The Hatred of the Ironborn and Curious Historical Counterparts (which are popular)

[Lord Reaver]

On the contrary. The real fact of the issue is that the "Vikings" did a heck of a lot more than simply raiding (a very minor activity actually). They did far more trading and exploring than they ever did raiding. But to the people who were target for their raids (such as the British), that's apparently all they remember, or care to remember.

[bbstark]

oh you had me at "Rape the women and call them Saltwives" as a cultural identification. If it makes you feel better, I don't think much higher of the Dothraki either.

[Jon of the Dead]

House Greyjoy is my favorite house :dunno:

I appreciate the Ironborn for what they are: secondary antagonists, just like the Tyrells. I don't think they are the sweetest and gentlest people in the 7K and I don't try to justify their behavior, but I think they are good villains like Euron and Victarion and good grey characters like Theon and Asha (Aeron is just a waste of a POV).

It doesn't hurt that the Ironborn culture is an amalgation (not a carbon copy, of course) of the Vikings, and other piratical cultures that I happen to find quite interesting.

[Ser Lepus]

The tough-guy culture is more prominent in the north than in the rest of the 7 kingdoms, but the northmen don't make a practice of robbing their neighbors and abducting people to make serfs or salt wives. The ironmen don't seem to be quite as malevolent as the Dothraki, but most of them seem to have a predator mentality.

The Dothraki seem to be more primitive and brutal, but at least they are able to take blows so well as they give them. The ironborn, on the other hand, wail and cry when their victims fight back and kick their asses: "They cheat! They fight back instead of falling on their knees and begging for their lives like we thought they would do!".

[The Prince of Ice]

This is my first post on this board I'm pretty sure, though it's difficult for me to tell due to an admirable level of inebriation :). Regardless, the purpose of this topic is simple. I think very few can deny that the Ironborn are probably the least popular culture of the series, by far at that. However, what strikes me as so interesting (and frustrating at that, given I love the Ironborn) is the fact that the Ironborn roughly represent various popular cultural "underdogs" throughout history.

The Viking and Pirate connections have been made many times already, so I won't quite delve into that. However; A connection I have seen made (rarely, though it's immensely accurate) is that of the Gaelic populations of Ireland and Scotland, i.e Celtic peoples of the so called dark ages and on. The interesting part here, as i'm getting at, is all of these cultures are immensely popular in Anglo culture, yet the Ironborn more than any other culture in Westeros draw ire. Can anyone explain these inconsistencies?

(The Gaelic, far from being victims of the English, survived on raids in Wales, Scotland and England for years. In many ways, the 'Irish' were vikings before vikings truly existed.)

Ok just to get your history right vikings existed for a long time before they spread out from Scandinavia, however they only raided other scandinavian nations mainly so they were isolated. So saying the Irish were the first Vikings doesnt make sense. Viking means sea-raid and scandanavians had been sea-raiding for hundreds of years before their great age. Also you calling the Ironborn underdogs is a little off in my opinion. There disliked but that doesn't make them underdogs. The Vikings were no underdogs they were expected to win by many European nations. Pirates on the other hand were the true underdogs, could be easily annhilated if there plan of hoisting the kings colors didnt work.

Also they are just like the Vikings at the end of their age, there begining to settle down and drop the Old Way because of how out of date it is for a nation like Westeros.

Overall readers and characters in the book dont like the Ironborn just because their just like the Vikings, simple thugs who think they can take whatever they want at a point of a sword. Nothing more nothing less.

[Mad Monkey]

The Dothraki seem to be more primitive and brutal, but at least they are able to take blows so well as they give them. The ironborn, on the other hand, wail and cry when their victims fight back and kick their asses: "They cheat! They fight back instead of falling to their knees and begging for their lives like we thought they would do!".

Pretty much. The ironmen seem genuinely enraged by the fact that the crannogmen don't fight them head-to-head in full-plate armor backed by a huge navy the way they do. While obviously I don't expect them to enjoy getting shot full of arrows it's a little galling to hear them complain just because their advantage in a fight goes from "Overwhelming" to merely "Formidable".

It's like Joffrey and Arya and Mycah; the ironborn want to be able to brutalize anyone they want to but they consider it dishonorable for any of their foes to fight back except in a preapproved manner that conveniently gives them a massive advantage.

[Greyjoy pook]

There at 500 yrs between the invasion of thw Anglo Saxons int o Britain and the Normans arriving.THey are not the same groups!!!.The anglo saxons come from south germany the normand come from france(i know they started out as vikings but by the thime they invaded england they were french.When the normand invaded england it was the anglo saxons they were conquering.!!!Like in Ireland they brought names and rabbits to england(as well as the feudal system) let me reperat the normand and anglos saxons are not the same group!!!.

Alos when the saxons inaded Britain they didnt bring cicilisation with them the ROmans had done that already 300 yrs earlier under Claudius.In may ways the Roman_British were more cicilised than the Saxons.After the saxon invasion tons of the advancement that the romans built were destroyed/forgotten.It was Irish monks who re-introduced christainity to england for example

I didn't say these two groups were the same. At all. Is English your first language? If it's not, then it's fine you keep misunderstanding me, but you really need to stop making wild assumptions about what I am saying so you can aggitate yourself further and assume that I don't know what I'm talking about. Before replying to a post of mine, step back and think. Ask me a question. I don't know, anything other than just assuming I'm saying something because you want to grasp for straws. This is at least twice you've done this now. You're also still under the assumption, despite my clarification, that I believe "civilization" was brought to any of these groups when I explicitly stated I didn't agree with that. Sit down, think and read before jumping to conclusions.

Ok just to get your history right vikings existed for a long time before they spread out from Scandinavia, however they only raided other scandinavian nations mainly so they were isolated. So saying the Irish were the first Vikings doesnt make sense. Viking means sea-raid and scandanavians had been sea-raiding for hundreds of years before their great age. Also you calling the Ironborn underdogs is a little off in my opinion. There disliked but that doesn't make them underdogs. The Vikings were no underdogs they were expected to win by many European nations. Pirates on the other hand were the true underdogs, could be easily annhilated if there plan of hoisting the kings colors didnt work.

Also they are just like the Vikings at the end of their age, there begining to settle down and drop the Old Way because of how out of date it is for a nation like Westeros.

Overall readers and characters in the book dont like the Ironborn just because their just like the Vikings, simple thugs who think they can take whatever they want at a point of a sword. Nothing more nothing less.

"Viking" is really just a profession - it wasn't a catch all term for an ethnicity or culture. As a result, regardless if the Norse raided one another, it's not appropriate to call them this, even for the sake of nitpicking to make yourself look more "right". By your logic, we should call someone such as the Gauls "vikings" for the raids they conducted on one another and Rome. Again, if English isn't your first language then it's understandable if you're misunderstanding me - I wasn't saying the Gaels were the first Vikings, I was drawing a comparison to their behavior and the behavior of about three generations of Norsemen, except the Gaels were doing it to foreigners (relative to them) far before the Norse were.

Again, just to clarify, I'm not saying we should ever refer to the Gaels as vikings - there's only comparisons to be made.

[Old God]

I dislike the Ironborn for the same reasons i dislike the Dothraki they are depicted as stupid, one dimensional raider types. It also doesnt help help that they are the only people who practise slavery on Westeros, and im not a Theon fan (some of the best written chapters though)

And they whine alot too, just rename them the Butthurt Islanders

[Sullen]

Because their culture is highly parasitic and violent (Just like most cultures on Planetos including Westerosi nobility, but that's for another topic) and they do not have the required decency/hypocrisy required to be ashamed of it... and because they have an incredibly antagonistic role to most fan-favourite factions in the story.

As a reader, I find them fascinating to read about as they bring a whole different view on morality and because they are the clear underdogs of the story, but if I were Westerosi, I would probably hate their guts too.

[Pootie Tang]

I'll stop as soon as people stop

1) Equating Ironborn 1:1 with Vikings

2) Spouting stupid Hollywood crap about Vikings (or more correctly Norse culture)

Of course, equating the ficional culture of the Ironborn with the vikings is much better than equating the hardships endured by the Jews with that of the Vikings.

But sure, The ironborn are worse than the vikings whose noble image has been distorted by evil Hollywood to resemble that of the ironborn. Happy?

[The Prince of Ice]

I didn't say these two groups were the same. At all. Is English your first language? If it's not, then it's fine you keep misunderstanding me, but you really need to stop making wild assumptions about what I am saying so you can aggitate yourself further and assume that I don't know what I'm talking about. Before replying to a post of mine, step back and think. Ask me a question. I don't know, anything other than just assuming I'm saying something because you want to grasp for straws. This is at least twice you've done this now. You're also still under the assumption, despite my clarification, that I believe "civilization" was brought to any of these groups when I explicitly stated I didn't agree with that. Sit down, think and read before jumping to conclusions.

"Viking" is really just a profession - it wasn't a catch all term for an ethnicity or culture. As a result, regardless if the Norse raided one another, it's not appropriate to call them this, even for the sake of nitpicking to make yourself look more "right". By your logic, we should call someone such as the Gauls "vikings" for the raids they conducted on one another and Rome. Again, if English isn't your first language then it's understandable if you're misunderstanding me - I wasn't saying the Gaels were the first Vikings, I was drawing a comparison to their behavior and the behavior of about three generations of Norsemen, except the Gaels were doing it to foreigners (relative to them) far before the Norse were.

Again, just to clarify, I'm not saying we should ever refer to the Gaels as vikings - there's only comparisons to be made.

Being a Viking isnt just a profession its a way of life, most scandanavian men were viking plus some other job which was their profession. Also the Gauls and Irish didnt raid their own people anywhere near as much as the Scandanavians.

However you did say the Gaels were Vikings before the Vikings so that clearly isnt true.

Being a Viking was key to male scandanavian culture, look at the numbers of men in Scandanavian countries who were Vikings then come talk to me. 70-90 percent of Scandinavian men were Vikings at certain times in the season, so being a Viking isnt just a profession.

[Lord Reaver]

Being a Viking isnt just a profession its a way of life, most scandanavian men were viking plus some other job which was their profession.

Nope. Most scandinavian men never went Viking. Most just stayed at home or went overseas to trade.

Being a Viking was key to male scandanavian culture, look at the numbers of men in Scandanavian countries who were Vikings then come talk to me. 70-90 percent of Scandinavian men were Vikings at certain times in the season, so being a Viking isnt just a profession.

Got any sources to back up these preposterous claims ?

[Greyjoy pook]

Being a Viking isnt just a profession its a way of life, most scandanavian men were viking plus some other job which was their profession. Also the Gauls and Irish didnt raid their own people anywhere near as much as the Scandanavians.

However you did say the Gaels were Vikings before the Vikings so that clearly isnt true.

Being a Viking was key to male scandanavian culture, look at the numbers of men in Scandanavian countries who were Vikings then come talk to me. 70-90 percent of Scandinavian men were Vikings at certain times in the season, so being a Viking isnt just a profession.

The Gallic tribes and the Gaels both were constantly engaged in warfare amongst themselves, so I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say here. Are the Norse at war with one another so often that it even dwarfs the Gaels and Gallics, or are you suggesting that these Celtic peoples only sporadically made war on themselves?

Secondly, what numbers? I'd be amazed if we could pull up an exact list of Vikings at any point in time, given we're not even sure that Ragnar Lodbrok even truly existed, we aren't sure where Rollo came from (founder of the Normans, if you will) and on a similar note to both Ragnar and Rollo, we aren't even sure of where Rurik came from, or even if he existed. In short, there's notoriously poor documented evidence of the pre-Christian Norse beyond Runestones and what their foes wrote of them. Again, I'm very interested if you have documents and figures that Academia lacks :).

[JanAgro]

Greyjoy pook you seem to be under the impression that the Irish/Gael/Hiberni/Iverni/Scotia/Milesians/Eireannach?Whatever name you wish to give them had a culture based on ttcaking via the sea.This just isnt the caseAll the great Celtic towns in ireland were based inland and they werent great shipbuilders or sailors.Thats why they could only cross at the shortest points.Intead because they worshipped cows they used to attack each other in great tains or cattle raids.This is not liek the Norse who travelled all across the baltic sea forloot

If you think about it the wilding are much more like a culture than the ironborn ,what with living behin a wall,not having a feudal system,kingships falling apart afer the death of the king etc.To top it off the wilding live in a place called the land of always winter.Hibernia(the latin name of ireland) means wintery

I apolgise for my bad spelling im typing via touch screen and its making me make mistakes

[Frey family reunion]

I think they are probably most modeled after the ancient Danes. Theon's story has some slight allusions to Hamlet.

[The Prince of Ice]

The Gallic tribes and the Gaels both were constantly engaged in warfare amongst themselves, so I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say here. Are the Norse at war with one another so often that it even dwarfs the Gaels and Gallics, or are you suggesting that these Celtic peoples only sporadically made war on themselves?

Secondly, what numbers? I'd be amazed if we could pull up an exact list of Vikings at any point in time, given we're not even sure that Ragnar Lodbrok even truly existed, we aren't sure where Rollo came from (founder of the Normans, if you will) and on a similar note to both Ragnar and Rollo, we aren't even sure of where Rurik came from, or even if he existed. In short, there's notoriously poor documented evidence of the pre-Christian Norse beyond Runestones and what their foes wrote of them. Again, I'm very interested if you have documents and figures that Academia lacks :).

I gotta find the text that states the numbers but tbh it most likely is flawed because of information gathered in that period, especially from an older textbook which im looking for atm.

[emeraldarcher]

I always saw stronger ties to the Irish Celts than the Scandinavians. Obviously the use of Long Boats is very Viking (The Kraken was also originally a Scandinavian myth although it is now widely used for all seafaring stories) and they are known more for raiding although the Ul' Niall did it for some time in Britannia and took Slaves (Such as St Patrick) as well.

I did get the chance to ask GRRM about this briefly during Comic-Con. I said there seemed to be a lot of Celtic influences in the Ironborn and he said: "Yes, some Celtic and a lot of Viking" however I took his use of "Viking" to mean the more literal "Pirate" or "Sea-Farer" culture rather than Scandinavian. I further asked him if Asha was in any way influenced by Grace (Granne) O'Malley who was a 13th century Irish Pirate who commanded over 100 ships. He said "Oh yes, I have actually have had a cat and dog named after her"

Aspects of the Ironborn that reminded me of the Celtic-Irish

The Kings of Ulster did not always follow blood in succession and sometimes had councils to pick their leader (Kingsmoot)

The Druids believed that the spirit would be reincarnated and inhabit another body ("What is dead may never die but rise again harder and stronger)

Resistance from outside rule

So the seafaring aspect seems more Viking and the Iron Island culture more Celtic-Irish IMO.

The Show has gone decidedly Irish with their interpretation from the cloths and armor of the Ironborn and even the commoners and crew appear to be using Irish Accents.

[Samwell Gamgi]

I only like Euron because he is the only cunning one and humiliated Asha. The others are fools.

[binga]

To be fair I doubt most of the people reading, especially after the increase in popularity due to the tv show, know or give a shit about Vikings and European history. Ironborn are hated because they are meant to be hated, written that way. They are raiders, killers, assholes, and brutes. Just like with many of the other characters in Westeros however, there is hypocrisy involved. Lannisters and Targaryens have done brutish things as well but they do them in an elegant way, while they maintain their stature and beauty.

[Aethermancer]

They wanted to keep their Old Way, and that was taken from them.

Maybe if they weren't such weaklings...