betazoid emblem clearly appeared on a Betazoid PADD in the Star Trek Lower Decks episode "Empathalogical Fallacies", giving us our first really good look at the emblem on screen.
Discovery
Then in May 2024, the Betazoid emblem was prominently seen on the library card in Star Trek Discovery's "Erigah". We also find out that a book called Labyrinths of the Mind was written by Betazoid Doctor Marina Derex.
It turns out that the name of the book is also written on the library card (substituting Latin letters with newly created Betazoid characters). If you take a look at the characters on the caps from DIS: "Erigah", you can see that the angular structure in the innermost ring was used as the basis for the Betazoid script.
In DIS: "Labyrinths", we finally see the actual handwritten manuscript of Dr. Marina Derex' Labyrinths of the Mind. The Betazoid emblem is embossed on the cover of the book and also appears on several pages inside the tome in a distorted, stylized way. Also in "Labyrinths", we are shown Dr. Marina Derex' (blurry) curriculum vitae and it reveals... that she is a recipient of the Betazoid Loyalties Award just as Picard - which brings the Betazoid emblem story full circle.
Origin of the Emblem
But where did the emblem on that trophy come from? Doing a Google image search of "Betazoid logo" or "Betazed logo" leads to several versions of this design. It can be assumed that's what the people in the prop department making the trophy for the show did in 2019. They put it on the prop, assuming it was a legitimate canon logo.
At that time it wasn't, but the prop does appear on screen in "Remembrance", so with that appearance the logo has become canon. Tracking down the origin of that online logo was rather difficult. It turns out that it was created in 2007 by a fan with the alias Zeleni, who created it for the fan-based Birth of the Federation 2 gaming mod Star Trek Supremacy.
After some web-sleuthing (it was hard enough finding the very first online appearance of the logo) we were finally able to catch up with David Bilic aka Zeleni, the creator of the logo, and let him know that his design had become canon. He kindly redrew his logo for EAS.
When asked for some background info on his inspiration for the logo David said, back in April of 2020:
"Yes, that is a logo that I originally created for fan-based pc game Star Trek Supremacy (BOTF 2 project) 10 or 12 years ago.
I did probably around a hundred logos for the game most of them are non-canon, as inspiration for this particular logo I used information that Lwaxana Troi is heir to the Holy Rings of Betazed.
So each circle in the logo represents one ring, each ring symbolizes one of five noble houses of Betazed. Inside logo (small black logo) represents that at a given time only one noble house is entitled to be a holder of the Holy Rings of Betazed. That was my line of thinking back then. Actually, what is the real meaning of Holy Rings I don't know, Star Trek never provided that info as far as I am aware."
See Also
The Trophies in Picard's Quantum Archive - identification and description of the trophies visible in PIC: "Remembrance"
Credits
Betazed logo redrawn by David Bilic aka Zeleni. Betazoid flag redrawn by Brad Wilder. Trophy image from TrekCore.
