“Men find slaves of interest, do they not?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said. “Indeed, wars have been fought to obtain beautiful slaves of a given city.”
“The Slave Wars!” she said.
She was referring to a series of wars, loosely referred to as the Slave Wars, which occurred among various cities in the middle latitudes of Gor, off and on, over a period of approximately a generation. They had occurred long before my coming to Gor. Although large-scale slaving was involved in these wars, and was doubtless a sufficient condition for them, hence the name, other considerations, as would be expected, were often involved, as well, such as the levying of tribute and the control of trade routes. Out of the Slave Wars grew much of the merchant law pertaining to slaves. Too, out of them grew some of the criteria for the standardization of the female slave as a commodity, for example, how, in virtue of her scarcity, her training, and such, she is to be figured as an item of tribute, for example, in terms of domestic animals, given her current market values in the area, and so on, such as verr and tarsks. For example, she might, at a given time, be worth five verr or three tarsks, but she might be worth only a fifth of a sleen or a tenth of a tarn. Obtaining women is one of the major reasons Goreans fight. Another is sport.”
