Prices
"A golden tarn disk was a small fortune."
"Tarnsman of Gor" page 191"A gold tarn disk is more than many common laborers earn in a year. Many low-caste Goreans have never held one in their hand. "
"Tribesman of Gor" page 158"Five pieces of gold, in its way, incidentally, is also a fortune on Gor. One could live, for example, in many cities, though not in contemporary Ar, with its press on housing and shortages of food, for years on such resources."
"Magicians of Gor" page 468/9"My financial resources, the ten silver tarsks, obtained from the sale of my former Mistress, the Lady Florence of Vonda, to the Slaver, Tenalion of Ar, had been severely depleted. Normally, such a sum would last a man months on Gor. In these times however, given my requirements and the prices, particurlarly those in Lara, I had been forced, to have resource to alternative sources of income."
"Rogue of Gor" page 59"A silver tarsk is, to most Goreans, a coin of considerable value."
"Rogue of Gor" page 155"Of the two hundred remaining double tarns from the victory in the Ubar's race I gave all but one to free Melanie, who had served in the kitchens of Cernus, and arrange a livelihood for her. With the money remaining over from her purchase price, which was negligible, she, who had been of the Cloth Workers, could open a shop in Ar, purchase materials, and hire men of her caste to aid her in the work.
"Assassin of Gor Page 160"I have heard of a cup of black wine in Ar, some years ago, selling for a silver eighty-piece. Even in Thentis black wine is used commonly only in High Caste homes."
"Assassin of Gor Page 106"I threw a silver tarsk, taken from what we had obtained from the slavers in the marsh, to the proprietor of the paga tavern, and took in return one of the huge bottles of paga out of the tavern, making my way along the narrow walkway lining the canal, toward the quarters taken by my men, Thurnock and Clitus, with our slaves."
"Raiders of Gor" page 110"Clitus, after returning to our quarters, had left and returned with four musicians, bleary-eyed, routed from their mats well past the Twentieth Hour, but, lured by the jingling of a pair of silver tarsks, ready to play for us, past the dawn if need be."
"Raiders of Gor" page 113"The cost of transporting a free person across the Laurius was a silver tarsk. The cost of transporting an animal, however, was only a copper tarn disk. I realized, with a start, that that was what I would cost. Targo was charged twenty one copper tarn disks for myself, the other girls, the new girl, and his four bosk."
"Captive of Gor" page 80"I hurled a golden tarn disk to the ground, to pay for lodging in Kassau, and the care of the bird. I would leave the saddle."
"Marauders of Gor" page 52"But when I descended the narrow gangplank of the dhow, which I took upstream from Kasra to the village port of Kurtzal, it was not as a tarnsman. The tarn I had sold in Kasra, for four golden tarn disks."
"Tribesmen of Gor" page 42""Come with me to the cafe of Red Cages," said a boy, pulling at my sleeve. They receive a copper tarsk for each patron they bring through the arched portal of the cafe. I gave the boy a copper tarsk, and he sped from me.
"Tribesmen of Gor" page 42"Water! Water!" called the man.
"Water," I said.
He came to me, bent over, tattered, swarthy, grinning up at me, the verrskin bag over his shoulder, the brass cups, a dozen of them, attached to shoulder straps and his belt, rattling and clinking. His shoulder on the left was damp from the bag. There were sweat marks on his torn shirt, under the straps. One of the brass cups he unhooked from his belt. Without removing the bag from his shoulder, he filled the cup. (...)
The water flowed into the cup through a tiny vent-and-spigot device, which wastes little water, by reducing spillage, which was tied in and waxed into a hole left in the front left foreleg of the verr skin. The skins are carefully stripped and any rents in the skin are sewed up, the seams coated with wax. When the whole skin is thoroughly cleaned of filth and hair, straps are fastened to it so that it may be conveniently carried on the shoulder, or over the back, the same straps serving, with adjustment, for either mode of support. The cup was dirty.
I took the water and gave the man a copper tarsk."
"Tribesmen of Gor" page 36"It is a custom of the Initiates of Teletus, and of certain other islands and cities, it the youth agrees to go to the Sardar when they request it, then his, or her, family or guardians, if they wish it, will receive one tarn disk of gold. Ute knew that the leather worker, and his companion, could well use this piece of gold."
"Captive of Gor" page 234"I wish," I said, "to board her, and purchase her some training." "We cage a wench for a copper tarsk per day," he said. "Training is extra, but, I think, reasonable."
"Tribesmen of Gor" page 53"I had been sold for nine pieces of gold.
The man mounted to the saddle of the tarn. The tarn screamed and began to beat its wings. Then the basket jerked forward, on its leather runners, and skidded across the clearing, and then, swung below the tarn.
I was on my way to the market.
I was sold from the great block of the Curulean, in Ar, for twelve pieces of gold, purchased by the master of a paga tavern, who thought his patrons might enjoy amusing themselves with me, a girl who wore penalty brands."
"Captive of Gor" page 355"“You wish her destroyed?” asked the man.
“Yes,” said Surbus, “destroyed.”
“Her price,” said the proprietor, “is five silver tarsks.”
From his pouch Surbus placed five silver tarsks, one after the other, on the counter."
"Raiders of Gor" page 120"Nela was an expensive girl, though there were pools where the girls cost as much as a silver tarn disk. The tarsk is a silver coin, worth fourty copper tarn disks."
"Assassin of Gor" page 160 "In some of the larger pools the girls went as cheaply as one copper tarn disk. For the fee one was entitled to use the girl as he wished for as long as he wished, his use, of course, limited by the hours of the pool's closing."
"Assassin of Gor" page 160"She had first been sold for eight silver tarsks to a keeper of one of the public kitchens in a cylinder, a former creditor of her father, who had in mind making a profit on her; she worked in the kitchen for a year as a pot girl, sleeping on straw and chained at night, and then, as her body more adequately developed the contours of womanhood, her master braceleted her and took her to the Capacian Baths where; after some haggling, he received a price of four gold pieces and a silver tarsk; she had begun in one of the vast cement pools as a copper-tarn-disk girl and had, four years later, become a silver-tarsk girl in the Pool of Blue Flowers."
"Assassin of Gor" page 164"Prices of girls vary considerably with her caste, the supply of her general type and the trends of the market. A girl in the Curulean is seldom sold for less than two gold pieces. This is largely, doubtless, because the Curulean refuses to accept women for sale who are not genuinely attractive. In a rather brief amount of time Verbina was auctioned to a young Warrior for seven gold pieces. An extremely good price, under relatively normal market conditions, for a truly beautiful woman of High Caste tends to be about thirty pieces of gold, though some go as high as forty, and fifty is not unknown; these prices, for women of low caste, may be approximately halved."
"Assassin of Gor" page 293"I am lonely," said a kneeling slave girl by one of the booths, lifting her hands to me. I looked at her, a comely wench in soiled Pleasure Silk. She was leashed and her master, who wished to rent her for the quarter Ahn, held the chain with its leather loop wound in his fist. "Use her," said he, "the poor wench is lonely, only a copper tarn disk." I turned and, pressing through the crowd, walked away."
"Assassin of Gor" page 156""Each night the baths were emptied and cleaned and I was one of many who attended to this task," he said. "I was only six years of age when I was taken to Turia, and I did not escape the city for eleven years." He smiled. "I cost my master only eleven copper tarn disks," he said, "and so I think he had no reason to be ill satisfied with his investment."
"Nomads of Gor" page 188"For a silver tarsk I purchased the male slave, and freed him. "Stand," I said to Alyena, who was trembling."
"Tribesmen of Gor" page 80
