Dathon was a Tamarian captain during the late-24th century. In 2368, Dathon became the first of his race to successfully establish communication with the Federation when his ship rendezvoused with the USS Enterprise-D at El-Adrel IV and beamed both himself and Starfleet Captain Jean-Luc Picard down on the planet's surface to hunt an aggressive lifeform living there. He hoped that facing a common enemy would help them learn to communicate. Picard successfully learned to understand the Tamarian's metaphor-based language system, but Dathon was killed by the lifeform. (TNG episode: "Darmok")