1. Each tribal member has a place. KNOW and UNDERSTAND your place and role. Accept and HONOR those roles. These roles will be outlined later in this notecard.
2. TRUTH and HONOR are held high in the eyes of a Red Savage. If a Red Savage says it is so, it is so. If a Red Savage paints a story on a kaiiluak skin, it is the truth, plain and simple. A Red Savage believes that truth will protect them. If a Red Savage lies, their shield will no longer protect them.
3. There are no castes as such in The Barrens.
4. There will be an area set aside for disputes between Red Savage men. Scripted weapons appropriate to The Barrens will be provided for such disputes.
5. Women and slaves of The Barrens do NOT carry nor touch weapons. Women and slaves do not fight. A Woman found doing such, faces force collaring. A slave found doing such, faces death. It is also a death sentence in The Barrens for a slave to remove their collar.
6. All women worked and worked damn hard. The Barrens is a harsh climate and all work in order for the village to survive.
7. Free Women of the Barrens may speak boldly, but beware of how far you go for a Free Woman can be beaten.
8. Free Women may NOT sit on council as ALL decisions are made by men.
9. Free Women may dance in The Barrens. HOWEVER, said dance must NOT be provocative in nature. It MUST be demure and ONLY during village dances.
10. The Ceremonial Dance Area, when built, is off limits to Free Women no matter where they are from. The sweat lodge is for the Free Men of the Dust Legs. Women are prohibited from entering. A male slave may enter ONLY when placing the stones inside the sweat lodge. Said slave will be assigned that duty.
11. Red Savages wore Native American styled clothing. Clothing for men of the Barrens is breechclout, moccasins during summer, breechclout, leggings, moccasins and shirt during cooler weather with hunting cloak during winter. ONLY Free Men may wear a breechclout. Clothing for women of the Barrens is modest as is the dress for women throughout all of Gor. No cleavage, no shoulders, no belly, no portion of the legs may be shown. Women of the Barrens wore shirt dresses with leggings and moccasins. Women of the Barrens did NOT wear breechclouts. Period! Veils are not worn by Red Savage Free Women. Slaves are naked or wear the rags of the Free Woman. Inahan male or female did NOT wear breechclouts. Period!
12. Any FW not dressed and acting appropriately faces force collaring.
13.The Red Savages beliefs mirrors the beliefs of much of Gor. Your welfare of Caste and Home Stone is mirrored by our firm belief in the welfare of our Tribe and Community as opposed to the individual.
Roles:
War Chief
Civil Chief and Medicine Chief
Storyteller
Medicine men and Medicine women
Akicitas
Women's roles in general
Chiefs in general:
Among the red savages there are various sorts of chief. The primary types of chief are the war chief, the medicine chief and the civil chief. One may be, interestingly, only one sort of chief at a time. This, like the rotation of police powers among warrior societies, is a portion of the checks and balances, so to speak, which tend to characterize tribal governance. Other checks and balanced are such things as tradition and custom, the closeness of the governed and the governors, multiple-family inter-relatedness, the election of chiefs, the submission of significant matters to a council, and ultimately, the feasibility of simply leaving the group in greater or lesser numbers. Savages of Gor, page 18
War Chief:
-- In charge of training new warriors
-- Keeps the honor of the warriors in check
-- Acts regardless of personal feelings for the good of the people
-- Decides when to act in battle
“The larger party has done its work and is returning to its home, presumably under the command of a blotanhunka, a war-party leader, usually a fellow of mature and experienced judgment. He exerts control; he commands restraint. The smaller party may consist of young men, insufficiently disciplined, urging one another on to yet another hazard or feat, fellows who are unwilling for the fun to be over, fellows who are eager to try for yet one more killing, fellows who wish to obtain yet one more trophy.” Savags pg 149
“Set a champion against me,” I said. “I will fight him, and, if successful, each of the others, in turn.”
“I am Blotanhunka,” said he. “I will not risk my men in that fashion.”
“It is then all or none,” I said.
“Yes,” said he.
I stepped back, further. “I am ready,” I said.
Savages pg 196
"He must, of course, as having been a Blotanhunka, be judicious and politic in how he handles this matter.”
pg 182 Blood Brothers
"I did not meet his eyes. It was I, of course, who had actually freed Cuwignaka. It had been my knife which had cut the thongs. This was something which Canka, as Blotanhunka, or war-party leader, of the All Comrades, had, of course, not been able to overlook. Regardless of is own feelings in the matter or even, possibly, of his own intentions with respect to the future, such an act could not be allowed to pass unnoticed. " Page 6 Blood Brothers
Civil Chief
-- In charge of the daily life in the camp
-- Acts much like an Administrator within a city
"The Civil Chief handles the day to day affairs of the tribe and functions much like and Administrator in a civilized Gorean town or city. " Blood Brothers pg 34
"Three or four abreast, in long lines, led by their civil chief, Watonka, One-Who-Is-Rich, and subchiefs and high warriors, the Isanna entered the camp of the Isbu. They carried feathered lances, and war shields and medicine shields, in decorated cases. They carried bow cases and quivers. They were resplendent in finery and paint. Feathers, each one significant and meaningful, in te codes of the Kaiila, recounting their deeds and honors, adorned their hair. Necklaces and rude bracelets glinted in the sun. High-pommeled saddles were polished. Coins and beads hung from the reins. Exploit markings and lucksigns were painted on the flanks and forequarters of their animals, and ribbons and feathers were fixed in the braided, silken manes." pg 13 Blood brothers
Medicine Chief
-- In charge of the spiritual well being of the tribe
-- performs ceremonies
-- heals the sick and trains others to heal
"This has to do with their beliefs as to the mysterious relationships which are thought to obtain between the world of reality and the medicine world, that, at times, these two worlds impinge on one another, and become one. " pg 23 Savages
"Winyela, in her finery, the beautiful, delicate, red-haired, white slave girl, under the direction of Cancega, medicine chief of the summer camp of all the Kaiila, carefully, obediently, frightened, applied the red paint. “It is Kaiila,” chanted many of the men about, as she did this. "
pg 21 blood brothers
"I was reminded by these things of the medicine of the pole, and of the great forthcoming dance, projected to take place about it. The medicine of the pole and dance had intimately to do, obviously, with such things as hunting, fertility and manhood. To the red savages the medicine world is very real."
pg 25 blood brothers
Medicine men and women:
The primary function of these "medicine elders" (who are not always male) is to secure the help of the spirit world, including the Great Spirit for the benefit of the entire community.
Sometimes the help sought may be for the sake of healing disease, sometimes it may be for the sake of healing the psyche, sometimes the goal is to promote harmony between human groups or between humans & nature. So the term "medicine man/woman" is not entirely inappropriate, but it greatly oversimplifies and also skews the depiction of the people whose role in society complements that of the chief. These people are not the Native American equivalent of the Chinese "barefoot doctors", herbalists, it is deeper than that.
To be recognized as the one who performs this function of bridging between the natural world and the spiritual world for the benefit of the community, an individual must be validated in his role by that community. Medicine men and women study through a medicine society or from a single teacher.
The Medicine Chief is responsible to teach these people and help them in their place in our society.
Akicitas:
-- ALL men are warriors regardless of other titles they may hold
"Warrior Societies in the tribes have many functions The are a significant component of tribal existence. Such societies on an alternating basis do such things as keep order in the camps and on the treks. They function too as guards and police. It is part of their function too to keep the tribes apprised as to the movements of kailiauk and to organize and police tribal hunts. Such societies too it might be noted are useful in various social ways They provide institutions through which merit can be recognized and rewarded and tribal traditions freshened maintained and renewed. The preserve medicine bundles keep ceremonies and teach histories. It is common for them to give feasts and hold dances. Their rivalries provide an outlet for intertribal aggression and the attendant competitions supply an encouragement for effort and a stimulus to excellence. Within the society itself of course the members profit from the values of alliance and camaraderie and friendship. Needless to say each society will have too its own medicines and mysteries. "
Savages of Gor, page 261
"This was a moon in which the Sleen Soldiers held police powers in the camp, and so it was to their lot that numerous details, such as scouting and guarding, supervising the camp and settling minor disputes, now fell. Among their other duties, of course, would come the planning, organization and policing of the great Wanasapi, the hunt or chase."
Blood Brothers of Gor Book 18 Page 8
"A camp, at night, incidentally, is usually quite a noisy place. It would not form, for example, an ideal refuge for scholarship. The stereotype of the taciturn red savage is one based, usually, on encountering him in guarded situations, where he is uneasy, perhaps meeting strangers, or is, say, being careful, perhaps being involved in trading. In his villages he is outspoken, good-humored and animate. He likes wagers, practical jokes and telling stories. He is probably one of the world’s greatest visitors and, too, one of the world’s greatest hosts, one of his great pleasures in life being the giving of gifts and the feasting of friends."
pg 29 Blood brothers
Story tellers :
To primitive man, storytelling was magic. There was little separation between what was spoken and what happened - to him, it seemed logical that if we could describe a great hunt and bring it home, in all its vividness and glory, to those who did not participate, then it should be possible to tell a story about a hunt and see it happen later. When it did not always work, they decided that perhaps drawing the story would help. The same is true among the red savages.
"Even now, among certain articles on the travois, brought from the lodge of Grunt at the festival camp, was the story hide, acquired long ago in the delta of the Vosk, some four pasangs from Port Kar. On this hide was protrayed the story of a hunt and of the finding of a medicine helper. This hide had been the clue which had brought not only Kog and Sardak, and their allies, to the Barrens, but myself as well. At the narrative’s termination on the hide the artist had drawn a likeness of the medicine helper, protrayed as though on a shield. "
pg 203 Blood brothers
“The story begins here,” said Kog, indicating the center of the skin. From this point there was initiated, in a slow spiral, to be followed by turning the skin, a series of drawings and pictographs. As the skin is turned each marking on it is at the center of attention, first, of course, of the artist, and, later, he follows the trail, of the viewer. The story, then, unanticipated, each event as real as any other, unfolds as it was lived.
“In many respects,” said Kog, “this story is not untypical. These signs indicate a tribal camp. Because of the small number of lodges, this is a winter camp. We can also tell this from these dots, which represent snow.”
I looked at the drawings. They were exactly, and colorfully done. They were, on the whole, small, and precise and delicate, like miniatures. The man who had applied the pigment to that hide canvas had been both patient and skillful. Too, he had been very careful. This care is often a feature of such works. To speak the truth is very important to the red savages."
Pg 19 Savages
“It is a good story,” said a man. “Through the years it will bear much retelling.”
“And it is not an owned story,” said a man. “We all may tell it.”
“Yes,” said another. Many stories among the red savages are owned stories, stories which only one man has a right to tell. If one would wish to hear the story one must ask its owner to tell it. It is a privilege to own a story. It can make one an important person, too, to own a story, to be he to whom one must come if one wishes to hear it. Sometimes they are told on special days, story-telling days, and many people will come to listen. Some men own little but their story, but owning a good story, in the opinion of the red savages, makes a man rich. Such stories, like other forms of personal property, can be given away or sold. They are, however, seldom sold, for the red savages do not like to think that a story can have a price. They like to think of them as being too precious to sell. Thus, like all things precious, or priceless, they are either to be kept or given away, kept as treasures, or awarded, freely, as by a man whose heart sings, as gifts. Sometimes a man bequeaths his story to his heirs; some stories, for example, have been in families for generations; sometimes, on the other hand, he will give it to someone who loves it, and whom he thinks, in turn, will tell it well."
pg 120 Blood brothers
Women :
“If you return to camp,” said Canka, “you will live as woman. You will wear the dress of a woman and do the work of a woman. You will scrape hides and cook. You will gather kailiauk chips for the fires. You will tend lodges. You will please warriors.” pg 195 Savages
“If she does not please you,” said Hci to Grunt, “beat her, as you would any other woman.” He then turned his mount abruptly about. I heard its paws, suddenly, striking the turf, the sound rapidly diminishing.
Pg 9 Blood brothers
“You will stay back from the hunt,” said Hci. “You will cut meat with the other women.”
pg 30 Blood brothers
“It is you who are lazy and slow, Bloketu,” said Cuwignaka. “It is well known. You would rather primp, and pose and smile for the hunters than do your work.”
“Oh!” cried Bloketu. Iwoso, he rhead down, smiled.
“It is not enough to be merely beautiful,” said Cuwignaka.
“At least you think I am beautiful,” said Bloketu, somewhat mollified.
“That is not enough,” said Cuwignaka. “If you were my woman, you would be worked well. If you did not work well I would beat you.”
“I suppose,” she said, “you think you could work me well.”
“Yes,” said Cuwignaka. “I would work you well, both outside the lodge and, even better, within it.”
“Oh!” said Bloketu, angrily.
pg 36 Blood Brothers
“I wonder what Wasnapohdi is doing,” I said.
Cuwignaka laughed. “She is probably doing what I am doing, scraping skins.”
“Do you want any help?” I asked.
“No,” said Cuwignaka. “This is woman’s work.”
I laughed. this response, a joke on Cuwignaka’s part, is a commonplace among the red savages. The offer of a man to help with a woman’s tasks is almost always refused. The man has his work, the woman hers. The gender of a task commonly has a plausible rational. It seems to be the men, for example, who are best suited to be the warriors and the women who are best suited to be the lovely, desirable prizes of such warriors. Similarly it seems men, with their strength, aggressiveness and size, would be better suited for the hunt, pursuing the swift, thrident-horned, belligerent kailiauk at full speed than the slighter, softer women, and that the women, with their patience, their sense of color, with thier small, nimble fingers, would be better suited to exacting, fine tasks such as beadwork and sewing. Similarly, it is natural to expect that the general, sex-linked orientations and predispositions, statistically obvious, both male and female, of human beings, presumably functions of genetic and hormonal differences, would tend to be reflected, broadly, in the sorts of tasks which each sex tends to perform most effciently and finds most congenial.
Some tasks, of course, from the biological point of view, may be sex-neutral, so to speak. Whether sex-neutral tasks exist or not is an interesting question. Such a task would seem to be on in which the sexual nature of a human being, with all its attendant physiological and psychological consequenses, was irrelevant.
It seems likely that sex-neutral tasks, at least of an interesting nature, do not exist. We shall suppsoe, however, for the purposes of argument, that there do exist such tasks. Let us suppose, for example, that the cutting of leather for moccasisns is such a task. Now among the red savages this task, supposedly sex-neutral, for the purposes of argument, is always, or almost always, performed by females.
pg 53 Blood Brothers
When a woman, then, finds herself being advised by her man to attend to her sewing, she understands, well enough, that it is now time for her to be silent. She has been, in effect, ordered to put a gag in her own mouth.
pg 56 Bloodbrothers
Slaves:
"The female slave of the Dust Legs, kneeling by the kaiila, wore a beaded collar, about an inch and a half in height. It was an attractive collar. It was laced closed, and tied snugly shut, in front of her throat. The patterns in the beading were interesting. They indicated her owner. Similar patterns are used by given individuals to identify their arrows or other personal belongings. It is particularly important to identify the arrows, for this can make a difference in the division of meat. It is death to a slave, incidentally, to remove such a collar without permission. Furthermore the collar is fastened by what is, in effect, a signature knot, a complex knot, within a given tribal style, whose tying is known only to the individual who has invented it. It is thus, for most practical purposes, impossible to remove and replace such a collar without the master, in his checking of the knot, by untying and retying it, being able to tell. Suffice it to say, the slaves of the red savages do not remove theft collars. The girl kept her head down. She apparently was not being permitted to raise her eyes at the trading point. She might, thus, if the master wished, have come and gone from the trading point without having seen anything or recognized anything, unless perhaps the grass between her knees and the paws of her master’s kaiila. Gorean slaves, incidentally, wherever they may be found, say, in the cities or in the Barrens, are generally kept under an iron discipline. It is the Gorean way."
page 126 Savages
"We watched the Dust Legs mounting up now, most of them, both men and women, preparing to take their leave. Ulla and Lenna were now on their feet, their hands still tied behind their backs, their neck thongs tied to the high, decorative pommels of their masters’ saddles. Their masters regarded them. They then slapped the girls’ naked flanks with possessive pleasure, as though they might have been kaiila. They then climbed to theft saddles, leaving the girls afoot, naked, neck-thonged, near theft stirrups. The girls looked up at their masters with fear and then, as the kaiila moved, hurried along beside the lofty animals, the grass to their thighs. I had little doubt but what they would soon be taught their duties, both those outside the lodge and those within it. I then saw Margaret, looking wildly over her shoulder, being drawn along, by the thong on her wrists, at the side of her own master’s beast. She, too, would doubtless soon receive instruction on the modalities of pleasure and service to be exacted by a red master of a female slave, and one who was merely white."
pg 135 Savages
Gaming:
"Their jokes, to be sure, might sometimes seem a bit eccentric or rude to more civilized folk. A favorite joke, for example, is to tell a young man that his kaiila offer to the parents of his prospective woman has been refused, thus plunging him into despair, until with roars of laughter, he is informed that it has been accepted. This type of thing, incidentally, does not count, culturally, as a violation of truth telling, a practice which the red savages take with great seriousness. Gambling, too, is of interest to the savages. Common games are lots, dice and stone guessing. Betting, too, may take place in connection with such things as the fall of arrows, and the appearance and movements of animals, particularly birds. Kaiila races, perhaps needless to say, are very popular. An entire village is likely to turn out to watch such a race. What was going on, further, could not be clearly understood unless it is understood that the Dust Legs knew and respected, and liked, Grunt. Such a game they would not have played with a stranger. Theoretically, one supposes, a high bid might be made on what lay concealed beneath the hide and then the hide, the bid accepted, might be withdrawn to reveal a wench as ugly as a tharlarion, but the Dust Legs knew, in the practical context, that Grunt would not do this to them. They understood, in the context, that he would be sure to put something not only good, but very good, beneath that hide. Similarly, since bids are almost always lower on an unseen commodity, he would be, in effect, making them a gift. The Dust Leg refused, with great drama, to go higher than two hides for what lay beneath the hide. Grunt, he made it clear, must now either accept or reject that offer. It was, of course, accepted, and Grunt, with some flair, threw off the hide. "
134 Savages
