The Caste of Musicians

Gordon - Dancer
Too, my former master, Gordon, had paid fifty copper tarsks for me, and this was undoubtedly a great deal of money for him. Surely that should count for something. He was only an impoverished itinerant musician.
Dancer

Czehar Player
Flutists
Kalika Player
Drummers
Player of miscellaneous instruments
Among Gorean musicians, incidentally, czehar players have the most prestige; there was only one in this group, I noted, and he was their leader; next follow the flutists and then the players of the kalika; the players of the drums come next; and the farthest fellow down the list is the man who keeps the bag. of miscellaneous instruments, playing them and parceling them out to others as needed.
Nomads

One hires a warrior for one thing, one hires a scribe for another. One does not expect a scribe to know the sword. Why, then, should one expect the warrior to know the pen? An excellent example of this sort of thing is the caste of musicians which has, as a whole, resisted many attempts to develop and standardize a musical notation. Songs and melodies tend to be handed down within the caste, from one generation to another. If something is worth playing, it is worth remembering, they say. On the other hand, I suspect that they fear too broad a dissemination of the caste knowledge.
Magicians

In most cities it is regarded, incidentally, as a criminal offense to enslave one of the caste of players. A similar decree, in most cities, stands against the enslavement of of one who is of the caste of musicians."
Beasts

Lastly it might be mentioned, thinking it is of some interest, musicians on Gor are never enslaved; they may, of course, be exiled, tortured, slain and such; it is said, perhaps truly, that he who makes music must, like the tarn and the Vosk gull, be free.
Nomads

Kaska - small hand drum They were not as yet playing, though one of them was absently tapping a rhythm on a small hand drum, the kaska;
Nomads

Czehar - eight stringed, played with horn pick
. One of the instruments was an eight-stringed czehar, rather like a large flat oblong box; it is held across the lap when sitting cross-legged and is played with a horn pick;
Nomads

Kalika - six stringed, played with pick
other was the kalika, a six-stringed instrument; it, like the czehar, is flat-bridged and its strings are adjusted by means of small wooden cranks; on the other hand, it less resembles a low, flat box and suggests affinities to the banjo or guitar, though the sound box is hemispheric and the neck rather long; it, too, of course, like the czehar, is plucked;
Nomads

Flute
The three flutists were polishing their instruments and talking together; it was shop talk I gathered, because one or the other would stop to illustrate some remark by a passage on his flute, and then one of the others would attempt to correct or improve on what he had done; occasionally their discussion grew heated.
Nomads

Tambourine
what was obviously a tambourine;
Nomads

Notched stick
and another fellow, a younger one, who sat very seriously before what appeared to me to be a pile of objects; among them was a notched stick, played by sliding a polished tem-wood stick across its surface;
Nomads

Gourds filled with pebbles
and several other instruments of a percussion variety, bits of metal on wires, gourds filled with pebbles,
Nomads

Barbaric
"The three Musicians bent to their instruments, and, in a moment, there were again the sounds of a paga tavern, the sounds of talk, of barbaric music, of pouring paga, the clink of bowl, the rustle of bells on the ankles of slave girls."
Assassin

"The Musicians had now begun to play. I have always enjoyed the melodies of Gor, though they tend on the whole to a certain wild, barbaric quality."
Assassin

Melodious & sensuous
The music of Gor, or much of it, is very melodious and sensuous. Much of it seems made for the display of slaves before free men, but then, I suppose, that is exactly what it is made for. Then the musicians were silent."
Dancer

"The musicians then again began to play, the sensous, melodious, exciting, wild music of Gor."
Rogue

The Lady Florence then signaled to the musicians. There was a swirl of music and a beating on the drum, and then a pause, and then began, with the czehar prominent, the strains of a slow Gorean melody.
Fighting Slave

Playng music at the Sardar Fair
the streets of the fair abound with jugglers, puppeteers, musicians and acrobats who, far from the theaters, compete in their ancient fashions for the copper tarn disks of the broiling, turbulent crowds."
Priest Kings

Playing block melodies at slave auctions
"The major auction house, the Curulean, contains the great block. It is a great mark of prestige amoung slave girls to be selected for sale from the great block in the Curulean, and girls tend to compte viciously among themselves for this honor. To be sold from the Curulean great block is almost a guarantee of a rich master, and a luxurious pleasant life, though it be, of course, only that of a slave. As at many of the larger markets, there are Musicians near the block, and a girl is given enough time to present herself well."
Assassin

Hired to play at private parties
Clitus, after returning to our quarters, had left and returned with four musicians, bleary-eyed, routed from their mats well past the Twentieth Hour, but, lured by the jingling of a pair of silver tarsks, ready to play for us, past the dawn if need be. We soon had them drunk as well and though it did not improve their playing, I was pleased to see them join with us in our festivities, helping us to make our feast.
Raiders

As we spoke some five musicians entered the room and took their places to one side. There was a czehar player, two flutists, a kalika player, and a player on the kaska, a small hand drum.
Between the tables there was a large, tiled scarlet circle, some twelve feet in width, with an iron ring at its center. "What is the entertainment you have planned for us, Lady Florence?" inquired the Lady Melpomene.
"It is to be a surprise," said the Lady Florence.
Fighting Slave

Employed in taverns, providing music for dancing slaves
The men who had come to the tavern were roistering but order, to some extent, had been restored. Two of the ship's lanterns had been broken. There was glass, and spilled paga about, and two broken tables. But the musicians were again playing and again, in the square of sand, the girl performed, through not now the Whip Dance. Nude slave girls, wrists chained, hurried about.
Raiders

Trumpets signal fleet movements among war ships
Then, rather bravely, the music drifting over the water, or oars at only half of maximum beat, we moved across the gleaming waters toward the large fleet.
Since the ram-ships of the enemy had not yet struck their masts, it would be only a matter of moments before we were sighted.
From the stern castle of the Dorna, then, with a long glass of the builders, I observed, far across the waters, the masts of ram-ships, one by one, lowering. I could hear, moreover, their war trumpets, carrying form ship to the other, signaling fleet movements. Message flags, doubltless repeating the message of the trumpets, were being run from the decks on their halyards to the heights of the stem castles.
Raiders

I called down to the oar-master to rest oars.
I wanted it to appear that I was suddenly undecided as to whether or not to attack, as though I was confused, startled.
I signaled my trumpeter to transmit the command "Rest oars." The same message was run up the halyard to the height of the stem castle.
Over the faint music coming from the distant ships, now approaching, I could hear her war trumpets and, with the glass, observe her flags. Whereas I did not know exactly the codes employed by the treasure fleet, I had little doubt that our hesitation was being signaled about the fleet, and then I heard other trumpets, and saw the round ships drawing apart, and tarn ships streaking between them, fanning out in our direction.
Raiders

Flutists and drummers on ships in battle
Although I had had the masts, with their yards, taken down and lashed to the decks, and the saild stored below, I had the flutists and drummers, not uncommon on the ram-ships of Thassa, strike up a martial air.
Raiders

"Quarter of maximum!" I called down to the oar-master, some feet below me.
I did not wish to approach the fleet too rapidly.
The treasure fleet would have no way of knowing that I definitely knew her size and composition.
For all the knew I might be astonished at the force on which I had come.
I listened for a while, chuckling, to the brave tunes being put forth by my flutists and drummers.
Then, when I saw the perimeter ships of the treasure feelt swinging about toward me, I motioned for the musicians to discontinure their performance.
When they were silent, I could hear the flutes and drums from the enemy ships.
Raiders

One of the most common of (-page 136-) naval strategies, other than ramming, is oar shearing, in which one vessel, her oars suddenly shortened inboard, slides along the hull of another, whose oars are still outboard, splintering and breaking them off. The injured galley then is like a broken-winged bird, and at the mercy of the other ship's ram as she comes about, flutes playing and drums beating, and makes her strike amidships.
Raiders