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Odd Thing for Sam to Say about Randyll


John Suburbs

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21 hours ago, A Song of Ass and Fire said:

Was Sam's grandfather still alive when he was little?  Maybe after Randyll's dad died and he became lord he had to go swear fealty directly to Mace as he would have been sworn to his father before.

 

22 hours ago, grinny said:

Or if the old, confused grandpa dies and Randyll finally official becomes the Lord.

This is what I was thinking. Maybe Randyll was not yet a lord when he fought for Mace at Ashburn? Then old lord Tarly dies some years later and Sam accompanies Randyll to swear allegiance to Highgarden.

 

13 hours ago, Aedam Targaryen said:

Since we're playing the maybe game, maybe lords in the reach re-affirm their fealty every seven years... well, because seven. 

This would be the only likely reason for a routine re-swearing IMO. Simply having all your vassals swear fealty on a yearly basis would likely be seen as s sign of weakness in the Tyrells, like they are unconvinced that the oath they received last year was genuine.

 

Still, I think the most intriguing possibility is that Randyll defied Mace in some way, and that could come into play as JonCon starts looking for allies in the Dornish Marches.

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On hearing of his marriage to Lord Mooten's daughter, Brienne "tried to recall how old he was; eight or ten, she thought."(AFfC, Ch.14 Brienne III). If so,  Mooten's daughter is likely to remain a maid, bedding or no.

Brienne recalls being betrothed at seven, but there is a difference between betrothal and marriage. As we have already learnt, in Westeros it is normal to wait until the girl has 'flowered'(Ch.19 Tyrion III), even for sex outside of marriage (AFfC, Prologue (Pate)). I suppose it isn't unheard of for a boy of 9 to be wedded and bedded (King Tommen,Ch.12 Cersei III) but as Lancel points out "Marriage requires consummation."(AFfC, Ch.30 Jaime IV), at least in the faith of the Seven.
 
More likely, Dickon is, or is nearly, 13 years old, four or five years younger than 17 year old Sam. That would make him 11 rather than 6 at Renly's coronation, when he dobbed in Brienne's suitors. Even in GRRM's world, it is hard to believe that Randyll would be taking him along to his audiences, "to watch and listen and learn from all he did"(AGoT, Ch.48 Jon VI), when Dickon was one (or three, at best.)

 

Can't imagine Tarly changing nappies, or dealing with an ill-timed tantrum from an overstimulated toddler in the middle of an audience.(Can you see him, in his crimson best dress mail, walking up and down outside the meeting hall, patting and rocking a screaming child?)  

On the other hand, in favour of Brienne's chronology, a dozen masters-at-arms and the warlocks of Qarth have passed through Horn Hill before Dickon was born. Randyll Tarly is not very patient, but twelve masters-at-arms by the time Sam turns five? Supposing Sam started weilding a padded wooden sword aged two, that would be a new master-at-arms on average every three months. If Rickon was born when Sam was nine (or seven), Randyll would be changing masters-at-arms every six months or so.

It still seems quite unreasonable to expect the first master-of-arms to have overcome Sam's timidity and turned him into a warrior before he was three, but Randyll is quite unreasonable, and I suspect the turnover of masters-at-arms at Horn Hill was not about Sam, anyway.

I don't think Randyll ignored Sam "from the day Dickon was born" (AGoT, Ch.26 Jon IV), because we know that Sam "had been no more than ten when he set sail on Lord Redwyne’s galleas...his father had never meant for him to return. “Horas was to come with us in your place, whilst you remained on the Arbor as Lord Paxter’s page and cupbearer.”(AFfC, Ch.15 Samwell II) Even if Brienne's guess that Dickon is only eight was correct, Dickon would have been between over a year old by that point.

So the audience with Mace Tyrell must have occurred when Sam was 9 or younger. As Sam can remember the audience, and as Randyll is not likely to have his heir accompany him anywhere before he was toilet trained (at least for daytime) we could reasonably expect he was over the age of two. So that audience with Mace Tyrell occurred somewhere between 285 and 292.

The Greyjoy Rebellion was in 289, which is within the window, but Mace Tyrell does not seem to have been involved in it - it was Paxter Redwyne and Stannis that smashed Victarion's fleet, a naval battle, and Mace doesn't have sea-worthy ships. Highgarden is well away from the sea, and Horn Hill isn't even near a river.

There is another Highgarden event that fits into that window - the Tourney where Oberyn Martell unhorses a young Willas Tyrell, and he falls under his horse and is crippled for life. Most likely date would be 288-289, when Willas is in his early teens.


I think there are only two reasons Randyll appears to be loyal: 1/ He turns his cloak at the same time as his liege lord, and for the same reason (goes to the side that pays him best). 2/ As hand of the king, Kevan Lannister talks him up as a soldier of proven loyalty. (Tywin, who knew exactly how much he had paid for Randyll's loyalty, never trusted him further than he could spit.)

It seems perfectly possible to me that, after Robert had become king and Mace had dropped his banners, House Tarly might have sworn allegiance to, say, the Florents of Brightwater Keep, who were keen to ally with the Baratheons, rather than leave their lands vulnerable to seizure by Caffren heirs or other Bartheon supporters, because they remained loyal to a now pacified but still Targaryen loyalist leige-lord.

When the threat of being punished for being on the wrong side of the rebellion was removed by Robert's decree or by time, Randyll might want to renew his allegiance to the Tyrells, in a Baratheon-friendly way.

At the time of the Tourney for Prince Joffrey's twelfth name day, Tarly was part of Lord Renly's entourage, and, interestingly, while Joffrey demanded oaths of loyalty from both Renly and Lord Tyrell when Robert died and he took the throne, he made no mention of Lord Randyll Tarly.

Another possibility is that Tarly was the bannerman of a house that was sworn to the Tyrells, rather than directly sworn to the Tyrells himself, when he took the van in the battle of Ashford. The Tyrells had not always been the greatest and most influential house in the Reach.

Maybe, twenty years before, the Tarlys were lieges of Hightower. Hightower is quite close to Horn Hill, and they were formerly the most powerful house in the Reach, although possibly more so in peace time than war. Horn Hill and Hightower are not on the best terms any more, maybe because Horn Hill defected.

The Hightowers are not big on fighting and seem to have stayed out of Robert's Rebellion. If young Randyll Tarly were to see war as an opportunity to expand his boundaries at his neighbours expense, of course he would want to come over to Mace's banners and have a go at Ashford. If his father was still Lord of Horn Hill at the time, Mace might have got Randyll and his army, without getting the allegiance of the Lord of Horn Hill.

At least, that is what you would expect if Randyll Tarly was treacherous the way the Boltons were treacherous, his neighbours the ones with the most to fear from him, war to be his excuse for killing them off. Geographically, Ashford is to Horn Hill what Hornwood is to the Dreadfort.

We know that the first thing Randyll did, when Renly's host started falling apart, was kill the Florents and Cranes, his own in-laws, and co-incidently, his nearest neighbours.

If Tarly's prime objective is expanding Horn Hill, its wealth, and its influence, then Highgarden on the Mander would be his endgame. Brightwater Keep is now a Tyrell property, making the Tyrells vulnerable to Ironborn attack. It would not surprise me at all if, while the strength of the Tyrells were being distracted and carted off as thralls by Ironborn at Brightwater, their loyal liege Tarly was to take them from behind with a takeover of Highgarden.

 

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19 hours ago, Stark Vader said:

I am pretty sure that it is a common enough custom in feudal societies to take part in a swearing society each year. 

Its something featured in series like Outlander or Vikings where attendance and certain gestures indicated a continuing loyalty. If someone got married or moved they would have to give up their old clan rights and join the new one. If people swore loyalty each year they could be trapped into a legal argument if they were disloyal allowing a justification of putting that person to death. The swearing in is both a social event and an important reaffirmation of a persons intentions.

This is exactly what I was thinking. It seems similar to the Outlander episode where they had the yearly swearing of loyalty. There was a feast and the lord sat at the high table and each clansprson came before him, bent the knee and seemed like they drank something. I can see the Tyrells having a yearly pageant that included the bending the knee.of each lord under him.

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21 hours ago, Balerion's Whiskers said:

This is exactly what I was thinking. It seems similar to the Outlander episode where they had the yearly swearing of loyalty. There was a feast and the lord sat at the high table and each clansprson came before him, bent the knee and seemed like they drank something. I can see the Tyrells having a yearly pageant that included the bending the knee.of each lord under him.

Quick research on the web has the oath of fealty as part of a longer commendation ceremony in which allegiance is sworn, honors are bestowed, fiefdoms awarded and a whole bunch of other stuff. I can't find anything that says whether these were annual events or not, but it seems to me that any lord who requires a yearly affirmation that their loyal bannermen are still loyal either doesn't trust the words of his vassals or is feeling very insecure in their position. Either way, it would be seen as weakness to other lords.

So I can see that, at every meeting, the vassal would have to take a knee and utter some words to his lords, especially if they required something from that lord -- kind of like kissing the Godfather's ring. But this would happen along with a whole bunch of other things, like the filing of petitions, discussions of matters of state, marriages and so on. But then Sam would not describe it as "rode to Highgarden to bend the knee to Lord Tyrell.." That would be just one of many things that Randyll would do, so why single it out as the purpose of the visit?

Every other use of "bend the knee" in aSoIaF is in reference to rebellious lords who were subdued by their lieges.

 

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Quote

Sam knew him. “Leo Tyrell.” Saying the name made him feel as if he were still a boy of seven, about to wet his smallclothes.

(AFfC, Ch.45 Samwell V)

Ok, so Leo is a cousin, and might have met Sam at his own home, or Lord Redwynnes or somewhere else that might possibly take on Sam as a page, but maybe all the Tyrells gathered at Highgarden to watch Randyll kneel.

If the latter, then the date of the kneeling is 290, a year after the Greyjoy rebellion, when Sam was seven.

It doesn't seem logical that Balon would have Horn Hill as an ally, and woe to Horn Hill if he did, as it is too far away from the sea to be much use to Balon, but not so inaccessible to Robert's bannermen from the Stormlands.

On a possibly unrelated note, after the Rebellion, there was the tourney of Lannisport. Even though Garlan at fifteen would in all probability be keen to go in a melee, or at least to squire for someone (even Loras might, at ten, be someone's squire), and according to Oberyn

Quote

The Fat Flower thrust him into tourneys at too tender an age, just as he did with the other two.

(ASoS, Ch.38 Tyrion V)

there is no sign of any Tyrells at the tourney. No sign of any house from the Reach  but Lord Hightower and his daughter. 

Maybe the Tyrells had their own tourney at the same time, or were not quite ready to bend the knee to King Robert or enjoy Lord Tywin's hospitality on his own terms. Maybe they didn't want to remind their King that they were Targaryen supporters before they bent the knee to him, and might have contributed to Balon's impression that  Baratheon rule was not well supported in the seven kingdoms?

 

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