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Links between Valyria/ Westeros before the doom


Kasporio

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By reading some quotes (mainly from lannisters characters), it is imply the Valyrian Freehold was aware of a Western continent.



They built Dragonstone... Why ? Outpost ? Trading post ? Tyrion wondered why the valyrians didnt take hold on the land. 3 dragons and some footmen conquered a fair part of the seven kingdoms and destroyed armies of thousands men.


A rich land, scarcely populated, not unified into a single entity...


So the Valyrian freehold never attempted a war against Westeros.


But it could be inferred some trade existed.



1/ Valyrian steel


When Tyrion thinks about valyrian steel in ASOS, he pretend there is thousands weapons of it in the world. Hundreds in the 7 kingdoms.


He maybe wrong. After all, few valyrian steel weapons are shown.


But if there is really thousands of valyrian weapons... Some of them came into noble families far before the conquest. Longclaw is supposed to belong to the mormont family for 500 years.



So many of the valyrian swords in westeros were not given by Aegon as gifts to his vassals.



2/ The maesters.


The order of the maesters is supposed to date back before the conquest.


The word maester seems valyrian, since high valyrian and its dialect (from Bravosii to Dothraki) seems to favor such grammar (ae).


The citadel still owns some glass candles brought, allegedly, tohusands of years before the doom. When it burns, its rumored to be used as a communication device.


A maester who studied magic wears a valyrian steel link. After the death of the last dragon, magic was seen obsolete.



3/ Noble houses of valyrian ancestry.


It is said about to houses they have valyrian ancestries, being founded after the conquest. Velaryon and Baratheon.


House Dayne supposedly existed before the conquest, and many members of this house exhibit valyrian look.




Ok this post is all about speculation. Was the valyrian steel traded for fur in the north and gold to the west ? The Dayne family maybe descended from wine growers from Valyria who settled in Dorne?


The maesters : the vanguard for an invasion which never came? (not in the way it was planned)



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By reading some quotes (mainly from lannisters characters), it is imply the Valyrian Freehold was aware of a Western continent.

The Valyrians certainly knew of Westeros' existence.

They built Dragonstone... Why ? Outpost ? Trading post ? Tyrion wondered why the valyrians didnt take hold on the land. 3 dragons and some footmen conquered a fair part of the seven kingdoms and destroyed armies of thousands men.

A rich land, scarcely populated, not unified into a single entity...

So the Valyrian freehold never attempted a war against Westeros.

But it could be inferred some trade existed.

1/ Valyrian steel

When Tyrion thinks about valyrian steel in ASOS, he pretend there is thousands weapons of it in the world. Hundreds in the 7 kingdoms.

He maybe wrong. After all, few valyrian steel weapons are shown.

But if there is really thousands of valyrian weapons... Some of them came into noble families far before the conquest. Longclaw is supposed to belong to the mormont family for 500 years.

So many of the valyrian swords in westeros were not given by Aegon as gifts to his vassals.

2/ The maesters.

The order of the maesters is supposed to date back before the conquest.

The word maester seems valyrian, since high valyrian and its dialect (from Bravosii to Dothraki) seems to favor such grammar (ae).

The citadel still owns some glass candles brought, allegedly, tohusands of years before the doom. When it burns, its rumored to be used as a communication device.

A maester who studied magic wears a valyrian steel link. After the death of the last dragon, magic was seen obsolete.

3/ Noble houses of valyrian ancestry.

It is said about to houses they have valyrian ancestries, being founded after the conquest. Velaryon and Baratheon.

House Dayne supposedly existed before the conquest, and many members of this house exhibit valyrian look.

Ok this post is all about speculation. Was the valyrian steel traded for fur in the north and gold to the west ? The Dayne family maybe descended from wine growers from Valyria who settled in Dorne?

The maesters : the vanguard for an invasion which never came? (not in the way it was planned)

It is speculated that the Valyrians never invaded for fear of the skinchangers in the North. They certainly traded with the Westerosi though and perhaps Valyria has something to do with the maesters.

Regarding Dothraki, I don't think it's related to Valyrian. Most people living in the area that used to be the Valyrian Freehold and the Braavosi speak various dialects of Bastard Valyrian. I imagine that these dialects could vary as much as French, Italian and Spanish but all come from the same root, High Valyrian, like the Romance languages all stem from Latin. But I digress...

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Valyrians afraid of skinchangers. Nice theory, but the first men had nothing but horses and bronze swords and they almost destroyed the COTF. The andals did better. If the skinchangers could change the tide of the war, they had launched thousands of bears and dire wolves, and controlled every horses. And dragons are not mere animals, they're said to be clever, and magical, nothing confirm they could be possessed.



I dont pretend dothraki are related to valyrians. But they came after the doom, their hordes no longer restrained by valyria's might. They thrive on slavery and keep many slaves for themselves. So they probably took the valyrian idiom, mixed with their own language. For example, they called Mirri a maegi, a valyrian word common in the free cities.


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Or they are aliens from a volcanic world and they needed to live amongst sulfur. They never invaded westeros because the air was pure. They didnt died in the doom but escaped to another planet (minus their half humans offspring).


They tried to invade earth by sending giant sea monsters as vanguard but was reppeled by giant robots. They made a movie about that.


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Yes, trade links likely existed before the Doom.



But 1) Valyria hadn't yet conquered Braavos or the rest of Essos.



2) Severe administrative headaches would come from trying to govern lands so far away and also (as we've seen in ADWD), ruling over a people of a dramatically different culture is no easy task.


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Rome never invaded scandinavia because it would have been impossible. They had difficulties to subjugate britannia. Scandinavia's conquest would have been awful, no way to maintain a supply line, and it was a target with no strategic interests, poor, harsh climate, far from the political hub. But Rome maintained commercial roads with scandinavia.



Valyria had magic and dragons. They used to destroy huge armies in hours. Ghis empire was easily broken, and it was as close to valyria than essos was to westeros.


I think the reason why Valyria never invaded Westeros its because of the landscape, more mountainous than Essos, it would have made a conquest difficult (Dorne resisted the targ for long)


Politically westeros was a collection of petty kingdoms, it never posed a threat to the valyrian freehold, unlike the rhoynar and old ghis.


Trade existed between Valyria and westeros.


Maybe Valyria maintained Westeros as a protectorate of sort. More specifically, its possible the family in charge was the targaryen. Thats why they built dragonstone.


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Valyrians afraid of skinchangers. Nice theory, but the first men had nothing but horses and bronze swords and they almost destroyed the COTF. The andals did better. If the skinchangers could change the tide of the war, they had launched thousands of bears and dire wolves, and controlled every horses. And dragons are not mere animals, they're said to be clever, and magical, nothing confirm they could be possessed.

Maybe the fact that Valyrians didn't invade Westeros for a long time is a clue that Dragons can be possessed?

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How clever an animal is isn't related to how a skinchanger can get ino them; cats are notoriously difficult to possess while dogs are very easy to warg. Ravens are hard to control too. I believe the wiki says that skinchanging is about how strong a bond you can forge with animals, hence dogs and wolves are easy because of how easy it is to form a bond with one. That is probably why dragons would be susceptible to possession; they tend to have incredibly strong bonds with their riders, and so a skinchanger should be able to expoit this bond potential argue the same as he can for dogs and wolves

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Well, if skinchangers could possess a dragon... why torhen stark did submitted to the targaryen ?


A dragon may not be so much clever than a dog, but is century old, huge, and magical... in fact, if a dog dies who cares? but with all dragons gone most magic almost stop to exist.



The main goal of my post wasnt to mean " hey bran will turn evil and side with the others and skinchange in every dragons dany came with to help her nephew jontarg and ...."


I hoped to see some speculations about the maesters and the dayne family but it seems its just all about crackpot.


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Well, if skinchangers could possess a dragon... why torhen stark did submitted to the targaryen ?

A dragon may not be so much clever than a dog, but is century old, huge, and magical... in fact, if a dog dies who cares? but with all dragons gone most magic almost stop to exist.

The main goal of my post wasnt to mean " hey bran will turn evil and side with the others and skinchange in every dragons dany came with to help her nephew jontarg and ...."

I hoped to see some speculations about the maesters and the dayne family but it seems its just all about crackpot.

Was Torrhen Stark a skinchanger? Did he even know a skinchanger? Did he even believe skinchangers to be more than legends? His descendant Ned didn't.

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Valyrians afraid of skinchangers. Nice theory, but the first men had nothing but horses and bronze swords and they almost destroyed the COTF. The andals did better. If the skinchangers could change the tide of the war, they had launched thousands of bears and dire wolves, and controlled every horses. And dragons are not mere animals, they're said to be clever, and magical, nothing confirm they could be possessed.

I dont pretend dothraki are related to valyrians. But they came after the doom, their hordes no longer restrained by valyria's might. They thrive on slavery and keep many slaves for themselves. So they probably took the valyrian idiom, mixed with their own language. For example, they called Mirri a maegi, a valyrian word common in the free cities.

mmm skinchangers who could take control of a dragon? And it was also a huge theory that weirwood is poisonous to dragons. It is also my own personal theory that the Valyrians had an inkling of the Others living on the continent of Westeros, and did not want to risk open war with a people that could bring about their doom (the White Walkers have been shown and displayed within the series to be almost the exact counterpoint of the Valyrians, in Ice form).

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Ok the valyrians wiped out entire civilizations, killing hundred thousand people in the process, and they was afraid either by :


- Freakin ewoks


- ice freaks with only weaknesses are : fire, obsidian, and, maybe ... valyrian steel.



It makes perfect sense.


O wait a minute : valyrians had fire breathing dragons, obsidian, and valyrian steel.

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Most likely the Valyrians didn't want to conquer Westeros since they would be overextending and probably be forced to build a Western capital to rule Westeros from (and two cities with dragonlords would lead to war at some point), so they were just smart and realized some expansion isn't worth it.



They had some trade with Westeros though, and many Valyrian Steel Swords probably origin from trade between Westeros and the Freehold.


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But 1) Valyria hadn't yet conquered Braavos or the rest of Essos.

The Freehold never conquered Braavos.

By the way, dragons are as clever as an average dog.

And apparently, less than direwolves. I still can't get over

Syrax throwing Joffrey to his death.

I mean, can you imagine one of the direwolves hurting a Stark?

To the OP, it's pretty obvious that there was trade between Westeros and Valyria - Ice and Longclaw are proof enough of that.

As to why the Freehold never tried to conquer Westeros - why would they? It's on the other end of the world and it offers nothing that they can't get in Essos. It was also not a threat to them, so they didn't need to deal with Starks and Lannisters and the like.

Edit: Also, they never finished conquering Essos itself.

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Ok the valyrians wiped out entire civilizations, killing hundred thousand people in the process, and they was afraid either by :

- Freakin ewoks

- ice freaks with only weaknesses are : fire, obsidian, and, maybe ... valyrian steel.

It makes perfect sense.

O wait a minute : valyrians had fire breathing dragons, obsidian, and valyrian steel.

The others seem to bring extreme cold with them. Dragons do poor in rain, I can't imagine them doing well in a blizzard. We also have no evidence that Valyrians knew that the others were weak to obsidian and we don't know that dragonsteel is valyrian steel.

What we do know is that Westeros has Skinchangers and greenseers. Westeros seems to have some of the old anti-magic(dragons are magical!) warding as well. Mel refers to the wall being more than just ice, and the Greenseer cave can apparently block wights.

Did you ever ask yourself why dragons died in Westeros but not in Essos?

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I see several potential reasons.



First, before King's Landing was built, there was really no good port on the east coast of the continent. White Harbor and Gulltown were the two major Eastern ports but Gulltown is surrounded by mountains and White Harbor has no notable roads leading into or out of the area. In both cases the local infrastructure was also minimal, marching armies would need to worry about significant insurgencies that would nibble away at the main forces while the navies would be in trouble from maritime obstacles (especially at White Harbor).



Second, it looks like Valyria was trying to conquer Qarth and its surrounding territories (a Persia analog of sorts). Valyria may have developed a weapon that would devastate cities in one blow and this might be the reason the Red Waste exists at all. Notice the Valyrian road in the northern part of Essos connecting to ruined cities in Sarnath along with the plethora of ruined towns like Vaes Tolloro not far from Qarth with its three walls. I think their attention was elsewhere and once Qarth was conquered the Westerosi would have been a much more realistic target.



Third, we know that Aegon came to Westeros only after a series of local wars was fought in the area. Storm's End participated in the war against Volantis and may have been weakened considerably while Harren the Black was raiding throughout the Riverlands and building Harrenhal. Tyrosh, Myr, Lys, and Pentos were in no position to offer a coalition to help anyone in Westeros. Dorne was able to still hold off Aegon regardless of his three dragons so if a coalition was available it might have been able to push back. The Reach would have been glad for help against the Iron Islands while the North did not want dragons burning everything down, also the Starks appear to have ruled the North in all but name anyway during the Targaryen rule anyway so they really do not lose anything by signing on. Timing was essential to the conquest, we do not know what a united Westeros would have been able to do against a Freehold whose attentions were focused elsewhere (see point two).



Fourth, what does Westeros have in abundance that would be worth the conquest? Rome could have walked into Hibernia/Ireland but why would they - land for soldiers or nobles taken as disproportionate expense? Had Rome known of the rich mineral deposits in modern Czechloslovakia they probably would have moved in immediately, their targets for conquest usually involved trade routes or existing wealth instead of pure colonization efforts.



Fifth, it looks like Valyria was already having some internal concerns about governance. Look at the passages regarding the Targaryen move to Dragonstone - they were mocked for weakness when they left Valyria itself. This infers that remote governance was looked at as a punishment duty, so there was either not a lot of incentive to govern the territories directly or there was some sort of event going on that made it less honorable to do so. Maybe Valyria was in the midst of a civil conflict and the glory would be had in the conquest? Why else would a civilization so reliant on dragons appear to lose all but three when its capital and hinterlands are toasted when the rest of its empire was spared?


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Why do you even think the Valyrians would conquer every single acre of land they came across?



Westeros was just not worth it. Waging a war across the ocean is a logistic nightmare. All other expansion of the Freehold took place in Essos - where you can travel over land or via short maritime routes. To do the same in Westeros, you'd have to send a sizeable army (and dragons) across the ocean and then maintain a strong military and political presence there - all the while risking that said presence just declares itself independent, because Valyria is far away and what are they going to do about it? Send a larger army? For what? It seems that Westeros has no significant amount of any resource that can't be found in Essos as well. The infrastructure was weak and underdeveloped.



Aegon conquered Westeros when there was no Valyria anymore, and he only had the choice between sitting out his days on Dragonstone or subjugating Westeros. Back before the Doom Valyria could also pour it's resources into conquering other parts of Essos, much more profitable and easier to maintain. So they left Westeros alone, except for trading and a comparatively small outpost, which is why Dragonstone exists.


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