|
 CollarsThese are relevant references from the Books where Collars are mentioned. This is not a list of every single reference to the slave collar. But it was my intention to list all the variations I could find. I make no pronouncements on these matters, but report them as I find them. Arrive at your own conclusions. I wish you well, Fogaban Click a heading to jump down to that topic. Added Weights Attractive Band Bar Beaded Beautiful Bejeweled Belled Binding Fiber Black Black Iron Buckled Neck Camp Capture Cell Chain Chain and Plate Choke Close-Fitting Close-Locking Cloth Clumsy Coffle Collar-and-Stick Color Coded Comfortable Common Company Cord Couch Covering Cruel Cunningly Wrought Custom Fitted Dancing Dark Dark Iron Decorated Decorative Diamond Dock Dress Efficient Enameled Engraved Finely Tooled Flat Gleaming Glinting Golden Graceful Gray Harness Heavy Height - Half Inch Height - Three-Quarters Height - One Inch Height - Three Inches High Hinged Holding Holding-Chain House Identification Inexpensive Inflexible Inn Inside Spikes Interim Iron Jeweled Jewelry Kaiila Kajira Ko-lar Kur Laces Large Leash Leather Leather and Metal Leather Strips Light Light Steel Lock Lock - Seven-Bolt Lock - Seven-Pin Lock Behind Neck Lock Type Lovely Lustrously Polished Massive Measured Message Metal and Leather Mill Name Narrow Neck Belt Not Uncomfortable Obdurate of the Galley Slave of the House of Andronicus of the House of Tima of the North of the Silk Slave of the Tavern of Pembe Ornamented Ornate Perfume Plank Plate Plated Platform Pretty Protection Public Punishment Red Retaining Riveted Rope Round Sales Serving Sheath Ship Shipping Silver Simple Sirik - Golden Size Slave Iron Sleen Sleeve Slender Slim Smooth Snap Snug Stable State Steel Stocking Strap Strings Sturdy Tarncamp Temporary Thick Throat Tight Torvaldsland Training Transition Transport Trevan Turian Turian - Message Turian Slave Bar Turian-Type - Sirik Uncomfortable Vine Vine Engraved Wall Weight Weighty White With a Ring With Points With Two Guide Chains Wondrously Wrought Work Yellow
"Ladies," said Targo to his charges, "I can diminish your rations and add weights to your collars.
I removed from its peg on the wall an opened slave collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort worn by many girls on Gor. It was both attractive and efficient. It would look well on a girl's throat, and it would hold, perfectly. "Here is your new collar," he said, displaying it for me. "Isn't it lovely?" "Yes, Master," I said. It was an attractive collar of gleaming steel, with a sturdy, heavy lock at the back. In it I would be marked as well, and confined as efficiently as I had been by the collar of Aemilianus. It was, I knew, a quality collar, finely tooled and attractive. The typical collar was practical and informative, light and comfortable, and attractive. I now wore a light metal band, flat, and close-fitting, on my throat, secured with a small lock at the back of the neck. It was a very common Gorean collar. "What do you think of your collar?" he asked. "It is attractive, Master," I said. Similarly she was nicely but not ostentatiously collared. The slave band was typical, flat, light but sturdy, efficient, close-fitting, comfortable, and attractive. Many women do not realize how exciting, how female, and beautiful, they are, until they see themselves in a collar. The lock, as usual, was at the back of the neck. The inscription read, "I am the property of Harold of Skjern," the collar thus providing a name which would not lead one to expect an accent of either Ar or Cos, and making a reference to a town remote enough to be unfamiliar, one about which I was not likely to entertain many questions.
The slave collar, of one form or another, band or bar, or chain and lock, is almost universal on Gor for slaves. She had a common band collar, flat, close-fitting. In a moment or two Dorna had returned to the dais with a collar. The collar was a common collar, flat, bandlike, gleaming, not unattractive, now closed. Looped about it was a string, on which there were two tiny keys. The collar was a simple one, of a familiar type, particularly in the northern hemisphere, a band collar, about a half inch in height, closely fitting, locked at the back. Most such collars range from a half inch to an inch in height. She touched the collar. Cabot had been curious about the collars of the slaves in the cylinder. They were of a common type, a flat, light, closely fitting band, locked at the back of the neck. "It is a standard collar, Master," she said, "but one similar to a public collar, as that of a state slave." I reached into the box by the side of the curule chair, and removed the collar. It was a standard collar of the northern sort, flat, bandlike, and close fitting. The lock goes at the back of the neck. I put it carefully about her neck, adjusted it slightly, and then, decisively, snapped it shut. A woman is not likely to forget that moment, or sound.
The slave collar, of one form or another, band or bar, or chain and lock, is almost universal on Gor for 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. Grunt's prize on the coffle, a beautiful red-haired girl, a former debutante from Pennsylvania, once Miss Millicent Aubrey-Welles, was selected out by Canka as a personal slave, one to run at the left flank of his own kaiila and wear her leather, beaded collar, placed on her by his command, for him alone. I wore now only the beaded leather collar which had been placed on me some two weeks ago. It was about an inch and a half high. It had a distinctive pattern of beading. The colors and design of the beading marked it as Canka's. It is common among red savages to use such designs, such devices, to mark their possessions. A collar of identical design, back in the village, was worn by the lovely, red-haired girl, the former Miss Millicent Aubrey-Welles, who had so taken the fancy of the young warrior. Both of our collars were tied shut. The knots on them had been retied personally by Canka after our arrival at his camp. This is done, in effect, with a signature knot, in a given tribal style, known only to the tier. This gives him a way of telling if the knot has been untied and retied in his absence. It is death, incidentally, for a slave to remove such a collar without permission. It can be understood then that slaves of the red savages do not tamper with their collars. They keep them on. "Please," she said, "let me adjust my collar." She then, carefully, with her small hands, aligned the beaded collar on her throat. At certain points she ran a finger around and under it, adjusting it for comfort. She then, again, aligned it, setting the central knot under her chin. "Your collar is different," I observed. This was an attractive collar, with red and yellow beading. The collar, as was the case with Mira's, would serve not only to mark the girl as a slave but, in its way, would distinguish her from the common properties of the red savages, whose collars are usually of beaded leather. There was a yellow, beaded collar about Bloketu's reddish-brown neck. Such collars tie in front. It was snug.
She tried to tear the collar from her throat. She could not, of course, do so. It remained fixed upon her, snug, beautiful, gleaming.
"This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave. She had been beaten, doubtless quite a rare experience for a high slave. If she had once worn a golden, bejeweled collar it was now gone. On her neck now was a simple iron collar, hammered shut, such as might be put on the neck of any slut picked up by any soldier in a flaming city.
Slave bells were attached to the collar and the rings. Ute went to the chest of silks and bells and brought forth five more slave bells, which she tied with bits of scarlet ribbon to my collar. I was belled and collared, in a black, enameled ankle ring, with five, black, enameled bells, on tiny golden chains, and a black, enameled Turian collar, it, too, with five bells, black and enameled, on five tiny golden chains. I wore the belled collar, and belled ankle ring, of the tavern, and a bit of black silk. I was clad as a slave girl, and wore a belled collar, which identified my master, and a belled ankle ring; too, I was branded. Her collar, too, was of gold, and belled. Her ankles were belled, and her wrists, and, lastly, about her neck, was closed a belled collar.
We no longer kept them in throat coffle. But we had, about the throat of each, wrapped, five times, a length of binding fiber, and knotted it, that this, serving as collar, might mark them as slave. The coils of the looped binding fiber, in their circularity and width, suggested the encirclement of a collar, one for a small throat, that of a female. And certainly they were reminiscent of the multiply stranded, temporary collars, tied shut, sometimes put on captures, particularly on stripped free women, the stripping and collaring serving to make clear their transient status, prior to an appropriate marking and collaring.
The collar of black iron, with its heavy hinge, its riveted closure, its projecting ring of iron, for a chain or padlock, showed black, heavy, against the whiteness of her lovely throat. She wore the black collar of the north. I was belled and collared, in a black, enameled ankle ring, with five, black, enameled bells, on tiny golden chains, and a black, enameled Turian collar, it, too, with five bells, black and enameled, on five tiny golden chains. "It is a black-enameled collar," he said. "There is nothing on it. The collar is enough. It would be recognized, and you would be returned to this house by guardsmen or others, and left bound, helpless, by the drawbridge and gate."
Men in the fields wore short tunics of white wool; some carried hoes; their hair was close cropped; about their throats had been hammered bands of black iron, with a welded ring attached. About her neck, riveted, was a collar of black iron, with a welded ring, to which a chain might be attached. How magnificent she seemed, the heavy black iron at her throat riveted. The collar of black iron, with its heavy hinge, its riveted closure, its projecting ring of iron, for a chain or padlock, showed black, heavy, against the whiteness of her lovely throat. Numbly I lifted the chain which hung from the collar fastened on my neck. I looked at it, disbelievingly. The links were close-set, heavy, of some primitive, simple black iron. It did not seem an attractive chain, or an expensive one. But I was held by it. I felt the collar with my fingers. I could not see it, but it seemed formed, too, of heavy iron; it seemed simple, practical, not ostentatious; it gripped my throat rather closely; I supposed it was black in color, matching the chain; it had a heavy hinge on one side; and the chain, by a link, opened and closed, was fastened to a loop on the side of the collar; the loop was fastened about a staple, which, it seemed, was a part of the collar itself; the hinge was under my right ear; the chain hung from its loop and staple under my chin; with my finger, on the other side, under my left ear, I felt a large lock, with its opening for the insertion of a heavy key. The collar, then, fastened with a lock; it had not been hammered about my neck. I wondered who held the key to that collar. I now wore, like other stable slaves, a common work collar, of black iron, with an attached ring. All were Gorean wenches. On the throat of each, though much more slender and graceful than those of the males, was a collar, too, a work collar, of black iron, with an attached ring. The black iron of her collar, and the chain, contrasted nicely with the lightness and texture of her skin. She had a common black, strap collar on her neck, no more, really, than a strap or plate of black iron. It was riveted shut, behind the back of her neck. I had noted this earlier, given the shortness of her hair, and her earlier position, facing away from us as she drew water. The legend would probably be a simple one, not even containing the girl's name, probably something like "I am the property of Appanius." I regarded her short brush of hair, the brief, tattered rag, scarcely more than a Ta Teera, which was her only garment, the simple collar, no more than a strap of black iron curved about her throat, its small, right-angled, pierced terminations flush to one another behind the back of her neck, held together by the rivet, her blistered, burned skin. She looked at the other girls. On their throats were heavy collars of black iron, the perforated ends of each curving about the neck to come together in front, in such a way that the collar curved closely about the neck behind the two perforated ends, and the two perforated ends extended forward. These jutting ends then, with their matching apertures, were hammered flat together. Through the matched apertures a dangling iron ring had been closed. Thus, in a sense, the collar was doubly closed, having not only been hammered shut, but also secured with the ring joining the two ends of the metal. Either closure is sufficient, of course. This collar-and-ring arrangement is simply and inexpensively wrought, not requiring the fusing of metals in welding. Ring mounts, and such, on the other hand, are usually fused into, welded into, thus becoming part of, the shackle or manacle. For example, the shackle on her left ankle had a common ring mount, welded into the metal, through which the ring was inserted and closed. "The heavy metal collar on her throat was uncomfortable, quite different from the light band with which she had been familiar. Further, it was a high collar, and it was not easy for her to put her head down. It was exactly the same sort of collar, she was sure, as that worn by the other girls. She could feel it, trace with her finger the closure, feel the extended ends, touch the heavy, dangling ring which had been put through the apertures and closed. Such a collar, with its size and weight, perhaps four or five pounds, its discomfort, she was sure, in the house would have been used only as a punishment collar. Yet, here, all the girls wore it. She moved her neck a bit, too, in her collar, that collar which was not the typical light, graceful slave collar, the attractive collar worn by most slave girls in the city, which might merely mark her as bond and identify her master, but the large, heavy, massive collar put by Targo on his properties, that they might, to escape the discomfort and indignity of such impediments, all the more eagerly submit themselves to the consideration of prospective buyers, collars, too, which, if they strayed, or fled, assuming they might obtain the unlikely opportunity to do so, would immediately call attention to themselves. "Guardsman! Search for an escaped slave in a weight collar, a high collar of thick, black iron, hammered shut about her neck, its two forward projections pierced, a dangling, two-hort iron ring threaded through the piercings!" In the training house, a heavy metal collar, of rounded iron, was hammered about my neck. That is temporary, but it has its effect on us.
Last night I had feared she might require discipline. She had balked at being fitted with the buckled neck collar. "Do you recall the marsh leech?" I had asked her. "Yes," she had said, frightened. "Do you wish to eat one, or more, of them?" I had asked. "No!" she had said. "No!" "Perhaps you will be good?" I said. "Yes," she said. "Perhaps you will be very good?" I asked. "Yes," she said. "I will be very good!" She had then quickly inserted her head into the double loop of the collar and lifted her chin while I buckled it shut, closely, about her throat.
"She is a camp slave," said the captain. "Ship her here," he said, indicating the specified craft. "It makes no difference." "No," said my captor. "She is a private slave." "That is a camp collar," said the officer. "It has not yet been changed," said my captor.
The man was tanned, dark-haired, very dark-haired, large, strong. He wore chains. His hands were manacled behind him. He stood proudly between the two beasts, bearing easily the weight of the two stirrup chains attached to his capture collar. Indeed, many slaves in her holding pens wore no more than chain collars, or capture collars, which suggested dubious origins, at best.
On her throat was a heavy cell collar, with ring; attached to the ring was some fifteen feet of chain, it attached to a plate near our heads.
It was a blond-haired peasant girl, thick-ankled and sturdy, from south of the Vosk. She was being sold from a rough platform on the wharves of Victoria. She wore a chain collar. Then, last night, on the rude stones of the Street of the Writhing Slave, she helpless in my arms, locked in the chain collar of a Coin Girl, with the flattish bell and coin box, I had instructed her, and thoroughly, in the respect due, did he but assume his mastery, to one who was once of Earth. "Perhaps she will be," I said. "As I understand it, it was only tonight that she was put in the chain collar." I looked down at Ina. She could not look up at me, for I had tied her on her knees, with her head down. In this particular tie, the Tharnan tie, as it is sometimes called, the ankles are crossed and bound and the head is tied down, fastened by a short tether running back to the ankles. Any pressure in this tie is, as usual, of course, at the back of the neck, not at the fragile, vulnerable throat. It can be used with chain collars, and such. The hands, as a last touch, are simply tied together behind the back. I looked down at her, a small brunet, half naked in a Ta Teera, a slave rag. About her neck, over her collar, close about it, was a chain collar, padlocked shut, with its coin box, and slot. The slave collar, of one form or another, band or bar, or chain and lock, is almost universal on Gor for slaves. The black woman, with the chain collar and disk, who was awaiting her consignment to a black merchant, was now carrying the ewer. There are chain collars, thought Cabot. As it is difficult to engrave such, these will commonly bear a small, dangling metal disk. On this disk pertinent information may be recorded, such as a girl's current name and master. Indeed, many slaves in her holding pens wore no more than chain collars, or capture collars, which suggested dubious origins, at best.
Beneath the toweling Nela wore nothing; about her neck, rather than the common slave collar, she, like the other bath girls, wore a chain and plate. On her plate was the legend; I am Nela of the Capacian Baths. Pool of Blue Flowers. I cost one tarsk. "Good," I said. "I am much pleased." I looked at him. "But what of those girls who did not work for Marlenus?" I asked. Hup looked puzzled. "They still wear their chain collars," said Hup, "and serve in the baths as slave girls."
I felt again the snap of the choke collar on my throat. A good Gorean tether constitutes no impediment whatsoever to a girl's breathing. An exception is the choke collar which does interfere with a girl's breathing, but only if she is in the least bit recalcitrant. He then unclipped the leash ring from the ring on the straps, under my chin. He then, over the straps, pushed my chin up, and fastened the leash, by means of its own clip and ring, about my neck, a portion of the leash thus serving as its own collar. The loop fitted closely about my neck. Perhaps there was something like a half inch of play in the loop. He jerked the loop open, as far as it would go, to its limit, where it was stopped by the ring and guard. I then had something like an inch of play within the loop. I could not, of course, hope to slip such a tether. "Note," he said. He then gave a slight tug on the leash and I looked up at him in terror. Whereas the loop might widen to the point where I might have as much as a full inch between my throat and the leather, no limit, other than my throat itself, was imposed on its closure. As the leash was now arranged, it constituted a choke collar. This was quite different from the earlier arrangement, when the ring had been attached to the sack straps. I lay there prone, trembling, sweating on the stone, the tunic tight between my teeth; he then put his foot on my back, holding me down, pressing me to the stone, and, leaning forward, pulled up the leash, the leather again under my chin; my head was painfully back; always, as a practiced leash master, he avoided exerting pressure on the throat; that can be extremely dangerous; the pressure of a collar, of whatever sort of collar, is to be always high, under the chin, or at the back or sides of the neck; happily, he had adjusted the collar so that it was no longer a choke collar; else I might have been slain; most collars, of course, as mine now was, given the adjustment he had made, are not choke collars; such collars, as suggested, can be extremely dangerous; indeed, most masters eschew them; too, they commonly train their girls to such a point of perfection that there is no need for such a device; too, of course, the girls go to great lengths in diligence and perfection of service to avoid having such a device put on them; also, as a matter of fact, other devices are as much or more effective in girl training, even things as simple as bracelets and a switch; but even if a choke collar is used, the slave knows that she has nothing to fear from it, unless she is in the least bit recalcitrant or disobedient; then, of course, there is much to fear from it; he then, with the free end of the leash, which was long, tied my hands behind my back, and then crossed my ankles, and pulled them up, painfully behind me, and tied them to my wrists. I reared up a little, but was helpless. I then, lay, subdued, on my belly, before him, my wrists tied behind me, my ankles pulled up and tied to my wrists.
As I had expected about her white throat there was fastened, graceful and gleaming, the slender, close-fitting collar of a Gorean slave girl. The attendant on the disk then bent down and picked up the slender, graceful metal collar. These collars are normally measured individually to the girl as is most slave steel. The collar is regarded not simply as a designation of slavery and a means for identifying the girl's owner and his city but as an ornament as well. Accordingly the Gorean master is often extremely concerned that the fit of the graceful band will be neither too tight nor too loose. The collar is normally worn snugly, indeed so much so that if the snap of a slave leash is used the girl will normally suffer some discomfort. She wore the Turian collar, rather than the common slave collar. The Turian collar lies loosely on the girl, a round ring; it fits so loosely that, when grasped in a man's fist, the girl can turn within it; the common Gorean collar, on the other hand, is a flat, snugly fitting steel band. Both collars lock in the back, behind the girl's neck. The Turian collar is more difficult to engrave, but it, like the flat collar, will bear some legend assuring that the girl, if found, will be promptly returned to her master. I took the chain and collar in the cell and locked it on her throat, over her close-fitting steel collar, that identifying her as mine. I was Teela, a paga slave of the Belled Collar. That could be read, I understood, on the close-fitting steel collar I wore, a ten-hort collar. She was pulled to her feet by the chain at her throat, that attached to the sirik, collar. The sirik collar was close-fitting and would not, like a work collar, fit over the shipping collar. The shipping collar was thrust up her throat, under her chin, where it would be easy to check. The sirik collar then had been locked about her throat below it. I did not think the girl would be let out of the shipping collar until she had been delivered into the hands of the slaver, Uchafu, who was to be her buyer. In the spark of light I had seen the glint of the collar, of close-fitting steel, about her throat. I considered her throat. I did not think it would look bad in a close-fitting steel collar, properly inscribed, identifying her as mine. I took the steel collar, the rounded, narrow metal loop, with its lock, which she had brought with her into the room. I snapped it about her throat. It fitted closely. How beautiful she was in her collar, close-fitting, and of gleaming, engraved steel, which she could not remove. I then turned the collar, slowly, carefully, on her neck, for it was high, thick and close-fitting. The stout collar ring was then in front of her throat, with its long, dependent leash. About her throat, narrow, sturdy and closely fitting, was a steel collar. They wore close-fitting metal collars and were chained together, literally, by the neck. She was nicely curved, with brown hair and eyes. She wore a close-flitting steel collar. Tears fell from the woman's eyes, falling to the marble. The padlock, holding her in the close-fitting metal collar, I wondered how one of the usual, close-fitting Gorean slave collars would look on her own throat. On my neck, also, there was now a flat, narrow steel collar. It was close-fitting. I could not remove it. It was locked there. It was not uncomfortable. I seldom even thought about it, but it was there. I noted the collar on her neck, metal, close-fitting and locked. The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap. Her collar, like most female slave collars, particularly in the northern hemisphere, was close fitting. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman. I had worn, almost from the first, a light, gleaming, about-a-half-inch-high, close-fitting steel collar. It locked in the back. About their throats, rather, closely fitting, locked, were flat, slender metal bands, slave collars. She touched the collar. Cabot had been curious about the collars of the slaves in the cylinder. They were of a common type, a flat, light, closely fitting band, locked at the back of the neck. "It is a standard collar, Master," she said, "but one similar to a public collar, as that of a state slave." With two hands I felt the collar on my neck. It was the first standard Gorean slave collar I had worn. It was a flat band which closely encircled my throat. Such collars are common in the north. It was sturdy, but light and not uncomfortable. Soon I would forget I wore such a device, but it was there. It was, of course, locked. I had determined that, almost immediately. And I was very grateful when I earned my first, more typical, collar, light, flat, and close-fitting. I wore a heavy metal collar, to which was attached a chain, fixed to a stout ring, anchored at the side of my mat. Beneath that collar was a light, close-fitting metal collar. I now wore a light metal band, flat, and close-fitting, on my throat, secured with a small lock at the back of the neck. It was a very common Gorean collar. There is a light metal collar on my neck. They were both typical, common collars, flat, light, comfortable, closely fitting, and locked. I could see the collar on her neck, under the hood, locked, closely encircling her throat. Similarly she was nicely but not ostentatiously collared. The slave band was typical, flat, light but sturdy, efficient, close-fitting, comfortable, and attractive. Many women do not realize how exciting, how female, and beautiful, they are, until they see themselves in a collar. The lock, as usual, was at the back of the neck. The inscription read, "I am the property of Harold of Skjern," the collar thus providing a name which would not lead one to expect an accent of either Ar or Cos, and making a reference to a town remote enough to be unfamiliar, one about which I was not likely to entertain many questions. And I would, too, consider the more general question, independently, of permitting her clothing, except, of course, a comfortable, close-fitting, locked, metal collar. I reached into the box by the side of the curule chair, and removed the collar. It was a standard collar of the northern sort, flat, bandlike, and close fitting. The lock goes at the back of the neck. I put it carefully about her neck, adjusted it slightly, and then, decisively, snapped it shut. A woman is not likely to forget that moment, or sound. There was nothing before him but a girl, a light, close-fitting collar on her neck. The collar on your neck, close-fitting and locked, is lovely, but then is not it so with any good-looking woman?
"This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave.
"Where is her collar?" asked Wanda. "You see the cloth I have knotted about her throat," said Desmond. "It serves as her badge of servitude. We will, when convenient, soon I trust, have her fitted with a proper collar."
Kneeling, in position, chained by the left ankle to a ring, her throat enclosed in a heavy, clumsy, ringed, iron collar, on a cement sales shelf, before Targo, sensitive to her nudity, and miserable, she noted one and another slave girl in the crowd.
The coffle chain had its own collars, rounded and rather loose, which lay below the common collars of the girls; they could not, of course, be slipped. They were similar to what I have learned are called Turian collars. The collars had front and back rings, were hinged on the right and locked on the left. This is a familiar form of coffle collar. The lengths of chain between the collars were about three to four feet long. Some were attached to the collar rings by the links themselves, opened and then reclosed about the rings, and some of them were fastened to the collar rings by snap rings. Another common form of coffle collar has its hinge in the front and closes behind the back of the neck, like the common slave collar. It has a single collar ring, usually on the right, through which, usually, a single chain is strung. Girls are spaced on such a chain, usually, by snap rings. "Tomorrow morning," I said, "your neck will be in a coffle collar." She heard the rustle of chain behind her and then, in an instant, a heavy metal collar was clasped about her neck and locked. A chain dangled from its back ring, its posterior ring, that at the back of her neck, to a girl behind her, and another chain ran from her collar's throat ring, or anterior ring, to the back ring, or posterior ring, of the next collar, which, a moment later, was closed about the lovely, slim neck of the slave before her, and so on, toward the beginning of the coffle. The collar, of iron, some half of an inch in thickness, was close about her throat. It, too, felt hot. The light collar of Portus, the common collar, typical of Gorean slave collars, had been removed last night, and the tag that had been wired to it. The only collar she now wore was that which fastened her in the coffle. She was pleased to be out of the heavy, sturdy coffle collar, with its weighty chain dangling before and behind her. I then felt another collar, a coffle collar, for one could sense the weight of the attendant chain, a light chain, for we were women, snapped about my neck. I did not know my place in the coffle, other than the fact that I was neither first nor last, for I could feel the weight of the coffle chain on both the front and back ring of the coffle collar. It was the only collar I now wore.
The collar is locked about one's neck, and the stick, rigid, and more than a yard long, is held by the individual supposedly being guided. The guide stick, with its attached collar, buckled under my chin, was tight against the back of my neck. Then I felt the rigid guide stick, fastened to the close-buckled collar, tight against my neck. Any movement I might make would then be conveyed back through the stick, to the hand of Tyrtaios.
"There are two tiny yellow bands on your collar," I said. "That is because I am a "yellow girl,"" she said. "There are also two yellow bands on the lock," I said. "Our collars are color coded to the locks and chains," she said. "There are five color-coded collars," she said, "red, orange, yellow, green and blue. Each color permits a girl a different amount of freedom in the tracks." At the holding area I was put in a transfer collar. The others were already in theirs. These collars were color-coded for our destinations, some girls being delivered to one place and some to another.
The typical collar was practical and informative, light and comfortable, and attractive. Similarly she was nicely but not ostentatiously collared. The slave band was typical, flat, light but sturdy, efficient, close-fitting, comfortable, and attractive. Many women do not realize how exciting, how female, and beautiful, they are, until they see themselves in a collar. The lock, as usual, was at the back of the neck. The inscription read, "I am the property of Harold of Skjern," the collar thus providing a name which would not lead one to expect an accent of either Ar or Cos, and making a reference to a town remote enough to be unfamiliar, one about which I was not likely to entertain many questions. And I would, too, consider the more general question, independently, of permitting her clothing, except, of course, a comfortable, close-fitting, locked, metal collar.
I would not have expected to have worn other than a common collar, of course, there are many sorts of collars. The most familiar are the "common collar," which, in its varieties, tends to be flat and closely fitting, and the "Turian collar," which, in its varieties, is more rounded, and barlike, and fits more loosely. Both lock behind the back of the neck. Dorna wore a "common collar." Some other types of collars are decorative collars, holding collars, training collars and punishment collars.
He then showed me the collar, indicating the engraving on it. "This is a company collar," he said. "It says, 'I belong to Mintar of Ar. I work in Mill 7. My number is four-zero-seven-three.'"
On some rence islands I have heard, incidentally, that the men have revolted, and enslaved their women. These are usually kept in cord collars, with small disks attached to them, indicating the names of their masters.
"On your feet, Slave," said Teela to Emily. "Cross your wrists, touching, behind your back, close your eyes and put down your head. You will uncross your wrists and open your eyes only when you feel the locking of the couch collar on your neck."
About her throat she had gracefully wrapped a scarf of white silk. I slowly unwrapped the white, silken scarf from her throat. Her eyes seemed to cloud with angry tears. As I had expected about her white throat there was fastened, graceful and gleaming, the slender, close-fitting collar of a Gorean slave girl. It was a collar like most others, of steel, secured with a small, heavy lock which closed behind the girl's neck. Bikkie wore, like one or two of the other girls still on the dais, only threads of leather, some dozen or so, depending from a leather sheathing encasing the locked, steel collar on her throat. On the front of the leather sheathing, which opened only at the back, to admit the key to the collar lock, there was sewn a red leather patch, small, in the shape of a heart. I reached out, timidly, toward her throat. I touched the object there. "What is this?" I asked. "The silk?" she asked. "That is a collar stocking, or a collar sleeve. They may be made of many different materials. In a cooler climate they are sometimes of velvet. In most cities they are not used." Under the silk I touched sturdy steel. "That, Mistress, of course," she said, "is my collar."
Certainly she did not want to wear so cruel, high, thick, and heavy a collar, one in which she could scarcely lower her head, in effect, a punishment collar.
"This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave.
"This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave.
I watched her, in the training sand, dancing to hide drums, naked, in slave bracelets and jeweled dancing collar. She wore a golden metal dancing collar about her throat, golden chains looped from her wrists, gracefully to the collar ring, then fell to her ankles; there are varieties of Tahari dancing chains; she wore the oval and collar; briefly, in readying a girl, after she has been belled and silked, and bangled, and has been made up, and touched with slave perfume, she kneels, head down in a large oval of light gleaming chain, extending her wrists before her; fastened at the sides of the top of the oval are two wrist rings, at the sides of the lower loop of the oval two ankle rings; the oval is then pulled inward and the wrist and ankle rings fastened on the slave; her throat is then locked in the dancing collar, which has, under the chin, an open snap ring; with the left hand the oval is then gathered together, so the two strands of chain lie in the palm of the left hand, whence, lifted, they are placed inside the snap ring, which is then snapped shut, and locked; the two strands of chain flow freely in the snap ring; accordingly, though the girl's wrists and ankles are fastened at generous, though inflexible limits from one another, usually about a yard for the wrists and about eighteen inches for the ankles, much of the chain may be played through, and back through, the collar ring; this permits a skillful girl a great deal of beautiful chain work; the oval and collar is traditional in the Tahari; it enhances a girl's beauty; it interferes little with her dance, though it imposes subtle, sensuous limits upon it; a good dancer uses these limits, exploiting them deliciously; for example, she may extend a wrist, subtly holding the chain at her waist with her other hand; the chain slides through the ring, yet short of the expected movement; the chain stops her wrist; her wrist rebels, but is helpless; it must yield; her head falls; she is a chained slave girl.
There was a dark collar on her neck, of a sort with which I was not familiar. On her neck there was a dark metal collar. Mina had worn such a collar. From what the Lady Bina had said on the trail, based on the lettering, I took it to be a Kur collar.
She was quite beautiful, kneeling barefoot before me, clad only in the brief, sleeveless brown rag of a slave, her blond hair about her shoulders, her blue eyes moist, her throat graced by the narrow collar of dark iron, slave iron.
She rose easily from the curule chair and stood before me. She held the opened collar before me. It was slender but sturdy, steel, enameled with white, decorated with tiny flowers in pink, a collar suitable for a woman's girl. There was printing in the enamel, tiny, exact. "See the printing?" she asked. "Yes, Mistress," I said.
I would not have expected to have worn other than a common collar, of course, there are many sorts of collars. The most familiar are the "common collar," which, in its varieties, tends to be flat and closely fitting, and the "Turian collar," which, in its varieties, is more rounded, and barlike, and fits more loosely. Both lock behind the back of the neck. Dorna wore a "common collar." Some other types of collars are decorative collars, holding collars, training collars and punishment collars.
A woman who is a pot girl to one fellow may be a dream to another, worthy of a diamond collar and a chain at the foot of a Ubar's throne. In the collar all women are equal, and nothing, mere slaves, though the collars of some may be set with diamonds.
Our necks were encircled with light metal collars. We could not remove these, as they were locked on us. They were "dock collars," which indicated the sphere of our activities and where we would be chained at night.
She was not, but clad in an ample, silken tunic, white. To be sure, I could see much of her. It was a slave tunic. It seemed she had a fine collar, probably a dress collar.
I removed from its peg on the wall an opened slave collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort worn by many girls on Gor. It was both attractive and efficient. It would look well on a girl's throat, and it would hold, perfectly.
"This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave. I, too, was surprised. Kneeling before us, on the wagon bed, her hands braceleted behind her back, two small keys dangling from her enameled collar was Taphris, who was one of the personal serving slaves of the Lady Florence. I understood what she meant, but collars are much the same. To be sure, some collars are more ornate than others, enameled, even jeweled, and such.
From his own tarn disks, Kazrak purchased two additional articles which he regarded as essential - a collar, which he had properly engraved, and a slave whip. She read the simple legend aloud; "I AM THE PROPERTY OF TARL OF BRISTOL." The young man approaches her, bearing a slave collar, its engraving proclaiming his name and city. There we would wait until her collar had been engraved. But on her collar there was not written the name of her owner and his city, as I would have expected. Instead I had read there only the Gorean numeral which would correspond to '708'. "But the engraving was large and very plain," he said. "Did you not read it?" asked Mul-Ba-Ta. Then to my surprise Al-Ka and Ba-Ta, from their pouches, produced golden collars, only too obviously prepared in advance. There were two heavy, short clicks and the lovely throats of the two girls were encircled. I gathered it was the only gold they would see for some time. On one collar there was engraved 'Al-Ka' and on the other 'Ba-Ta'. She wore the Turian collar, rather than the common slave collar. The Turian collar lies loosely on the girl, a round ring; it fits so loosely that, when grasped in a man's fist, the girl can turn within it; the common Gorean collar, on the other hand, is a flat, snugly fitting steel band. Both collars lock in the back, behind the girl's neck. The Turian collar is more difficult to engrave, but it, like the flat collar, will bear some legend assuring that the girl, if found, will be promptly returned to her master. after these things there would only remains of course, an engraved Turian collar and the clothing of Elizabeth Cardwell Kajir. "Whose name is on your collar?" I asked. "They showed me," she said, "but I do not know I cannot read!" I reached over and turned the collar somewhat. It was attached to a chain. I gathered the girl was in Sirik, the chain on the floor attached to the slave ring running to the twin ankle rings. She would not face me but stood covering her face, looking away. The engraving on the Turian collar consisted of the sign of the four bosk horns and the sign of the city of Ko-ro-ba, which I took it, Kamchak had used for my sign. There was also an inscription in Gorean on the collar, a simple one; I am Tarl Cabot's girl. I restraightened the collar and walked away, going to the other side of the wagon, leaning my hands against it, wanting to think. "Look at her collar," said Cernus. I read the collar aloud. "I am the property of the Home of Portus." My memories are confused of the night, but we did find a smithy, and we had the girls marked, and purchased collars for them, lock collars, which we had engraved. Ula's collar read I AM THE PROPERTY OF CLITUS; Thurnock had his slave's engraved THURA SLAVE OF THURNOCK; I had two collars engraved one for Midice and one for Telima; both read simply, I BELONG TO BOSK. He sheathed his sword and, by the hair, pulled her to her feet and faced her to the fire. He rudely read her collar. "A wench of Bosk of Port Kar," he laughed. He thrust her from him, a yard or so, and examined her. "Bosk of Port Kar," he said, "has a good eye for slave flesh." Beneath her veil I had not been able to read the lettering on her collar, which would tell who owned her. She rose easily from the curule chair and stood before me. She held the opened collar before me. It was slender but sturdy, steel, enameled with white, decorated with tiny flowers in pink, a collar suitable for a woman's girl. There was printing in the enamel, tiny, exact. "See the printing?" she asked. "Yes, Mistress," I said. "I know you are illiterate," she said, "so I shall read it to you. It says 'I am Judy. Return me to the Lady Elicia of Six Towers.'" I examined her collar. The legend had once read 'I am the girl of Kikombe'. The name 'Kikombe' now, however, for the most part, with a set of rough, zigzag lines, had been scratched out, and the name 'Uchafu', with a sharp tool, had been added. I smiled. Uchafu even used second-hand collars. Each, on her throat, wore a light, locked steel collar. The collars had writing on them, incised in the steel, which I could not read. The heavy iron collar I had worn was now replaced with a lighter collar, enameled white. It had writing on it, in yellow, but incised, too, into the steel. I could not read the writing, for I was illiterate. I had been told the writing read 'Return me for punishment to the House of Andronicus'. I felt the collar at my throat, of sturdy steel. It was enameled white. In it, incised, in tiny, dark cursive letters, in a feminine-type script, was a message in Gorean. It read, I had been told, 'I am the property of the Lady Florence of Vonda.' The lock on the back of the collar had a double bolt, the double bolt, however, responding to a single key. Such collars usually bear a legend. Usually the legend identifies the master, that the slave, if fled, or lost or strayed, may be promptly returned. How beautiful she was in her collar, close-fitting, and of gleaming, engraved steel, which she could not remove. "I am the slave of Ligurious, first minister of Corcyrus," she said. She slid the collar sleeve about the collar and, feeling with her fingers, indicated some marks on the collar. I could see engraving there. I could not read the writing. "That information," she said, "is recorded here." The legend on the collar said, "If you find me, return me to Boots Tarsk-Bit. Reward." I then put out my hand and touched the collar on her neck. It was one of three collars I had for her. The other two, with their keys, were in the flat box. The collar on her neck bore the legend, "RETURN ME TO TARL AT THE INSULA OF TORBON." I then removed the first of the other two collars from the box and, reaching out, put it on her neck, next to the other collar, but ahead of it, closer to the chin. I snapped it shut. It fit well. It was now on her, locked. Its legend read, "RETURN ME TO THE WHIP MASTER OF THE CENTRAL CYLINDER." I then turned it and, inserting the key, opened it, and removed it from her neck. I then lifted the second collar from the box, putting the first, with the key, back in it. This second collar I then put on her neck, next to the original collar, and ahead of it, closer to the chin, as I had the one a moment before. Then I snapped it shut. It, too, fit well, and was now on her, locked. Its legend read, "RETURN ME TO APPANIUS OF AR." I then let her remain that way for a little while, on all fours, in the two collars. I had expected, naturally, to be named. It is useful, after all, for a slave to have a name. It makes it easier to refer to her, to summon her, and so on. But I would have expected a master to have considered me with some care, as he might another form of animal, and to have then selected a name for me which, at least to his fancy, seemed to him fitting or suitable, a name which might then, sooner or later, be inscribed on a collar. To be sure, not all collars have the slave's name on them. Some apparently say things as simple as "I am the slave of so-and-so," "I belong to so-and-so," "I am the property of so-and-so," or "Return me to so-and-so," such things. An advantage of having the girls name on the collar is in tracing her. After all, a rich man might own a hundred or more women. A typical collar might read, "My name is Tula. I am the slave of so-and-so." But it seemed now that I would not be considered, and named, with a collar, a new collar, a personal collar, eventually following the naming, as one might hope, being suitably inscribed, but that my name, whatever it was to be, would be the result of what already appeared on a collar. The collar would not be a function of the name, so to speak, but the name, it seemed, would be a function of the collar, of some name already on a collar! On Ellen's throat was a light, inexpensive, engraved, metal collar. It was locked on her, fastened behind the back of the neck. The legend of the collar read "I am Ellen, the slave of Portus Canio." Cestiphon's chosen sign for his females, the petal of a flower, was on the collar. There would thus be no doubt as to whom she belonged. Her collar was a simple, flat metal band, light, close-fitting, with the lock, as is common, at the back of the neck. In this fashion, the front of the collar, if engraved, may be easily read. Sometimes, if one is given a name, the name, too, will appear on the collar. "I am so-and-so, the slave of so-and-so." "I am so-and-so, so-and-so owns me." "I am so-and-so, the property of so-and-so." Sometimes the collar is quite simple, as in "I am owned by so-and-so," "I am the property of so-and-so," or merely "Return me to so-and-so," or such. Normally a collar is engraved in such a way that the slave may be identified. A typical collar might read something like "I belong to Achiates of Jad." Sometimes the slave's name also appears on the collar, as in something like "I am Gail. I am the property of Publius Major of Brundisium." "I do not even know the name of my Master," she said. "It is on your collar," I said. "What did she tell you the collar said?" I asked. "It said," she said, "I am Lais. I am the slave of Eiron of Brundisium." "That is correct," I said. The typical collar, as I understood it, tended to be a bit more specific, or personal, and would be likely to contain one or more proper names. "My collar," I said, "identifies me as the property of Bazi Imports, a collar supposedly rare this far north," "I have the key," he said. "I will remove it and scrape away the legend. Such collars, defaced, re-lettered, and so on, are not rare, particularly amongst the Peasants." The slaves in and about the camp may be divided into personal slaves and public slaves. The collars of the personal slaves identify the Master; those of the public slaves identify the company. For example, I no longer wore the collar of Bazi Imports, a public collar. My present collar read, I am told, 'I am the slave of Rupert of Hochburg.'
It was, I knew, a quality collar, finely tooled and attractive.
She wore the Turian collar, rather than the common slave collar. The Turian collar lies loosely on the girl, a round ring; it fits so loosely that, when grasped in a man's fist, the girl can turn within it; the common Gorean collar, on the other hand, is a flat, snugly fitting steel band. Both collars lock in the back, behind the girl's neck. The Turian collar is more difficult to engrave, but it, like the flat collar, will bear some legend assuring that the girl, if found, will be promptly returned to her master. He went to his desk and, from one of its drawers, drew forth an opened slave collar. It was unlike most of the Gorean collars. It was a Turian collar. Most Gorean collars, decorated or not, are basically a flat, circular band, hinged, which locks snugly about the girl's neck. The collar, the flat, snug, unslippable band on her throat, locked behind the back of her neck, was lovely. On my neck, also, there was now a flat, narrow steel collar. It was close-fitting. I could not remove it. It was locked there. It was not uncomfortable. I seldom even thought about it, but it was there. The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman. She had a common band collar, flat, close-fitting. I could see the collar. It was flat, narrow, about half inch in height, and closely fitting, a common collar. About their throats, rather, closely fitting, locked, were flat, slender metal bands, slave collars. She touched the collar. Cabot had been curious about the collars of the slaves in the cylinder. They were of a common type, a flat, light, closely fitting band, locked at the back of the neck. "It is a standard collar, Master," she said, "but one similar to a public collar, as that of a state slave." I now wore a light metal band, flat, and close-fitting, on my throat, secured with a small lock at the back of the neck. It was a very common Gorean collar. Similarly she was nicely but not ostentatiously collared. The slave band was typical, flat, light but sturdy, efficient, close-fitting, comfortable, and attractive. Many women do not realize how exciting, how female, and beautiful, they are, until they see themselves in a collar. The lock, as usual, was at the back of the neck. The inscription read, "I am the property of Harold of Skjern," the collar thus providing a name which would not lead one to expect an accent of either Ar or Cos, and making a reference to a town remote enough to be unfamiliar, one about which I was not likely to entertain many questions. I reached into the box by the side of the curule chair, and removed the collar. It was a standard collar of the northern sort, flat, bandlike, and close fitting. The lock goes at the back of the neck. I put it carefully about her neck, adjusted it slightly, and then, decisively, snapped it shut. A woman is not likely to forget that moment, or sound.
I slowly unwrapped the white, silken scarf from her throat. Her eyes seemed to cloud with angry tears. As I had expected about her white throat there was fastened, graceful and gleaming, the slender, close-fitting collar of a Gorean slave girl. It was a collar like most others, of steel, secured with a small, heavy lock which closed behind the girl's neck. Two, however, housed Chamber Slaves, girls like Vika, clad and collared identically. I supposed the only difference in the attire of the three girls would have been the numerals engraved on their collars. Vika of course had worn a scarf and these girls did not, but now Vika no longer wore her scarf; now her collar, steel and gleaming, locked, encircling her fair throat, was as evident and beautiful as theirs, proclaiming her to the eyes of all, like them, only a slave girl. I saw his collar gleaming at her throat. She tried to tear the collar from her throat. She could not, of course, do so. It remained fixed upon her, snug, beautiful, gleaming. "This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave. Timidly, when he was not watching, but sitting behind his desk, engaged in work, perhaps entering my acquisition and price in his ledgers, I touched the collar, rounded, steel and gleaming. The gleaming collar, snug and locked, was very beautiful on her throat. How beautiful she was in her collar, close-fitting, and of gleaming, engraved steel, which she could not remove. "Here is your new collar," he said, displaying it for me. "Isn't it lovely?" "Yes, Master," I said. It was an attractive collar of gleaming steel, with a sturdy, heavy lock at the back. In it I would be marked as well, and confined as efficiently as I had been by the collar of Aemilianus. The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap. I had worn, almost from the first, a light, gleaming, about-a-half-inch-high, close-fitting steel collar. It locked in the back. In a moment or two Dorna had returned to the dais with a collar. The collar was a common collar, flat, bandlike, gleaming, not unattractive, now closed. Looped about it was a string, on which there were two tiny keys.
In the light of the lamp her collar glinted. Their collars glinted, the steel reflecting the dim, reddish light of the tiny lamps. She looked lovely, nude, deliciously curved, frightened, in the glinting collar, in the flickering reddish darkness.
Inside the second wall, I was escorted among the tents by a tower slave, a black girl whose livery was golden and who wore large golden earrings that matched a golden collar. Then to my surprise Al-Ka and Ba-Ta, from their pouches, produced golden collars, only too obviously prepared in advance. There were two heavy, short clicks and the lovely throats of the two girls were encircled. I gathered it was the only gold they would see for some time. On one collar there was engraved 'Al-Ka' and on the other 'Ba-Ta'. I noted that the girls who had been once their slaves, captured enemies, now wore no longer their collars of gold, but instead stood at their sides as Free Companions. She wore a collar of gold, and, hanging in her ears, were loops of gold. Lying in the dirt, her legs drawn up, her wrists tied behind her back, was the deliciously bodied little wench, dark-haired, in gold silk, now dirtied and torn, in golden collar, and gold earrings, who had exchanged words with Ivar's wool-kirtled wenches at the thing. She was the trained girl, the southern silk girl. In fury, she squirmed to her feet. "I am not a Kur girl," she cried. Indeed, she did not wear the heavy leather collar, with ring and lock, which Kurii fastened on their female cattle. She wore a collar of gold, and earrings, and, torn and muddied, a slip of golden silk, of the sort with which masters sometimes display their girl slaves. She wore a gold, locked collar, and, looped about her neck, many light chains and pendants; on her wrists were many bracelets; on her upper arms, both left and right, were armlets, tight, there being again more on the left arm. She shook her head, her hair was loose. She wore a golden metal dancing collar about her throat, golden chains looped from her wrists, gracefully to the collar ring, then fell to her ankles; there are varieties of Tahari dancing chains; she wore the oval and collar; briefly, in readying a girl, after she has been belled and silked, and bangled, and has been made up, and touched with slave perfume, she kneels, head down in a large oval of light gleaming chain, extending her wrists before her; fastened at the sides of the top of the oval are two wrist rings, at the sides of the lower loop of the oval two ankle rings; the oval is then pulled inward and the wrist and ankle rings fastened on the slave; her throat is then locked in the dancing collar, which has, under the chin, an open snap ring; with the left hand the oval is then gathered together, so the two strands of chain lie in the palm of the left hand, whence, lifted, they are placed inside the snap ring, which is then snapped shut, and locked; the two strands of chain flow freely in the snap ring; accordingly, though the girl's wrists and ankles are fastened at generous, though inflexible limits from one another, usually about a yard for the wrists and about eighteen inches for the ankles, much of the chain may be played through, and back through, the collar ring; this permits a skillful girl a great deal of beautiful chain work; the oval and collar is traditional in the Tahari; it enhances a girl's beauty; it interferes little with her dance, though it imposes subtle, sensuous limits upon it; a good dancer uses these limits, exploiting them deliciously; for example, she may extend a wrist, subtly holding the chain at her waist with her other hand; the chain slides through the ring, yet short of the expected movement; the chain stops her wrist; her wrist rebels, but is helpless; it must yield; her head falls; she is a chained slave girl. I saw the gold of her collar beneath her dark hair. She wore on her throat a high, gold collar, with, in front, a large golden loop, some two inches in width. "I had intended to rent a dancing slave in Vonda," said the Lady Florence to her guests, "a decorous girl in blue silk and a golden collar, who might by the loveliness and grace of her movements please us, but it slipped my mind. I am so forgetful! Her collar, too, was of gold, and belled. I then turned my attention again to the dancers. There were three of them in blue silk and golden collars. Then, when I was absolutely naked, a golden collar, to which a chain was attached, with wrist rings and ankle rings, was brought. It was a chaining system of that sort called a sirik. My chin was thrust up and I felt the golden collar locked on my throat. Almost at the same time my wrists, held closely together before me, were locked helplessly in the wrist rings. In another instant my ankles, held, were helpless in the ankle rings. A chain then ran from my collar to the chain on, my wrist rings and from thence, the same chain, to the chain on my ankle rings. My ankle-ring chain was about twelve inches in length, and my wrist-ring chain was about six inches in length. The central chain, where it dangled down from the wrist rings, lay on the floor before the throne, before it looped up to where it was closed about a central link of the ankle-ring chain. This permits; the prisoner, usually a slave, to lift her arms. She is thus in a position to feed herself or better exhibit her beauty to masters in a wider variety of postures and attitudes than would otherwise be the case. The point of the sirik is not merely to confine a woman, but to confine her beautifully. She had high cheekbones, a tannish skin and a golden collar. She had been beaten, doubtless quite a rare experience for a high slave. If she had once worn a golden, bejeweled collar it was now gone. On her neck now was a simple iron collar, hammered shut, such as might be put on the neck of any slut picked up by any soldier in a flaming city. We all wore golden collars, or, actually, collars plated with gold. I noted, startled, the brunette, long haired, her legs muchly bared in brief scarlet silk, in a golden collar, who had been among the first to flee the wall. Her golden collar, if not the rings, suggested that her master was rich, and, indeed, he was. I knew him. Too, once, while I was out of the box, the golden collar had been cut from my neck. Even the filings from the saw had been gathered in a silken napkin, laid under my head and neck, my hair tied up, over my head. The collar, even the filings, were of value. "There were two collars of gold," said the man behind me. The newcomer made a tiny gesture, granting them such trivial objects. The collars would doubtless be melted down. Either was doubtless worth more than many slaves, doubtless more than I and perhaps more even than Aynur. No longer did we wear collars of gold. Desperate, I had risked accosting itinerant tradesmen, gardeners, cooks, grooms, slaves in slippers and golden collars, worth more than the girl herself, and even house masters. "The collar," she said, "is not of gold, not even of silver. Too, I fear it is not encrusted with jewels." "I do not wish to tempt thieves," I said. "Such a collar would be worth more than most slaves." "Perhaps we should be put in golden collars," I said. "We cannot have slaves stolen for their collars," said the guard. "That would not do," I admitted.
Deliberately, with both hands, she slipped her garment some inches down her shoulders, fully revealing her white throat. It was bare, not encircled by one of the slender, graceful slave collars of Gor. She was free. I slowly unwrapped the white, silken scarf from her throat. Her eyes seemed to cloud with angry tears. As I had expected about her white throat there was fastened, graceful and gleaming, the slender, close-fitting collar of a Gorean slave girl. It was a collar like most others, of steel, secured with a small, heavy lock which closed behind the girl's neck. The attendant on the disk then bent down and picked up the slender, graceful metal collar. I then went to the girls, to check the graceful, slender steel collars they wore, those lighter, characteristic slave collars about which the heavy iron wall collars had been closed. He stepped about, in front of me. He showed me an opened collar, graceful and slim, and of inflexible steel.
I noted her throat was encircled by a collar of gray metal. I supposed it indicated that she was a state slave of Tharna. There was the girl, warm-eyed Linna, who had been kind to me, whose auburn hair was knotted with coarse string, who wore the gray collar of a state slave of Tharna. The female state slave of Ar wears a brief, gray slave livery, with matching gray collar, save for the color it is identical with most common slave livery. She pulled the robes down from her throat. "I wear a collar," she said. I saw the simple, circular, gray collar, the collar of the house of Samos, locked around her throat. The girl's hair was still bound, knotted, on her head; it had not yet even been loosened, as that of a slave girl. Looped about her neck, locked, was a slender, common, gray-steel slave collar. The garmenture of the state slave, that of a girl owned by the city itself, some time ago, had been brief, sleeveless and gray, slashed to the waist. The collar worn by such slaves had been gray, matching the tunic, and it had been customary to lock about their left ankle a steel band, also gray, from which depended five small bells, also of gray metal.
The guard took the straps which had bound her ankles together, and, untying them, slipped them through the metal ring, glinting, sewn into the back of the leather collar of the harness, worn over the simple curved collar of iron which marked her, even should she be clothed, and her brand not visible, as slave. The straps had run from the back of the collar to her ankles, holding her in a kneeling position. Her legs were now free. The ankle straps then, sewn to the sides of the collar, and now circled about the collar and crossing in back, and now run through the ring on the front of the collar, served as leash. The harness is designed to provide a large number of ties.
She lay there on the stones, half-stripped, turned away, bound hand and foot, her throat fastened to the slave ring by the heavy collar and chain. Ho-Tu led the way, moving from catwalk to catwalk, spanning cages below. In these cages, through the bars, male slaves, crowded together, naked and wearing heavy collars, glared sullenly up at us. There was a rusted, heavy iron collar riveted about the neck of Ho-Hak, with a bit of chain dangling from it. Thurnock, the peasant, and Clitus, the fisherman, approached, holding between them Ho-Hak, bound hand and foot, the heavy collar of the galley slave, with its dangling chain, still riveted about his neck. I could see the heavy metal collar hammered about the man's neck, not uncommon in a male slave. His head would have been placed across the anvil, and the metal curved about his neck with great blows. Thurnock hastened to unlock the manacles and heavy throat collar which bound the great Ubar. How magnificent she seemed, the heavy black iron at her throat riveted. The collar of black iron, with its heavy hinge, its riveted closure, its projecting ring of iron, for a chain or padlock, showed black, heavy, against the whiteness of her lovely throat. Over her iron collar she wore a heavy leather Kur collar, high, heavily sewn, with its large ring. They were bound for the brine pits of the Tahari, whence comes most of the caravan salt. I expected that less than half of them would reach the pits. Heavy collars, with rings, they wore about their necks. I lay in the shadow of the slave ring. A chain and heavy collar lay at the foot of the ring, the chain attached to the ring. He took the heavy metal collar and closed it about my throat, over and about the lighter collar I wore, confining me at the ring, on the furs at the foot of his couch. I rose on one elbow and looked down at her. How incredibly beautiful and soft she seemed; she was curled in the furs; she was half covered by them; I lifted them away, that I might see her fully; she stirred; her hands moved a bit on the furs; she drew her legs up; she reached as though to pull the furs more about her but her hands did not find them; she drew her legs up a bit more and snuggled down in the furs; there is perhaps nothing in the world as beautiful as a naked slave girl; a heavy iron collar, with chain, was locked on her throat; He knelt in the clearing, in the chains of the talunas, shackles on his ankles and wrists, connected to a common chain depending from a heavy iron collar. I was intensely conscious of the heavy metal collar I wore. I felt with my fingers the heavy collar of iron, with its ring, fastened on my neck. I crouched beside her and took the nearby chain and collar. I fastened the chain to the slave ring and then closed the heavy collar about her neck, over the other collar. She was then chained by the neck to my slave ring. "Listen closely, Kliomenes," I told him. "You will be able to hear, from the wharves at Victoria, the ringing of a hammer, pounding on iron, on an anvil. Do you hear it?" "Yes," he said. "They are curving collars of iron, with chains attached, about the throats of your fellow pirates." He was silent. "Such collars are heavy and uncomfortable," I said. "I know. I have worn such collars. There is this to be said for them, however. We were now passing an open slave market. The merchant was chaining his girls on the broad, tiered, cement display shelves. One girl lay on her stomach, on her elbows, her head down, the heavy iron collar on her neck visible beneath her hair; a short, weighty chain of thick dark links connected this collar, by its collar ring, to a wide, stout ring, anchored deeply in the cement, Being dragged along the side of the platform, conducted by a dozen chains, each attached to, and radiating out from, a heavy metal collar, each chain held by a child, was a pathetic figure, stumbling and. struggling, its ankles shackled and its upper body almost swathed in chains, Gnieus Lelius. She looked at the other girls. On their throats were heavy collars of black iron, the perforated ends of each curving about the neck to come together in front, in such a way that the collar curved closely about the neck behind the two perforated ends, and the two perforated ends extended forward. These jutting ends then, with their matching apertures, were hammered flat together. Through the matched apertures a dangling iron ring had been closed. Thus, in a sense, the collar was doubly closed, having not only been hammered shut, but also secured with the ring joining the two ends of the metal. Either closure is sufficient, of course. This collar-and-ring arrangement is simply and inexpensively wrought, not requiring the fusing of metals in welding. Ring mounts, and such, on the other hand, are usually fused into, welded into, thus becoming part of, the shackle or manacle. For example, the shackle on her left ankle had a common ring mount, welded into the metal, through which the ring was inserted and closed. "The heavy metal collar on her throat was uncomfortable, quite different from the light band with which she had been familiar. Further, it was a high collar, and it was not easy for her to put her head down. It was exactly the same sort of collar, she was sure, as that worn by the other girls. She could feel it, trace with her finger the closure, feel the extended ends, touch the heavy, dangling ring which had been put through the apertures and closed. Such a collar, with its size and weight, perhaps four or five pounds, its discomfort, she was sure, in the house would have been used only as a punishment collar. Yet, here, all the girls wore it. Kneeling, in position, chained by the left ankle to a ring, her throat enclosed in a heavy, clumsy, ringed, iron collar, on a cement sales shelf, before Targo, sensitive to her nudity, and miserable, she noted one and another slave girl in the crowd. Certainly she did not want to wear so cruel, high, thick, and heavy a collar, one in which she could scarcely lower her head, in effect, a punishment collar. She moved her neck a bit, too, in her collar, that collar which was not the typical light, graceful slave collar, the attractive collar worn by most slave girls in the city, which might merely mark her as bond and identify her master, but the large, heavy, massive collar put by Targo on his properties, that they might, to escape the discomfort and indignity of such impediments, all the more eagerly submit themselves to the consideration of prospective buyers, collars, too, which, if they strayed, or fled, assuming they might obtain the unlikely opportunity to do so, would immediately call attention to themselves. "Guardsman! Search for an escaped slave in a weight collar, a high collar of thick, black iron, hammered shut about her neck, its two forward projections pierced, a dangling, two-hort iron ring threaded through the piercings!" I had now been fitted with a collar of the house, one which had been hammered about my neck. It was large high, heavy, and uncomfortable. I could scarcely lower my chin. It was quite different from the light lovely, comfortable but quite secure, common collars which Gorean masters commonly lock about the throats of their kajirae, collars, for example, of the sort which I envied in my instructresses. Perhaps the point of such collars, the house collars, was to make their trainees eager to be brought to the block. In the training house, a heavy metal collar, of rounded iron, was hammered about my neck. That is temporary, but it has its effect on us. I looked up, the heavy collar on my neck. The chain, too, is heavy, dependent from its ring. I had little doubt that the collar and chain, as the others, was originally intended for men, perhaps criminals, perhaps prisoners of war, bound for the quarries or galleys. I wore a heavy metal collar, to which was attached a chain, fixed to a stout ring, anchored at the side of my mat. Beneath that collar was a light, close-fitting metal collar. To my dismay a heavy metal collar was placed about my throat and snapped shut. There was a ring in the back of the collar and, in a moment, by a chain and two snap locks I was fastened to a heavy ring behind me, set deeply in the logs of the kennel.
He opened the hinged collar of black iron, about a half inch in height. He put it about her throat. It also contained a welded ring, suitable for the attachment of a chain. I had worn, almost from the first, a light, gleaming, about-a-half-inch-high, close-fitting steel collar. It locked in the back. I could see the collar. It was flat, narrow, about half inch in height, and closely fitting, a common collar. The collar was a simple one, of a familiar type, particularly in the northern hemisphere, a band collar, about a half inch in height, closely fitting, locked at the back. Most such collars range from a half inch to an inch in height. The collar was a common Gorean collar, of the sort favored in particular in her northern hemisphere, flat, light, sturdy, about a half to three-quarters of an inch in height, close-fitting, locked, the lock at the back of the neck.
The collar was a common Gorean collar, of the sort favored in particular in her northern hemisphere, flat, light, sturdy, about a half to three-quarters of an inch in height, close-fitting, locked, the lock at the back of the neck.
The collar was a simple one, of a familiar type, particularly in the northern hemisphere, a band collar, about a half inch in height, closely fitting, locked at the back. Most such collars range from a half inch to an inch in height.
She approached me. From my pouch I drew forth a leather Kur collar, with its lock, and, sewn in leather, its large, rounded ring. "What is it?" she asked, apprehensively. I took it behind her neck, and then, closing it about her throat, thrust the large, flattish bolt, snapping it, into the locking breech. The two edges of metal, bordered by the leather, fitted closely together. The collar is some three inches in height. The girl must keep her chin up. "It is the collar of a Kur cow," I told her. The Kur collar, leather, some three inches in height, holding her chin up, with its ring, was still on her throat.
There was, however, literally sewn about her neck, a thick, high leather collar. Over her iron collar she wore a heavy leather Kur collar, high, heavily sewn, with its large ring. She approached me. From my pouch I drew forth a leather Kur collar, with its lock, and, sewn in leather, its large, rounded ring. "What is it?" she asked, apprehensively. I took it behind her neck, and then, closing it about her throat, thrust the large, flattish bolt, snapping it, into the locking breech. The two edges of metal, bordered by the leather, fitted closely together. The collar is some three inches in height. The girl must keep her chin up. "It is the collar of a Kur cow," I told her. About the dais, kneeling, waiting to serve, were slave girls, some in high collars, clad in strands of slave silk. She wore on her throat a high, gold collar, with, in front, a large golden loop, some two inches in width. About her neck there was a chain. From the chain there hung two objects; the first was a narrow, bronze bell, flattish and tapering, with a flat top and ring; when she moved it would sound, calling attention to her whereabouts; the second was a metal coin box, which contained a slot for the deposition of coins; the coin box was locked. I had not heard coins sound, from within the coin box. Too, about her neck, under the chain, with its dangling articles, there was a high, tight leather collar. I then turned the collar, slowly, carefully, on her neck, for it was high, thick and close-fitting. The stout collar ring was then in front of her throat, with its long, dependent leash. At one point, crouching down, then kneeling, as we passed, by hangings at the side of the corridor, was a slave girl. She was terrified. She wore some twists of silk about her. She wore a collar of a sort, rather high and ornate, which is often jeweled. No jewels, however, caught the light as we passed. They had been, I gathered, pried from their settings. "Lift up your chin," he said. "Yes, Master," I said. I then felt the high, thick collar put about my neck, over the collar of Aemilianus. I could feel it snug under my chin. It was then snapped shut. Then again, desperately, I strove to resist. The high, black, leather collar cut at the bottom of my chin. She looked at the other girls. On their throats were heavy collars of black iron, the perforated ends of each curving about the neck to come together in front, in such a way that the collar curved closely about the neck behind the two perforated ends, and the two perforated ends extended forward. These jutting ends then, with their matching apertures, were hammered flat together. Through the matched apertures a dangling iron ring had been closed. Thus, in a sense, the collar was doubly closed, having not only been hammered shut, but also secured with the ring joining the two ends of the metal. Either closure is sufficient, of course. This collar-and-ring arrangement is simply and inexpensively wrought, not requiring the fusing of metals in welding. Ring mounts, and such, on the other hand, are usually fused into, welded into, thus becoming part of, the shackle or manacle. For example, the shackle on her left ankle had a common ring mount, welded into the metal, through which the ring was inserted and closed. "The heavy metal collar on her throat was uncomfortable, quite different from the light band with which she had been familiar. Further, it was a high collar, and it was not easy for her to put her head down. It was exactly the same sort of collar, she was sure, as that worn by the other girls. She could feel it, trace with her finger the closure, feel the extended ends, touch the heavy, dangling ring which had been put through the apertures and closed. Such a collar, with its size and weight, perhaps four or five pounds, its discomfort, she was sure, in the house would have been used only as a punishment collar. Yet, here, all the girls wore it. She tried to lift the heavy collar on her throat, but, of course, it was stopped almost instantly, pressing upward against her chin. Certainly she did not want to wear so cruel, high, thick, and heavy a collar, one in which she could scarcely lower her head, in effect, a punishment collar. The collar was, as noted, high, and she could not well lower her head without a movement of her entire body, though she could, of course, keep her eyes cast down. "Head up!" he said. "Do you wish to be put in a high collar, to keep your head up?" "No, Master," she said, quickly. Such collars are common with Kur pets. They are also used from time to time in slave training. The chain seemed heavier than necessary, and the collars were high and dark. If the girl kneels upright, her back straight, as slaves are commonly expected to kneel, she cannot well lower her head in such a collar. The head remains lifted to the master, which can be fearful for a slave. She lowers her head by bending at the waist. I did not want to live the rest of my life in ankle chains, my throat locked in a high collar, of weighty iron, with points. Any collar but this! Let it be a high collar, a weight collar, a punishment collar! Let it have inside spikes, anything!
He opened the hinged collar of black iron, about a half inch in height. He put it about her throat. It also contained a welded ring, suitable for the attachment of a chain. The collar of black iron, with its heavy hinge, its riveted closure, its projecting ring of iron, for a chain or padlock, showed black, heavy, against the whiteness of her lovely throat. Numbly I lifted the chain which hung from the collar fastened on my neck. I looked at it, disbelievingly. The links were close-set, heavy, of some primitive, simple black iron. It did not seem an attractive chain, or an expensive one. But I was held by it. I felt the collar with my fingers. I could not see it, but it seemed formed, too, of heavy iron; it seemed simple, practical, not ostentatious; it gripped my throat rather closely; I supposed it was black in color, matching the chain; it had a heavy hinge on one side; and the chain, by a link, opened and closed, was fastened to a loop on the side of the collar; the loop was fastened about a staple, which, it seemed, was a part of the collar itself; the hinge was under my right ear; the chain hung from its loop and staple under my chin; with my finger, on the other side, under my left ear, I felt a large lock, with its opening for the insertion of a heavy key. The collar, then, fastened with a lock; it had not been hammered about my neck. I wondered who held the key to that collar. He then thrust the heavy key he carried into the lock at the back of her hinged collar, and dropped it to the side, near the ring, with the coil of chain, on the deck.
Philebus unlocked even the holding collars on the neck chains of the girls at the post, that they, too, might participate in the serving. "Sometimes slave girls," I said, "are aroused and then put in their kennels with their hands braceleted behind their backs, held there with a belly chain, or a belly cord. Much the same effect is achieved when they are chained by the neck in a slave bin, on the straw, their wrists chained to their holding collar." I would not have expected to have worn other than a common collar, of course, there are many sorts of collars. The most familiar are the "common collar," which, in its varieties, tends to be flat and closely fitting, and the "Turian collar," which, in its varieties, is more rounded, and barlike, and fits more loosely. Both lock behind the back of the neck. Dorna wore a "common collar." Some other types of collars are decorative collars, holding collars, training collars and punishment collars. "She is to be stripped and branded, and put in a holding collar. It was a simple collar and I supposed it was a temporary collar, a holding collar. Its engraving was probably no more than some simple legend, such as "If found, return me to the pens of Treve." The slave was now in two collars, the holding collar and, just above it, the identification collar, that by means of which she can be identified, as belonging to a particular individual. As soon as the identification collar was in place, the guard of the court removed the holding collar. Cabot jerked Cecily's chain against the collar ring, twice, this ring attached to the bulkhead's holding collar, which was rather heavy, which was closed over her slave collar.
I saw a chain snapped onto the common chain of the women. At the end of this shorter chain there was an open collar. It was then put about my neck and snapped shut. I touched it. I was now on the same chain with the other women. "I am not branded and collared," I reminded him, "except, of course, for the holding-chain collar."
"But she is a slave," he said. "Her thigh bears the brand of Treve. Her throat is encircled in the collar of my house." She pulled the robes down from her throat. "I wear a collar," she said. I saw the simple, circular, gray collar, the collar of the house of Samos, locked around her throat. She, like I, wore slave bells on her left ankle, brief, parted yellow silk, the house collar. She was kept in the kennels off the kitchens. In spite of this she wore only the common house collar. "Bring a stable collar," said Kenneth. Barus put aside his tallying board and marking stick, and went into a nearby stable building, an equipment shed. "Hood her," said Kenneth to me. Telitsia sobbed. I took the slave hood from the wagon bed and drew it over her head, adjusting the straps and buckling them under her chin. I then descended from the bed. Kenneth threw the key to Telitsia's collar to Borto, who caught it and placed it in his pouch. Her collar would be removed only when a new one was ready to replace it, probably the house collar of some slaver's emporium. There I was forced to kneel, and was put in a house collar. "Take her below," said Samos to one of the two guards flanking the woman. "Put the iron to her body, left thigh, common Kajira mark, and, I think, for the time, a common house collar will do for her." The reference to "block melodies" had to do with certain melodies which are commonly used in slave markets, in the display of the merchandise. Some were apparently developed for the purpose, and others simply utilized for it. Such melodies tend to be sexually stimulating, and powerfully so, both for the merchandise being vended, who must dance to them, and for the buyers. It is a joke of young Goreans to sometimes whistle, or hum, such melodies, apparently innocently, in the presence of free women who, of course, are not familiar with them, and do not understand their origins or significance, and then to watch them become restless, and, usually, after a time, disturbed and apprehensive, hurry away. Such women, of course, will doubtless recall such melodies, and at last understand the joke, if they find themselves naked on the sales block, in house collars, dancing to them. The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap. I had now been fitted with a collar of the house, one which had been hammered about my neck. It was large high, heavy, and uncomfortable. I could scarcely lower my chin. It was quite different from the light lovely, comfortable but quite secure, common collars which Gorean masters commonly lock about the throats of their kajirae, collars, for example, of the sort which I envied in my instructresses. Perhaps the point of such collars, the house collars, was to make their trainees eager to be brought to the block. My head was forced up and the house collar, now a new house collar, submitting to a bolt and key, was thrust up under my chin. This new house collar was quite different from the original house collar in which I had been placed, the high, heavy, iron collar, which had been hammered about my neck. That had been removed in the house's metal shop the morning following my red-silking. I was much pleased to be relieved of the original collar. The new collar was not the light lovely, secure embondment signification of the common collar but it was a considerable improvement over its high, weighty predecessor. The removal of the original collar suggested that my sale might be imminent. This speculation had proved to be warranted. One role of the original collar was presumably to encourage a girl to do well in her lessons, that she may the sooner be brought to the block. Would such a collar not be likely to produce such an effect? I had been marked my first morning in the house of training, and a house collar, a training collar, had been hammered about my throat.
The slave was now in two collars, the holding collar and, just above it, the identification collar, that by means of which she can be identified, as belonging to a particular individual. As soon as the identification collar was in place, the guard of the court removed the holding collar.
On Ellen's throat was a light, inexpensive, engraved, metal collar. It was locked on her, fastened behind the back of the neck. The legend of the collar read "I am Ellen, the slave of Portus Canio."
I was now a collared slave girl on Gor. I touched the collar. It was light, but, too, it was efficient and inflexible. He stepped about, in front of me. He showed me an opened collar, graceful and slim, and of inflexible steel.
A naked slave girl was chained by the neck to a heavy stake sunk deeply into the ground. When we appeared from about the corner of the inn and she glimpsed Aetius, she, trembling, went immediately to first obeisance position, kneeling, her head down between her extended arms, the palms of her hands on the ground. Her neck was encircled with the inn collar. An inn tunic, presumably removed from her, had been cast to the side where she could not reach it.
Any collar but this! Let it be a high collar, a weight collar, a punishment collar! Let it have inside spikes, anything!
The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap.
the male slave, or Kajirus, seldom has a locked collar; normally a band of iron is simply hammered about his neck; The female slaves, like the men, were unclothed, and wore collars; their collars, however, were not the typical locked collar of the female slave but, since they were only in the iron pens, a narrow band of iron, with a number, hammered about their neck. Virginia and Phyllis, however, Elizabeth had told me, still wore the simple iron collars which had been hammered about their necks by the smith days before. There was a rusted, heavy iron collar riveted about the neck of Ho-Hak, with a bit of chain dangling from it. Ho-Hak, sweating, breathing deeply, wildly, his great ears flat against the sides of his head, the iron, riveted collar of the galley slave, with its broken, dangling chain, about his neck, clutching his oar pole, stood with his legs planted widely apart on the rence, at bay. The man was barefoot, and wore only a rag. His hair was tangled and matted; it had been sheared at the base of his neck. About his neck was hammered an iron collar. About the wrists of many, though separated, still clung iron manacles; about the throats of many, too, still clung collars of iron, some with dangling, broken lengths of chain. About her neck, riveted, was a collar of black iron, with a welded ring, to which a chain might be attached. A simple band of iron had been hammered about her neck by one of the metal workers in the employ of Samos. She was poor stuff, not fit for a lock collar. My neck wore an iron collar, with its ring, behind my neck, through which a long chain passed, the chain, too, being held to the wall by its own rings. He was a large man, exhausted. At his hips he wore a rag. An iron collar, with broken chain, was at his neck. "There," said the metal worker. He eased the heavy iron collar, with the short, dangling chain, from Ram's neck. "Ah," said Ram. Beside him, on the floor, knelt Tina, which was now her slave name. Ram directed the metal worker to saw away an inch and a half of the opened collar. He put it in a vise on his workbench and did so. The metal worker finished sawing the portion off the heavy collar Ram had worn. Ram then pulled Tina to the feet by her hair and forced her head down on the anvil. The metal worker looked at him. "Put it on her neck," he said. I watched while the heavy collar, shortened now to fit a woman, was curved expertly about her neck by blows of the hammer, and then, decisively, struck shut. He knelt in the clearing, in the chains of the talunas, shackles on his ankles and wrists, connected to a common chain depending from a heavy iron collar. I felt with my fingers the heavy collar of iron, with its ring, fastened on my neck. "Listen closely, Kliomenes," I told him. "You will be able to hear, from the wharves at Victoria, the ringing of a hammer, pounding on iron, on an anvil. Do you hear it?" "Yes," he said. "They are curving collars of iron, with chains attached, about the throats of your fellow pirates." He was silent. "Such collars are heavy and uncomfortable," I said. "I know. I have worn such collars. There is this to be said for them, however. We were now passing an open slave market. The merchant was chaining his girls on the broad, tiered, cement display shelves. One girl lay on her stomach, on her elbows, her head down, the heavy iron collar on her neck visible beneath her hair; a short, weighty chain of thick dark links connected this collar, by its collar ring, to a wide, stout ring, anchored deeply in the cement, They were only slaves. That could be told by the collars they wore, bars of rounded iron which, here, in the house, had been curved about their necks and hammered shut. On her neck was an iron collar. By means of this collar and its chain, the chain fastened about the wagon axle, she was secured in place. She had been beaten, doubtless quite a rare experience for a high slave. If she had once worn a golden, bejeweled collar it was now gone. On her neck now was a simple iron collar, hammered shut, such as might be put on the neck of any slut picked up by any soldier in a flaming city. The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap. After the golden collar had been cut away, and the napkin, with its filings, carefully gathered up and folded, I had been led, held by the hair, my head held at the hip of one of the men, to an anvil. My head and neck were laid upon it. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a sturdy, rounded bar of iron. This bar was bent into a curve, but the curve was not closed on one side. It was shaped rather like the letter C. this was put about my neck. I saw a heavy hammer rise. Then, as I closed my eyes, this bar, with powerful, expert strokes, was shaped about my neck. The C had now become a closed circle. The curve was regular; the two ends were flush. It had been well put upon me. I suspected that my captor, he who had wielded the hammer, might be, or might once have been, of the Metal Workers. I could no more removed the collar, of course, than I could have opened a link in a heavy chain, one which might have held a ship, with my fingers. No longer, then, did I wear a collar of gold. I now wore a simpler collar, indeed, a collar that was no more, in fact, physically, than a ring of iron.
Midice now possessed a hundred pleasure silks, and rings and beads, which she might twine in her now-jeweled collar. I watched her, in the training sand, dancing to hide drums, naked, in slave bracelets and jeweled dancing collar. I understood what she meant, but collars are much the same. To be sure, some collars are more ornate than others, enameled, even jeweled, and such. "You have a lovely collar," I said. "I wager it was expensive." My collar was indistinguishable from thousands of others, a quite common collar. "I do not know," she said. "All the display slaves have similar collars." "Your master must be rich," I said. "I fear so," she said. "I have heard his chamber slaves and dancers are sometimes put in jeweled collars." "The collar," she said, "is not of gold, not even of silver. Too, I fear it is not encrusted with jewels." "I do not wish to tempt thieves," I said. "Such a collar would be worth more than most slaves." It is not unusual for a Master to desire to enhance the beauty of his properties by various means, jeweled collars, and such.
"Do not think of the collar as a simple piece of jewelry," I said, "though it can serve that purpose. Its primary objective is to identify he to whom you belong."
The collars of most of these girls had been cut from their throats, for they had been Kaiila collars.
I pulled against the leash collar with the side of my neck, but it was close about my neck, then above the kajira collar.
I'm surprised I've never addressed the topic of ko-lar before and I've added it to this section because it seemed the most likely place for it. The letters ko-lar appear just three times within the series. They are shown as Eta is teaching Judy how to speak Gorean. The phonetic pronunciation is used to help Judy as she is taught a variety of Gorean pronunciations for various items. In other words, a ko-lar is not different in form or function from any other collar as described in every other reference throughout the books. It seems obvious then that spelling out the phonetic pronunciation "ko-lar" is as silly as always spelling out "El-in-or" for Elinor or "E-liz-a-beth-card-vella" for Elizabeth Cardwell's name. "Ko-lar," she said, indicating her collar. "It is the same word in English," I cried. She did not understand my outburst. Gorean, as I would learn, is rich in words borrowed from Earth languages; how rich it is I am not a skilled enough philologist to conjecture. It may well be that almost all Gorean expressions may be traced to one or another Earth language. Yet, the language is fluid, rich and expressive. Borrowed expressions, as in linguistic borrowing generally, take on the coloration of the borrowing language; in time the borrowings become naturalized, so to speak, being fully incorporated into the borrowing language; at this point they are, for all practical purposes, words within the borrowing language. How many, in English, for example, think of expressions such as 'automobile,' 'corral,' and 'lariat' as being foreign words? "Collar!" I said. Eta frowned. "Ko-lar," she repeated, again indicating the neck band of steel fashioned on her throat. "Ko-lar," I said, carefully following her pronunciation. Eta accepted this. "Var Ko-lar?" asked Eta. I pointed to the collar on her throat. "Var Ta-Teera?" asked Eta, smiling. I pointed to the brief rag which I wore. Eta seemed pleased. She had laid out a number of articles. My lessons in Gorean had begun. Suddenly, stammering, I said, "Eta - var - var Bina?" Eta looked at me, surprised. "Elinor," I whispered. "El-in-or," she repeated, smiling. Then, facing the other girls, she pointed at me. "El-in-or," she said, pleased. She seemed delighted. "E-liz-a-beth-card-vella" he would try to say, adding the "a" sound because it is a common ending of feminine names on Gor. He could never, like most native speakers of Gorean properly handle the "w" sound, for it is extremely rare in Gorean, existing only in certain unusual words of obviously barbarian origin. 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. On the other hand, Kamchak could say the sound I have represented as "vella" quite easily and would upon occasion use this as Elizabeth's name. Most often, however, he and I simply referred to her as the Little Barbarian.
The collars were of thick leather, with metal insert locks, flat metal bolts slipping, locking, into spring catches; when closed, two rectangular metal plates adjoined; sewn into each collar was a light, welded metal ring; about this was closed the leash snap; the action of the leash snap was mechanical but, apparently, it was beyond the strength of a woman to open it. In one corner of the stockade, huddled together, their white bodies, now stripped, red in the light of the flames, were the bond-maids, in their leather collars, leashed, the straps in the furred fists of their master. Over her iron collar she wore a heavy leather Kur collar, high, heavily sewn, with its large ring. She approached me. From my pouch I drew forth a leather Kur collar, with its lock, and, sewn in leather, its large, rounded ring. "What is it?" she asked, apprehensively. I took it behind her neck, and then, closing it about her throat, thrust the large, flattish bolt, snapping it, into the locking breech. The two edges of metal, bordered by the leather, fitted closely together. The collar is some three inches in height. The girl must keep her chin up. "It is the collar of a Kur cow," I told her. The Kur collar, leather, some three inches in height, holding her chin up, with its ring, was still on her throat. On the Steel Worlds she would have had the protection of her collar, which was wide and locked on her neck. It identified her master in Kur, and gave her much standing amongst those of her species. It was not a slave collar, of course, as she was not a slave, but merely an animal. It was a typical pet collar, for such as she, high, to keep her head up, leather, closely fitting, locked in the back, with a ring in front, to which a leash might be attached, a chain, or such. On her neck there was a dark metal collar. Mina had worn such a collar. From what the Lady Bina had said on the trail, based on the lettering, I took it to be a Kur collar.
About their necks, wrapped several times, three or four times, were leather strips, about an inch wide. These were knotted in front, with a variety of ties. These are slaves, thought Cabot. They are collared. The different knots probably identify the master. It is like Gorean slave strings, or slave laces, fastened about a girl's neck, indicating her bondage and her owner.
She moved her neck a bit, too, in her collar, that collar which was not the typical light, graceful slave collar, the attractive collar worn by most slave girls in the city, which might merely mark her as bond and identify her master, but the large, heavy, massive collar put by Targo on his properties, that they might, to escape the discomfort and indignity of such impediments, all the more eagerly submit themselves to the consideration of prospective buyers, collars, too, which, if they strayed, or fled, assuming they might obtain the unlikely opportunity to do so, would immediately call attention to themselves. "Guardsman! Search for an escaped slave in a weight collar, a high collar of thick, black iron, hammered shut about her neck, its two forward projections pierced, a dangling, two-hort iron ring threaded through the piercings!" I had now been fitted with a collar of the house, one which had been hammered about my neck. It was large high, heavy, and uncomfortable. I could scarcely lower my chin. It was quite different from the light lovely, comfortable but quite secure, common collars which Gorean masters commonly lock about the throats of their kajirae, collars, for example, of the sort which I envied in my instructresses. Perhaps the point of such collars, the house collars, was to make their trainees eager to be brought to the block.
He then unlocked the leash collar and freed me of it and the leash. The leash collar was a high, sturdy one, and fitted rather closely about her neck. Girls do not slip such leashes. It had two buckle fastenings. These I had fastened in the front and then turned to the back. This had brought the sturdy leading ring, on its plate, riveted into the leather, to the front, under her chin. This is the common position for front leading, the girl behind you, whether she is on her feet, as it was my intention to lead this girl, if only to save time, or, say, on her belly or all fours. The back position is commonly used when the girl is in front of you, and you are controlling her from behind, she either on her feet ahead of you, or, say, beside you or ahead of you on her belly or all fours. The front position is generally preferred as leash pressure is then received at the back and sides of the neck, not the front. To be sure, a girl is likely to be much more wary, and fearful, and docile, when the ring is at the back. I shook the slave leash, now on her. This movement was transmitted through the leather, until it jerked and snapped at the ring, on the leash collar. He then turned her about and put a leather leash collar, with its attached lead, now dangling before her, on her neck. He then unclipped the leash ring from the ring on the straps, under my chin. He then, over the straps, pushed my chin up, and fastened the leash, by means of its own clip and ring, about my neck, a portion of the leash thus serving as its own collar. The loop fitted closely about my neck. Perhaps there was something like a half inch of play in the loop. He jerked the loop open, as far as it would go, to its limit, where it was stopped by the ring and guard. I then had something like an inch of play within the loop. I could not, of course, hope to slip such a tether. I pulled against the leash collar with the side of my neck, but it was close about my neck, then above the kajira collar. She straightened herself, as the leash went taut, between the ring on the leash collar and his fist. I saw Trachinos drop a widened leash collar about the head of the slave, and then adjust it to her neck. I felt my hands pulled behind me and I heard the click of slave bracelets. Then a leash collar was buckled about my throat. I felt the leash pulled up. "Look up," said the dealer. I was still on all fours. The leash was taut. I looked up, as I must, the leash collar tight under my chin. Slave bracelets were snapped about my wrists, pinioning them behind my body. A moment later the leash collar was buckled about my neck. A leash collar was put about my neck. Then a leash was attached to the collar. He put his hand under the leash collar on my metal collar, light, encircling my throat closely, impossible even to think of slipping.
There was, however, literally sewn about her neck, a thick, high leather collar. The collars were of thick leather, with metal insert locks, flat metal bolts slipping, locking, into spring catches; when closed, two rectangular metal plates adjoined; sewn into each collar was a light, welded metal ring; about this was closed the leash snap; the action of the leash snap was mechanical but, apparently, it was beyond the strength of a woman to open it. In one corner of the stockade, huddled together, their white bodies, now stripped, red in the light of the flames, were the bond-maids, in their leather collars, leashed, the straps in the furred fists of their master. Over her iron collar she wore a heavy leather Kur collar, high, heavily sewn, with its large ring. The Kur collar, leather, some three inches in height, holding her chin up, with its ring, was still on her throat. The guard took the straps which had bound her ankles together, and, untying them, slipped them through the metal ring, glinting, sewn into the back of the leather collar of the harness, worn over the simple curved collar of iron which marked her, even should she be clothed, and her brand not visible, as slave. The straps had run from the back of the collar to her ankles, holding her in a kneeling position. Her legs were now free. The ankle straps then, sewn to the sides of the collar, and now circled about the collar and crossing in back, and now run through the ring on the front of the collar, served as leash. The harness is designed to provide a large number of ties. The leash dangled between us, depending from our leather collars. Arlene stripped herself, to the leather collar, in Imnak's hide tent. About her neck there was a chain. From the chain there hung two objects; the first was a narrow, bronze bell, flattish and tapering, with a flat top and ring; when she moved it would sound, calling attention to her whereabouts; the second was a metal coin box, which contained a slot for the deposition of coins; the coin box was locked. I had not heard coins sound, from within the coin box. Too, about her neck, under the chain, with its dangling articles, there was a high, tight leather collar. "How laughable and delicious would the little collared chits find it that I, who so scorned them, am not only now, too, a slave, but a low slave, one with only a leather collar, one not even permitted clothing, As she still lay half across the table, shuddering, half in shock, a leather collar, with a ring and attached leash, was buckled about her throat, over the snugly fitting steel collar. She was then pulled from the table and, stumbling, with faltering steps, terrified, was drawn by Hassan between the snarling sleen. He then went to a chest and from it fetched forth a thick, plain, black-leather collar with a lock closure. It was a sturdy ring attached to this collar, and, attached to ring, there was a long slave leash of black leather. Then again, desperately, I strove to resist. The high, black, leather collar cut at the bottom of my chin. On her neck, as on mine, was a buckled, two-ringed, leather collar. It was the sort of collar which may be easily put on, and removed from, a girl. The girl, of course, if manacled as we were, is helpless in it. The rings are located at 180 degrees from one another. This permits girls to be fastened, the collar oriented appropriately, either side by side, in ranks, or behind one another, in files. A leather strap, with snaps at both ends, joins the rings, usually the ring at the back of one collar to the ring at the front of another. I watched them descending the steps to the central walkway. She half fell once, losing her footing, striking against the right side of the stone stairwell but he kept her upright, his hand then literally about her thick leather collar, and then, in a moment; now again on a short leash, I saw her drawn about the corner, toward the line of rings below and in back of the upper battlements. The door opened a little, and I shoved Ina, barefoot, hooded and braceleted, the leash dangling from a buckled leather collar on her neck, inside. He then turned her about and put a leather leash collar, with its attached lead, now dangling before her, on her neck. Also a leather collar was on my neck, from which a leash dangled, and the end of the leash was clutched in one of the beast's massive paws. Each of us wore a leather collar, with a metal ring in the back. Through this ring a rope was threaded, and knotted about each ring. Each end of this rope was in the keeping of an Ashigaru. "I can fashion a collar from leather, or rope," said Tajima. "We can always, later, brand her, search out a lock collar; and such." "Kajira canjellne!" I cried. There was a great silence in the theater. This is an ancient cry. I do not know its origins. It might date from the time that Ar was no more than a cluster of villages. It is surely older than the roads of Turia and the aqueducts of Venna and Torcadino. It is in old Gorean, the language from which modern Gorean evolved. The cry does not translate easily or well into English, or modern Gorean, but it is a challenge, commonly followed by the death of one or more individuals. It perhaps dates from a time when slave collars were no more than strips of knotted leather and ropes no more than twisted vines. But the rope was taken up from her bound wrists, behind her back, to encircle her neck a few times, where it was knotted. The remainder of the rope then, dangling from the rope collar, lifted, could serve as a leash. There was also, in his case, enough rope left over to serve not only as a leash, but as a whip, should the leash holder wish to so employ it.
She twisted her hand in the metal and leather choke collar. Again the metal and leather collar slid shut on my throat, and with a gasp of anguish, wrists bound behind my back, not permitted clothing, I followed at my tether, not as they, the proud women of the forest, but only as I could be among them, Kajira. Verna resnapped the leather and metal choke collar on my throat. Then I felt the leather and metal choke collar again slide shut on my throat and, choking, I followed hurriedly at my tether. The collars were of thick leather, with metal insert locks, flat metal bolts slipping, locking, into spring catches; when closed, two rectangular metal plates adjoined; sewn into each collar was a light, welded metal ring; about this was closed the leash snap; the action of the leash snap was mechanical but, apparently, it was beyond the strength of a woman to open it. She approached me. From my pouch I drew forth a leather Kur collar, with its lock, and, sewn in leather, its large, rounded ring. "What is it?" she asked, apprehensively. I took it behind her neck, and then, closing it about her throat, thrust the large, flattish bolt, snapping it, into the locking breech. The two edges of metal, bordered by the leather, fitted closely together. The collar is some three inches in height. The girl must keep her chin up. "It is the collar of a Kur cow," I told her.
About their necks, wrapped several times, three or four times, were leather strips, about an inch wide. These were knotted in front, with a variety of ties. These are slaves, thought Cabot. They are collared. The different knots probably identify the master. It is like Gorean slave strings, or slave laces, fastened about a girl's neck, indicating her bondage and her owner.
I was now a collared slave girl on Gor. I touched the collar. It was light, but, too, it was efficient and inflexible. She looked lovely, the light, locked, steel collar on her throat. I saw slave females, too, barefoot and bare-armed, in their tiny skirts, their necks in their light steel collars. The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman. I had worn, almost from the first, a light, gleaming, about-a-half-inch-high, close-fitting steel collar. It locked in the back. On Ellen's throat was a light, inexpensive, engraved, metal collar. It was locked on her, fastened behind the back of the neck. The legend of the collar read "I am Ellen, the slave of Portus Canio." She touched the collar. Cabot had been curious about the collars of the slaves in the cylinder. They were of a common type, a flat, light, closely fitting band, locked at the back of the neck. "It is a standard collar, Master," she said, "but one similar to a public collar, as that of a state slave." Almost all the slaves, of course, wore ship collars, as did Alcinoë, but some had lighter, lovelier collars, more common on the continent, and islands, but as securely locked, and as unslippable. As the collar was light, it seemed to me likely that it was a private collar, not a public collar, not, say, a ship's collar. With two hands I felt the collar on my neck. It was the first standard Gorean slave collar I had worn. It was a flat band which closely encircled my throat. Such collars are common in the north. It was sturdy, but light and not uncomfortable. Soon I would forget I wore such a device, but it was there. It was, of course, locked. I had determined that, almost immediately. And I was very grateful when I earned my first, more typical, collar, light, flat, and close-fitting. The typical collar was practical and informative, light and comfortable, and attractive. I wore a heavy metal collar, to which was attached a chain, fixed to a stout ring, anchored at the side of my mat. Beneath that collar was a light, close-fitting metal collar. I now wore a light metal band, flat, and close-fitting, on my throat, secured with a small lock at the back of the neck. It was a very common Gorean collar. Similarly she was nicely but not ostentatiously collared. The slave band was typical, flat, light but sturdy, efficient, close-fitting, comfortable, and attractive. Many women do not realize how exciting, how female, and beautiful, they are, until they see themselves in a collar. The lock, as usual, was at the back of the neck. The inscription read, "I am the property of Harold of Skjern," the collar thus providing a name which would not lead one to expect an accent of either Ar or Cos, and making a reference to a town remote enough to be unfamiliar, one about which I was not likely to entertain many questions. There was nothing before him but a girl, a light, close-fitting collar on her neck.
My hand was at her throat, thrusting the light steel collar she wore up under her chin.
"If your training goes well," said Flaminius to the girls, "you will in time be given a pretty collar." He indicated Elizabeth's yellow enameled collar, bearing the legend of the House of Cernus. "It will even have a lock," said Flaminius. Virginia looked at him blankly. "You would like a pretty collar, wouldn't you?" asked Flaminius. "Yes, Master," said Virginia numbly. "And what of you Phyllis?" asked Flaminius. "Yes, Master," said the girl, a whisper. "I will decide if and when they receive a lock collar," said Sura. "Of course," said Flaminius, backing away a step, bowing his head. My memories are confused of the night, but we did find a smithy, and we had the girls marked, and purchased collars for them, lock collars, which we had engraved. A simple band of iron had been hammered about her neck by one of the metal workers in the employ of Samos. She was poor stuff, not fit for a lock collar. A heavy key was then thrust in the lock of my collar. The lock contained sand and salt. In the heat the metal was expanded. The lock resisted. Then the key, forced, with a heavy snap, turned, freeing the lock bolt. She wore a one-piece tunic of rep-cloth, cut high at the thighs, to better reveal them, her steel collar, which was a lock collar, and her brand. "It is," said Haruki, "it is a collar, a slave collar, a collar for a slave." "No!" said the girl. "Yes," said Tajima. "A lock collar," I said. "Of course," said Tajima.
I turned the key and opened the tiny, heavy, single-action, seven-bolt lock on the collar. Each of the bolts is said to stand for one of the letters in the spelling of 'Kajira', the most common Gorean expression for a slave girl.
The common female slave collar on Gor has a seven-pin lock. There are, incidentally, seven letters in the most common Gorean expression for female slave, Kajira.
I took from my tunic the key my father had given me, the key to Sana's collar. I reached to the lock behind her neck, inserted the key and turned it, springing open the mechanism. It was a collar like most others, of steel, secured with a small, heavy lock which closed behind the girl's neck. She wore the Turian collar, rather than the common slave collar. The Turian collar lies loosely on the girl, a round ring; it fits so loosely that, when grasped in a man's fist, the girl can turn within it; the common Gorean collar, on the other hand, is a flat, snugly fitting steel band. Both collars lock in the back, behind the girl's neck. The Turian collar is more difficult to engrave, but it, like the flat collar, will bear some legend assuring that the girl, if found, will be promptly returned to her master. What happened then was done very swiftly. Kamchak lifted from the box an object indeed intended to grace the throat of a girl. But it was a round metal ring, a Turian collar, the collar of a slave. There was a firm snap of the heavy lock in the back of the collar and the throat of Aphris of Turia had been encircled with slave steel! I felt him thrust a key into the small, heavy lock at the back of my collar. He opened it, and placed it, too, on the table. Then she, lifting her arms, fitted the key into the lock at the back of her collar. I readjusted the collar on her neck, so that the small, heavy lock was again at the back of her neck. I felt her jam another key into the lock on the back of my collar. She twisted the key, freeing the single-action double bolt. I felt the collar at my throat, of sturdy steel. It was enameled white. In it, incised, in tiny, dark cursive letters, in a feminine-type script, was a message in Gorean. It read, I had been told, 'I am the property of the Lady Florence of Vonda.' The lock on the back of the collar had a double bolt, the double bolt, however, responding to a single key. My hand wandered to her hair, and then to her neck, enclosed in the narrow, steel collar. I fingered the lock at the back. I gently parted her hair, putting it delicately on either side of her neck. In this way I could see the collar on her neck, and the small, sturdy lock at the back of the neck. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman. "Straighten your collar," I said to Lavinia. Instantly, embarrassed, self-consciously, she lifted her hands to her collar. Then she looked at me, for a moment puzzled. To be sure, it was almost perfect. Then, shyly, with seeming demureness, but with a slave girl's sense of self-display, she, her chin level, her back straight, her shoulders back, centered the lock, with both hands, delicately, carefully, at the back of the neck. This lifted her breasts, beautifully. She put the collar about her neck, with the lock in front, and closed it. There was a small, solid click. Then, carefully, as it was a close-fitting collar, like most such collars, she turned it on her neck, so that the lock was at the back. This is the common way in which such collars are worn. The lock on the collar, as most of you will now be aware, is normally at the back of the neck. You will be taught to keep it there. If one looks closely, one will see it there, beneath your hair. Do not forget to wear your tunic well, and keep the collar lock at the back of your neck. After all, you do not wish to be whipped. I went behind one of the women, at the aft end of a pole, and carefully turned her collar. She remained absolutely still. The collar was plain. I adjusted it then so that the lock was again at the back of the neck, where it belongs. Her collar was a simple, flat metal band, light, close-fitting, with the lock, as is common, at the back of the neck. In this fashion, the front of the collar, if engraved, may be easily read. The collar is not uncomfortable. Usually I am not aware it is on me. It is noticeable of course, when I see my reflection as, for example, when I wish to adjust it a bit, on my neck, that it may sit more attractively on me. He wishes the lock, for example, to be squarely at the back of my neck. He is clear on that point. I reached into the box by the side of the curule chair, and removed the collar. It was a standard collar of the northern sort, flat, bandlike, and close fitting. The lock goes at the back of the neck. I put it carefully about her neck, adjusted it slightly, and then, decisively, snapped it shut. A woman is not likely to forget that moment, or sound.
It was a collar like most others, of steel, secured with a small, heavy lock which closed behind the girl's neck. The collar made a small, heavy click as it closed about her throat. Then to my surprise Al-Ka and Ba-Ta, from their pouches, produced golden collars, only too obviously prepared in advance. There were two heavy, short clicks and the lovely throats of the two girls were encircled. I gathered it was the only gold they would see for some time. On one collar there was engraved 'Al-Ka' and on the other 'Ba-Ta'. What happened then was done very swiftly. Kamchak lifted from the box an object indeed intended to grace the throat of a girl. But it was a round metal ring, a Turian collar, the collar of a slave. There was a firm snap of the heavy lock in the back of the collar and the throat of Aphris of Turia had been encircled with slave steel! He pushed up her head and then, with a click that could be heard throughout the enclosure, closed the collar a Turian collar - about her throat. The chain to which the collar was attached was a good deal longer than that of the Sirik, containing perhaps twenty feet of length. Kamchak's hands were at the small, heavy lock at the back of the steel, Turian collar she wore. He turned the key and opened the collar, discarding it. The small, heavy lock on a girl's slave collar, incidentally, may be of several varieties, but almost all are cylinder locks, either of the pin or disk variety. In a girl's collar lock there would be either six pins or six disks, one each, it is said, for each letter in the Gorean word for female slave, Kajira; the male slave, or Kajirus, seldom has a locked collar; normally a band of iron is simply hammered about his neck; He stepped behind me and tore open the top button of the black, bare-midriff blouse. I felt a small key being inserted into the small, heavy lock. The collar sprang open. Samos, with a general key, one used for many of the gray collars, unlocked the band of steel which encircled her lovely throat. Numbly I lifted the chain which hung from the collar fastened on my neck. I looked at it, disbelievingly. The links were close-set, heavy, of some primitive, simple black iron. It did not seem an attractive chain, or an expensive one. But I was held by it. I felt the collar with my fingers. I could not see it, but it seemed formed, too, of heavy iron; it seemed simple, practical, not ostentatious; it gripped my throat rather closely; I supposed it was black in color, matching the chain; it had a heavy hinge on one side; and the chain, by a link, opened and closed, was fastened to a loop on the side of the collar; the loop was fastened about a staple, which, it seemed, was a part of the collar itself; the hinge was under my right ear; the chain hung from its loop and staple under my chin; with my finger, on the other side, under my left ear, I felt a large lock, with its opening for the insertion of a heavy key. The collar, then, fastened with a lock; it had not been hammered about my neck. I wondered who held the key to that collar. Then, holding me by the hair with his left hand, from behind, I felt a heavy key, which he must have removed from his tunic, thrust deeply into the large collar lock, below my left ear. The heavy collar, with its lock, pushed into the left side of my neck. The key turned. I heard the bolt click back. It made a heavy sound. It must have been a thick, heavy bolt. He dropped the key to the grass and, with both hands, jerking it, opened the collar. He dropped it, with the depending chain, to the grass. I felt him thrust a key into the small, heavy lock at the back of my collar. He opened it, and placed it, too, on the table. I felt her jam another key into the lock on the back of my collar. She twisted the key, freeing the single-action double bolt. I felt the collar at my throat, of sturdy steel. It was enameled white. In it, incised, in tiny, dark cursive letters, in a feminine-type script, was a message in Gorean. It read, I had been told, 'I am the property of the Lady Florence of Vonda.' The lock on the back of the collar had a double bolt, the double bolt, however, responding to a single key. The key to the sales collar was placed into my hand by one of the cage attendants. I saw the snug fit of the steel on her throat. It was incredibly exciting. She could not remove it. Then, sweating, getting a grip on myself, hurriedly, fumbling, I thrust the tiny key into the lock. I turned the key and opened the tiny, heavy, single-action, seven-bolt lock on the collar. Each of the bolts is said to stand for one of the letters in the spelling of 'Kajira', the most common Gorean expression for a slave girl. The collar was clearly visible on her neck, and the small, heavy lock, by means of which it was secured upon her. To be sure, there, below her hair, at the back of her neck, at the closure of the steel apparatus on her neck, there was a small, heavy, sturdy lock. I saw the keyhole. It would take a tiny key. I was then startled. I felt Miles of Argentum, from the back, pressing a tiny key into my collar. "Here is your new collar," he said, displaying it for me. "Isn't it lovely?" "Yes, Master," I said. It was an attractive collar of gleaming steel, with a sturdy, heavy lock at the back. In it I would be marked as well, and confined as efficiently as I had been by the collar of Aemilianus. She put her hand to the collar. It was closed with a padlock. I gently parted her hair, putting it delicately on either side of her neck. In this way I could see the collar on her neck, and the small, sturdy lock at the back of the neck. He then thrust the heavy key he carried into the lock at the back of her hinged collar, and dropped it to the side, near the ring, with the coil of chain, on the deck. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman. I felt the collar again. It was closed by means of a heavy lock, part of the collar itself. It would thus, presumably, respond to a key. I shuddered to even touch such things, the garment tiny and flimsy, the collar light but so imminently practical and efficient, with its tiny, sturdy lock, which went at the back of the neck.
The collar, the flat, snug, unslippable band on her throat, locked behind the back of her neck, was lovely. Almost all the slaves, of course, wore ship collars, as did Alcinoë, but some had lighter, lovelier collars, more common on the continent, and islands, but as securely locked, and as unslippable. "The collar is pretty on her neck," said Iantha. "They are designed to be lovely," I said, "and secure."
On the throat of each was a lustrously polished silver collar, and on the left wrist of each, locked, with a chain loop, should one desire to secure them, a matching bracelet.
She moved her neck a bit, too, in her collar, that collar which was not the typical light, graceful slave collar, the attractive collar worn by most slave girls in the city, which might merely mark her as bond and identify her master, but the large, heavy, massive collar put by Targo on his properties, that they might, to escape the discomfort and indignity of such impediments, all the more eagerly submit themselves to the consideration of prospective buyers, collars, too, which, if they strayed, or fled, assuming they might obtain the unlikely opportunity to do so, would immediately call attention to themselves. "Guardsman! Search for an escaped slave in a weight collar, a high collar of thick, black iron, hammered shut about her neck, its two forward projections pierced, a dangling, two-hort iron ring threaded through the piercings!"
Some slave perfumes are right for some slaves, and others not. Vella's perfume, I thought, doubtless a tribute to the skills of some perfumer, had suited her superbly. It fitted her well, like a measured collar. "This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave. I was Teela, a paga slave of the Belled Collar. That could be read, I understood, on the close-fitting steel collar I wore, a ten-hort collar. "It is a ten-hort collar," I whispered. I could tell by its feel. "Your size exactly," she laughed. I wondered when the measurement could have been taken.
"Did you note the collar she wore?" I asked. He had not seemed to show much interest in the high, thick leather collar that the girl had had sewn about her neck. "Of course," he said. "I myself," I said, "have never seen such a collar." "It is a message collar," said Kamchak. "Inside the leather, sewn within, will be a message." "The collar," said Kamchak, "is Turian." Kutaituchik nodded. This was news to me, and I welcomed it, for it meant that probably, somehow, the answer to at least a part of the mystery which confronted me lay in the city of Turia. But how was it that Elizabeth Cardwell, of Earth, wore a Turian message collar? Kamchak drew the quiva from his belt and approached the girl. She looked at him wildly, drawing back. "Do not move," I told her. Kamchak set the blade of the quiva between the girl's throat and the collar and moved it, the leather collar seeming to fall from the blade. The girl's neck, where the collar had been sewn, was red and sweaty, broken out. Kamchak returned to his place where he again sat down cross-legged, putting the cut collar on the rug in front of him. I and Kutaituchik watched as he carefully spread open the collar, pressing back two edges. Then, from within the collar, he drew forth a thin, folded piece of paper, The scarred face wrinkled again and Kamchak rocked back and slapped his knees. He laughed, "Do you think Priest-Kings, if they wished you dead, would ask others to do this for them?" He pointed at the opened collar lying before him on the rug. "Do you think Priest-Kings would use a Turian message collar?" Perhaps in that moment Elizabeth Cardwell recalled the strange man, so fearsome, gray of face with eyes like glass, who had so examined her on Earth, before whom she had stood as though on a block, unknowingly being examined for her fitness to bear the message collar of Turia.
She twisted her hand in the metal and leather choke collar. Again the metal and leather collar slid shut on my throat, and with a gasp of anguish, wrists bound behind my back, not permitted clothing, I followed at my tether, not as they, the proud women of the forest, but only as I could be among them, Kajira. Verna resnapped the leather and metal choke collar on my throat. Then I felt the leather and metal choke collar again slide shut on my throat and, choking, I followed hurriedly at my tether. She approached me. From my pouch I drew forth a leather Kur collar, with its lock, and, sewn in leather, its large, rounded ring. "What is it?" she asked, apprehensively. I took it behind her neck, and then, closing it about her throat, thrust the large, flattish bolt, snapping it, into the locking breech. The two edges of metal, bordered by the leather, fitted closely together. The collar is some three inches in height. The girl must keep her chin up. "It is the collar of a Kur cow," I told her.
She, too, was camisked, and wore the mill collar.
I suddenly wished I wore a name collar, like Eta, that would make it clear to whom I belonged. I then collared her. I had thought that some wench, probably one to be purchased in Schendi, would have been a useful addition to my disguise, as an aid in establishing and confirming my pretended identity as a metal worker from the island of Teletus. This little wench though, now locked in my collar, I thought would serve the purpose well. There was no particular reason to wait to Schendi before buying a girl. Besides, the collar on her might help to convince Ulafi, who seemed to me a clever and suspicious man, that, whatever I might be, I was a reasonably straightforward and honest fellow. I traveled with a girl who wore a name collar.
The female slaves, like the men, were unclothed, and wore collars; their collars, however, were not the typical locked collar of the female slave but, since they were only in the iron pens, a narrow band of iron, with a number, hammered about their neck. She was quite beautiful, kneeling barefoot before me, clad only in the brief, sleeveless brown rag of a slave, her blond hair about her shoulders, her blue eyes moist, her throat graced by the narrow collar of dark iron, slave iron. To see her in the brief rag of a stable slut, she standing so beautifully, the narrow collar on her throat, was to desire to rape her. My hand wandered to her hair, and then to her neck, enclosed in the narrow, steel collar. I looked about, at the girls among the tables. Some, but not all, wore five steel loops on their body, a rounded, narrow collar loop, and, rounded and narrow, loops on their wrists and ankles. I took the steel collar, the rounded, narrow metal loop, with its lock, which she had brought with her into the room. I snapped it about her throat. It fitted closely. About her throat, narrow, sturdy and closely fitting, was a steel collar. On my neck, also, there was now a flat, narrow steel collar. It was close-fitting. I could not remove it. It was locked there. It was not uncomfortable. I seldom even thought about it, but it was there. On her neck, beneath the coils of the heavy, padlocked chain, was a common, close-fitting Gorean slave collar. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman. I was sure these women were such as I because their throats were encircled by collars, mostly of the common variety, those closely fitting, of narrow steel. But two, at least, wore the looser collars of rounded metal, the Turian collar. To be sure, it, too, cannot be slipped. The woman in scarlet silk rose somewhat angrily. She had a narrow steel collar on her neck, which had been covered by the earlier higher, heavier collar, that to which her chain had been attached.
'She wears a neck belt.' 'Oh,' I said. 'See its knot and disk,' he asked, 'the distinctive slave knot, and the disk, that identifying the master?' On her throat was the neck belt of bondage, doubtless tied shut with a slave knot, and, fastened to it, identifying her, the disk of the master. From the flat box he then took a yellow neck belt, two inches in height, and beaded. It is fastened with a thong, which ties before the throat. 'Say "I am a slave. I am your slave, Master,"' he said. 'I am a slave,' I said. 'I am your slave, Master.' He then put the neck belt on me, tying it shut with the thong, with what I knew must be a slave knot. From the box then he took a yellow leather disk, which had a small hole, possibly drilled with a tiny stone implement, near its top. There was writing in some barbaric script upon it. He threaded an end of the thong through the hole and then, using the other end of the thong, too, knotted the disk snugly at the very base of the collar, in the front, below my throat. 'This is a slave's neck belt,' he said, jerking at the snug collar on my throat.
With two hands I felt the collar on my neck. It was the first standard Gorean slave collar I had worn. It was a flat band which closely encircled my throat. Such collars are common in the north. It was sturdy, but light and not uncomfortable. Soon I would forget I wore such a device, but it was there. It was, of course, locked. I had determined that, almost immediately.
I felt the steel collar, so smooth and obdurate, fastened on my throat. Roughly he shut the collar, enclosing her lovely throat in the obdurate band of slave steel. The collar was obdurate on her throat.
Ho-Hak, sweating, breathing deeply, wildly, his great ears flat against the sides of his head, the iron, riveted collar of the galley slave, with its broken, dangling chain, about his neck, clutching his oar pole, stood with his legs planted widely apart on the rence, at bay. No longer about his throat was clasped the collar of the galley slave, with short dangling chain.
I knelt naked, the steel collar of the house of Andronicus on my neck, before the small, opened slave box.
Almost at the same time another man closed another collar about my throat and snapped it shut. I then wore the collar of the House of Tima.
They all wore collars of the north, with the projecting iron ring. She was naked, except for the Torvaldsland collar of black iron on her neck, with its projecting ring, and the heavy chain padlocked about her right ankle; the chain was about a yard long; it secured her, by means of a heavy ring, to the block. About her throat she wore the north's collar of black iron, riveted. She wore the black collar of the north. The collar she wore was not one of the common, flat, gleaming, close-fitting, light-but-inflexible lock collars worn by most female slaves in the north. It was a mere band of iron which had been put about her neck and hammered shut, the two ends evened to match one another. Such collars often serve as interim collars. Sometimes, too, they are used in the houses of slavers, as house collars. Many of the females in the slave camp, for example, wore such collars. Too, of course, they are cheap. Her collar, like most female slave collars, particularly in the northern hemisphere, was close fitting. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman.
I no longer wore the collar of the silk slave. I now wore, like other stable slaves, a common work collar, of black iron, with an attached ring.
He then, roughly, removed the collar of the tavern of Pembe from her throat.
"This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave.
At one point, crouching down, then kneeling, as we passed, by hangings at the side of the corridor, was a slave girl. She was terrified. She wore some twists of silk about her. She wore a collar of a sort, rather high and ornate, which is often jeweled. No jewels, however, caught the light as we passed. They had been, I gathered, pried from their settings. I understood what she meant, but collars are much the same. To be sure, some collars are more ornate than others, enameled, even jeweled, and such.
"Do you know the perfume you wear?" I asked. "It is a slave perfume," she said. "Yes," I said. It was a heady perfume. It made me wish to reach across the table, seize her, and throw her upon it, and then, there, on that small, smooth, hard surface, put her to my pleasure, ravishing her publicly. "Do you know its name?" I asked. "No," she whispered. She was, after all, a free woman. "It is a well-known Cosian perfume," I said, "'The Chains of Telnus'." "I see," she whispered. "Cosian masters sometimes enjoy putting women of Ar, their slaves, in it." "You speak of it as though it were a collar," she said. "In a sense, it is," I said.
Nearby there were four girls in a plank collar. This is formed from two boards into which matching semicircles have been cut. The two boards are connected and supported by five flat, sliding U-irons; when the U-irons are slid back, the collar is opened. When they are slid into place, and the two leaves are bolted together, the collar is closed. Two hasps with staples, secured with padlocks, occur, too, at opposite ends of the planks. These lock the collar. I moved on the low wooden bench, one of several aligned perpendicularly to the interior port wall of the enclosed barge. There was a similar set of benches aligned identically against the starboard wall. "These benches are uncomfortable," I said to Samos. My legs were cramped. "They are designed for women," said Samos. There was room for five women on each bench. With my heel I kicked some light, siriklike slave chains back under the bench. Such chains are too light for a man, but they are fully adequate for a woman. The primary holding arrangements for women on the benches, however, are not chains. Each place on the bench is fitted with ankle and wrist stocks, and for each bench there is a plank collar, a plank which opens horizontally, each half of which contains five matching, semicircular openings, which, when it is set on pinions, closed, and chained in place, provides thusly five sturdy, wooden enclosures for the small, lovely throats of women. The plank is thick and thus the girls' chins are held high. The plank is further reinforced between each girl with a narrowly curved iron hand, the open ends of which are pierced; this is slid tight in its' slots, in its metal retainers, about the boards; and secured in place with a four-inch metal pin, which may or may not be locked in place. Each girl is held well in her place, thusly, not only by the ankle and wrist stocks, which hold her ankles back and her wrists beside her, but by the plank collar as well. Then I looked about and found one of the pairs of long boards, each board with its matching semicircular openings long enough to cover the five positions on one of the benches. I then inserted the rear board in the iron framework above the bench. "Put your head back," I said, "so that your neck, resting back, is half encircled in the semicircular opening." She did so. I then slid the matching board in place, frontally, in the framework, until its back flat edge was flush against the flat front edge of the rear board. In this fashion, by means of the matching semicircular openings in the two boards, her neck was fully, and closely, encircled. I then, by means of metal pins, passing through holes, and clips fastening together matching rings, secured the apparatus in place. As the boards were thick, her chin was forced up. Her small shoulders thrust up suddenly against the collar stocks. Her small hands pulled back in the wrist stocks, but could not escape their grasp. Her hands opened and closed. Her head turned to the side, her eyes closed.
She indicated Virginia and Phyllis. "How do you expect me to train uncollared slaves?" she asked. Ho-Tu grinned. "Call the smith!" said he to the guard. "Plate collars!" To their surprise, the guard then released the two girls, and Elizabeth as well, from their slave bracelets. Flaminius gestured that the two girls should try to rise and walk a bit about the room. Awkwardly, painfully, they did so, stumbling to the edge of the room, then leaning against the wall, taking a step at a time. Elizabeth, now also free, went to their side, trying to help them. She did not speak to them, however. As far as they knew she could speak only Gorean. When the smith arrived, he took, from a rack in the wall, two narrow, straight bars of iron, not really plates but narrow cubes, about a half inch in width and fifteen inches in length. The girls were then motioned to the anvil. First Virginia and then Phyllis laid their heads and throats on the anvil, head turned to the side, their hands holding the anvil, and the smith, expertly, with his heavy hammer and a ringing of iron, curved the collar about their throats; a space of about a quarter of an inch was left between the two ends of the collar; the ends matched perfectly; both Virginia and Phyllis stepped away from the anvil feeling the metal on their throats, both now collared slave girls. I had had a plate collar hammered about his neck. My head was placed across an anvil and, about my throat, was hammered a simple plate collar.
We all wore golden collars, or, actually, collars plated with gold.
If you see a female locked in her platform collar, with its chain, of course, and in a while you see the collar empty, it is not irrational to suppose that she has been sold.
"If your training goes well," said Flaminius to the girls, "you will in time be given a pretty collar." He indicated Elizabeth's yellow enameled collar, bearing the legend of the House of Cernus. "It will even have a lock," said Flaminius. Virginia looked at him blankly. "You would like a pretty collar, wouldn't you?" asked Flaminius. "Yes, Master," said Virginia numbly. "And what of you Phyllis?" asked Flaminius. "Yes, Master," said the girl, a whisper.
What's your idea of a Protection Collar? From what I understand, it seems reasonable enough, for the online community. Some girl wishes to explore a portion of online Gor and to guard against unwanted attention you give her a Protection Collar which has your name or the name of your city on it. As long as it's understood that no such thing exists on Gor, and any Gorean would shake their head in disbelief, go ahead and do whatever you wish. Just know, there is no such thing as a Protection Collar. It is an onlineism. Here now are all the quotes that even come close to this topic. One difference, of course, was clear between the collars of the girl and myself. Hers was the collar of a true slave, in the fullness of that meaning, whereas mine, in effect, though identical, functioned almost as a badge of protection. In being Canka's slave I had a status and place in the Isbu camp which, in its way, sheltered me from the type of sportive attack to which a lone, free white man might be otherwise exposed. Did they think she was a free woman, of wealth and title, of placement and connections, who might threaten them, one to whom magistrates would carefully attend? She was only a slave. I know nothing, she thought. I have done nothing. I am not a free woman, she thought. Have I not at least the protection of my collar? Chain me, she thought. Market me, but do not kill me. On the Steel Worlds she would have had the protection of her collar, which was wide and locked on her neck. It identified her master in Kur, and gave her much standing amongst those of her species. It was not a slave collar, of course, as she was not a slave, but merely an animal. It served much the same purpose as might a collar on, say, a dog on Earth. "Because, Lita," he said, "though you are collared, you are obviously human." "Of course, Master," she said, puzzled. "It has to do with the message," said Lord Grendel. "Your bonds, and such, even your collar," said Cabot, "no longer afford you protection." "The message," said Lord Grendel, "was clear." "What was it?" asked Lita. "'Kill all humans'," said Lord Grendel. I recalled then my instructresses, and their admonitions with respect to free women, and their encouragement to look to men for comfort and protection. There was safety in wearing a man's collar. Men were fond of kajirae; free women were not. Then the Lady Alexina, though free, was before him, in nadu, the position of a Gorean pleasure slave. "Put the iron to my thigh," she begged. "Mark me! Put me in the degrading, scandalous scrap of cloth, fit only for a slave!" "No," he said. "I deny you the protection of a collar. For my purposes it is important that you be free." Commonly the slave's protection is her collar, and her standing, or lack of standing, as a domestic beast, her marketability, and such.
She touched the collar. Cabot had been curious about the collars of the slaves in the cylinder. They were of a common type, a flat, light, closely fitting band, locked at the back of the neck. "It is a standard collar, Master," she said, "but one similar to a public collar, as that of a state slave." It was almost as though the collar on her neck might not have been a public collar, say, that of the ship of Tersites, but, rather, a private collar, say, that of Callias of Jad. As the collar was light, it seemed to me likely that it was a private collar, not a public collar, not, say, a ship's collar.
I would not have expected to have worn other than a common collar, of course, there are many sorts of collars. The most familiar are the "common collar," which, in its varieties, tends to be flat and closely fitting, and the "Turian collar," which, in its varieties, is more rounded, and barlike, and fits more loosely. Both lock behind the back of the neck. Dorna wore a "common collar." Some other types of collars are decorative collars, holding collars, training collars and punishment collars. She looked at the other girls. On their throats were heavy collars of black iron, the perforated ends of each curving about the neck to come together in front, in such a way that the collar curved closely about the neck behind the two perforated ends, and the two perforated ends extended forward. These jutting ends then, with their matching apertures, were hammered flat together. Through the matched apertures a dangling iron ring had been closed. Thus, in a sense, the collar was doubly closed, having not only been hammered shut, but also secured with the ring joining the two ends of the metal. Either closure is sufficient, of course. This collar-and-ring arrangement is simply and inexpensively wrought, not requiring the fusing of metals in welding. Ring mounts, and such, on the other hand, are usually fused into, welded into, thus becoming part of, the shackle or manacle. For example, the shackle on her left ankle had a common ring mount, welded into the metal, through which the ring was inserted and closed. "The heavy metal collar on her throat was uncomfortable, quite different from the light band with which she had been familiar. Further, it was a high collar, and it was not easy for her to put her head down. It was exactly the same sort of collar, she was sure, as that worn by the other girls. She could feel it, trace with her finger the closure, feel the extended ends, touch the heavy, dangling ring which had been put through the apertures and closed. Such a collar, with its size and weight, perhaps four or five pounds, its discomfort, she was sure, in the house would have been used only as a punishment collar. Yet, here, all the girls wore it. Certainly she did not want to wear so cruel, high, thick, and heavy a collar, one in which she could scarcely lower her head, in effect, a punishment collar. And some collars were unpleasant, point collars, punishment collars, and such. Any collar but this! Let it be a high collar, a weight collar, a punishment collar! Let it have inside spikes, anything!
About their throats were matching red-enameled collars. Elizabeth's collar had also been changed. She now wore a red-enameled collar. One of her guards snapped a slave leash on her collar. The leash key was on a tiny loop of wire. The guard twisted this wire about the red-enameled steel of her collar.
"There were two collars on my neck," she said, "a light, temporary slave collar, identifying me as a slave provisionally in the custody of magistrates, and, over it, a retaining collar, that by means of which I was fastened to the wall."
Ho-Hak, sweating, breathing deeply, wildly, his great ears flat against the sides of his head, the iron, riveted collar of the galley slave, with its broken, dangling chain, about his neck, clutching his oar pole, stood with his legs planted widely apart on the rence, at bay. Thurnock, the peasant, and Clitus, the fisherman, approached, holding between them Ho-Hak, bound hand and foot, the heavy collar of the galley slave, with its dangling chain, still riveted about his neck. Ho-Hak's collar had been riveted about his throat. About her neck, riveted, was a collar of black iron, with a welded ring, to which a chain might be attached. He took her hair and threw it forward, and thrust her neck against the left side of the anvil. Over the anvil lay the joining ends of the two pieces of the collar. The inside of the collar was separated by a quarter of an inch from her neck. I saw the fine hairs on the back of her neck. On one part of the collar are two, small, flat, thick rings. On the other is a single such ring. These rings, when the wings of the collar are joined, are aligned, those on one wing on top and bottom, that on the other in the center. They fit closely together, one on top of the other. The holes in each, about three-eighths of an inch in diameter, too, of course, are perfectly aligned. The smith, with his thumb, forcibly, pushed a metal rivet through the three holes. The rivet fits snugly. "Do not move your head, Bond-maid," said the smith. Then, with great blows of the iron hammer, he riveted the iron collar about her throat. Additional security can be achieved, and often is, particularly when moving women, or when they are to be kept on the chain for a longer time, by riveting the collars shut. She had a common black, strap collar on her neck, no more, really, than a strap or plate of black iron. It was riveted shut, behind the back of her neck. I had noted this earlier, given the shortness of her hair, and her earlier position, facing away from us as she drew water. The legend would probably be a simple one, not even containing the girl's name, probably something like "I am the property of Appanius." I regarded her short brush of hair, the brief, tattered rag, scarcely more than a Ta Teera, which was her only garment, the simple collar, no more than a strap of black iron curved about her throat, its small, right-angled, pierced terminations flush to one another behind the back of her neck, held together by the rivet, her blistered, burned skin. As her hair had fallen forward, it was easy to see the collar on her neck, fastened not with a lock but a plug rivet.
She wore a short slave tunic, white, of the wool of the Hurt, and a rope collar. On my throat I wore a rope collar. She fingered the rope collar on her throat. I moved my finger inside the rope collar, moving it out a bit from my neck, wiping sweat and dirt from under it. The rope scratched my neck, but I must wear it. She stepped back from me. She looked at me, and then she went up the stairs into her hut, and, soon, returned, with a coil of rope. She tied one end of the rope on my rope collar and then, leaving me about a foot of slack, tied the rope about the piling, at the level of my neck. The rest of the rope, depending from the piling, she let fall to the dirt. "Have rope brought, and collar me, Thurnus," she said. "I am yours." "Bring rope," said Thurnus. Rope was brought. Thurnus took the rope, and regarded the girl. She looked up at him. "Collar me," she said. "If I collar you." he said, "you are again a slave." "Collar me, Master," she said. Thurnus wrapped the rope twice about her throat, and knotted it. I took the rope from the side of the alcove and, folding it so as to make four strands, looped it several times about her throat and knotted it. I thus made a heavy rope collar for her, knotted under her chin, with heavy guide strands. I let the two loose ends of the braided, rawhide rope, some seven or eight inches in length, dangle between her breasts. They would also make a convenient, short leash, to pull her about with, if I wished. I looked at the woman, collared. The three loops were about her neck. The ends dangled down, between her breasts. This collaring arrangement, though not unfamiliar on Gor generally, particularly after the fall of a city, when metal collars may not be available in abundance, or in rural areas, is unusual in the Barrens, where leather, thong-tied beaded collars are almost universal. "What is that on her neck?" she asked, referring to the narrow, dark, braided rawhide rope, looped three times about the slave's neck and knotted before her throat, the two loose ends dangling between her breasts. "It serves as a slave collar," I said. He then looped the dark, narrow, braided rawhide rope three times about her neck. He adjusted it so that it was snug and not too tight, and the ends were even. He then tied the two loose ends together, closing the collar. He jerked the two loose ends, sharply, snapping them in contrary directions, making the knot tight. A narrow, inverted triangle of flesh showed between the first two coils of the collar, wrapped closely about her neck, and the knot. He released the two loose ends of the collar, below the knot, and they fell lightly, dangling, as was the case with Mira's collar, between her breasts. The collar, too, of course, and she was already in a collar, a leather-rope collar, makes her exquisitely attractive, indicating her status, that she is only a lovely, owned she-animal, to be done with as one pleases. She began to play with the narrow, dangling, braided-rawhide rope ends of her leather-rope collar, that which I had put on her in the vicinity of the compound of the Waniyanpi. She fiddled with them, and sometimes jerked on them, showing me, thusly, as though inadvertently, that the collar was well fastened on her. "And if you return to your village I think you will find little waiting for you there but a rope collar and a trip in a sack to the nearest market." "Would you like to be a naked slave of peasants, a community slave, in a peasant village," I asked, "and wear a rope collar, and be taught to hoe weeds and pull a plow, and spend your nights in a sunken cage?" I would have settled even for a peasant's slave, usually large, coarse girls, in rope collars, but the gates to their pens hung open. "The robes of concealment must be bulky, hot, uncomfortable in the delta," I said. "The rence girls go barefoot, commonly, or wear rence sandals, and short tunics." "It is you who are the prisoner!" she said. "And their slaves are sometimes not permitted clothing at all." "Sleen," she said. "Except perhaps a rope collar," I said. "I can fashion a collar from leather, or rope," said Tajima. "We can always, later, brand her, search out a lock collar; and such." "Kajira canjellne!" I cried. There was a great silence in the theater. This is an ancient cry. I do not know its origins. It might date from the time that Ar was no more than a cluster of villages. It is surely older than the roads of Turia and the aqueducts of Venna and Torcadino. It is in old Gorean, the language from which modern Gorean evolved. The cry does not translate easily or well into English, or modern Gorean, but it is a challenge, commonly followed by the death of one or more individuals. It perhaps dates from a time when slave collars were no more than strips of knotted leather and ropes no more than twisted vines.
She wore the Turian collar, rather than the common slave collar. The Turian collar lies loosely on the girl, a round ring; it fits so loosely that, when grasped in a man's fist, the girl can turn within it; the common Gorean collar, on the other hand, is a flat, snugly fitting steel band. Both collars lock in the back, behind the girl's neck. The Turian collar is more difficult to engrave, but it, like the flat collar, will bear some legend assuring that the girl, if found, will be promptly returned to her master. What happened then was done very swiftly. Kamchak lifted from the box an object indeed intended to grace the throat of a girl. But it was a round metal ring, a Turian collar, the collar of a slave. There was a firm snap of the heavy lock in the back of the collar and the throat of Aphris of Turia had been encircled with slave steel! Timidly, when he was not watching, but sitting behind his desk, engaged in work, perhaps entering my acquisition and price in his ledgers, I touched the collar, rounded, steel and gleaming. I looked about, at the girls among the tables. Some, but not all, wore five steel loops on their body, a rounded, narrow collar loop, and, rounded and narrow, loops on their wrists and ankles. I took the steel collar, the rounded, narrow metal loop, with its lock, which she had brought with her into the room. I snapped it about her throat. It fitted closely. They were only slaves. That could be told by the collars they wore, bars of rounded iron which, here, in the house, had been curved about their necks and hammered shut. I would later learn that, in the south, collars were often rounded, and looser. These are usually referred to, in their varieties, as "Turian collars."
The Curulean does not use sales collars. The girl screamed, fighting the sales collar and the position chain. She wore only her sales collar with her sales disk, on which was written her lot number, wired to the steel. The key to the sales collar was placed into my hand by one of the cage attendants. I saw the snug fit of the steel on her throat. It was incredibly exciting. She could not remove it. Then, sweating, getting a grip on myself, hurriedly, fumbling, I thrust the tiny key into the lock.
Once a guest at first refused to believe that the lovely wench in pleasure silk, a chain on her slave bracelets run to a ring on her serving collar, who served his viands at a feast was the same girl whom he had spurned to one side with his foot that afternoon in a corridor.
The girl lay on her belly, naked on the tiles. Even the silken collar sheath, of one color or another, which was usually worn, selected to match a tunic, was gone. Her neck was encircled by the bared, unadorned steel alone.
I now wore a ship collar, of locked steel, gray, with its destination tag. The tag, I had been told, read "Send me to the Lady Elicia of Ar, of Six Towers." She was nicely collared. "A ship's collar?" I asked. "Yes!" she whispered. To be sure, almost all the slaves on board wore the ship's collar, were ship slaves. It was almost as though the collar on her neck might not have been a public collar, say, that of the ship of Tersites, but, rather, a private collar, say, that of Callias of Jad. She wore the ship's collar, with the sturdy lock at the back of the neck. Almost all the slaves, of course, wore ship collars, as did Alcinoë, but some had lighter, lovelier collars, more common on the continent, and islands, but as securely locked, and as unslippable. She clutched at the ship's collar on her neck, and, two hands on it, jerked it against the back of her neck, again and again, and tears burst from her eyes. As the collar was light, it seemed to me likely that it was a private collar, not a public collar, not, say, a ship's collar.
"I have a collar here," said Ulafi, lifting a steel slave collar. It was a shipping collar. It had five palms on it, and the sign of Schendi, the shackle and scimitar. The girl who wore it would be clearly identified as a portion of Ulafi's cargo. Ulafi then, pushing her head down, fastened the sturdy, steel shipping collar on her throat, snapping it shut behind the back of her neck. It had five palms on it, and the sign of Schendi, the shackle and scimitar. "What sort of collar do you wear?" "A shipping collar, Master. It shows that I am a portion of the cargo of the Palms of Schendi." She was pulled to her feet by the chain at her throat, that attached to the sirik, collar. The sirik collar was close-fitting and would not, like a work collar, fit over the shipping collar. The shipping collar was thrust up her throat, under her chin, where it would be easy to check. The sirik collar then had been locked about her throat below it. I did not think the girl would be let out of the shipping collar until she had been delivered into the hands of the slaver, Uchafu, who was to be her buyer.
I had noted that the throats of the girls were encircled by silver collars. "You see the collars," said Kron, pointing to the slender graceful bands of silver each girl wore at her throat. "We melted the masks and used the silver for the collar." She wore yellow Pleasure Silk, and, beneath her long black hair, on her throat, I glimpsed a silverish Turian collar. On the throat of each was a lustrously polished silver collar, and on the left wrist of each, locked, with a chain loop, should one desire to secure them, a matching bracelet. A silver collar graced her throat. "The collar," she said, "is not of gold, not even of silver. Too, I fear it is not encrusted with jewels." "I do not wish to tempt thieves," I said. "Such a collar would be worth more than most slaves."
She pulled the robes down from her throat. "I wear a collar," she said. I saw the simple, circular, gray collar, the collar of the house of Samos, locked around her throat. Her collar was a simple one.
Then, when I was absolutely naked, a golden collar, to which a chain was attached, with wrist rings and ankle rings, was brought. It was a chaining system of that sort called a sirik. My chin was thrust up and I felt the golden collar locked on my throat. Almost at the same time my wrists, held closely together before me, were locked helplessly in the wrist rings. In another instant my ankles, held, were helpless in the ankle rings. A chain then ran from my collar to the chain on, my wrist rings and from thence, the same chain, to the chain on my ankle rings. My ankle-ring chain was about twelve inches in length, and my wrist-ring chain was about six inches in length. The central chain, where it dangled down from the wrist rings, lay on the floor before the throne, before it looped up to where it was closed about a central link of the ankle-ring chain. This permits; the prisoner, usually a slave, to lift her arms. She is thus in a position to feed herself or better exhibit her beauty to masters in a wider variety of postures and attitudes than would otherwise be the case. The point of the sirik is not merely to confine a woman, but to confine her beautifully.
I had not known my collar size on Earth, for I had not purchased garments with such attention to the neck. On Gor, it was ten horts. Accordingly it must have been, in Earth measurements, in the neighborhood of twelve and one half inches. It would also be proclaimed, of course, in such a situation, along with her weight and collar size, and such things, from the block, during her sale." The auctioneer was now calling off her measurements, and her collar, and wrist and ankle-ring size. An experienced slaver, incidentally, can usually tell a woman's wrist, ankle and collar sizes almost at a glance. I took a number-two ankle ring and a number-two wrist ring. I took a ten-hort collar. These are common and standard sizes. The most commonly worn wrist and ankle rings are the twos and threes. The most common collar sizes are the ten-, eleven- and twelve-hort sizes. He then snapped the collar about my throat. I wore the collar, then, of Miles of Argentum. "It is a perfect fit," he said. "Yes, Master," I said. "It is the same size as the other collar," he said. "I had your collar size from the Enterprises of Aemilianus." My collar size is eleven horts. These are average sizes. Gloria, for example would have taken larger sizes. Men's sizes, those of male slaves, incidentally, though the numbers are similar, are on a different scale. When they were to move out they would pass through a certain station where a Cosian slaver's man, with a marking tape, would measure them for their collar size. This number then would be written by another fellow, with a grease pencil, on their left breast, for the convenience of the fitter.
She was quite beautiful, kneeling barefoot before me, clad only in the brief, sleeveless brown rag of a slave, her blond hair about her shoulders, her blue eyes moist, her throat graced by the narrow collar of dark iron, slave iron.
Thurnus then looped the sturdy, leather, metal-embossed sleen collar about her throat. With an awl, brought by a man, he punched two holes, vertically, in the leather strap, and thrust the twin buckle-claws through the holes; he then took the long, loose end of the strap, for the sleen has a large neck, thrust it through the four strap loops, thick and broad, and then, with a knife, cut off the portion of the strap which protruded beyond the last strap loop. Melina, her shoulders bared, stood before him, wearing a sleen collar. It had, sewn in its side, a heavy ring, to which a sleen leash might be attached.
I reached out, timidly, toward her throat. I touched the object there. "What is this?" I asked. "The silk?" she asked. "That is a collar stocking, or a collar sleeve. They may be made of many different materials. In a cooler climate they are sometimes of velvet. In most cities they are not used." Under the silk I touched sturdy steel. "That, Mistress, of course," she said, "is my collar." "Would you take it off," I asked, "please? I would like to see it." She laughed merrily. "Forgive me, Mistress," she said. "I cannot take it off." "Why not?" I asked. "It is locked on me," she laughed. She turned about. "See?" she asked. Feverishly I thrust apart the two sides of the silken sleeve at the back of the girl's neck. To be sure, there, below her hair, at the back of her neck, at the closure of the steel apparatus on her neck, there was a small, heavy, sturdy lock. I saw the keyhole. It would take a tiny key. "I am the slave of Ligurious, first minister of Corcyrus," she said. She slid the collar sleeve about the collar and, feeling with her fingers, indicated some marks on the collar. I could see engraving there. I could not read the writing. "That information," she said, "is recorded here." "The yellow fits in nicely with the yellow of your belt," I said, "and the yellow flowers on the tunic." "Yes, Mistress," smiled the girl. The sleeve I saw now could function rather like an accessory, perhaps adding to, or completing, an ensemble. It did, in this case, at least, make its contribution to the girl's appearance.
Deliberately, with both hands, she slipped her garment some inches down her shoulders, fully revealing her white throat. It was bare, not encircled by one of the slender, graceful slave collars of Gor. She was free. I slowly unwrapped the white, silken scarf from her throat. Her eyes seemed to cloud with angry tears. As I had expected about her white throat there was fastened, graceful and gleaming, the slender, close-fitting collar of a Gorean slave girl. It was a collar like most others, of steel, secured with a small, heavy lock which closed behind the girl's neck. The attendant on the disk then bent down and picked up the slender, graceful metal collar. "This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave. She rose easily from the curule chair and stood before me. She held the opened collar before me. It was slender but sturdy, steel, enameled with white, decorated with tiny flowers in pink, a collar suitable for a woman's girl. There was printing in the enamel, tiny, exact. "See the printing?" she asked. "Yes, Mistress," I said. "I know you are illiterate," she said, "so I shall read it to you. It says 'I am Judy. Return me to the Lady Elicia of Six Towers.'" The girl's hair was still bound, knotted, on her head; it had not yet even been loosened, as that of a slave girl. Looped about her neck, locked, was a slender, common, gray-steel slave collar. I then went to the girls, to check the graceful, slender steel collars they wore, those lighter, characteristic slave collars about which the heavy iron wall collars had been closed. Similarly I did not expect them to note, under the loops of chain, with the standard lens resolutions they would use, similar to those in Half-Ear's compartment, I supposed, that she lacked the slender steel collar of the Gorean slave girl. The slender steel collar was beautiful on her throat. I saw the slender steel collar on her neck. About their throats, rather, closely fitting, locked, were flat, slender metal bands, slave collars.
He stepped about, in front of me. He showed me an opened collar, graceful and slim, and of inflexible steel.
I felt the steel collar, so smooth and obdurate, fastened on my throat.
The man who had held the stake then took a snap collar, with chain and snap lock, about a yard in length, and secured the girl, on her knees, by the neck, to the stake.
She tried to tear the collar from her throat. She could not, of course, do so. It remained fixed upon her, snug, beautiful, gleaming. Numbly I lifted the chain which hung from the collar fastened on my neck. I looked at it, disbelievingly. The links were close-set, heavy, of some primitive, simple black iron. It did not seem an attractive chain, or an expensive one. But I was held by it. I felt the collar with my fingers. I could not see it, but it seemed formed, too, of heavy iron; it seemed simple, practical, not ostentatious; it gripped my throat rather closely; I supposed it was black in color, matching the chain; it had a heavy hinge on one side; and the chain, by a link, opened and closed, was fastened to a loop on the side of the collar; the loop was fastened about a staple, which, it seemed, was a part of the collar itself; the hinge was under my right ear; the chain hung from its loop and staple under my chin; with my finger, on the other side, under my left ear, I felt a large lock, with its opening for the insertion of a heavy key. The collar, then, fastened with a lock; it had not been hammered about my neck. I wondered who held the key to that collar. He went to his desk and, from one of its drawers, drew forth an opened slave collar. It was unlike most of the Gorean collars. It was a Turian collar. Most Gorean collars, decorated or not, are basically a flat, circular band, hinged, which locks snugly about the girl's neck. The gleaming collar, snug and locked, was very beautiful on her throat. The key to the sales collar was placed into my hand by one of the cage attendants. I saw the snug fit of the steel on her throat. It was incredibly exciting. She could not remove it. Then, sweating, getting a grip on myself, hurriedly, fumbling, I thrust the tiny key into the lock. She felt the chain, then, pull at the snug collar and jerk it against the back of her neck. As she still lay half across the table, shuddering, half in shock, a leather collar, with a ring and attached leash, was buckled about her throat, over the snugly fitting steel collar. She was then pulled from the table and, stumbling, with faltering steps, terrified, was drawn by Hassan between the snarling sleen. The collar, the flat, snug, unslippable band on her throat, locked behind the back of her neck, was lovely.
"Bring a stable collar," said Kenneth. Barus put aside his tallying board and marking stick, and went into a nearby stable building, an equipment shed. "Hood her," said Kenneth to me. Telitsia sobbed. I took the slave hood from the wagon bed and drew it over her head, adjusting the straps and buckling them under her chin. I then descended from the bed. Kenneth threw the key to Telitsia's collar to Borto, who caught it and placed it in his pouch. Her collar would be removed only when a new one was ready to replace it, probably the house collar of some slaver's emporium.
"She was put in a state collar," said Flaminius, "with no specifications or restrictions. "You belong to the city," he said. "The collar is a state collar."
"And instead," she cried. "I have only these walls of stone and the steel collar of a slave girl!" The steel of a Gorean slave collar is not made to be removed at a girl's pleasure. Two, however, housed Chamber Slaves, girls like Vika, clad and collared identically. I supposed the only difference in the attire of the three girls would have been the numerals engraved on their collars. Vika of course had worn a scarf and these girls did not, but now Vika no longer wore her scarf; now her collar, steel and gleaming, locked, encircling her fair throat, was as evident and beautiful as theirs, proclaiming her to the eyes of all, like them, only a slave girl. "Do not forget," I said, "that on your throat you wear a collar of steel." Kamchak's hands were at the small, heavy lock at the back of the steel, Turian collar she wore. He turned the key and opened the collar, discarding it. She looked up at me. "It is a long time since I have worn a steel collar," she said. Her collar, however, that she might not grow pretentious, was of simple steel. I wore only my bonds and, locked about my throat, a collar of steel. I laughed and hurled the cloak back to him. "A steel-collar girl," I said, "should not have so fine a cloak!" On her throat, half concealed by her long blond hair, was a collar of steel, the steel of Ar. Her neck was encircled by a band of steel, the slave collar. I was Teela, a paga slave of the Belled Collar. That could be read, I understood, on the close-fitting steel collar I wore, a ten-hort collar. I considered to myself how she might look in a snatch of slave silk and a steel collar, one bearing a master's name. The prospect was not completely displeasing. The slender steel collar was beautiful on her throat. I felt the collar at my throat, of sturdy steel. It was enameled white. In it, incised, in tiny, dark cursive letters, in a feminine-type script, was a message in Gorean. It read, I had been told, 'I am the property of the Lady Florence of Vonda.' The lock on the back of the collar had a double bolt, the double bolt, however, responding to a single key. My hand wandered to her hair, and then to her neck, enclosed in the narrow, steel collar. How beautiful she was in her collar, close-fitting, and of gleaming, engraved steel, which she could not remove. About her throat, narrow, sturdy and closely fitting, was a steel collar. "Here is your new collar," he said, displaying it for me. "Isn't it lovely?" "Yes, Master," I said. It was an attractive collar of gleaming steel, with a sturdy, heavy lock at the back. In it I would be marked as well, and confined as efficiently as I had been by the collar of Aemilianus. How incredibly beautiful and sensuous they were, how soft and vulnerable, how owned. It was not merely that they were nude and that their necks were locked in steel collars. The collar, such fine, strong steel, looked nice under her right ear.
I reached out, timidly, toward her throat. I touched the object there. "What is this?" I asked. "The silk?" she asked. "That is a collar stocking, or a collar sleeve. They may be made of many different materials. In a cooler climate they are sometimes of velvet. In most cities they are not used." Under the silk I touched sturdy steel. "That, Mistress, of course," she said, "is my collar."
I heard the ringing of a metal worker's hammer on metal, where simple straps of iron were being curved about the necks of beauties, their heads and hair over the anvil, these serving as temporary collars. "Brand her," said he, "common Kajira mark, and strap-collar her." The girls within, stripped, wearing straplike collars of iron hammered about their necks, fled away from him, huddling together, against the palings. I then picked up a short, buckled strap, cut from the harness I had worn in drawing the raft through the marsh. I wrapped this twice about her neck, closely, and buckled it shut. I then lifted up one end, the loose end, of a long strap, also part of the harness I had worn in drawing the raft through the marsh, and tied it about both of the turns of the strap on her neck. In this way the interior strap, given the pull of the lead strap, could not close on her throat. Similarly, the pressure of the lead strap, if it were transmitted to the turns of the neck strap, as in a slave leash on a girl front-led, would be at the back of her neck, not at the throat. I looked at her, in the light of the moons, sitting on the rough raft, her ankles crossed and bound, her hands tied behind her, in her improvised collar, on its strap. She had a common black, strap collar on her neck, no more, really, than a strap or plate of black iron. It was riveted shut, behind the back of her neck. I had noted this earlier, given the shortness of her hair, and her earlier position, facing away from us as she drew water. The legend would probably be a simple one, not even containing the girl's name, probably something like "I am the property of Appanius."
About their necks, wrapped several times, three or four times, were leather strips, about an inch wide. These were knotted in front, with a variety of ties. These are slaves, thought Cabot. They are collared. The different knots probably identify the master. It is like Gorean slave strings, or slave laces, fastened about a girl's neck, indicating her bondage and her owner.
She rose easily from the curule chair and stood before me. She held the opened collar before me. It was slender but sturdy, steel, enameled with white, decorated with tiny flowers in pink, a collar suitable for a woman's girl. There was printing in the enamel, tiny, exact. "See the printing?" she asked. "Yes, Mistress," I said. "I know you are illiterate," she said, "so I shall read it to you. It says 'I am Judy. Return me to the Lady Elicia of Six Towers.'" I felt the collar at my throat, of sturdy steel. It was enameled white. In it, incised, in tiny, dark cursive letters, in a feminine-type script, was a message in Gorean. It read, I had been told, 'I am the property of the Lady Florence of Vonda.' The lock on the back of the collar had a double bolt, the double bolt, however, responding to a single key. With two hands I brushed her hair forward, putting it before her shoulders. I then checked her collar. It was a standard collar, of a sort familiar in the north, flat, narrow, light, sturdy, close-fitting. I did not bother reading the engraving on the collar, as it would be of no interest, her master being a weakling. The collar was closed at the back of her neck with a small, heavy lock. This is common. It was attractive on her, as such things are on any woman. She was pleased to be out of the heavy, sturdy coffle collar, with its weighty chain dangling before and behind her. On her neck, closed, was a sturdy metal collar. On this collar there was a heavy collar ring, and to this collar ring there was attached a heavy, black chain, which presumably was fastened to a ring or mount under the straw. With two hands I felt the collar on my neck. It was the first standard Gorean slave collar I had worn. It was a flat band which closely encircled my throat. Such collars are common in the north. It was sturdy, but light and not uncomfortable. Soon I would forget I wore such a device, but it was there. It was, of course, locked. I had determined that, almost immediately.
I now wore a Tarncamp collar.
Even free women visiting Tharna from other cities must, at the gates, don temporary collars and slave tunics, and be leashed. "There were two collars on my neck," she said, "a light, temporary slave collar, identifying me as a slave provisionally in the custody of magistrates, and, over it, a retaining collar, that by means of which I was fastened to the wall." It was a simple collar and I supposed it was a temporary collar, a holding collar. Its engraving was probably no more than some simple legend, such as "If found, return me to the pens of Treve." The coils of the looped binding fiber, in their circularity and width, suggested the encirclement of a collar, one for a small throat, that of a female. And certainly they were reminiscent of the multiply stranded, temporary collars, tied shut, sometimes put on captures, particularly on stripped free women, the stripping and collaring serving to make clear their transient status, prior to an appropriate marking and collaring.
My prison was a rubber disk, perhaps a foot thick and ten feet in diameter. In the center of this disk, recessed so I could not dash my head against it, was an iron ring. Running from this ring was a heavy chain attached to a thick metal collar fastened about my throat. Further, my ankles wore manacles and my wrists were fastened behind my back with steel cuffs. There was, however, literally sewn about her neck, a thick, high leather collar. About her neck was a thick metal collar to which a heavy iron chain had been fastened; the chain itself was attached to a large iron ring placed in the floor. I then turned the collar, slowly, carefully, on her neck, for it was high, thick and close-fitting. The stout collar ring was then in front of her throat, with its long, dependent leash. There was a sound of chain beside me. The chain had moved against the collar ring of the girl beside me. Beneath the furs she was naked. The chain ran from the slave ring at the foot of my couch, a heavy chain, to the thick metal collar fastened on her neck. He then went to a chest and from it fetched forth a thick, plain, black-leather collar with a lock closure. It was a sturdy ring attached to this collar, and, attached to ring, there was a long slave leash of black leather. Lady Publia struggled wildly, trying to pull her head up, against the thick collar and heavy strap. But, in the end, she was exactly as she had been before. I watched them descending the steps to the central walkway. She half fell once, losing her footing, striking against the right side of the stone stairwell but he kept her upright, his hand then literally about her thick leather collar, and then, in a moment; now again on a short leash, I saw her drawn about the corner, toward the line of rings below and in back of the upper battlements. Certainly she did not want to wear so cruel, high, thick, and heavy a collar, one in which she could scarcely lower her head, in effect, a punishment collar. She moved her neck a bit, too, in her collar, that collar which was not the typical light, graceful slave collar, the attractive collar worn by most slave girls in the city, which might merely mark her as bond and identify her master, but the large, heavy, massive collar put by Targo on his properties, that they might, to escape the discomfort and indignity of such impediments, all the more eagerly submit themselves to the consideration of prospective buyers, collars, too, which, if they strayed, or fled, assuming they might obtain the unlikely opportunity to do so, would immediately call attention to themselves. "Guardsman! Search for an escaped slave in a weight collar, a high collar of thick, black iron, hammered shut about her neck, its two forward projections pierced, a dangling, two-hort iron ring threaded through the piercings!" The collar, of iron, some half of an inch in thickness, was close about her throat. It, too, felt hot. The light collar of Portus, the common collar, typical of Gorean slave collars, had been removed last night, and the tag that had been wired to it. The only collar she now wore was that which fastened her in the coffle.
Thurnock hastened to unlock the manacles and heavy throat collar which bound the great Ubar. The slaver then unlocked the slaves' throat collars and tossed them, with the chain, to the platform.
About her neck there was a chain. From the chain there hung two objects; the first was a narrow, bronze bell, flattish and tapering, with a flat top and ring; when she moved it would sound, calling attention to her whereabouts; the second was a metal coin box, which contained a slot for the deposition of coins; the coin box was locked. I had not heard coins sound, from within the coin box. Too, about her neck, under the chain, with its dangling articles, there was a high, tight leather collar.
She was naked, except for the Torvaldsland collar of black iron on her neck, with its projecting ring, and the heavy chain padlocked about her right ankle; the chain was about a yard long; it secured her, by means of a heavy ring, to the block.
I would not have expected to have worn other than a common collar, of course, there are many sorts of collars. The most familiar are the "common collar," which, in its varieties, tends to be flat and closely fitting, and the "Turian collar," which, in its varieties, is more rounded, and barlike, and fits more loosely. Both lock behind the back of the neck. Dorna wore a "common collar." Some other types of collars are decorative collars, holding collars, training collars and punishment collars. I had been marked my first morning in the house of training, and a house collar, a training collar, had been hammered about my throat.
Indeed, when a city falls, amidst its burning and sacking, free women will often strip and collar themselves, to escape the sword. When it is later discovered they are not branded, they are often severely whipped, but the blood lust, by then, is commonly dissipated, and they are spared. To be sure, they will soon be put under the iron, have transition collars hammered about their necks, and put with other female slaves who will doubtless have their vengeance upon them, switching them and using them as their own serving slaves, as though they might be the slaves of slaves.
We all, too, had new collars on our necks, probably transport collars. They had metal tags attached to them.
"I was captured by Rask of Treve," she said, "a warrior amongst warriors, a man amongst men. I must wear a Trevan collar. When embassies are exchanged with enemy municipalities the banquets are almost always served by naked slaves. For example, if those of Ar visit Treve, the banquet will almost certainly be served by stripped women once of Ar, now in the collar of Trevan masters, which courtesy is returned, of course, should those of Treve visit Ar, where the free men of Treve will be served by stripped women once of Treve, now in the collars of their masters, men of Ar. "And I," she said, "the daughter of Marlenus, found myself in a Trevan collar!"
She wore the Turian collar, rather than the common slave collar. The Turian collar lies loosely on the girl, a round ring; it fits so loosely that, when grasped in a man's fist, the girl can turn within it; the common Gorean collar, on the other hand, is a flat, snugly fitting steel band. Both collars lock in the back, behind the girl's neck. The Turian collar is more difficult to engrave, but it, like the flat collar, will bear some legend assuring that the girl, if found, will be promptly returned to her master. after these things there would only remains of course, an engraved Turian collar and the clothing of Elizabeth Cardwell Kajir. What happened then was done very swiftly. Kamchak lifted from the box an object indeed intended to grace the throat of a girl. But it was a round metal ring, a Turian collar, the collar of a slave. There was a firm snap of the heavy lock in the back of the collar and the throat of Aphris of Turia had been encircled with slave steel! He pushed up her head and then, with a click that could be heard throughout the enclosure, closed the collar a Turian collar - about her throat. The chain to which the collar was attached was a good deal longer than that of the Sirik, containing perhaps twenty feet of length. She turned within the collar, as the Turian collar is designed to permit. At last his fist was within the Turian collar itself and he drew the girl, piteous and exhausted, to his lips, subduing her with his kiss, She wore yellow Pleasure Silk, and, beneath her long black hair, on her throat, I glimpsed a silverish Turian collar. Kamchak's hands were at the small, heavy lock at the back of the steel, Turian collar she wore. He turned the key and opened the collar, discarding it. The Turian collar, too, a looser ring of steel, large enough for a man's fist to grasp on the girl's throat, was occasionally seen now in the northern cities. He went to his desk and, from one of its drawers, drew forth an opened slave collar. It was unlike most of the Gorean collars. It was a Turian collar. Most Gorean collars, decorated or not, are basically a flat, circular band, hinged, which locks snugly about the girl's neck. The Turian collar, on the other hand, fits more loosely and resembles a hinged ring, looped about the throat. A man can get his fingers inside a Turian collar and use it to drag the girl to him. It does not fit loosely enough to permit its being slipped, of course. Gorean collars are not made to be slipped by the girls who wear them. I was belled and collared, in a black, enameled ankle ring, with five, black, enameled bells, on tiny golden chains, and a black, enameled Turian collar, it, too, with five bells, black and enameled, on five tiny golden chains. I was sure these women were such as I because their throats were encircled by collars, mostly of the common variety, those closely fitting, of narrow steel. But two, at least, wore the looser collars of rounded metal, the Turian collar. To be sure, it, too, cannot be slipped. I would later learn that, in the south, collars were often rounded, and looser. These are usually referred to, in their varieties, as "Turian collars."
"The collar," said Kamchak, "is Turian." Kutaituchik nodded. This was news to me, and I welcomed it, for it meant that probably, somehow, the answer to at least a part of the mystery which confronted me lay in the city of Turia. But how was it that Elizabeth Cardwell, of Earth, wore a Turian message collar? Kamchak drew the quiva from his belt and approached the girl. She looked at him wildly, drawing back. "Do not move," I told her. Kamchak set the blade of the quiva between the girl's throat and the collar and moved it, the leather collar seeming to fall from the blade. The girl's neck, where the collar had been sewn, was red and sweaty, broken out. Kamchak returned to his place where he again sat down cross-legged, putting the cut collar on the rug in front of him. I and Kutaituchik watched as he carefully spread open the collar, pressing back two edges. Then, from within the collar, he drew forth a thin, folded piece of paper, The scarred face wrinkled again and Kamchak rocked back and slapped his knees. He laughed, "Do you think Priest-Kings, if they wished you dead, would ask others to do this for them?" He pointed at the opened collar lying before him on the rug. "Do you think Priest-Kings would use a Turian message collar?" Perhaps in that moment Elizabeth Cardwell recalled the strange man, so fearsome, gray of face with eyes like glass, who had so examined her on Earth, before whom she had stood as though on a block, unknowingly being examined for her fitness to bear the message collar of Turia.
Harold and I had been fastened in a Turian slave bar, a metal bar with a collar at each end and, behind the collar, manacles which fasten the prisoner's hands behind his neck.
both girls wore the Sirik, a light chain favored for female slaves by many Gorean masters; it consists of a Turian-type collar, a loose, rounded circle of steel, to which a light, gleaming chain is attached; During all this time, and torches had been brought, the hours of the night being burned away, Elizabeth Cardwell was not permitted to move, but must needs retain the position of the Pleasure Slave, knees properly placed, back straight, head high, the gleaming chain of the Sirik dangling from the Turian collar, falling to the pelt of the red larl on which she knelt.
"Listen closely, Kliomenes," I told him. "You will be able to hear, from the wharves at Victoria, the ringing of a hammer, pounding on iron, on an anvil. Do you hear it?" "Yes," he said. "They are curving collars of iron, with chains attached, about the throats of your fellow pirates." He was silent. "Such collars are heavy and uncomfortable," I said. "I know. I have worn such collars. There is this to be said for them, however. She looked at the other girls. On their throats were heavy collars of black iron, the perforated ends of each curving about the neck to come together in front, in such a way that the collar curved closely about the neck behind the two perforated ends, and the two perforated ends extended forward. These jutting ends then, with their matching apertures, were hammered flat together. Through the matched apertures a dangling iron ring had been closed. Thus, in a sense, the collar was doubly closed, having not only been hammered shut, but also secured with the ring joining the two ends of the metal. Either closure is sufficient, of course. This collar-and-ring arrangement is simply and inexpensively wrought, not requiring the fusing of metals in welding. Ring mounts, and such, on the other hand, are usually fused into, welded into, thus becoming part of, the shackle or manacle. For example, the shackle on her left ankle had a common ring mount, welded into the metal, through which the ring was inserted and closed. "The heavy metal collar on her throat was uncomfortable, quite different from the light band with which she had been familiar. Further, it was a high collar, and it was not easy for her to put her head down. It was exactly the same sort of collar, she was sure, as that worn by the other girls. She could feel it, trace with her finger the closure, feel the extended ends, touch the heavy, dangling ring which had been put through the apertures and closed. Such a collar, with its size and weight, perhaps four or five pounds, its discomfort, she was sure, in the house would have been used only as a punishment collar. Yet, here, all the girls wore it. The collar is not uncomfortable. Usually I am not aware it is on me. It is noticeable of course, when I see my reflection as, for example, when I wish to adjust it a bit, on my neck, that it may sit more attractively on me. I had now been fitted with a collar of the house, one which had been hammered about my neck. It was large high, heavy, and uncomfortable. I could scarcely lower my chin. It was quite different from the light lovely, comfortable but quite secure, common collars which Gorean masters commonly lock about the throats of their kajirae, collars, for example, of the sort which I envied in my instructresses. Perhaps the point of such collars, the house collars, was to make their trainees eager to be brought to the block.
Then, looking up into my eyes, smiling, close to me, her arms about my neck, she insolently wound the vine five times about my neck, and knotted it in front. "Now," she said, "you have a collar." "Do you find me truly beautiful?" she asked. She had one finger inside my collar of marsh vine, idly playing with the side of my neck. Unsteadily she stood up and, with fumbling fingers, untied the knot that bound the five coils of the collar of marsh vine about my neck. "You are free," she whispered. The little men then tied a vine collar on the throat of each girl and, by the arms, dragged them, one by one, to a long-trunked, fallen tree. About this tree, encircling it, were a number of vine loopings. The little men then knelt each girl at one of the vine loopings. Pushing down their heads, they then, with pieces of vine rope, fastened both under the vine collars on the girls, tied down their heads, close to the trunk. The leader of the small people then untied the ankles of the blond girl and unbound the fastening that held her, by her vine collar, to the loop tied about the log. He untied her ankles and freed her vine collar from the loop on the trunk of the tree. "Kajira canjellne!" I cried. There was a great silence in the theater. This is an ancient cry. I do not know its origins. It might date from the time that Ar was no more than a cluster of villages. It is surely older than the roads of Turia and the aqueducts of Venna and Torcadino. It is in old Gorean, the language from which modern Gorean evolved. The cry does not translate easily or well into English, or modern Gorean, but it is a challenge, commonly followed by the death of one or more individuals. It perhaps dates from a time when slave collars were no more than strips of knotted leather and ropes no more than twisted vines.
About the throats of the girls were locked new collars, again of inflexible steel, but now those of huntsmen, vine engraved and bearing the names of their masters.
There was a ring in the back of the collar and, in a moment, by a chain and two snap locks I was fastened to a heavy ring behind me, set deeply in the logs of the kennel. I shook the chains in misery, looking up at him, unbelievingly. I tried to lean forward but was held by the wall collar.
"Then you want to remain here, in a weight collar, on the shelf?" he said. She now wore a weight collar, as the others, and this collar, by its ring, was padlocked to a ring anchored in the stone floor. She could not lift her head more than two or three inches from the floor. The weight collars they wore, too, with the dangling rings, by means of which they were fastened to the floor rings, could not be removed either, except by tools. She moved her neck a bit, too, in her collar, that collar which was not the typical light, graceful slave collar, the attractive collar worn by most slave girls in the city, which might merely mark her as bond and identify her master, but the large, heavy, massive collar put by Targo on his properties, that they might, to escape the discomfort and indignity of such impediments, all the more eagerly submit themselves to the consideration of prospective buyers, collars, too, which, if they strayed, or fled, assuming they might obtain the unlikely opportunity to do so, would immediately call attention to themselves. "Guardsman! Search for an escaped slave in a weight collar, a high collar of thick, black iron, hammered shut about her neck, its two forward projections pierced, a dangling, two-hort iron ring threaded through the piercings!" He then knelt her beside the anvil, her head down, across it. In order to remove the weight collar he unbuckled the hood, and thrust it up, a few inches. He did not, however, raise it enough for her to see. She shuddered, kneeling, bent over, her head laid across the anvil, as Barzak then, with his tools, opened and removed the weight collar. The ringing of the tools on the metal was loud, reverberating, terrifying, and she remained on her knees, frightened, absolutely still. One false blow of the hammer and she knew that her head or throat, with such blows, could be broken as easily as one might crush an egg underfoot. How good it felt to have the weight collar removed! Any collar but this! Let it be a high collar, a weight collar, a punishment collar! Let it have inside spikes, anything!
I did not want to live the rest of my life in ankle chains, my throat locked in a high collar, of weighty iron, with points.
The meal was served by slave girls in white tunics, each wearing a white-enameled collar. A girl slave, in a white tunic and white collar, barefoot, came to the table, and knelt before it. About her throat, close-fitting and snug, there was a white-enameled collar, a lock collar. About her throat, however, as was the case with Phyllis also, there was now a lock collar, snugly fitting, white-enameled. She rose easily from the curule chair and stood before me. She held the opened collar before me. It was slender but sturdy, steel, enameled with white, decorated with tiny flowers in pink, a collar suitable for a woman's girl. There was printing in the enamel, tiny, exact. "See the printing?" she asked. "Yes, Mistress," I said. "I know you are illiterate," she said, "so I shall read it to you. It says 'I am Judy. Return me to the Lady Elicia of Six Towers.'" The heavy iron collar I had worn was now replaced with a lighter collar, enameled white. It had writing on it, in yellow, but incised, too, into the steel. I could not read the writing, for I was illiterate. I had been told the writing read 'Return me for punishment to the House of Andronicus'. I felt the collar at my throat, of sturdy steel. It was enameled white. In it, incised, in tiny, dark cursive letters, in a feminine-type script, was a message in Gorean. It read, I had been told, 'I am the property of the Lady Florence of Vonda.' The lock on the back of the collar had a double bolt, the double bolt, however, responding to a single key.
About her neck, riveted, was a collar of black iron, with a welded ring, to which a chain might be attached. He opened the hinged collar of black iron, about a half inch in height. He put it about her throat. It also contained a welded ring, suitable for the attachment of a chain. The collar of black iron, with its heavy hinge, its riveted closure, its projecting ring of iron, for a chain or padlock, showed black, heavy, against the whiteness of her lovely throat. She wore a plain iron collar, with ring. She then removed the chain from her belt and snapped it on the metal ring attached to my collar. I had, this morning, when my chains had been removed, felt the attachment. It was as I had conjectured, a ring. It was about a quarter of an inch thick. It was sturdy. It was of iron. This collar, too, though much lighter than the former collar, had, too, a ring upon it, for the snap of a leash. I now wore, like other stable slaves, a common work collar, of black iron, with an attached ring. All were Gorean wenches. On the throat of each, though much more slender and graceful than those of the males, was a collar, too, a work collar, of black iron, with an attached ring. I had looked again at the girls, their scanty garments and collars, with the dependent chain loops. I then, in turn, secured Peliope and Leah in their kennels. Both drew in their breath briefly, briefly, too, closing their eyes, when the heavy lock was closed about their collar loops. They then looked at me, the weight of the chain dragging down their collars. I felt with my fingers the heavy collar of iron, with its ring, fastened on my neck. I then turned the collar, slowly, carefully, on her neck, for it was high, thick and close-fitting. The stout collar ring was then in front of her throat, with its long, dependent leash. We were now passing an open slave market. The merchant was chaining his girls on the broad, tiered, cement display shelves. One girl lay on her stomach, on her elbows, her head down, the heavy iron collar on her neck visible beneath her hair; a short, weighty chain of thick dark links connected this collar, by its collar ring, to a wide, stout ring, anchored deeply in the cement, A wrist ring was fastened on her right wrist. The long, slender, gleaming chain was fastened to this and, looping down and up, ascended gracefully to a wide chain ring on her collar, through which it freely passed, thence descending, looping down, and ascending, looping up, gracefully, to the left wrist ring. If she were to stand quietly, the palms of her hands on her thighs, the lower portions of the chain, those two dangling loops, would have been about at the level of her knees, just a little higher. The higher portion of the chain, of course, would be at the collar loop. As she still lay half across the table, shuddering, half in shock, a leather collar, with a ring and attached leash, was buckled about her throat, over the snugly fitting steel collar. She was then pulled from the table and, stumbling, with faltering steps, terrified, was drawn by Hassan between the snarling sleen. He then went to a chest and from it fetched forth a thick, plain, black-leather collar with a lock closure. It was a sturdy ring attached to this collar, and, attached to ring, there was a long slave leash of black leather. She put her hand to the collar. It was closed with a padlock. The collars these women wore had rings. It was by means of these rings, one to each collar, at the right side of the collar, and a second padlock, the bolt of which passed through the ring and a link of the chain, that the collars were attached to the common chain. To one side there was a slave ring. Near it were some chains. Too, among them, opened, I saw an iron collar, woman-size, with its lock ring. This permits it to be fastened on various chains, to be incorporated in a sirik, to be locked about the linkage of slave bracelets, and such. The leash collar was a high, sturdy one, and fitted rather closely about her neck. Girls do not slip such leashes. It had two buckle fastenings. These I had fastened in the front and then turned to the back. This had brought the sturdy leading ring, on its plate, riveted into the leather, to the front, under her chin. This is the common position for front leading, the girl behind you, whether she is on her feet, as it was my intention to lead this girl, if only to save time, or, say, on her belly or all fours. The back position is commonly used when the girl is in front of you, and you are controlling her from behind, she either on her feet ahead of you, or, say, beside you or ahead of you on her belly or all fours. The front position is generally preferred as leash pressure is then received at the back and sides of the neck, not the front. To be sure, a girl is likely to be much more wary, and fearful, and docile, when the ring is at the back. On her neck, as on mine, was a buckled, two-ringed, leather collar. It was the sort of collar which may be easily put on, and removed from, a girl. The girl, of course, if manacled as we were, is helpless in it. The rings are located at 180 degrees from one another. This permits girls to be fastened, the collar oriented appropriately, either side by side, in ranks, or behind one another, in files. A leather strap, with snaps at both ends, joins the rings, usually the ring at the back of one collar to the ring at the front of another. Lady Publia, bound at our feet, winced. There was a noise as the leash ring moved on the collar ring. She sat on the deck. She felt the ankle rings and the chain between them, and the neck chain, and then, with each hand, she tried to slip the wrist ring from the opposite wrist. She could not, of course, begin to do so. She was exploring the device. Then she put her hands on the neck chain and moved up it, with her fingers, and pulled it against its staple on the collar. Then she felt the staple, jerked the chain again against it, and convinced herself that it was well secured there. "I see," she said. The chain trembled, moving in the staple welded to the collar. Similarly, some collars, leather or otherwise, have rings to which such snap rings may be conveniently fastened. Kneeling, in position, chained by the left ankle to a ring, her throat enclosed in a heavy, clumsy, ringed, iron collar, on a cement sales shelf, before Targo, sensitive to her nudity, and miserable, she noted one and another slave girl in the crowd. She heard the rustle of chain behind her and then, in an instant, a heavy metal collar was clasped about her neck and locked. A chain dangled from its back ring, its posterior ring, that at the back of her neck, to a girl behind her, and another chain ran from her collar's throat ring, or anterior ring, to the back ring, or posterior ring, of the next collar, which, a moment later, was closed about the lovely, slim neck of the slave before her, and so on, toward the beginning of the coffle. On her neck, closed, was a sturdy metal collar. On this collar there was a heavy collar ring, and to this collar ring there was attached a heavy, black chain, which presumably was fastened to a ring or mount under the straw. It was a typical pet collar, for such as she, high, to keep her head up, leather, closely fitting, locked in the back, with a ring in front, to which a leash might be attached, a chain, or such. Each of us wore a leather collar, with a metal ring in the back. Through this ring a rope was threaded, and knotted about each ring. Each end of this rope was in the keeping of an Ashigaru.
"You think of punishment," said one of the instructresses, "in terms of the switch, the whip, close chains, the denial of clothing, the affixing of a collar with points, a reduction in rations, being sent naked into the streets, being denied speech, being put in the modality of the she-tarsk, such things?" I did not want to live the rest of my life in ankle chains, my throat locked in a high collar, of weighty iron, with points. When I was once displeasing, foolishly, this was replaced with a heavy, iron, point collar, which was very unpleasant. "I have rethought the matter of the slave," I said. "please have one sent to me this evening. Too, please have her sent naked as that will save time. Too, I like them in collars." "It will be so," said Lord Yamada. "Would you like points inside the collar, or, perhaps, a high metal collar with points on the upper rim, so that she keeps her head up?" "A single, plain, comfortable collar will do," I said, "as long as it is locked on her neck." And some collars were unpleasant, point collars, punishment collars, and such.
A collar, with two guide chains, one on each side, was fastened on his neck. "Then I was double leashed," she said. "A single metal collar," I said, "with chain leashes on each side?" "Yes," she said. There are several double leashing arrangements, sometimes with two collars, and sometimes with a single collar, with leash rings on opposite sides. The collars are usually of leather, metal or rope. The leashes, too, are of similar materials. Some collars, stocklike, are of wood. The point of double leashing is security and control. A prisoner is not likely to be able to pull away from two leashes. At least one is likely to restrain him. Similarly, by two leashes he can easily be immobilized, kept in place, held, say, between two leash masters, unable to reach either of them, or a third person. In the case of females double leashing is primarily aesthetic. Certainly a girl would not be likely, more than once, at any rate, to attempt to attack a leash holder, say, to bite or kick. That is something she would never do again. On the other hand, in Lavinia's case, clearly the guards would not wish to risk her approaching the Ubara too closely, even back-braceleted. The chain attached to the ring on the front of my collar looped forward, and up, to the side of the item before me. The chain attached to the ring on the back of my collar, as the link turned, and given my position, lay diagonally over my back, behind my left shoulder, whence it descended, to loop up, to the front ring of the collar behind me. She moved her neck a bit, too, in her collar, that collar which was not the typical light, graceful slave collar, the attractive collar worn by most slave girls in the city, which might merely mark her as bond and identify her master, but the large, heavy, massive collar put by Targo on his properties, that they might, to escape the discomfort and indignity of such impediments, all the more eagerly submit themselves to the consideration of prospective buyers, collars, too, which, if they strayed, or fled, assuming they might obtain the unlikely opportunity to do so, would immediately call attention to themselves. "Guardsman! Search for an escaped slave in a weight collar, a high collar of thick, black iron, hammered shut about her neck, its two forward projections pierced, a dangling, two-hort iron ring threaded through the piercings!"
"This rope is rough and coarse," said Ladletender, fingering the rope collar. "Would you not like a smooth steel collar, one slender and gleaming, or perhaps ornamented and cunningly wrought, or enameled, perhaps to match your eyes and hair, one designed in color and workmanship to enhance your style of beauty, one perhaps measured or custom-fitted to the beauty of your own slave throat?" "Whatever pleases the master," I said. I knew that a steel collar did immeasurably enhance the beauty of a girl. I had much envied Eta her collar, though it had been plain. I had seen few collars on Gor, but I had learned from Eta that there was great variety among them. They ranged from simple bands of iron, hammered about a girl's throat, her head held down on an anvil, to bejeweled, wondrously wrought, close-locking circlets befitting the preferred slave of a Ubar; such collars, whether worn by a kitchen slave or the prize beauty of a Ubar, had two things in common; they cannot be removed by the girl and they mark her as slave.
The scrubbing, and cleaning, to my interest, had been done by jailers. I would have expected such work to be done by nude female slaves, in work collar, chain and ankle ring, to keep them on their knees with their brushes, but it had not been; The two girls, on their hands and knees on the deck, linked together by a gleaming neck chain, some five feet in length, attached to two steel work collars, these fitted over their regular collars, looked up. She was pulled to her feet by the chain at her throat, that attached to the sirik, collar. The sirik collar was close-fitting and would not, like a work collar, fit over the shipping collar. The shipping collar was thrust up her throat, under her chin, where it would be easy to check. The sirik collar then had been locked about her throat below it. I did not think the girl would be let out of the shipping collar until she had been delivered into the hands of the slaver, Uchafu, who was to be her buyer. I now wore, like other stable slaves, a common work collar, of black iron, with an attached ring.
she wore the briefly skirted, sleeveless slave livery common in the northern cities of Gor; the livery was yellow and split to the cord that served her as belt; about her throat she wore a matching collar, yellow enameled over steel. He fingered the collar on her throat, yellow enameled over steel. It bore the legend; I am the property of the House of Cernus. In this room I saw two slave girls, clad in yellow livery with yellow collars, as Elizabeth normally was, kneeling opposite one another. She wore a yellow collar, that of the House of Cernus, and yellow Pleasure Silk. "If your training goes well," said Flaminius to the girls, "you will in time be given a pretty collar." He indicated Elizabeth's yellow enameled collar, bearing the legend of the House of Cernus. "It will even have a lock," said Flaminius. Virginia looked at him blankly. Her collar, a lock collar, was yellow, enameled. Her collar, yellow and enameled, shone in the darkness, at her throat. Sometimes their girls wear yellow-enameled collars; and yellow-enameled wrist rings and ankle rings, with chains with blue links. |       
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