CITY LAWS
LAWS OF THE GOREAN CITY OF JASMINE
There are three types of Gorean Law; they are the City Law, Merchant Law, and Initiate Law. For the most part, once you step outside the walls of a city, their city laws will no longer apply and the city will not protect you. Many cities, including Jasmine claim sovereignty over the lands surrounding their city, including certain locations located outside the city over where the city exercises full legal control, such as a banner keep. There is a saying on Gor that the laws of a city extend no further than its walls but where the walls end can be disputed.
JASMINE MUNICIPAL (CITY) LAWS
§1. The theft of Jasmine Home Stone is the worse of crimes and shall be punished by extreme torture followed by death in boiling oil. (Despite this, the theft of an enemy's Home Stone is also considered the greatest of glories, showing that the thief is favoured by the Priest-Kings.)
§2. Only citizens of High Castes may serve on the High Council of Jasmine. Jasmine Free Women (FW) shall not be elected to the High Council.
§3. Each of the five High Castes shall select one representative, the head of each caste, to be on the High Council.
§4. Members of the High Council shall elect one of themselves to be the city Administrator, or during times of war or attack, an Ubar. Low Castes do not possess any voting rights.
§5. The city of Jasmine has determined the following castes are recognised as High: Initiate, Scribe, Builder, Physician, and Warrior.
§6. The High Council of Jasmine must approve changing of a citizen’s caste, based on your qualifications for the new caste and the willingness of the new caste to accept you.
§7. It is a crime to attempt to deceive with respect to caste. (This encompasses such actions as engaging in business under false pretences and claiming explicitly to be of a caste other than your own.)
§8. No map of Jasmine may be taken outside the city.
§9. It is illegal for a non-citizen to make their own map of a city. The punishment for this crime shall be the removal of one hand.
§10. To be a citizen of Jasmine is a privilege, not a right, and a person must actively apply for it as well as continue to earn it throughout your life by attending public ceremonies, such as an official semi-annual taking of auspices, and participating in numerous public assemblies, some of which are called on short notice.
§11. All citizens upon reaching their intellectual majority must complete the citizenship requirement. Being a citizen of Jasmine provides some protection against foreign creditors.
§12. A citizen may renounce their Jasmine citizenship and acquire citizenship in another city. Obviously, you must be accepted by this other city as a citizen, meeting all prerequisites that are in place.
§13. Every citizen of Jasmine, as determined by the Initiate Caste must journey, at least once, to the Sardar Mountains before they are twenty-five years old.
§14. Anyone who enters Jasmine without permission is punishable to death by impalement.
§15. Assassins, when bearing the mark of the black dagger on their forehead, are permitted entrance into Jasmine without interference, but must contact the city administrator as soon as possible.
§16.Members of the Players, Poets, Musicians and Singers caste may freely enter Jasmine.
§17. All outlaws are forbidden entrance Jasmine and shall be impaled or enslaved. Panther-girls and Taluna’s are considered outlaws.
§18. FW of Jasmine in the Physician's Caste cannot engage in the full practice of medicine until they have first bore two children. The city of Jasmine will recognise all other cities Caste qualifications as equal to those required by Jasmine.
§19. Free Companionship, the Gorean form of marriage, lasts for a single year. If it is not renewed by the twentieth Ahn of the anniversary date, it will automatically dissolve.
§20. A Free Companionship may dissolve earlier than one year if one of the parties is either enslaved or dies.
§21. Free woman of Jasmine do not change their name in a Free Companionship.
§22. In Jasmine only one Free Companion maybe held at a time.
§23.Jasmine FW must dress appropriately for their caste. It is customary to wear robes of concealment and veils but is not a legal requirement in Jasmine.
§24. Any free woman who couches with another's slave or readies for such, becomes, by Jasmine law, herself a slave and the property of said slave's owner
§25. Face stripping a free woman by forcefully removing her veils against her will, is a serious crime and illegal in Jasmine.
§26. In Jasmine FW are not permitted to play Kaissa.
§27. Anyone who starts the Jasmine forest on fire shall be burnt alive.
MERCHANT LAWS APPLIED BY JASMINE
§1. Heralds, bearing a gold slash on the left temple of their helmet or headgear, are immune from interference in Jasmine. Foreign Ambassadors possess the same diplomatic immunity as heralds.
§2. No locksmith shall make an unauthorised copy of a key, Punishable by loss of the right hand.
§3. Forgery of Jasmine’s seal on mercantile products is illegal, punishable by loss of merchandise and ability to do business in Jasmine.
§4. Jasmine holds a Merchant's Foot and Stone and these are available for the city's Merchants to verify their own personal measuring devices. Any Merchant found to be using a deceptive Foot or Stone will be punished the same as for forgery.
§5. Jasmine has for legal and commercial purposes standardised certain letters. These would include those representing weights and measures, as well as the "kef."
§6. Thievery is illegal and includes the shaving, clipping, cutting or slicing off metal from any coin. The following minimum punishments shall be given: first offence: an ear notching, second offence: enslavement, third offence: loss of right hand.
§7. It is legal, in Jasmine, to slay a male thief, or enslave a female thief, if the thief is caught within one Ahn of the theft. Once an Ahn has passed though, the thief must be handed over to the Warrior Caste for a hearing or trial. The minimum punishment is such cases shall be a male thief is sentenced to hard labor in the Arsenal or on the wharves for a period ranging from one week to one year, while a female thief shall be sentenced to serve in a penal brothel for a period ranging from one week to one year.
§8. Crests, signs and family emblems can be registered and their use will be legally restricted.
§9. Weapons are not prohibited from being carried into the Initiate's temple.
§10. No Non-Initiates shall enter the sanctuary area of the Initiate's temple unless they have received the chrism of temporary permission.
§11. Any person apprehended in Jasmine wearing or possessing a tunic that is lined with a different colour, which could be turned inside out to alter ones identity is guilty of fraud.
§12. Any citizen of Jasmine that contracts Dar-Kosis will lose all of their possessions, which shall then pass either by will or by the intestate laws.
§13.The crime of attempting to deceive with regards to caste does not apply to individuals legally selling a slave. But, that same person cannot claim to be a member of the Slaver's Caste if he is not.
§14. Adoption is legal in Jasmine.
§15. It is the right of citizens of Jasmine, free and slave, to receive the Stabilisation Serums, the Gorean life extension treatment. No slave owner may deny their slave the treatment.
MERCHANT LAWS DEALING WITH SLAVES IN JASMINE
§16. Slaves are legally considered property and owners may do as they wish with them.
§17. In Jasmine Slaves do not own anything, even their name which their owner may change as desired.
§18.The institution of capture is honoured in Jasmine as long as the person captured belongs to an enemy of Jasmine.
§19. If a lost, stolen or runaway slave is found in Jasmine the original owner has one Gorean week to regain their property. Then the slave becomes legal property by the Free that found and capture the slave
.
§20.If a FW is captured and submits to her captor she has become his slave.
§21. A FW who couches, or even prepares to couch anothers slave, will become the slave to the owner of that slave
§22. In Jasmine if a FW submits to a FM she becomes his slave without regard to capture.
§23. If a FW cannot pay her debts in Jasmine she will be enslaved.
§24. Any FW will be enslaved if they are found guilty of acting in conduct indicating suitability for the collar as determined by the Jasmine Magistrate.
§25. In Jasmine it is legal for a FW to self contract to become a slave for up to a Gorean year.
§26. The property of any person being enslaved shall be transferred to the nearest male relative or to the city of Jasmine if no male relative is found.
§27. The child born of a slave is a slave.
§28. In Jasmine it is not required to mark a slave but if the owner so desires there are three legal marking places for brands, on the left thigh, right thigh, and lower left abdomen
§29. It is illegal to sell a slave, without the owner's permission, that is not your own. Punishment shall be as follows: the seller is a man - the penalty is exile; the seller is a woman -the penalty is enslavement.
§30. It is illegal to sell a slave as auburn haired if she is truly not so.
§31. It is a felony to forge or falsify pedigree papers on any slave. Punishment shall follow that for thievery.
§32. A slave, on threat of torture and impalement, shall endure whatever abuse a free person cares to inflict on her.
§33. It is legal in Jasmine for any free person to discipline an insolent or errant slave, even one who is in the least bit displeasing. (If the slave is killed or permanently injured, the owner of the slave has the right to seek compensation for the loss and the magistrate shall determine if such compensation should be paid and if so now much.)
§34. In Jasmine the showing of too much skin by a FW maybe a cause for enslavement based on determination by Jasmine’s High Magistrate and or a trial.
§35. No slave shall strike a free person in Jasmine. The punishment shall be death by impalement, preceded by lengthy torture.
§36. With the exception of a registered fighting slave in the arena, it is illegal for a slave to wield or have any weapon in their possession,
§37.It is illegal for a slave to claim caste.
§38. With the exception of specific costumes such as during slave dances, it is illegal for a female slave to wear the garment including veils of a free woman.
§39. It is illegal for a male slave to touch either a free woman or a female slave without permission. Maximum punishment is death.
§40. In Jasmine tavern slaves may touch and handle coins which are to be turned over to the tavern master immediately.
§41. In any legal proceedings, the testimony of slaves may be taken by torture as necessary.
§42. It is illegal for a slave to run-away from their owner. Punishment upon return is as follows: first offense - severe whipping on the public post; second offense - hamstringing.
§43. It is illegal for slaves to go outside the city of Jasmine juristidation (docks and farm land such as to another city/village/camp-sim) unless accompanied by a free person or NPC. In such cases the slave would be considered a runaway.
§44. It is illegal for slaves to go outside the city walls after nightfall unless accompanied. (a NPC is allowed)
§45. It is illegal for slaves to enter the initiate temple.
§46. It is illegal for slaves to play Kaissa. Punishment shall be to have their hands cut off.
§47. It is illegal for slaves to be without a visible token of their slavery within Jasmine city limits.
§48. It is illegal for slaves to build anything.
§49. It is illegal for slaves to touch or handle legal documents.
§50. It is illegal for slaves to teach free men and women.
§51. It is illegal for a slave to laugh AT a free. Punishment is enforced by public whipping.
§52. It is illegal to rape slaves without the permission of their owners. (It is recommended that slave owners who worry about such unauthorized rape keep their slaves inside or put them in iron belts.)
§53. It is illegal for slaves to sit in chairs. Punishment is enforced by a public whipping.
§54. A slave freed in Jasmine is required to always hold explicit papers of manumission on their person and are to wear suitable free garments within 20 ahns of their release, or they shall be enslaved again without repercussion.
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