Doom Of Valyria - Long Night Duality

[RaidenSchumacher]

How do people compare these events?

The first involves volcanoes and lava flows. The second ice and white walkers.

Dragonglass rained from the sky. Anyone else noticed this?

[Usrnmhsnomning]

I don't think people associate the Doom of Valyria with summer the way the Long Night is associated with winter. There's no suggestion anything like the Doom has happened before or will ever happen again.

[RaidenSchumacher]

I don't think people associate the Doom of Valyria with summer the way the Long Night is associated with winter. There's no suggestion anything like the Doom has happened before or will ever happen again.

Okay, but that's their decision.

There was no suggestion of another Long Night until now.

[cocoalover1956]

There is a connection, but the Doom of Valyria is more comparable to Hardhome than the Long Night, which is why I think you have compare Valyria to Hardhome first.

Valyria was the greatest settlement in the East, Hardhome was the greatest settlement beyond the Wall (thought Hardhome could hardly compare to Valyria). There was a cataclysm in both places, the details of either we know little about about. Given the language used to describe them, the events happened quickly and without warning.

The proudest city in all the world was gone in an instant, its fabled empire vanished in a day, the Lands of the Long Summer scorched and drowned and blighted.

Hardhome had been halfway toward becoming a town, the only true town north of the Wall, until the night six hundred years ago when hell had swallowed it.

Both events appear to be a major geological event, most likely a volcanic eruption.

It was written that on the day of Doom every hill for five hundred miles had split asunder to fill the air with ash and smoke and fire, blazes so hot and hungry that even the dragons in the sky were engulfed and consumed. Great rents had opened in the earth, swallowing palaces, temples, entire towns. Lakes boiled or turned to acid, mountains burst, fiery fountains spewed molten rock a thousand feet into the air, red clouds rained down dragonglass and the black blood of demons, and to the north the ground splintered and collapsed and fell in on itself and an angry sea came rushing in.

Its people had been carried off into slavery or slaughtered for meat, depending on which version of the tale you believed, their homes and halls consumed in a conflagration that burned so hot that watchers on the Wall far to the south had thought the sun was rising in the north. Afterward ashes rained down on haunted forest and Shivering Sea alike for almost half a year. Traders reported finding only nightmarish devastation where Hardhome had stood, a landscape of charred trees and burned bones, waters choked with swollen corpses, blood-chilling shrieks echoing from the cave mouths that pocked the great cliff that loomed above the settlement.

Now, they are both avoided and thought to be haunted.

"Does our captain mean to test the curse?"...No free man would willingly sign aboard a ship whose captain spoke openly of his intent to sail into the Smoking Sea.

Six centuries had come and gone since that night, but Hardhome was still shunned...haunted by ghouls and demons and burning ghosts with an unhealthy taste for blood

By constrast, the Long Night was a wide-scale invasion that swept across a large portion of Westeros, but eventually ended by Azoh Ahai. The affect areas were eventually repopulated. As oppose the hot, swift, dramatic destruction in the Doom and Hardhome, the Long Night was a slow, drawn out, dark, icy destruction.

Thousands and thousands of years ago, a winter fell that was cold and hard and endless beyond all memory of man. There came a night that lasted a generation, and kings shivered and died in their castles even as the swineherds in their hovels. Women smothered their children rather than see them starve, and cried, and felt their tears freeze on their cheeks...In that darkness, the Others came for the first time. They were cold things, dead things, that hated iron and fire and the touch of the sun, and every creature with hot blood in its veins. They swept over holdfasts and cities and kingdoms, felled heroes and armies by the score, riding their pale dead horses and leading hosts of the slain. All the swords of men could not stay their advance, and even maidens and suckling babes found no pity in them. They hunted the maids through frozen forests, and fed their dead servants on the flesh of human children.

Depending on how things play out in the next two books, or what new information we learn about the Long Night, it could be that the Long Night (via the Others) and the Doom become connected through Hardhome. Geographically, Hardhome lies between Valyria and the Lands of Always Winter, where the Others are said to originate.

Hardhome has connections to the Others as well as Valyria. In the current era, many the wildings who are not already at the Wall are being called to Hardhome by Mother Mole. They are fleeing the Others and another Long Night. After more than half of millennia of superstition, wildings suddenly flock to Hardhome in hopes of rescue coming from the sea. Valyria was partially drowned by the sea, which adds a salvation/destruction contrast, along with this line.

Mother Mole was heard to preach that the free folk would find salvation where once they found damnation.

Jon Snow, who might have the blood of both Valyria and the First Men, wanted to rescue the refugees at Hardhome from fear that they would turn into wights. This dedication to Hardhome was one of the factors in the betrayal of his men. His effort to rescue the wildings was one of the things that led to his death. His efforts regarding Hardhome are ruined because of a storm and the men sent to save the wildings are now in terrible danger.

Another example of this motif is in the story of the Last Hero-searching for help and rescue, left with death.

So as cold and death filled the earth, the last hero determined to seek out the children, in the hopes that their ancient magics could win back what the armies of men had lost. He set out into the dead lands with a sword, a horse, a dog, and a dozen companions. For years he searched, until he despaired of ever finding the children of the forest in their secret cities. One by one his friends died, and his horse, and finally even his dog, and his sword froze so hard the blade snapped when he tried to use it. And the Others smelled the hot blood in him, and came silent on his trail, stalking him with packs of pale white spiders big as hounds-

And again with the Targaryens, who fled Valyria before the Doom, seeking shelter on Dragonstone. They had it fairly good for a few hundred years until Robert's Rebellion nearly wiped them all out.

So what we're left is a line in which Hardhome is the fulcrum between the Others and the Long Night, and the Doom of Valyria, coupled with a motif contrasting expected safety with unexpected destruction that links all three of them.

[Grey Words]

snip

Brilliant stuff, Cocolover. Much to ponder there as you're ideas have certainly set my wheels spinning....

[Not Dead Just Broken]

Thematically, I think one could draw a connection between the Long Night and the Doom. Both events can be seen as natural forces reclaiming the world around them. In this way the contrast between destruction by fire and destruction by ice as outlined by the OP can be seen. However, what throws a major wrench into the works is that the Doom of Valyria was (at least IMO) man-made. The Faceless Men are the likely culprits for the Doom, if the Kindly Man can be believed, and their powers are neither fire nor ice. They use what is at hand. In Valyria, they had volcanoes, so they destroyed it with volcanoes. If Valyria had been a snowy place they may have buried it in an avalanche.

I agree with cocoalover1956 that Hardhome and Valyria share a lot in common but I think you can tie it into an even larger theme of areas being blighted and not recovered. Very few places are rebuilt after a sacking. Most remain in some sort of destruction and often develop some sort of curse surrounding them. So, Valyria is said to be toxic. Hardhome has ghosts. Harrenhall is cursed. High Heart is haunted. Even recently destroyed castles aren't rebuilt. Summerhall isn't rebuilt after the tragedy and becomes a place of tragic beauty. Ramsay makes no efforts to rebuild Winterfell. Moat Cailin and the abandoned castles of the Night's Watch are in decay. So too are most of the building in the Gift.

If we treat the Doom of Valyria as analagous to the the Fall of Rome in terms of its importance, ASOIAF is basically set in the Dark Ages. A lot of the old knowledge has been lost and little is being done to recover that knowledge. What knowledge is being preserved or advanced is done by small groups of men in seclusion: the Maesters in Oldtown, the Faceless Men in Braavos, the Children of the Forest in their cave. Very little knowledge is shared and perhaps more worryingly little knowledge is sought. Characters who read are treated as strange or weak. I think this is why these destroyed places are not rebuilt. There's no willingness to try again when things have failed.

Circling back to what the OP was saying I think you can see the Doom of Valyria and the Long Night having some sort of duality. The Long Night was a great tragedy that forced mankind into ingenuity. Bran the Builder raises the Wall and Winterfell as defenses against future attack. Storm's End is raised symbolically allowing for human settlement amidst the worst storms of the Stormlands. Conversely, the Doom of Valyria seems to have discouraged ingenuity. If the greatest city that ever was (with apologies to Qarth) can disappear in an instant, what's the point of progress? Why not allow what is ruined to stay ruined? I think what a lot of the characters that GRRM paints sympathetically are trying to do is fight against this decay. Tyrion wants to rule with brains not brawn. Jon wants to rebuild the Night's Watch. Sam seeks the ancient secrets in Oldtown. This may explain why there's a difference between the seemingly inexorable and inherently nature-driven power of the Others and the Long Night and the, if the Faceless Men theory is true, man-made destruction of Valyria. The people of ASOIAF are misinterpreting the Doom of Valyria because they don't realize its a man-made event.

[cocoalover1956]

snip

The analysis of decay and loss of knowledge in Westeros is very insightful. What is the theory that the Faceless Men destroyed Valyria? I've never heard that and I don't understand it.

[yolkboy]

The analysis of decay and loss of knowledge in Westeros is very insightful. What is the theory that the Faceless Men destroyed Valyria? I've never heard that and I don't understand it.

When Kindly man is telling Arya about the history of the faceless men, he hints they were responsible for the doom. I'm sorry i cant provide a quote for you.

[Free Northman]

The Faceless Men found the Horn of Joramun in the Far North, tested it at Hardhome, where it woke giants from the earth, and then used it in Valyria to bring about the Doom.

[Not Dead Just Broken]

The analysis of decay and loss of knowledge in Westeros is very insightful. What is the theory that the Faceless Men destroyed Valyria? I've never heard that and I don't understand it.

The Kindly Man hints at it but basically tells Arya he can't tell her until she's a full fledged FM. It's when he's telling Arya the history of the order and how the first FM killed the slaves who were begging for death. Arya says something to the effect, of "I would have killed the masters" to which the Kindly Man replies "we did, but that's a story I can tell no one" ie a FM.

There are a lot crazy theories as to how they did it. Some people think they threw dragon eggs into the volcanoes. Some people think the explosion at Hardhome was a test of whatever they did. If the Hardhome thing is true, it almost seems like it has the strength of nuclear bomb. As silly as that sounds, it would explain why Valyria seems to still be almost radioactive 600 years later.

[Lyse Stark]

There is a connection, but the Doom of Valyria is more comparable to Hardhome than the Long Night, which is why I think you have compare Valyria to Hardhome first.

Valyria was the greatest settlement in the East, Hardhome was the greatest settlement beyond the Wall (thought Hardhome could hardly compare to Valyria). There was a cataclysm in both places, the details of either we know little about about. Given the language used to describe them, the events happened quickly and without warning.

The proudest city in all the world was gone in an instant, its fabled empire vanished in a day, the Lands of the Long Summer scorched and drowned and blighted.

Hardhome had been halfway toward becoming a town, the only true town north of the Wall, until the night six hundred years ago when hell had swallowed it.

Both events appear to be a major geological event, most likely a volcanic eruption.

It was written that on the day of Doom every hill for five hundred miles had split asunder to fill the air with ash and smoke and fire, blazes so hot and hungry that even the dragons in the sky were engulfed and consumed. Great rents had opened in the earth, swallowing palaces, temples, entire towns. Lakes boiled or turned to acid, mountains burst, fiery fountains spewed molten rock a thousand feet into the air, red clouds rained down dragonglass and the black blood of demons, and to the north the ground splintered and collapsed and fell in on itself and an angry sea came rushing in.

Its people had been carried off into slavery or slaughtered for meat, depending on which version of the tale you believed, their homes and halls consumed in a conflagration that burned so hot that watchers on the Wall far to the south had thought the sun was rising in the north. Afterward ashes rained down on haunted forest and Shivering Sea alike for almost half a year. Traders reported finding only nightmarish devastation where Hardhome had stood, a landscape of charred trees and burned bones, waters choked with swollen corpses, blood-chilling shrieks echoing from the cave mouths that pocked the great cliff that loomed above the settlement.

Now, they are both avoided and thought to be haunted.

"Does our captain mean to test the curse?"...No free man would willingly sign aboard a ship whose captain spoke openly of his intent to sail into the Smoking Sea.

Six centuries had come and gone since that night, but Hardhome was still shunned...haunted by ghouls and demons and burning ghosts with an unhealthy taste for blood

By constrast, the Long Night was a wide-scale invasion that swept across a large portion of Westeros, but eventually ended by Azoh Ahai. The affect areas were eventually repopulated. As oppose the hot, swift, dramatic destruction in the Doom and Hardhome, the Long Night was a slow, drawn out, dark, icy destruction.

Thousands and thousands of years ago, a winter fell that was cold and hard and endless beyond all memory of man. There came a night that lasted a generation, and kings shivered and died in their castles even as the swineherds in their hovels. Women smothered their children rather than see them starve, and cried, and felt their tears freeze on their cheeks...In that darkness, the Others came for the first time. They were cold things, dead things, that hated iron and fire and the touch of the sun, and every creature with hot blood in its veins. They swept over holdfasts and cities and kingdoms, felled heroes and armies by the score, riding their pale dead horses and leading hosts of the slain. All the swords of men could not stay their advance, and even maidens and suckling babes found no pity in them. They hunted the maids through frozen forests, and fed their dead servants on the flesh of human children.

Depending on how things play out in the next two books, or what new information we learn about the Long Night, it could be that the Long Night (via the Others) and the Doom become connected through Hardhome. Geographically, Hardhome lies between Valyria and the Lands of Always Winter, where the Others are said to originate.

Hardhome has connections to the Others as well as Valyria. In the current era, many the wildings who are not already at the Wall are being called to Hardhome by Mother Mole. They are fleeing the Others and another Long Night. After more than half of millennia of superstition, wildings suddenly flock to Hardhome in hopes of rescue coming from the sea. Valyria was partially drowned by the sea, which adds a salvation/destruction contrast, along with this line.

Mother Mole was heard to preach that the free folk would find salvation where once they found damnation.

Jon Snow, who might have the blood of both Valyria and the First Men, wanted to rescue the refugees at Hardhome from fear that they would turn into wights. This dedication to Hardhome was one of the factors in the betrayal of his men. His effort to rescue the wildings was one of the things that led to his death. His efforts regarding Hardhome are ruined because of a storm and the men sent to save the wildings are now in terrible danger.

Another example of this motif is in the story of the Last Hero-searching for help and rescue, left with death.

So as cold and death filled the earth, the last hero determined to seek out the children, in the hopes that their ancient magics could win back what the armies of men had lost. He set out into the dead lands with a sword, a horse, a dog, and a dozen companions. For years he searched, until he despaired of ever finding the children of the forest in their secret cities. One by one his friends died, and his horse, and finally even his dog, and his sword froze so hard the blade snapped when he tried to use it. And the Others smelled the hot blood in him, and came silent on his trail, stalking him with packs of pale white spiders big as hounds-

And again with the Targaryens, who fled Valyria before the Doom, seeking shelter on Dragonstone. They had it fairly good for a few hundred years until Robert's Rebellion nearly wiped them all out.

So what we're left is a line in which Hardhome is the fulcrum between the Others and the Long Night, and the Doom of Valyria, coupled with a motif contrasting expected safety with unexpected destruction that links all three of them.

Good Post!

[I am of the Night]

Mind = blown!

[RaidenSchumacher]

Hmm, yes, it seems that there is a time thing where Long Night takes a long time, and not the cataclysmic events of which you speak. Perhaps there is a reason why Hardhome is in the books, because it makes it clear that fire comes from within the earth.

So it's not only north and south.

[Grey Words]

Hmm, yes, it seems that there is a time thing where Long Night takes a long time, and not the cataclysmic events of which you speak. Perhaps there is a reason why Hardhome is in the books, because it makes it clear that fire comes from within the earth.

So it's not only north and south.

Yes. Hardhome could be a clue that the real issues isn't just North vs South or even simply Ice vs. Fire, but is perhaps an imbalance in the earth/nature itself.

[King of Vaes Tolorro]

Not North or South or Summer vs Winter. Its East vs West. The Fall of ROme vs. the ?

[Lord Martin]

What is interesting is that Hardhome pre-dates The Doom. Hardhome is 300 years before Aegon's landing, or 200 years before The Doom.

I wonder if there was another similar event 100 years after the conquest (every 200 years or so).... the dragons died out around that time, but I can't say its connected....

[complexphoenix]

Personally, I think it's clear that the Doom of Valyria was magical in nature. I consider it inconceivable that a natural volcanic eruption, even a really big one, could burn hot enough to kill every dragon in a hundreds-of-miles radius. No, this was something else. I might suspect a meteor strike if there was a crater, but the damage to the landscape is more complicated than that, so we can rule that out.

I see two possibilities: either the Faceless Men did it on purpose with some kind of secret magic, or the Valyrians somehow overdid their own magics and triggered the cataclysm inadvertently. But either way, it was magic.