| Children Children are also a part of the concept of being Gorean. This research is provided to show what the series has to say about them. First is a compilation using the word 'child' which also pulled up instances of 'children'. Following that is a compilation using the word 'youth'. It is not meant to be anything other than the facts of the matter. "The caste structure," said my father patiently, with perhaps the trace of a smile on his face, "is relatively immobile, but not frozen, and depends on more than birth. For example, if a child in his schooling shows that he can raise caste, as the expression is, he is permitted to do so. But, similarly, if a child does not show the aptitude expected of his caste, whether it be, say, that of physician or warrior, he is lowered in caste." Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 42 The ancestors of some of them might have been Chaldeans or Celts or Syrians or Englishmen brought to this world over a period of centuries from different civilizations. But the children, of course, and their children eventually became simply Gorean. In the long ages on Gor almost all traces of Earth origin had vanished. Occasionally, however, an English Word in Gorean, like "ax" or "ship," would delight me. Certain other expressions seemed clearly to be of Greek or German origin. Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 45 "A tarn-goad," he replied. He snapped the switch in the barrel to the "on" position and struck the table. It showered sparks in a sudden cascade of yellow light, but left the table unmarked. He turned off the goad and extended it to me. As I reached for it, he snapped it on and slapped it in my palm. A billion tiny yellow stars, like pieces of fiery needles, seemed to explode in my hand. I cried out in shock. I thrust my hand to my mouth. It had been like a sudden, severe electric charge, like the striking of a snake in my hand. I examined my hand, it was unhurt. "Be careful of a tarn-goad," said the Older Tarl. "It is not for children." I took it from him, this time being careful to take it near the leather loop, which I fastened around my wrist. Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 50 The tarn continued to climb, and I saw the City of Cylinders dropping far below me, like a set of rounded children's blocks set in the gleaming green hills. Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 56 We purchased a bottle of Ka-la-na wine and shared it as we walked through the streets. She begged a tenth of a tarn disk from me, and I gave it to her. Like a child she went to one or two stalls, making me look the other way. In a few minutes she returned, carrying a small package. Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 133 Around his neck he wore the golden chain of the Ubar, carrying the medallionlike replica of the Home Stone of Ar. In his hands he held the Stone itself, that humble source of so much strife, bloodshed and honor. He held it gently, as though it might have been a child. Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 154 Without realizing what I was doing, I had shaken the two restraining tarnsmen from my arms as if they had been children, and I rushed on Marlenus and struck him violently in the face with my fist, causing him to reel backward, his face contorted with astonishment and pain. Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 157 Pa-Kur, for his part, demanded and was granted the usual savage fees imposed by the Gorean conqueror. The population would be completely disarmed. Possession of a weapon would be regarded as a capital offense. Officers in the Warrior Caste and their families were to be impaled, and in the population at large every tenth man would be executed. The thousand most beautiful women of Ar would be given as pleasure slaves to Pa-Kur, for distribution among his highest officers. Of the other free women, the healthiest and most attractive thirty percent would be auctioned to his troops in the Street of Brands, the proceeds going to the coffers of Pa-Kur. A levy of seven thousand young men would be taken to fill the depleted ranks of his siege slaves. Children under twelve would be distributed at random among the free cities of Gor. As for the slaves of Ar, they would belong to the first man who changed their collar. Tarnsman of Gor Book 1 Page 188 – 189 Normally such plants are cleared from the sides of the roads and from inhabited areas. They are primarily dangerous to children and small animals, but a grown man who might lose his footing among them would not be likely to survive. Outlaw of Gor Book 2 Page 34 One looks into the blood in one's cupped hands. It is said that if one sees one's visage black and wasted one will die of disease, if one sees oneself torn and scarlet one will die in battle, if one sees oneself old and white haired, one will die in peace and leave children. Outlaw of Gor Book 2 Page 38 I missed the shrill, interminable calls of the vendors, each different; the good-natured banter of friends in the marketplace exchanging gossip and dinner invitations; the shouts of burly porters threading their way through the tumult; the cries of children escaped from their tutors and playing tag among the stalls; the laughter of veiled girls teasing and being teased by young men, girls purportedly on errands for their families, yet somehow finding the time to taunt the young swains of the city, if only by a flash of their dark eyes and a perhaps too casual adjustment of their veil. Outlaw of Gor Book 2 Page 67 The balance of mutual regard is always delicate and, statistically, it is improbable that it can long be maintained throughout an entire population. Accordingly, gradually exploiting, perhaps unconsciously, the opportunities afforded by the training of children and the affections of their men, the women of Tharna improved their position considerably over the generations, also adding to their social power the economic largesse of various funds and inheritances. Outlaw of Gor Book 2 Page 205 – 206 Kron seized my arm and guided me to a table near the center of the room. Holding Lara by the hand I followed him. Her eyes were stunned but like a child's were wide with curiosity. She had not known the men of Tharna could be like this. Outlaw of Gor Book 2 Page 224 The children of the Wagon Peoples are taught the saddle of the kaiila before they can walk. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 17 Here and there children ran between the wheels, playing with a cork ball and quiva, the object of the game being to strike the thrown ball. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 27 I was about to press Kamchak on this matter when we heard a sudden shout and the squealing of kaiila from among the wagons. I heard then the shouts of men and the cries of women and children. Kamchak lifted his head intently, listening. Then we heard the pounding of a small drum and two blasts on the horn of a bosk. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 33 Kamchak strode among the wagons, toward the sound, and I followed him closely. Many others, too, rushed to the sound, and we were jostled by armed warriors, scarred and fierce; by boys with unscarred faces, carrying the pointed sticks used often for goading the wagon bosk; by leather-clad women hurrying from the cooking pots; by wild, half-clothed children; even by enslaved Kajir-clad beauties of Turia; even the girl was there who wore but bells and collar, struggling under her burden, long dried strips of bosk meat, as wide as beams, she too hurrying to see what might be the meaning of the drum and horn, of the shouting Tuchuks. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 34 Watching us there were a few children, some men, some slave girls. As soon as Kamchak had agreed to Albrecht's proposal the children and several of the slave girls immediately began to rush toward the wagons, delightedly crying "Wager! Wager!" Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 65 – 66 In the crowd, on the back of a kaiila, I noted the girl Hereena, of the First Wagon, whom I had seen my first day in the camp of the Tuchuks, she who had almost ridden down Kamchak and myself between the wagons. She was a very exciting, vital, proud girl and the tiny golden nose ring, against her brownish skin, with her flashing black eyes, did not detract from her considerable but rather insolent beauty. She, and others like her, had been encouraged and spoiled from childhood in all their whims, unlike most other Tuchuk women, that they might be fit prizes, Kamchak had told me, in the games of Love War. Turian warriors, he told me, enjoy such women, the wild girls of the Wagons. A young man, blondish-haired with blue eyes, unscarred, bumped against the girl's stirrup in the press of the crowd. She struck him twice with the leather quirt in her hand, sharply, viciously. I could see blood on the side of his neck, where it joins the shoulder. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 67 Some two hours later we reached the encampment of the Tuchuks and made our way among the wagons and the cooking pots and playing children. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 134 The "w" sound, incidentally, is a complex one, and, like many such sounds, is best learned only during the brief years of childhood when a child's linguistic flexibility is at its maximum, those years in which it might be trained to speak any of the languages of man with native fluency a capacity which is, for most individuals at least, lost long prior to attaining their majority. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 174 I heard a child screaming its disgust at being thrust in the wagon. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 176 A woman carrying a market basket moved to one side, watching him, that she might not touch him, holding a child to her. Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 7 The word actually cried was “Kaissa,” which is Gorean for “Game.” . . . . . . even children find among their playthings the pieces of the game . . . It is not unusual to find even children of twelve or fourteen years who play with a depth and sophistication, a subtlety and a brilliance, that might be the envy of the chess masters of Earth. Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 26 – 27 I whispered in Gorean to Ho-Tu, as though I could not understand what was transpiring. “What is he doing with them?” Ho-Tu shrugged. “He is teaching them they are slaves,” he said. “I remember the lash,” said Phyllis. “Phyllis remembers the lash,” corrected Flaminius. “I am not a child!” she cried. “You are a slave,” said Flaminius. Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 131 “Once,” she said, “for Kajuralia, many years ago, I was mated.” “Do you know with whom?” I asked. “No,” she said. “I was hooded.” She shuddered. “He was brought in from the streets,” she said. “I remember him. The tiny body, swollen. The small, clumsy hands. His whining and giggling. The men at table laughed very loudly. It was doubtless quite amusing.” “What of the child?” I asked. “I bore it,” she said, “but, once more hooded, I never saw it. It was surely, considering its sire, a monster.” She shuddered. Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 253 I fell down several times but the cart did not stop; each time I managed to regain my feet, though sometimes I was dragged for several yards before, nearly strangling, I managed to get up once more. Twice children tripped me; at least twice one of the guards with the butt of his spear did so. They laughed. Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 283 The crowd was stirring in the stands. The caste colors of Gor seemed turbulent in the high tiers. Men rushed here and there securing the clay disks confirming their bets. Hawkers cried their wares. Here and there children ran about. The sky was a clear blue, dotted by clouds. The sun was shining. It was a good day for the races. Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 361 Some of the riders of the Steels, I recalled, seeing it among the belongings of Gladius of Cos, had jested with me about it, asking if it were a toy, or perhaps a training bow for a child; these men, of course, had never, on kaiilaback, and it is just as well for them, met Tuchuks. Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 366 There were tears in the eyes of those about me, and my own eyes were not dry as well. I heard a child ask his father, “Father, who is that man?” “He is Marlenus,” said the father. “He has come home. He is Ubar of Ar.” Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 377 My ankles had been unbound only long enough to push me stumbling from the rush craft, among the shouting women and men and children, to the throne of Ho-Hak. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 14 Over her shoulder were slung the four birds she had caught in the marshes, their necks were now broken and they were tied together, two in front and two over her back. There were other women about as well, and here and there, peering between the adults I could see children. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 16 I did not even much care that I might spend the rest of my life as an abject slave, abused on a rence island, the sport of a girl or children, the butt of cruelty and jests of men. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 30 The smaller children played together, the boys playing games with small nets and reed marsh spears, the girls with rence dolls, or some of the older ones sporting with throwing sticks, competing against one another. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 41 There were children about the periphery of the circles but many of them were already asleep on the rence. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 43 The bantering of the young people in the morning, and the display of the girls in the evening, for in effect in the movements of the dance every woman is nude, have both, I expect, institutional roles to play in the life of the rence growers, significant roles analogous to the roles of dating, display and courtship in the more civilized environments of my native world, Earth. It marks the end of a childhood when a girl is first sent to the circle. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 46 Everywhere about us there were shouting men, screaming women, running, crying children, and everywhere, it seemed, the men of Port Kar, and their slaves, holding torches aloft, burning like the eyes of predators in the marsh night. A boy ran past. It was he who had given me a piece of rence cake in the morning, when I had been bound at the pole, who had been punished by his mother for so doing. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 53 I took the child in my arms and walked down to the shore of the rence island. I looked westward, the direction that had been taken by the heavily laden barges of the slavers of Port Kar. I kissed the child. “Did you know him?” asked Telima. I threw the body into the marsh. “Yes,” I said. “He was once kind to me.” Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 66 “Is that why you have saved them, from the men of Port Kar?” I looked at her in fury. “There was a child,” I said, “one who was once kind to me.” “You have done all this,” she asked, “because a child was once kind to you?” “Yes,” I said. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 82 “The child,” she said, “is bound. It is in pain. It is doubtless thirsty and hungry.” I turned and made my way to the second barge. I found the child, a boy, perhaps of five years of age, blond like many of the rencers, and blue-eyed. I cut him free, and took him in my arms. I found his mother and cut her free, telling her to feed the child and give water to it. Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 83 The men shouted. Women cursed, and screamed their hatred of the panther girls. Children cried out and pelted them with pebbles. Slave girls in the crowd rushed forward to surge about the carts, to poke at them with sticks, strike them with switches and spit upon them. Captive of Gor Book 7 Page 213 There must have been two hundred or more peasants, men, children and women, all shouting, and beating on their kettles or pans. The women and children carried sticks and switches, the men spears, flails, forks and clubs. They were too close together, there were too many of them! A child saw me and he cried out and began to beat more loudly on his pan. Captive of Gor Book 7 Page 249 Women and children, too, in the dusty square crowded about. I heard some clanging of pans. I saw sticks in the hands of some of the children. Captive of Gor Book 7 Page 253 It could perhaps be mentioned that such work, cooking, cleaning and laundering, and such, is commonly regarded as being beneath even free women, particularly those of high caste. In the high cylinders, in Gorean cities, there are often public slaves who tend the central kitchens in cylinders, care for the children, but may not instruct them, and, for a tiny fee to the city, clean compartments and do laundering. Captive of Gor Book 7 Page 317 There was little sugar in the forest, save naturally in certain berries, and simple hard candies, such as a child might buy in shops in Ar, or Ko-ro-ba, were, among the panther girls in the remote forests, prized. Hunters of Gor Book 8 Page 31 Men, and women and children, were lining the side street, and others were pouring in from the street before the tavern. We heard the beating of a drum and the playing of flutes. “What is going on?” I asked a fellow, of the metal workers. “It is a judicial enslavement,” he said. Hunters of Gor Book 8 Page 48 That he had once played a man such as Scormus of Ar or Centius of Cos is the sort of thing that a Gorean grandfather will boast of to his grandchildren. Hunters of Gor Book 8 Page 148 . . . lastly, they should make greater appeal to women than they do, for, in most Gorean cities, women, of one sort or another, care for and instruct the children in the crucial first years. That would be the time to imprint them, while innocent and trusting, at the mother’s or nurse’s knee, with superstitions which might, in simpler brains, subtly control then the length of their lives. So simple an adjustment as the promise of eternal life to women who behaved in accordance with their teachings, instructing the young and so on, might have much effect. But the initiates, like many Gorean castes, were tradition bound. Marauders of Gor Book 9 Page 30 I looked into the hungry eyes of a child, clinging in a sack to its mother’s back. She kept nodding her head in prayer. Marauders of Gor Book 9 Page 33 When the war arrow is carried, of course, all free men are to respond; in such a case the farm may suffer, and his companion and children know great hardship; in leaving his family, the farmer, weapons upon his shoulder, speaks simply to them. “The war arrow has been carried to my house,” he tells them. Marauders of Gor Book 9 Page 142 . . . the tiny, six-toed rock tharlarion of southern Torvaldsland, favored for their legs and tails, which are speared by children. Marauders of Gor Book 9 Page 152 It seemed first a ghastly infection, a plague; then it seemed like a fire, invisible and consuming; then it seemed like the touching of these men by the hands of gods, but no gods I knew, none to whom a woman or child might dare pray, but the gods of men, and of the men of Torvaldsland, the dread, harsh divinities of the cruel north, the gods of Torvaldsland. Marauders of Gor Book 9 Page 247 Some of the peppers and spices, relished even by children in the Tahari districts, were sufficient to convince an average good fellow of Thentis or Ar that the roof of his mouth and his tongue were being torn out of his head. Tribesmen of Gor Book 10 Page 46 Once she stole a date. I did not whip her. I chained her, arms over her head, back against the trunk, to a flahdah tree. I permitted nomad children to discomfit her. They are fiendish little beggars. They tickled her with the lanceolate leaves of the tree. They put honey about her, to attract the tiny black sand flies, which infest such water holes in the spring. Tribesmen of Gor Book 10 Page 81 When she had left the room she had used the runner at the side of the room. Rooms in private dwellings, in the Tahari, if rich, usually are floored with costly rugs. The rooms are seldom crossed directly, in order to prevent undue wear on the rugs; long strips of ruglike material line the edges of the room; these are commonly used in moving from room to room; children, servants, slaves, women, commonly negotiate the rooms by keeping on the runners, near the walls. Men commonly do also, if guests are not present. Tribesmen of Gor Book 10 Page 157 The children of nomads, both male and female, until they are five or six years of age, wear no clothing. During the day they do not venture from the shade of the tents. At night, as the sun goes down, they emerge happily from the tents and romp and play. They are taught written Taharic by their mothers, who draw the characters in the sand, during the day, in the shade of the tents. Most of the nomads in this area were Tashid, which is a tribe vassal to the Aretai. It might be of interest to note that children of the nomads are suckled for some eighteen months, which is nearly twice the normal length of time for Earth infants, and half again the normal time for Gorean infants. These children, if it is significant, are almost, uniformly secure in their families, sturdy, outspoken and serf-reliant. Among the nomads, interestingly, an adult will always listen to a child. He is of the tribe. Another habit of nomads, or of nomad mothers, is to frequently bathe small children, even if it is only with a cloth and a cup of water. There is a very low infant mortality rate among nomads, in spite of their limited diet and harsh environment. Tribesmen of Gor Book 10 Page 170 – 171 To indicate the greater significance of the evening meal, as compared to the other Gorean meals, no slave girl may touch it without first having been given permission, assuming that a free man or woman, even a child, is present. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 74 Normally mating takes place among caste members, but if the mating is of mixed caste, the woman may elect to retain caste, which is commonly done, or be received into the caste of the male companion. Caste membership of the children born of such a union is a function of the caste of the father. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 213 Gorean culture tends to view the body, its development, its appetites and needs, with congeniality. We do not grow excited about the growth of trees, and Goreans do not grow excited about the growth of people. In some respects the Goreans are, perhaps, cruel. Yet they have never seen fit, through lies, to inflict suffering on children. They seem generally to me to be fond of children. Perhaps that is why they seldom hurt them. Even slave children, incidentally, are seldom abused or treated poorly, and are given much freedom, until they reach their young adulthood. It is then, of course, that they are taught that they are slaves. Men come, and the young male is tied and taken to the market. If the young slave is a female she may or may not be sent to a market. Many young slave maidens are raised almost as daughters in a home. It is often a startling and frightening day for such a girl when, one morning, she finds herself suddenly, unexpectedly, put in a collar and whipped, and made to begin to pay the price of her now-blossomed slave beauty. Beasts of Gor Book 12 Page 155 Sometimes a girl, winning love, is freed, perhaps to bear the children of a former master. Beasts of Gor Book 12 Page 235 I did know the red hunters were extremely permissive with their children, even among Goreans. They very seldom scolded them and would almost never strike a child. They protected them as they could. Soon enough the children would learn. Until that time let them be children. Beasts of Gor Book 12 Page 266 Most families in Port Kar own their own boats. These boats are generally shallow-drafted, narrow and single-oared, the one oar being used to both propel and guide the boat. Even children use these boats. Explorers of Gor Book 13 Page 61 Any person on the street, seeing us, would know what we were. Even children would know us as mere slaves, for, categorically, and legally, that is what we would be. Rouge of Gor Book 15 Page 212 In a family house, of course, girls are almost always modestly garbed. Children of many houses might be startled if they could see the transformation which takes place in their pretty Didi or Lale, whom they know as their nurse, governess and playmate, when she is, in their absence or after their bedtime, ordered to the chamber of one of the young masters, there to dance lasciviously before him, and then to be had, and as a slave. Guardsman of Gor Book 16 Page 106 The children that we passed in the streets, playing at marbles or stone toss, scarcely glanced up. Two children, however, one boy and one girl, did run and strike the slave. She started, and squirmed, on my shoulder under the blows. I did not admonish the children. First, it was nothing to me that they had struck her, for she was a slave. Secondly, they were free persons, and free persons on Gor may do much what they please. It is slaves who must be careful of their behavior, lest free persons find it displeasing. The boy who had struck her, I believe, had been in a fit of ill temper. I think he had just lost at stone toss. The girl, on the other hand, I think, had had far different motivations. She had not been involved in the game, but had only been watching it. Yet she had struck the slave by far the cruelest blow. Already she had learned, as a free woman, that female slaves are to be despised and beaten. Guardsman of Gor Book 16 Page 197 A child is often put on kaiilaback, its tiny hands clutching the silken neck, before it can walk. Savages of Gor Book 17 Page 47 “You, yourself,” I said, “do not seem much infected by the lunacy of the Waniyanpi.” “No,” she said. “I am not. I have had red masters. From them I have learned new truths. Too, I was taken from the community at an early age.” “How old were you?” I asked. “I was taken from the enclosure when I was eight years old,” she said, “taken home by a Kaiila warrior as a pretty little white slave for his ten-year-old son. I learned early to please and placate men.” “What happened?” I asked. “There is little more to tell,” she said. “For seven years I was the slave of my young master. He was kind to me, and protected me, muchly, from the other children. Although I was only his slave, I think he liked me. He did not put me in a leg stretcher until I was fifteen.” Savages of Gor Book 17 Page 236 Some of these rode kaiila to which travois were attached. Some had cradles slung about the pommels of their saddles. These cradles, most of them, are essentially wooden frames on which are fixed leather, open-fronted enclosures, opened and closed by lacings, for the infant. The wooden frame projects both above and below the enclosure for the infant. In particular it contains two sharpened projections at the top, like picket spikes, extending several inches above the point where the baby’s head will be located. This is to protect the infant’s head in the event of the cradle falling, say, from the back of a running kaiila. Such a cradle will often, in such a case, literally stick upside down in the earth. The child, then, laced in the enclosure, protected and supported by it, is seldom injured. Such cradles, too, vertical, are often hung from a lodge pole or in the branches of a tree. In the tree, of course, the wind, in its rocking motion, can lull the infant to sleep. Older children often ride on the skins stretched between travois poles. Sometimes their fathers or mothers carry them before them, on the kaiila. When a child is about six, if his family is well-fixed, he will commonly have his own kaiila. The red savage, particularly the males, will usually be a skilled rider by the age of seven. Bareback riding, incidentally, is common in war and the hunt. In trading and visiting, interestingly, saddles are commonly used. This is perhaps because they can be decorated lavishly, adding to one’s appearance, and may serve, in virtue of the pommel, primarily, as a support for provisions, gifts and trade articles. “It is simply splendid,” said Cuwignaka, happily. “Yes,” I said. Children, too, I noted, those not in cradles, greased, their hair braided, their bodies and clothing ornamented, in splendid finery, like miniature versions of the adults, some riding, some sitting on the skins stretched between travois poles, participated happily and proudly, or bewilderedly, in this handsome procession. Blood Brothers of Gor Book 18 Page 26 From the lodges near the edge of the escarpment men again drew forth travois. On these were great bundles of arrows, hundreds of arrows in a bundle. Many of these arrows were not fine arrows. Many lacked even points and were little more than featherless, sharpened sticks. Yet, impelled with force from the small, fierce bows of the red savages at short range, they, too, would be dangerous. For days warriors, and women and children, had been making them. Blood Brothers of Gor Book 18 Page 415 The people of Corcyrus, it was clear, had welcomed the men of from Ar, as liberators. The colors of Argentum and of Ar, on ribbons and strips of cloth, angled from windows and festooned, even being stretched between windows and rooftops overhead, the triumphal way. Such colors, too, were prominent in the crowd, on garments being waved, fluttering, by citizens and sometimes even children, perched on the shoulders of adults. Kajira of Gor Book 19 Page 189 “We wish you well, noble captain,” said Chino, shaking Petrucchio’s hand, warmly. “I do not think we shall soon forget our chance encounter with the great Captain Petrucchio.” “That is for certain,” said Lecchio. “Few do,” Petrucchio admitted. “May we have your permission to tell our children and our grandchildren about this?” inquired Chino. “Yes,” said Petrucchio. “Thank you,” said Chino. “It is nothing,” said Petrucchio, as though it might really have been nothing, the bestowal of so priceless a right. Players of Gor Book 20 Page 315 Then Genserix reached down and lifted up the child. The women cried out with pleasure and the men grunted with approval. Genserix held the child up now, happily, it almost lost in his large hands, and then he lifted it up high over his head. “Ho!” called the warriors, standing up, rejoicing. The women beamed. “It is a son!” cried one of the women. “Yes,” said Genserix. “It is a son!” “Ho!” called the warriors. “Ho!” “What is going on?” asked Feiqa. “The child has been examined,” I said. “It has been found sound. It will be permitted to live. It is now an Alar. Too, he has lifted the child up. In this he acknowledges it as his own.” Genserix then handed the child to one of the warriors. He then drew his knife. “What is he going to do?” gasped Feiqa. “Be quiet,” I said. Genserix then, carefully, made two incisions in the face of the infant, obliquely, one on each cheek. The infant began to cry. Blood ran down the sides of its face, about the sides of its neck and onto its tiny shoulders. “Let it be taken now,” said Genserix, “to its mother.” The woman who had brought the child to the side of the fire now took up the blanket in which it had been wrapped, and, wrapping it again in its folds, took it then from the warrior, and made her way back to the wagon. “These are a warrior people,” I said to Feiqa, “and the child is an Alar. It must learn to endure wounds before it receives the nourishment of milk.” Mercenaries of Gor Book 21 Page 46 – 47 Feiqa was kneeling before a boy, perhaps some eleven or twelve years of age. His face was dirty. He was barefoot, and in rags. I assumed he must live in the rooms somewhere. Feiqa, a full-grown and beautiful female, but a slave, put down her head and, doing him obeisance, kissed his feet, and fearfully, and humbly. He was a free person, and a male. Mercenaries of Gor Book 21 Page 277 Twice some children addressed themselves to the coffle, jeering its captives, spitting upon them, stinging them with hurled pebbles, rushing forward, even, to lash at them with switches. Already, it seemed, to these children, the women were no more than mere slaves. Magicians of Gor Book 25 Page 162 Youth It was said a youth of the Wagon Peoples was taught the bow, the quiva and the lance before their parents would consent to give him a name, for names are precious among the Wagon Peoples, as among Goreans in general, and they are not to be wasted on someone who is likely to die, one who cannot well handle the weapons of the hunt and war. Until the youth has mastered the bow, the quiva and the lance he is simply known as the first, or the second, and so on, son of such and such a father. Nomads of Gor Book 4 Page 11 “Young warrior,” asked Hassan, of a youth, no more than eight, “have you heard aught of a tower of steel?” His sister, standing behind him, laughed. Verr moved about them, brushing against their legs. The boy went to the kaiila of Alyena. “Dismount, Slave,” he said to her. She did so and knelt before him, a free male. The boy’s sister crowded behind him. Verr bleated. “Put back your hood and strip yourself to the waist,” said the boy. Alyena shook loose her hair; she then dropped her cloak back, and removed her blouse. “See how white she is!” said the nomad girl. “Pull down your skirt,” said the boy. Alyena, furious, did so, it lying over her calves. “How white!” said the nomad girl. The boy walked about her, and took her hair in his hands. “Look,” said he to his sister, “silky, fine and yellow, and long.” She, too, felt the hair. The boy then walked before Alyena. “Look up,” said he. Alyena lifted her eyes, regarding him. “See,” said he to his sister, bending down. “She has blue eyes!” “She is white, and ugly,” said the girl, standing up, backing off. “No,” said the boy, “she is pretty.” “If you like white girls,” said his sister. “Is she expensive?” asked the boy of Hassan. “Yes,” said Hassan, “young warrior. Do you wish to bid for her?” “My father will not yet let me own a girl,” said the youngster. “Ah,” said Hassan, understanding. “But when I grow up,” said he. “I shall become a raider, like you, and have ten such girls. When I see one I want, I will carry her away, and make her my slave.” He looked at Hassan. “They will serve me well, and make me happy.” “She is ugly,” said the boy’s sister. “Her body is white.” “Is she a good slave?” asked the boy of Hassan. “She is a stupid, miserable girl,” said Hassan, “who must be often beaten.” “Too bad,” said the boy. “Tend the verr,” said his sister, unpleasantly. “If you were mine,” said the boy to Alyena, “I would tolerate no nonsense from you. I would make you be a perfect slave.” “Yes, Master,” said Alyena, stripped before him, her teeth gritted. “You may clothe yourself,” said the boy. “Thank you, Master,” said Alyena. Tribesmen of Gor Book 10 Page 171 – 172 Goreans seldom have cavities. I am not certain what the reasons for this are. In part it is doubtless a matter of a plainer, simpler diet, containing less sugar; in part, I suspect, the culture, too, may have a role to play, as it is a culture in which undue chemical stress, through guilt and worry, is not placed on the system either in the prepubertal or pubertal years. Gorean youth, like the youth of Earth, encounter their difficulties in growing up but the culture, or cultures, have not seen fit to implicitly condition them into regarding the inevitable effects of maturation as either suspect, deplorable or insidious. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 27 Young men and women of the city, when coming of age, participate in a ceremony which involves the swearing of oaths, and the sharing of bread, fire and salt. In this ceremony the Home Stone of the city is held by each young person and kissed. Only then are the laurel wreath and the mantle of citizenship conferred. This is a moment no young person of Ar forgets. The youth of Earth have no Home Stone. Citizenship, interestingly, in most Gorean cities is conferred only upon the coming of age, and only after certain examinations are passed. Further, the youth of Gor, in most cities, must be vouched for by citizens of the city, not related in blood to him, and be questioned before a committee of citizens, intent upon determining his worthiness or lack thereof to take the Home Stone of the city as his own. Citizenship in most Gorean communities is not something accrued in virtue of the accident of birth but earned in virtue of intent and application. The sharing of a Home Stone is no light thing in a Gorean city. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 394 The youth of Tharna is usually bred from women temporarily freed for purposes of their conception, then reenslaved. In Tharnan law a person conceived by a free person on a free person is considered to be a free person, even if they are later carried and borne by a slave. In many other cities this is different, the usual case being that the offspring of a slave is a slave, and belongs to the mother’s owner. The education, however, of the Tharnan youth differs on a sexual basis. The boys are raised to be men, and masters, and the girls to be women, and slaves. The boys, as a portion of the Home Stone Ceremony, take an oath of mastery, in which they swear never to surrender the dominance which is rightfully theirs by nature. It is in this ceremony, also, that they receive the two yellow cords commonly worn in the belt of a male Tharnan. These cords, each about eighteen inches long, are suitable for the binding of a female, hand and foot. In the same ceremony the young women of Tharna are also brought into the presence of the Home Stone. They, however, are not permitted to kiss or touch it. Then, in its presence they are stripped and collared. Vagabonds of Gor Book 24 Page 267 A surrogate stone was subsequently used for the ceremony of citizenship. Certain youth refused then to participate in the ceremony and certain others, refusing to touch the surrogate stone, uttered the responses and pledges while facing northwest, toward Cos, toward their Home Stone. Magicians of Gor Book 25 Page 163 Indeed, a good portion of the civilian militia had been composed of such fellows, and youth, many not old enough to know how to handle a weapon. Magicians of Gor Book 25 Page 242 |