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Friday, July 22, 2011

8 - Tools of the Scribe & How They Are Used

There were many tools used by the Scribes of Gor  , here I list a few of them One such popular tool was known as a  Reading Device - a metal frame with rollers at the top and bottom - and, pushing a button, spun the scroll to its opening mark, a single sign.
Also the Scribe would of needed a desk to sit up , it would of probably been piled up with papers and scrolls ,  pots of ink pens quill s  , scissors leather fastners  and binders .
Marking  sticks Wood-bound tablets
The scribes put their marking sticks away. They closed their wood-bound tablets, tying them shut. Magicians
Tablet & Stylus, for note taking, childrens lessons, drafts...
Now, emerging from the kitchen, came the Lady Temione on all fours, as I had commanded. From her mouth, on its looped string, dangled the small, closed, hinged, wooden waxed tablet which would contain the bill. These tablets, and tablets of these sorts, which sometimes have several divisions, and fold up, are often used on Gor for drafts, note taking, temporary tallyings, children’s lessons, and such. (pg.80) They contain one or more waxed surfaces which are written on by a stylus. The smaller ones open like flat books, not roll books, and may be closed with tiny latches, or tied shut.
Renegades
Scroll Racks
There was no square foot of the chamber that did not contain racks of scrolls, and others, hundreds perhaps, were piled like cord wood here and there. His sleeping mat was unrolled, and his blankets must not have been aired for weeks. His personal belongings, which seemed to be negligible, were stuffed into the nearest of the scroll racks.
Tarnsman
Translation Machine
"One of the most interesting was the Translator, which could be set for various languages. Whereas there was a ma n common tongue on Gor, with apparently several related dialects or sublanguages, some of the Gorean languages bore in sound little resemblance to anything I had heard before, at least as languages; they resembled rather the cries of birds and the growls of animals; they were sounds I knew could not have been produced by a human throat. Although the machines could be set for various languages, one term of the translation symmetry, at least in the machines I saw, was always Gorean. If I set the machine to, say, Language A and spoke Gorean into it, it would, after a faction of a second, emit a succession of noises, which was the translation of my Gorean sentences into A. On the other hand, a new succession of noises in A would be received by the machine and emitted as a message in Gorean. My father, to my delight, had taped one of these translation devices with English, and accordingly it was a most useful tool in working out equivalent phrases. Also, of course, he and Torm worked intensively with me. The machine, however, particularly to Torm's relief, allowed me to practice on my own. These translation machines are a marvel of miniaturization, each of them, about the size of a portable typewriter, being programmed for four non-Gorean languages. The translations, of course, are rather Literal, and the vocabulary is limited to recognitions of only about 25,000 equivalencies for each language.
Tarnsman
Scribe's Box
Contains pens, ink or powdered ink, paper, knife, eraser stone, etc.
One of the men with the officer, the captain, was clad not in the gear of war, but wore a blue tunic, and carried, on two straps, slung now beside him, a scribe's box. It was flat and rectangular. Pens are contained, in built-in racks, within it. Depending on the box, it may also contain ink, or powdered ink, to be mixed with water, the vessel included, or flat, disklike cakes of pigment, to be dampened, and used as ink, rather as water colors. In it, too, in narrow compartments, are sheets of paper, commonly linen paper or rence paper. A small knife may also be contained in such boxes for scraping out errors, or a flat eraser stone. Other paraphernalia may also be included, depending on the scribe, string, ostraka, wire, coins, even a lunch. The top of the box, the lid, the box placed on a solid surface, serves as a writing surface, or desk.
Witness
Notebooks, bound in leather
“Look there,” said Shaba, indicating a table to one side, on which there lay a cylindrical leather case, with a leather cap, and four notebooks, heavy and bound with leather.
“I see,” I said.
“There is a map case there,” he said, “and my notebooks. I have, in my journey, charted the Ua, and in the notebooks I have recorded my observations. Those things, though you, of the warriors, may not understand this, are priceless.”
Explorers
Code books of Cryptographers
"Do not confuse a code with a cipher," said Bosk. "In a code, a given character, or set of characters, will commonly correlate with a word, as opposed to a letter. Codes require code books. Codes, in effect, cannot be broken. If the code book can be captured, of course, the code is useless. Codes are vulnerable in one way, ciphers in another."
Slave Girl
Ledgers for bookkeeping
In a bit the attendant had returned with a large, somewhat dusty, oblong ledgerlike book. It was tied shut with a cord. It contained several pages. It was bound in leather. On the cover, though it was hard to see from where I stood, there seemed to be some designations, such as perhaps dates and numbers. “The older records, such as these,” he said, “are kept here, together with duplicates of the more current records. The more current records, together with duplicates of the older records, are kept at the house.”
I nodded. In that way two identical sets would be maintained, in different locations. This was not uncommon with Gorean bookkeeping, particularly in certain kinds of businesses.
Mercenaries
Rence paper in rolls
The paper is then attacked, sheet to sheet, to form rolls, usually about twenty sheets to a roll. The best paper is on the outside of the roll, always, not to practice deceit in the quality of the roll but rather to have the most durable paper on the outside, which will take the most weathering, handling and genteral wear/ Rence paper comes in various grades, about eight in all. The rence growers market their product either at the eastern or western end of the delta.
Raiders
Linen, vellum and parchment
Rence paper is, incidentally, not the only type of writing material used on Gor. A milled linen paper is much used, large quantities of which are produced in Ar, and vellum and parchment, prepared in many cities, are also popular.
Raiders

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