Lord Havelock Vetinari (, ), Lord Patrician (Primus inter pares) of the city-state of Ankh-Morpork, is a fictional character in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. A calculating, cool-headed leader, his design inspirations include Italian statesman and diplomat Niccolò Machiavelli, including writing a similarly-named dissertation called The Servant.
Fictional biography
Early years Lord Vetinari was born into the extremely powerful Vetinari family (a pun on the real-life family of the Medici and on the word "veterinary") and raised by his aunt, Lady Roberta Meserole. As a youth, he enrolled in the Assassins' Guild which, apart from teaching its students how to kill other people for money, also gives them an excellent academic education. Because of the similarity his name bore to "veterinary", he endured the nickname of Dog-botherer (cf. god-botherer). Vetinari graduated from the Guild with exceptional marks, scoring disconcertingly high in attention to detail. It is also mentioned that he studied languages; in Jingo he translates Klatchian for Sergeant Colon, although he flatly denies being able to speak it.
In his late teens, Vetinari was involved in the "Glorious 25th of May" (Night Watch), to which his most notable contribution was the (technical) assassination of the then-Patrician of Ankh-Morpork, Homicidal Lord Winder, though the latter ended up dying of fright rather than the planned, direct assassination. When asked (as was traditional) about who he is and who sent him, Vetinari replies, respectively, "Think of me as... your future" and "I come from the city" showing that he already has the concern for the city's welfare he later shows. Later, Vetinari fought alongside the remnants of the Night Watch commanded by a time-traveling Samuel Vimes (who had been impersonating Sergeant-at-Arms John Keel); The entire experience clearly shape Vetinari's (and by extension, Vimes') views on the effective way of running the city.
Vetinari later journeyed to Überwald on what is known as the Grand Sneer where met the vampire Lady Margolotta. It is implied that the two had some kind of relationship, and stated more clearly that he taught her a lot of what she knows, and vice versa. It was also there that he learnt about the nature of evil after witnessing a mother otter and its pups feeding on a salmon and its roes (Unseen Academicals).
Rise to power
Vetinari is the archetype of a benevolent dictator. He is chilly and inscrutable, avoiding (apparent) direct intervention until needed or not abusing power for petty personal grievances, despite having the means to do so. The sole reason for his ruling the city is that he is fiercely loyal to it, although it has also at times been implied that he does it because it amuses him to do so, in the sense that he enjoys outwitting all the people who try to oppose him. He also has no exploitable vices, barring a strange fondness for candied jellyfish – ambiguously mentioned in the early books and thus believed by some readers to be referring to a previous Patrician - and a humorous hatred of street mimes.
Lord Vetinari succeeded Mad Lord Snapcase, who had been as mad as the name suggests. One of Vetinari's earliest actions and a sample of his way of running the city was to legalize squabbling Guilds such as those of the Thieves and the "Seamstresses", with the caveat this put them under the scrutiny of a governing body which now knew everything about them. Therefore, the Guilds typically follow his well-researched, more direct "suggestions". Lord Vetinari's political philosophy can be summed up by his belief that what people wish for most is not good government, or even justice, but merely for things to stay the same (Vetinari's family motto translating to "If it ain't broke, don't fix it"); Vetinari has an interest in keeping things in smooth, simple working order and does not destroy or remove things unnecessarily, such as seemingly frivolous but harmless ancient government departments or the palace gardens. This does not mean that there are absolutely no changes; things that don't work are fixed very quickly, even if it does not look like they are at first. He allowed the emergence of a free press and the Night Watch to form a guild, reserving judgement until later. He prefers to cow people into doing his bidding with persuasive arguments, and has rarely (if ever) been known to have innocent people just dragged off to dungeons without a trial (beyond the running joke of an intense hatred of mime artists, which is treated as a relatively mild quirk in-universe).
Morporkians are in no doubt that Vetinari is firmly in charge of the city; the political system of Ankh-Morpork is described as "One Man, One Vote," in which Vetinari alone is the Man, and he has the Vote. Despite this, his skill at judging and predicting people's behavior (e.g., Moist Von Lipwig or Samuel Vimes) means he often lets events play out under detached supervision, giving him a degree of plausible deniability if ever confronted. However, he is genuinely, broadly tolerant of individual rights unless said people place their own interests above those of the city. In Going Postal, an already suspicious Vetinari nonetheless avoids an investigation of the Grand Trunk company until public opinion allowed it, and only then did he proclaim his right as a "tyrant" to launch such an inquiry. Similarly in Making Money, he declines meddling in the affairs of private business, but suddenly exercises his executive power in closing several prominent banks for audit at the end of the novel. Beyond this, he arranges for useful but problematical people to "vanish" in one fashion or another (such as the pseudo-incarceration of genius Leonard of Quirm, the charismatic confidence trickster Moist Von Lipwig, or skilled forger Owlswick Jenkins) only to be press-ganged into working for himself and the city, though such options technically include the option to refuse, though to likely negative results.
In Thud!, his rule of the city is likened to a room full of tension, with people bickering and shouting at one another, and "in the middle of it all, one man, quietly doing his own thing". While not necessarily more popular than those who came before him (with a few genuine allies such as Carrot Ironfoundersson and Samuel Vimes) Lord Vetinari has maintained sound mind and judgment and thus stayed alive. He has achieved this by understanding most of his direct enemies and power-wielding opponents dislike each other even more, and arranges matters so that a reality which includes him as Patrician is slightly better than one which does not. There is general acknowledgement that very little goes on in the city that Vetinari does not know about. Thus, when a visitor stands in audience with the Patrician, they can be assured that Vetinari knows exactly why they're there, even if the visitor does not. Vetinari is even implied to organize grassroots resistance to himself, enabling him to ensure that all plots against him fail and that the various groups are constantly quarrelling with each other. This approach has been so effective he is one of the few people excluded from potential targeting from the Assassins' Guild out of concern for the resulting political chaos. Other reasons for the Patrician's continued rule include his mastery of diplomacy and manipulation, his distant and menacing air, his ever-present calmness and composure (which, ironically, make other people ill at ease), and his skills as an Assassin; in The Truth, another character relates that "Vetinari moved like a snake". Despite publicly denying their existence, Vetinari also uses a of team of information-gathering 'Dark Clerks', whose myriad jobs include accounting, forensic auditing, and domestic intelligence. It was established in Guards!, Guards! that Vetinari can communicate with the palace rats (granted accidental sentience from Unseen University's magical rubbish), who are loyal to him after being given conflict advice allowing them to become the dominant vermin of the palace.
Deposition and restoration Several attempts have been made on Vetinari's life or position; strangely enough, he seems to be involved or predicted them in advance. Shortly after his ascent to office, he was briefly turned into a lizard by a wizard under the influence of a Sourcerer. He was deposed for a time in favor of a pretender king and subsequently a summoned dragon (Guards! Guards!) and locked up in his own dungeons which were secretly designed to allow for escape at his leisure for just such an occasion. Nonetheless, he did not avoid a permanent injury during a botched assassination attempt in Men at Arms that forces him to use a cane; In Making Money he flatly denies the circulating rumor the cane held a sword made of iron collected from the blood of a thousand men, sarcastically pointing out to Moist how melodramatic and out of character that would be. He would later initially fall victim to an arsenic-poisoning plot in (Feet of Clay) but fakes subsequent symptoms, partially to demonstrate to the perpetrators the consequences of his deposing him including incurring the dogged wrath of Commander Vimes.
During the brief war with Klatch (Jingo), Vetinari unexpectedly surrenders to martial law and is put on trial for treason; his secret excursion throughout the story created a scenario where the Klatchian leader would organically lose face and position amongst his own people. Some time later (The Truth) Vetinari is framed for assault (on his secretary) and theft from the city treasury and once again comes within a hair's breadth from being deposed. He is arrested by his own Commander of the Watch (Samuel Vimes) for attempted murder and spends part of the book incarcerated, with William de Worde and Vimes finding the crime extremely suspicious (if only because any genuine attempt at murder by the Patrician would undoubtedly succeed) and using the arrest simply as a way to keep Vetinari safe until the actual mystery was solved). Vetinari feigns unconsciousness throughout the main events, only to "come to" once the mystery was solved.
Notable events during Vetinari's rule Vetinari has seen Ankh-Morpork through many unusual events, including the appearance of a Sourcerer (Sourcery), a dragon (Guards! Guards!), a near-civil war (Men at Arms), plus one actual war (Jingo) and an attempt to destroy the Discworld (The Last Hero), as well as the metaphysical crises of Moving Pictures, Music With Rocks In (Soul Music), superfluous life force and belief (Reaper Man, Hogfather), and one major temporal shatter (Thief of Time). It is unclear whether even the well-informed Vetinari was aware of the last.
Vetinari has encouraged the growth of the Guilds and public services. The Ankh-Morpork City Watch in particular has flourished, and is an excellent example of the adaptability which has kept Vetinari in office. At the time he rises to power, the Night Watch consists of three incompetents led by a drunk, just how he then wanted it (incapable of fighting crime, which was being efficiently controlled by the government-approved Thieves and Assassins Guilds). The group evolves into a large, efficient, well-oiled machine that facilitates the smooth operation of the city, and that appears to be just how he wants it. It is observed to him on one occasion that if Vimes (and presumably Vimes' Guards) did not exist, he would have had to invent him; to which he responds "You know,... I rather think I did" (Feet of Clay).