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Atlas of Ice and Fire


Werthead

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After our discussion in the Valyrian thread and earlier map threads, I was inspired to start putting together some maps of Westeros and Essos with greater detail than what we have seen before and coming at them from a different angle.



Note that I am not even remotely an artist. These are maps taken from elsewhere which I have adjusted in Paint (!). I also still haven't found a solution for rendering mountains and especially volcanoes on the map that I am happy with, so there are some limitations here. Suggestions for improvements (and spending £100+ for Photoshop isn't viable! :) ) would be gratefully accepted.



Map 1: Westeros and Essos at the Dawn of Days


Link.



An attempt to envisage the world at the very start of the history, 12,000 years Before Conquest (BC and AC are apparently the new official dating systems, replacing AL for After the Landing) by the traditional calendar. Several notable changes: Westeros and Essos are connected by the Arm of Dorne (I've always thought of this as a naming corruption of Arm of the Dawn/for the Dawn; possibly the First Men marched from the rising sun towards the setting) which covers most of the Stepstones area. Valyria is still a peninsula. The Neck is not a swamp. Westeros is much more extensively covered by forest than during the later epochs. Other changes on Essos and in more remote parts of the world are not known.



We know that the First Men came from Essos, crossing over from the region of the Disputed Lands. It is not known why they started moving, although they could have been displaced by other people. We know settlers from Ibben colonised the northern Free Cities region before being defeated by the earliest Andals, so it could be that the Ibbenese (or rather their remote ancestors) displaced the First Men. Otherwise the First Men naturally moved west into Westeros as their numbers grew.



Westeros at this time was much more extensively covered by forests, in which dwelled those who sing the songs of earth (i.e. the children of the forest). They had no cities, just vast groves of weirwood and caverns like those we saw in ADWD. Exactly where and when the first cities appeared is unknown, but I suspect Oldtown was the first of them (the First Men origins of House Hightower confirm it predates the invasion of the Andals).



The existence of other civilisations in Essos at this time is unknown. Aside from the above evidence that the Ibbenese may have been around, there are no indications of other civilised human settlements on either continent.



Other speculation: if we go with the theory that it was the Long Night that threw the seasons out of balance, it is possible that at this time the world was experiencing normal, regular seasons.



ETA: I've redone the map to show the Shrinking Sea when it was at its full size and the Silver Sea before it began shrinking down into smaller lakes.


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Daenerys's Journey


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This is an updated version of a map I did a while ago based on the HBO map (not canon for the books). It's colour-codes the stages of Dany's journey by book: A Game of Thrones (Pentos to Lhazar, via Vaes Dothrak) in red, A Clash of Kings (Lhazar to Qarth) in blue, A Storm of Swords (Qarth to Meereen, via Astapor and Yunkai) in green and A Dance with Dragons (Meereen to 'Dragonstone' Hill) in purple.



My original estimate of Dany's journey in the books to date encompassing approximately 8,000-8,500 miles appears to be more or less accurate, though clearly there's a lot of wriggle room. The one improvement is that we can now take a better guess on Dany's route across the Dothraki sea, as the Lands of Ice and Fire shows roads (though in that case, more likely a trail) across the grasslands that would probably have been used.


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Brilliant Werthead. Looking forward to seeing more.



Your best option would be using GIMP. Its no photoshop but by far the best free alternative. Its easy to use but a bit of a steep learning regarding the design of it rather than editing itself.



With regard to the first map, Pyke is describe as having a headland that more of the castle sat on. But has since fell into the sea. Not sure if it would be large enough to show up on the map anyway?

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Hmm. Does GIMP use layers? Being able to put text on a separate layer would be really handy, as it means I don't have to have 3-4 versions of each map.



And yup, at this scale Pyke's stacks don't even show up as a separate island.


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Yes it does. Plus with the layers you can also set them as a transparent background as well. Which is handy for copying ontop of things.



Give it a try, to be honest I'm amazed you were able to do any of that with Paint! You'll be achieve 1000 times it with GIMP.



I'll have a think and maybe we can submit some requests for you to make fo us? :bowdown:


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Map 2: The War of the Children and the First Men


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The First Men crossed over the Arm of Dorne and invaded Westeros. My theory on how the First Men achieved their early successes is based on climate: assuming Dorne was as it is now, it was probably mostly desert with no large forests. Hence the Children may not have even been aware of the First Men until they came pouring over the Red Mountains, maybe some time after establishing bases and settlements in Dorne itself. This is why the breaking of the Arm was ineffective: not only did it result in the closely-packed Stepstone islands, which the First Men could simply hop over even on fairly primitive boats (hence possibly the name), but the First Men almost certainly had time to regroup in Dorne before invading the Reach and Stormlands.



The date on the map reflects the reference to Moat Cailin being 'only' 10,000 years old in AGoT, whilst the First Men's invasion was 2,000 years earlier. The entire war was probably fought over a century or two at the most circa 12,000 BC, and Moat Cailin was probably simply older, or the reference to the Children using Moat Cailin as the location from which to raise the Hammer of the Waters was wrong. However, it may provide an early clue as to how the traditional and revisionist histories diverged: if everything is 2,000 years younger than it's reported, that tracks with some of the revisionist history (i.e. the Others' invasion and raising of the Wall was 6,000 years ago, not 8,000, and the Andals invaded Westeros 4,000 years ago rather than 6,000, the latter of which is mooted in ADWD).



The map assumes that the shattering of the Arm was, whilst cataclysmic, not massively damaging on a worldwide scale. If the Narrow Sea was higher than the Summer when the Arm was shattered, there may have been widespread flooding and the coastlines of not just Westeros and Essos but also Sothoryos and the Summer Islands would have been affected as well. For simplicity's sake I have assumed this is not the case.


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Wow, great work, I really like this idea!


Just a small point; if the Hammer of Waters didn't occur until the War of the Children and the First Men, would the Neck not look very different in the Dawn of Days Map? I'm not sure of course, but I always assumed that it would have changed the shape of the land, rather than just turning the area into swampland.


Or are the two maps different in that area and I am just too dense to see it?


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Daenerys's Journey

Link.

This is an updated version of a map I did a while ago based on the HBO map (not canon for the books). It's colour-codes the stages of Dany's journey by book: A Game of Thrones (Pentos to Lhazar, via Vaes Dothrak) in red, A Clash of Kings (Lhazar to Qarth) in blue, A Storm of Swords (Qarth to Meereen, via Astapor and Yunkai) in green and A Dance with Dragons (Meereen to 'Dragonstone' Hill) in purple.

My original estimate of Dany's journey in the books to date encompassing approximately 8,000-8,500 miles appears to be more or less accurate, though clearly there's a lot of wriggle room. The one improvement is that we can now take a better guess on Dany's route across the Dothraki sea, as the Lands of Ice and Fire shows roads (though in that case, more likely a trail) across the grasslands that would probably have been used.

It's funny seeing Dany's route color-coded that way, it's like red she's "property", blue she's coming to terms with herself and her situation, green her confidence is growing and purple she's finally accepting who and what she is, I had never looked at it that way. Cool! :)

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Work in progress: the Valyrian Freehold. This is where being able to do mountains/volcanoes well would be handy.



We cover this in the Extent of the Valyrian Empire thread, but working out where the borders of the Freehold are in the east is tricky. Going by the roads, it looks like the Freehold didn't extend much further east than Meereen, Astapor and Yunkai. We can assume that Qarth controlled the lands much further east, but working out if Lhazar was under Valyrian control or existed then as a buffer state between Valyria and Qarth isn't really possible at the moment.



Also an interesting one: Faros and particularly Vahar could be Valyrian names, which makes me wonder if those cities were also Valyrian in origin.


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A quick musing on the size of the world. Assuming Planetos is the same size as Earth (GRRM used to say it was slightly bigger, but not by how much), Westeros and Essos-as-mapped covers a fairly small part of it. Without accounting for distortion or projection, this is approximately how much of Westeros and Essos should cover of an Earth-sized planet. Westeros's position is very roughly placed in accordance with the treeline, based on the northern-extent of trees in Scandanavia (which is, very roughly, 1,500 miles south of the North Pole), which extend further north than anywhere else in the world (according to Wikipedia).


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A quick musing on the size of the world. Assuming Planetos is the same size as Earth (GRRM used to say it was slightly bigger, but not by how much), Westeros and Essos-as-mapped covers a fairly small part of it. Without accounting for distortion or projection, this is approximately how much of Westeros and Essos should cover of an Earth-sized planet. Westeros's position is very roughly placed in accordance with the treeline, based on the northern-extent of trees in Scandanavia (which is, very roughly, 1,500 miles south of the North Pole), which extend further north than anywhere else in the world (according to Wikipedia).

Nice work.

Incidentally, that would place the Wall at around 60 degrees North latitude - given that it is around 600 miles below the top of the treeline.

Meaning that the Neck at around 1200 miles further south = 1200/69 = 17 degrees further south. This places the North between latitudes 43 and 60 degrees North.

Pretty much killing the idea that the North is a straight equivalent to Scandinavia in terms of its climatic and agricultural zone.

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Interesting. The British Isles run from 50 degrees to 60 degrees north (Shetland is actually just north of the 60 degree line). Of course, Britain is much warmer than it should be thanks to the Gulf Stream, which we should assume doesn't exist on Martinworld, so the North would be colder than Britain, but not necessarily vastly so.


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Interesting. The British Isles run from 50 degrees to 60 degrees north (Shetland is actually just north of the 60 degree line). Of course, Britain is much warmer than it should be thanks to the Gulf Stream, which we should assume doesn't exist on Martinworld, so the North would be colder than Britain, but not necessarily vastly so.

The Northern part of the North, yes.

But the British Isles are only 600 miles long. That means it only stretches from about the Wall (equivalent of the northern tip of Scotland), to around Winterfell (the equivalent of the southern tip of England).

That means the entire area from Winterfell down to the Neck lies south of the British Isles.

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First map has been redone to show the Silver Sea (as we know those lakes in Sarnor are the shrunken remnants of it) and the Shrinking Sea before it started shrinking. Fortunately they're not on the other maps, so I didn't have to redo all of them.


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It's becoming more and more evident that something is seriously wrong with the water cycle in Essos. The drying up of the Dothraki Sea mentioned in ADwD is merely the continuation of a tendency that’s been going on for thousands of years.



East of the Bone Mountains, we don’t only have the Shrinking Sea, but now it turns out that the Great Sand Sea was once well watered, fertile and the center of a mighty civilization.



And in the Dothraki Sea, the Silver Sea could’ve have existed as close as 400 years ago.



Why is Essos drying up?


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The drying up of the Dothraki Sea mentioned in ADwD

I'm not sure that's part of it. I think the Dothraki Sea drying up was because of the onset of winter, and is probably 'normal' for Martinworld. I'd be interested to see what how the Dothraki, at least, survive the winters.

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  • 3 months later...

If there was ever a proper Atlas of Ice and Fire, I was thinking about what should be included. Taking a cue from Karen Wynn Fonstand's excellent fantasy atlases of the 1980s and 1990s (The Atlas of Pern, The Atlas of Middle-earth, The Atlas of the Land, The Dragonlance Atlas and The Forgotten Realms Atlas) I came up with the followng structure.



Basically there are two sections: a historical section, showing changing borders over time and battles and so forth, and a 'present day' section showing the world in greater detail, along with castle and city maps.



Historical Maps


Westeros in the Dawn of Days


The War of the First Men and the Children


The Ancient Kingdoms of Westeros*


The War for the Dawn


The Andal Invasion/Migrations


The Rise of Valyria


The War of the Freehold and the Rhoynar


The Doom of Valyria


The Century of Blood, including the Volantene Expansion, the Fall of Sarnor and maybe the Battle of Qohor


The Seven Kingdoms on the Eve of Aegon's Invasion


The War of Conquest (The Battle of Gulltown, The Razing of Harrenhal, The Last Storm, The Field of Fire, The King Who Knelt, The Invasion of Dorne)


The Dance of Dragons (The Battle of Rook's Rest, The Sacking of Driftmark, The Battle on the Honeywine, The Fall of King's Landing, The Battle of Gods Eye, The Battle at Stony Ridge, etc)


Daeron's Invasion of Dorne (battles in the Red Mountains, The Sack of Planky Town, The Submission of Sunspear, The Dornish Rising)


The Blackfyre Rebellion (The First Rebellion, The Battle of Redgrass Field, The Second/Third/Fourth Rebellion, The War of the Ninepenny Kings, Maelys's Fall)


Tywin's Vengeance (The Fall of Castamere and Tarbeck Hall)


Robert's Rebellion (The Three Battles of Ashford, The Battle of the Bells, The Battle of the Trident, The Sack of King's Landing)


The Greyjoy Rebellion (The Battle of Lannisport, The Battle of Seagard, The Battle of Fair Isle, The Battle of Pyke)


The War of the Five Kings (The Battle of the Golden Tooth, the Green Fork, Whispering Woods, Camps, Oxcross, the Fords and Stone Mill, Blackwater, Duskendale, The Red Wedding, the Ironborn Invasion of the North, Winterfell)


The War Beyond the Wall (Mance Rayder's Advance, The Battle of the Wall)


The War in the East (Daenerys's Journey, The Battle of Meereen)



Westeros


The Wall and Beyond


The Wall


Castle Maps: Castle Black, Eastwatch-by-the-Sea, The Shadow Tower, The Nightfort


The Lands Beyond the Wall



The North


Castle Maps: Winterfell, Moat Cailin, the Dreadfort, Deepwood Motte


City Map: White Habour


Town Map: Barrowton


Area Map: The Neck


Island Maps: Bear Island and Skagos



The Riverlands


Castle Maps: Riverrun, Harrenhal, Darry, The Twins, Whitewalls


Town Maps: Maidenpool, Saltpans and Stoney Sept


Septry Map: The Quiet Isle


Inn Maps: The Inn at the Crossroads, The Inn of the Kneeling Man


Island Map: The Isle of Faces



The Vale of Arryn


Castle Maps: The Eyre, The Gates of the Moon, The Bloody Gate


City Map: Gulltown



The Iron Islands


Castle Maps: Pyke, Ten Towers


Island Maps: Great Wyk/Old Wyk, Pyke/Saltcliffe, Hawlaw, Orkmont/Blacktyde, Lonely Light



The Westerlands


Castle Maps: Casterly Rock, The Crag, The Golden Tooth


City Map: Lannisport



The Crownlands


City Map: King's Landing


Castle Maps: The Red Keep, Stokeworth, Dragonstone


Town Map: Rosby


Temple Map: The Great Sept of Baelor


Area Map: Blackwater Bay



The Stormlands


Castle Maps: Storm's End, Griffin's Roost


Island Map: Tarth


Area Map: The Dornish Marches



The Reach


Castle Maps: Highgarden, The High Tower, The Citadel, Ashford, Bitterbridge, Coldmoat/Standfast


City Map: Oldtown


Island Maps: The Shield Islands, The Arbor



Dorne


Castle Maps: Sunspear, The Water Gardens, Starfall


Island Map: Ghaston Grey



The East


The Free Cities


City Maps: Braavos, Lorath, Pentos, Norvos, Qohor, Myr, Tyrosh, Lys, Volantis, Chroyane


Temple Map: The House of Black and White


Town Maps: Selhorys, Valysar, Volon Therys


Area Map: The Disputed Lands


Island Map: The Stepstones



The Dothraki Sea


City Map: Vaes Dothrak


Area Map: The Fallen Kingdom of Sarnor



Ibben


City Map: The Port of Ibben



Slaver's Bay


City Maps: Astapor, Yunkai, Meereen, Mantarys, Valyria


Castle Map: The Great Pyramid of Meereen


Temple Map: The Temple of the Graces


Island Maps: The Isle of Cedars, Ghaen



Lhazar and the Red Waste


City Maps: Vaes Tolorro, Qarth



The Summer Isles


City Map: Lotus Port


Town Map: Tall Trees Town



Sothoryos


Island Maps: Naath, the Basilisk Isles



The Lands of the Jade Sea


Island Maps: Great Moraq and surrounding islands (Lesser Moraq, Vahar, Isle of Elephants), Marahi, Leng


Area Map: Yi Ti



The Far East


Island Map: The Thousand Islands


Area Map: The Plains of the Jogos Nhai



Lands of Mystery


City Map: Asshai


Area Map: The Shadow Lands


Area Map: Ulthos



* At this point, before even the North was unified, there are probably way too many kingdoms and not enough information to create such a map, but it'd be nice to try.



There's something like 200 potential maps there, so it might be highly impractical to do. However, some of the old Fonstad atlases didn't have far off that and not all the maps would be super-detailed. There's also maybe an argument for only mapping locations featured in the books, but in some cases I think it's warranted to go beyond that (each of the Nine Free Cities should be mapped, IMO, even if we never go to Lorath or Lys in the books).


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