'Ho!' cried Torm, that most
improbable member of the Caste of Scribes, throwing his blue
robes over his head. ~Tarnsmen of Gor
" 'Al-Ka!' said Torm,
pointing one long, authoritative finger at the sign. 'Al-Ka,' he
said. 'Al-Ka,' I repeated. We looked at one another, and
both of us laughed. A tear of amusement formed along the side of
his sharp nose, and his pale blue eyes twinkled. I had
begun to learn the Gorean alphabet." ~Tarnsmen of
Gor - Page 38
"Oddly enough, there
was little religious instruction, other than to encourage awe of
the Priest-Kings, and what there was, Torm refused to administer,
insisting it was the province of the Initiates. Religious
matters on this world tend to be rather carefully guarded by the
Caste of Initiates, who allow members of other castes little
participation in their sacrifices and ceremonies. I was given
some prayers to the Priest-Kings to memorize, but they were in
Old Gorean, a language cultivated by the Initiates but not
spoken generally on the planet, and I never bothered to learn
them. To my delight, I learned that Torm, whose memory was
phenomenal, had forgotten them years ago. I sensed that a
certain distrust existed between the Caste of Scribes and the
Caste of Initiates." ~ Tarnsmen of Gor
"I was also instructed
in the Double Knowledge - that is, I was instructed in what the
people, on the whole, believed, and then I was instructed in
what the intellectuals were expected to know. Sometimes there
was a surprising discrepancy between the two. For example, the
population as a whole, the castes below the High Castes, were
encouraged to believe that their world was a broad flat disc.
Perhaps this was to discourage them from exploration or to
develop in them a habit of relying on common-sense prejudices -
something of a social control device. On the other hand, the
High Castes, specifically the Warriors, Builders, Scribes,
Initiates and Physicians, were told the truth in such matters,
perhaps because it was thought they would eventually determine
it for themselves, from observations such as the shadow of their
planet on one or another of Gor's three small moons during
eclipses, the phenomenon of sighting the tops of distant objects
first, and the fact that certain stars could not be seen from
certain geographical positions; if the planet had been flat,
precisely the same set of stars would have been observable from
every position on its surface." ~ Tarnsmen of Gor - Page
41
"The scribes, of course,
are the scholars and clerks of Gor, and there divisions and
rankings within the group, from simple copiers to the savants of
the city." ~ Tarnsmen of Gor
"The Chamber of the
Council is the room in which the elected representatives of the
High Castes of Ko-ro-ba hold their meetings. Each city has such
a chamber. It was in the widest of cylinders, and the ceiling
was at least six times the height of the normal living level.
The ceiling was lit as if by stars, and the walls were of five
colours, applied laterally, beginning from the bottom - white,
blue, yellow, green, and red, caste colours. Benches of stone,
on which the members of the Council sat, rose in five monumental
tiers about the walls, one tier for each of the High Castes.
These tiers shared the colour of that portion of the wall behind
them, the caste colours.
The tier nearest the floor, which denoted some preferential
status, the white tier, was occupied by Initiates, Interpreters
of the Will of Priest-Kings. In order, the ascending tiers, blue,
yellow, green, and red, were occupied by representatives of the
Scribes, Builders, Physicians, and Warriors." ~
Tarnsmen of Gor
"When I returned to
Ko-ro-ba with Talena, a great feast was held and we celebrated
our Free Companionship. A holiday was declared, and the city was
ablaze with light and song. Shimmering strings of bells pealed
in the wind, and festive lanterns of a thousand colors swung
from the innumerable flower-strewn bridges. there was shouting,
and laughter, and the glorious colors of the castes of Gor,
mingled equally in the cylinders. Gone for the night was even
the distinction of master and slave, and many a wretch in
bondage would see the dawn as a free man. To my delight, even
Torm of the Caste of Scribes, appeared at the tables, I was
honored that the little scribe had separated himself from his
beloved scrolls long enough to share my happiness, only that of
a warrior. He was wearing a new robe and sandals, perhaps for
the first time in years. He clasped my hands, and, to my wonder,
the little scribe was crying. And then in his joy, he turned to
Talena and in gracious salute lifted the symbolic cup of
Ka-la-na wine to her beauty. Talena and I swore to honor that
day as long as either of us lived. I have tried to keep that
promise, and I know that she has done so as well. That night,
that glorious night, was a night of flowers, torches, and
Ka-la-na wine, and late, after sweet hours of love, we fell
asleep in each other's arms." ~ Tarnsmen of Gor
"Four times a year,
correlated with the solstices and equinoxes, there are fairs
held in the plains below the mountains, presided over by
committees of Initiates, fairs in which men of many cities
mingle without bloodshed, times of truce, times of contests and
games, of bargaining and marketing.
Torm, my friend of the Caste of Scribes, had been to such fairs
to trade scrolls with scholars from other cities, men he would
never have seen were it not for the fairs, me of hostile cities
who yet loved ideas more than they hated their enemies, men like
Torm who so loved learning that they would risk the perilous
journey to the Sardar Mountains for the chance to dispute a text
or haggle over a coveted scroll. Similarly men of such castes as
the Physicians and Builders make use of the fairs to disseminate
and exchange information pertaining to their respective crafts.
The fairs do much to unite intellectually the otherwise so
isolated cities of Gor. And I speculate that the fairs likewise
do their bit toward stabilizing the dialects of Gor, which might
otherwise in a few generations have diverged to the point of
being mutually unintelligible - for the Goreans do have this in
common, their mother tongue in all its hundred permutations,
which they simply refer to as the Language, and all who fail to
speak it, regardless of their pedigree or background, of their
standards or level of civilization, are regarded as almost
beyond the pale of humanity." ~ Outlaws of Gor
" 'Is this the will of
the Priest-Kings?' asked a voice.
'If it is the will of the Priest-Kings,' I said, 'let it be done.'
And then I raised my hands again and standing on the windlass
over the shaft, blown by the wind, with the moons of Gor above
me, I cried. 'And if it be not the will of the Priest-Kings -
still let it be done!' 'Let it be done,' said the heavy voice of
Kron.
'Let it be done,' said the men, first one and then another,
until there was a sober chorus of assent, quiet but powerful,
and I knew that never before in this harsh world had men spoken
thus. And it seemed strange to me that this rebellion, this
willingness to pursue the right as they saw it, independently of
the will of the Priest-Kings, had come not first from the proud
Warriors of Gor, nor the Scribes, nor the Builders nor the
Physicians, nor any of the high castes of the many cities of
Gor, but had come from the most degraded and despised of men,
wretched slaves from the mines of Tharna." ~ Outlaws
of Gor
"Further, members of
castes such as the Physicians and Builders use the fairs for the
dissemination of information and techniques among Caste
Brothers, as is prescribed in their codes in spite of the fact
that their respective cities may be hostile. And as might be
expected members of the Caste of Scribes gather here to enter
into dispute and examine and trade manuscripts." ~
Priest Kings of Gor
"My small friend, Torm
of Ko-ro-ba, of the Caste of Scribes, had been to the fairs four
times in his life. He informed me that in this time he had
refuted seven hundred and eight scribes from fifty-seven cities,
but I will not vouch for the accuracy of this report, as I
sometimes suspect that Torm, like most members of his caste, and
mine, tends to be a bit too sanguine in recounting his numerous
victories. Moreover I have never been too clear as to the
grounds on which the disputes of scribes are to be adjudicated,
and it is not too infrequently that both disputants leave the
field each fully convinced that he has the best of the contest.
In differences among member of my own caste, that of the
Warriors, it is easier to tell who has carried the day, for the
defeated one often lies wounded or slain at the victor's feet.
In the contests of scribes, on the other hand, the blood that is
spilled is invisible and the valiant foemen retire in good
order, reviling their enemies and recouping their forces for the
next day's campaign. I do not hold this against the contests of
scribes; rather I commend it to the members of my own caste."
~ Priest Kings of Gor
"It took not much time
to purchase a small bundle of supplies to take into the Sardar,
nor was it difficult to find a scribe to whom I might entrust
the history of the events in Tharna. I did not ask his name nor
he mine. I knew his caste, and he knew mine, and it was enough.
He could not read the manuscript as it was written in English, a
language as foreign to him as Gorean would be to most of you,
but yet he would treasure the manuscript and guard it as though
it were a most precious possession, for he was a scribe and it
is the way of scribes to love the written word and keep it from
harm, and if he could not read the manuscript, what did it
matter - perhaps someone could someday, and then the words which
had kept their secret for so long would at last enkindle the
mystery of communication and what had been written would be
heard and understood." ~ Priest Kings of Gor
"My Chamber Slave's
accent had been pure High Caste Gorean though I could not place
the city. Probably her caste had been that of the Builders or
Physicians, for had her people been Scribes I would have
expected a greater subtlety of inflections, the use of less
common grammatical cases; and had her people been of the
Warriors I would have expected a blunter speech, rather
belligerently simple, expressed in great reliance on the
indicative mood and, habitually, a rather arrogant refusal to
venture beyond the most straightforward of sentence structures.
On the other hand these generalisations are imperfect, for
Gorean speech is no less complex than that of any of the great
natural language communities of the Earth nor are its speakers
any the less diverse. It is, incidentally, a beautiful language;
it can be as subtle as Greek; as direct as Latin; as expressive
as Russian; as rich as English; as forceful as German. To the
Goreans it is always, simply, The Language, as though there were
no others, and those who do not speak it are regarded
immediately as barbarians. This sweet, fierce, liquid speech is
the common bond that tends to hold together the Gorean world. It
is the common property of the Administrator of Ar, a herdsman
beside the Vosk, a peasant from Tor, a scribe from Thentis, a
metalworker from Tharna, a physician from Cos, a pirate from
Port Kar, a warrior from Ko-ro-ba." ~ Priest Kings
of Gor
"The Wagon Peoples, of
all those on Gor that I know, are the only ones that have a clan
of torturers, trained as carefully as scribes or physicians, in
the arts of detaining life." ~ Nomads of Gor
"From these raids the
Wagon Peoples obtain a miscellany of goods which they are
willing to barter to the Turians, jewels, precious metals,
spices, colored table salts, harnesses and saddles for the
ponderous tharlarion, furs of small river animals, tools for the
field, scholarly scrolls, inks and papers, root vegetables,
dried fish, powdered medicines, ointments, perfume and women..."
~ Nomads of Gor - Page 57
"It might be mentioned,
for those unaware of the fact, that the Caste of Merchants is
not considered one of the traditional five High Castes of Gor
the Initiates, Scribes, Physicians, Builders and Warriors. Most
commonly, and doubtless unfortunately, it is only members of the
five high castes who occupy positions on the High Councils of
the cities. ~ Nomads of Gor
"I permitted her, of
course, but a single garment, but I allowed it to be opaque, and
of the blue of the Scribes. It was sleeveless and felll to just
above her knees. Her collar, however, that she might not grow
pretentious was a simple steel. It read, as I wished, I BELONG
TO BOSK." ~ Raiders of Gor
"Chronometers exist on
Gor, but they are rare and valuable. Marcus and I did not have
any, of intent, at the time, among our belongings. They would
not haev seemed to fit in well with our guise as auxiliary
guardsmen. In many cities, of course, including Ar, time tends
to be kept publicly. Official clocks are adjusted, of course,
according to the announcements of scribes, in virtue of various
astronomical measurements, having to do with the movements of
the sun and stars. The calendar, and adjustments in it, are also
results of their researches, promulgated by civil authorities.
The average Gorean has variety of simple devices at his disposal
for making the passage of time. Typical among them are marked,
or calibrated, candles, sun dials, sand glasses, clepsydras, and
oil clocks." ~ Magicians of Gor