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Military strengths of the Houses of Westeros


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4 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

However, my point is that this is a collective term that is used for all lords that are vassals of primary bannerlords or lower.

Well, no. That is my point. That is nowhere stated to be the case. I understand your desire to create some sort of fixed and recognizable hierarchy but there is none.

Thanks to George not giving us dukes and earls and marquesses and counts and barons and all their ilk.

@thelittledragonthatcould

I might have been wrong. Perhaps 'petty lords' are indeed some sort of 'well-defined category' worthy of being a special group in the appendices. But then, they usually just reflect what's said in the books (or should do that). If Stout is introduced as a petty lords in the text he'll be listed as such in the appendices. 

But in any case 'petty lords' would be a very special group of insignificant lords, and it is also pretty clear that lords that are vassals themselves can have also vassals that are by no means considered to be petty lords.

From the existence of this or that 'officially designated petty lord' we cannot deduce that, say, Lady Webber is also a petty lord unless this is properly introduced.

That is my main issue with this kind of thing. The feudal hierarchy doesn't seem to be reflected by this kind of diminutive term.

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7 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

As Lord Varys just said. You are either a lord or you are not. There is no title of "petty lord". It is a colloquial term. Harwood Stout is the lord of Goldgrass.

 

Why is GRRM using a colloquial term in the appendix?

Or why does Jon use that term to try to explain the Mountain clans to Stannis?

"The map is not the land, my father often said. Men have lived in the high valleys and mountain meadows for thousands of years, ruled by their clan chiefs. Petty lords, you would call them, though they do not use such titles amongst themselves."

A petty lord is not a Lord.

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I think you guys are confusing yourselves.

Ignoring everything else, just from simple logic we can deduce that if Manderly has a hundred landed knights sworn to him, but just a dozen petty lords, that petty lords are rarer and of a higher level than Landed Knights.

Regarding the levels of lords, you have Lords Paramount. Then you have those great lords that are sworn to the Lord Paramount and have other lords as their vassals. Then you have lords who fall beneath these great lords.

Now some of them may be fairly powerful in their own right, and some will be as weak as House Webber. It would seem that Lord Manderly makes zero distinction between petty lords and other vassal lords, however. To him, they are all petty lords.

So either there is not a single mid-tier lord sworn to Lord Manderly, or he lumps all of his vassal lords together as petty lords. If the latter, then petty lord is indeed the colloquial term for a lord below a primary bannerlord. And if the former, well, then it appears likely that in the entire North the only lords below primary bannerlord are petty lords, which  amount to the same thing.

Using Manderly's example as a yardstick, there is no lord lower than primary bannerlord who is not a petty lord, in the North.

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10 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I think you guys are confusing yourselves.

Ignoring everything else, just from simple logic we can deduce that if Manderly has a hundred landed knights sworn to him, but just a dozen petty lords, that petty lords are rarer and of a higher level than Landed Knights.

 

I'm not confusing myself, as I stated before many landed knights and petty lords would be on a similar footing but in the hierarchy I would have them above petty lords for the simple fact that there are no petty lords of the equivalent of the Fossoways, Tempetons or Swyfts.

Manderly is an Andal worshiper, it makes perfectly sense that the vast majority of the men under him would be landed knights but that there would also be a minority of nobles who have not given into the andal faith so are merely petty lords.

Nothing in what Manderly said says that the petty lords are of a higher value than his landed knights.

 

 

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4 minutes ago, thelittledragonthatcould said:

I'm not confusing myself, as I stated before many landed knights and petty lords would be on a similar footing but in the hierarchy I would have them above petty lords for the simple fact that there are no petty lords of the equivalent of the Fossoways, Tempetons or Swyfts.

Manderly is an Andal worshiper, it makes perfectly sense that the vast majority of the men under him would be landed knights but that there would also be a minority of nobles who have not given into the andal faith so are merely petty lords.

Nothing in what Manderly said says that the petty lords are of a higher value than his landed knights.

 

 

Well this is interesting.

So you are saying that petty lord is the Northern equivalent of Landed Knight? And in that case, it would mean that in the North there are no proper lords below the level of primary bannerlord then?

In other words, House Manderly doesn't have a single proper Lord sworn to them?

 

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3 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Well this is interesting.

So you are saying that petty lord is the Northern equivalent of Landed Knight?

No as there are petty lords in the South.

I'm saying that a petty lord and a landed knight can have the same prestige/power. Though in your hierarchy chart they would come above due to there being Landed knights more powerful than some Lords but we know of zero petty lords being more powerful than Lords.

 

Littlefinger started the series as a petty lord.

Littlefinger was no threat to anyone. A clever, smiling, genial man, everyone's friend, always able to find whatever gold the king or his Hand required, and yet of such undistinguished birth, one step up from a hedge knight, he was not a man to fear. He had no banners to call, no army of retainers, no great stronghold, no holdings to speak of, no prospects of a great marriage.

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1 minute ago, thelittledragonthatcould said:

No as there are petty lords in the South.

I'm saying that a petty lord and a landed knight can have the same prestige/power. Though in your hierarchy chart they would come above due to there being Landed knights more powerful than some Lords but we know of zero petty lords being more powerful than Lords.

No, but in your structure, you said that Manderly's petty lords are nobles who do not follow the Andal faith, else they would be called Landed Knights.

Also, if Manderly only has Landed Knights and these petty lords sworn to him, then it means he doesn't have a single proper lord sworn to him.

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2 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

No, but in your structure, you said that Manderly's petty lords are nobles who do not follow the Andal faith, else they would be called Landed Knights.

Also, if Manderly only has Landed Knights and these petty lords sworn to him, then it means he doesn't have a single proper lord sworn to him.

He doesn't have a sworn Lord to him. It is actually very rare that Lords have actual Lords as vassals.

Hightower(5), Royce(2), Frey(1) and Vance(1) are the only vassal Lords we know of who have vassal Lords themselves.

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6 minutes ago, thelittledragonthatcould said:

He doesn't have a sworn Lord to him. It is actually very rare that Lords have actual Lords as vassals.

Hightower(5), Royce(2), Frey(1) and Vance(1) are the only vassal Lords we know of who have vassal Lords themselves.

Ok, now we are getting somewhere. So you are then saying that the vast majority of actual Lords are Primary Bannerlords to the Lords Paramount. (As according to you it is very rare to find actual Lords sworn to other vassal Lords).

Is that correct?

 

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1 minute ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Ok, now we are getting somewhere. So you are then saying that the vast majority of actual Lords are Primary Bannerlords to the Lords Paramount. (As according to you it is very rare to find actual Lords sworn to other vassal Lords).

Is that correct?

 

What is this 'primary bannerlords' you are using? And when have I ever used that?

You seem to be asking loaded questions when I have made no reference to primary bannerlords.

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14 minutes ago, thelittledragonthatcould said:

What is this 'primary bannerlords' you are using? And when have I ever used that?

You seem to be asking loaded questions when I have made no reference to primary bannerlords.

No need to be combative just for the sake of it. This is an interesting discussion, and I am not asking a loaded question at all.

I use "primary bannerlord" for the sake of summary. By that I mean a major lord sworn directly to a House Paramount. The reason I ask it, is because I have always viewed this group as a very select group of lords. The highest and most powerful level you get before you get to Lord Paramount. With the vast majority of lords falling below them.

What you are saying presents a different view. Which is that it is very rare to have Lords falling below this level. Those were your words, were they not :

"It is very rare to have Lords sworn to other vassal Lords." I'm just clarifying, is that what you are saying?

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12 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

No need to be combative just for the sake of it. This is an interesting discussion, and I am not asking a loaded question at all.

My apologies. I didnt mean it to sound so terse.

Quote

I use "primary bannerlord" for the sake of summary. By that I mean a major lord sworn directly to a House Paramount. The reason I ask it, is because I have always viewed this group as a very select group of lords. The highest and most powerful level you get before you get to Lord Paramount. With the vast majority of lords falling below them.

In all honesty I see the Lords as pretty much equal rank but separated by how powerful they are and their relationship to their Overlord/King.

One generation the Dustins could be the closest House to the Starks and 50 years later outsiders.

If I was to determine what a 'primary bannerlord' was, I'd guess it had more to do with the relationship between them to their ruler. The Cleganes are far from being powerful yet Tywin's reliance on Gregor would make him a primary bannerman. The same could be said of Littlefinger in service to Jon Arryn on the Small Council.

Primary, in my personal canon, would be more about the personal reliance the Overlord has on his vassal.

 

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19 minutes ago, thelittledragonthatcould said:

My apologies. I didnt mean it to sound so terse.

In all honesty I see the Lords as pretty much equal rank but separated by how powerful they are and their relationship to their Overlord/King.

One generation the Dustins could be the closest House to the Starks and 50 years later outsiders.

If I was to determine what a 'primary bannerlord' was, I'd guess it had more to do with the relationship between them to their ruler. The Cleganes are far from being powerful yet Tywin's reliance on Gregor would make him a primary bannerman. The same could be said of Littlefinger in service to Jon Arryn on the Small Council.

Primary, in my personal canon, would be more about the personal reliance the Overlord has on his vassal.

 

Ok, I understand.

So let's erase the term Primary Bannerman.

My understanding from what you are saying is that the vast majority of real Lords (with right of pit and gallows) are direct vassals of the Lords Paramount. And that the vast majority of lesser lordlings who are sworn to vassal Lords, are not true lords but are in fact either landed knights or petty lords.

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28 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Ok, I understand.

So let's erase the term Primary Bannerman.

My understanding from what you are saying is that the vast majority of real Lords (with right of pit and gallows) are direct vassals of the Lords Paramount. And that the vast majority of lesser lordlings who are sworn to vassal Lords, are not true lords but are in fact either landed knights or petty lords.

Possibly. In my own head canon. But of course I'm not the writer and may well be wrong.

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Just now, thelittledragonthatcould said:

Possibly. In my own head canon. But of course I'm not the writer and may well be wrong.

No, fair enough. I get that. But as the old saying goes, in any discussion, seek first to understand before seeking to be understood. So I just wanted to be clear on what your view is. Thanks for clarifying. In my head canon, I see it as a hierarchy with far more levels of real lords. As per the following statement from Martin:

Question: I am also a bit curious as to the social structure of westeros. I understand the seven high lords, and the slightly lower lords (ie. Boltons, Karstarks, Freys etc.). However, do these lords also have sub lords below them? Lords who maybe raise 10 or 20 men for the Karstarks?

Answer: Yes, it is a feudal system. The lords have vassals, the vassals have vassals, and sometimes the vassals of the vassals have vassals, down to the guy who can raise five friends

So in my view, you have the "Great Houses" of each region, who are sworn directly to the former King, (now Lord Paramount), of one of the Seven Kingdoms. Let's use the North as example.

These "Great Houses" rule vast swathes of this Kingdom, as vassals to the Lord Paramount. These would be Houses like the Manderlys, Karstarks, Boltons, Umbers and in the South Houses like the Royces, Rowans, Mallisters, Freys etc.. But they rule their lands through vassal Lords of their own, who in turn have vassals of their own and so on and so forth, down to the "guy who can raise five friends".

And in this head canon of mine, you in fact have a thousand or so lordly Houses in Westeros, each with the right of pit and gallows in their villages and lands. This would include the petty lords.

And Landed Knights are then a lower category than these thousand or so petty lords. And as we see, House Manderly alone has about a hundred such landed knights in their service, in addition to the dozen lords that owe fealty to them. This is not dissimilar to House Rowan in the Reach, who occupies the position formerly held by House Osgrey. And we learn that House Osgrey a thousand years ago commanded the fealty of a hundred landed knights and a score of lesser lordlings.

Again, these would be landed knights and petty lords. But it is worth noting that once again the petty lords are less numerous than the landed knights, signifying - in my view - a higher status.

 

 

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2 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

 

Again, these would be landed knights and petty lords. But it is worth noting that once again the petty lords are less numerous than the landed knights, signifying - in my view - a higher status.

 

Or rather military status. Most of the people Lords would get to look after their lands would be men they would count on to both keep the peace in their lands and answer the summons to war when needed. In the South (and the Manderlys lands) it would be Knights more often than not rewarded with these lands rather than men who had been rewarded for other abilities.

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@Free Northman Reborn & @thelittledragonthatcould

Let's take this from another perspective:

There is only the king and lords in this world. Petty lords are a subgroup of lords specified by vague criteria connected to them being weak and/or insignificant in comparison to other lords.

There are no hints that a 'petty lord' lacks any rights and privileges a 'normal lord' doesn't have (e.g. Rohanne Webber having the right of pits and gallows despite the fact that she could qualify as a petty lord).

I also see no inherent reason to see the so-called great houses in a different light than all the other 'normal lords'. They just control a larger territory and more vassals. But that doesn't give them special privileges other lords do not also possess (unless they are granted by the Crown).

The appendices aren't complete lists of the feudal hierarchy of a region they just list the vassals and family members, etc. of a certain house or king.

We don't know how many vassals of what category ('normal lord' or 'petty lord') a given house has. In some cases the feudal hierarchy might be pretty flat (e.g. Iron Throne > Crackclaw Point lords or Iron Throne > Winterfell > mountain clans) in others, like the Reach, the Vale, or the Riverlands, it might be much more complex (Iron Throne > Highgarden > Goldengrove > Coldmoat). 

Where petty lords or normal lords stand in relation to landed knights is a completely different question. Landed knights lack fundamental rights and privileges which lords have. But just as there can be lords of various strength there can also be landed knights with various strength. They vary from the level of the Osgrey up to the Templetons and Fossoways.

And, of course, the Knight of Ninestars is a much more powerful, esteemed, and honored guy than a lord like Littlefinger. But this doesn't change the fact that Littlefinger has the right to sentence his peasants to death and the Knight of Ninestars (presumably) does not have that right.

Whether there are more lords or landed knights in a region really depends on the history of the place. thelittledragonthatcould made a good point that the Manderlys most likely have a lot of landed knights because they gave a lot of their knights parcels of land over the years - which makes sense considering that they follow the Faith of the Seven and are expected to reward the knights in their service.

Lordships suggest that there is more history and a longer tradition involved. As far as we know only kings/the Crown can make lords, so most of the lords who were not made since the Conquest would already have been existed in the days of the Seven Kingdoms. Sure, you can most likely petition the king to name some of your younger sons a lord (like Mace did with Garlan) but that doesn't seem to happen all that often. The Crown seems to grant lordships as special rewards to loyal people.

That means if you want to reward some loyal servant of yours all you can do as a lord (even a great lord) is to give him land and/or make him a landed knight. There should also be, of course, a difference between a landed knight and a knight who owns some land (say, a house with fields attached to it). A landed knight usually seems to have some sort of castle or keep. Vice versa, even rich commoners should be able to own/purchase keeps and castles but if they lack the title of a lord they remain commoners.

I guess making landed knights is a better idea than to make yourself some lordly vassals because a lordship comes with more privileges and makes the vassal more independent from his liege. A landed knight is still a knight, but a lord is a lord.

In the end, though, this whole strict feudal hierarchy doesn't seem to be so strict at all.

Walder Frey tells us that he sworn oaths to the Crown, too, so every lord seems to have duties to his king as well to the liege the king as set above him (as representative of the king). We see how various kings through the centuries grant rewards, riches, and titles to various mid-tier lords who apparently can easily gain both the favor and rewards of the king without including the liege lord of that lord in their dealings. That suggests that whatever feudal hierarchy there isn't doesn't concern the king all that much. Aerys II does not have to go through, say, Lord Tyrell to grant Lord Merryweather some lands or name him his Hand. He can just do that. And as Hand Lord Merryweather then outranks his own liege lord, Mace Tyrell.

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On 5/30/2016 at 0:30 AM, thelittledragonthatcould said:

The 20k is those Houses plus the Lordly Houses Coldwater and Tollett, the knightly House Shett and possibly the Corbrays. Lords Coldwater, Tollett and Ser Shett are all vassals of Lord Royce so were not included on the Lords Declarant parchment but are part of the 20k.

Lyonel Corbray was not involved with the Lords Declarant (indeed, was pro-Baelish), so the 20,000 figure wouldn't have included House Corbray.

So if you take 20,000 as representing the six lords there, to that you add Corbray, Grafton, Lynderly, Waxley, Melcolm, Sunderland (not to be relied upon, but still formally part of their strength), the Arryn's personal troops (which you'd expect would be numerous), and assorted others (Upcliff, Elesham and Pryor surely can't be that significant, given the size of their holdings).

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49 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

 

That means if you want to reward some loyal servant of yours all you can do as a lord (even a great lord) is to give him land and/or make him a landed knight. There should also be, of course, a difference between a landed knight and a knight who owns some land (say, a house with fields attached to it). A landed knight usually seems to have some sort of castle or keep. Vice versa, even rich commoners should be able to own/purchase keeps and castles but if they lack the title of a lord they remain commoners.

Taxes are the difference. A knight who owns some land (property, allod) may collect rent on it, but the taxes are indepent of it. A landed knight might rule some land (fief, odal), collecting taxes from it, but the rent would go to the actual owners.

Of course any landed knight would try hard to get at least some allod inside the borders of his fief...

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1 hour ago, Lord Varys said:

@Free Northman Reborn & @thelittledragonthatcould

Let's take this from another perspective:

There is only the king and lords in this world. Petty lords are a subgroup of lords specified by vague criteria connected to them being weak and/or insignificant in comparison to other lords.

There are no hints that a 'petty lord' lacks any rights and privileges a 'normal lord' doesn't have (e.g. Rohanne Webber having the right of pits and gallows despite the fact that she could qualify as a petty lord).

I also see no inherent reason to see the so-called great houses in a different light than all the other 'normal lords'. They just control a larger territory and more vassals. But that doesn't give them special privileges other lords do not also possess (unless they are granted by the Crown).

The appendices aren't complete lists of the feudal hierarchy of a region they just list the vassals and family members, etc. of a certain house or king.

We don't know how many vassals of what category ('normal lord' or 'petty lord') a given house has. In some cases the feudal hierarchy might be pretty flat (e.g. Iron Throne > Crackclaw Point lords or Iron Throne > Winterfell > mountain clans) in others, like the Reach, the Vale, or the Riverlands, it might be much more complex (Iron Throne > Highgarden > Goldengrove > Coldmoat). 

Where petty lords or normal lords stand in relation to landed knights is a completely different question. Landed knights lack fundamental rights and privileges which lords have. But just as there can be lords of various strength there can also be landed knights with various strength. They vary from the level of the Osgrey up to the Templetons and Fossoways.

And, of course, the Knight of Ninestars is a much more powerful, esteemed, and honored guy than a lord like Littlefinger. But this doesn't change the fact that Littlefinger has the right to sentence his peasants to death and the Knight of Ninestars (presumably) does not have that right.

Whether there are more lords or landed knights in a region really depends on the history of the place. thelittledragonthatcould made a good point that the Manderlys most likely have a lot of landed knights because they gave a lot of their knights parcels of land over the years - which makes sense considering that they follow the Faith of the Seven and are expected to reward the knights in their service.

Lordships suggest that there is more history and a longer tradition involved. As far as we know only kings/the Crown can make lords, so most of the lords who were not made since the Conquest would already have been existed in the days of the Seven Kingdoms. Sure, you can most likely petition the king to name some of your younger sons a lord (like Mace did with Garlan) but that doesn't seem to happen all that often. The Crown seems to grant lordships as special rewards to loyal people.

That means if you want to reward some loyal servant of yours all you can do as a lord (even a great lord) is to give him land and/or make him a landed knight. There should also be, of course, a difference between a landed knight and a knight who owns some land (say, a house with fields attached to it). A landed knight usually seems to have some sort of castle or keep. Vice versa, even rich commoners should be able to own/purchase keeps and castles but if they lack the title of a lord they remain commoners.

I guess making landed knights is a better idea than to make yourself some lordly vassals because a lordship comes with more privileges and makes the vassal more independent from his liege. A landed knight is still a knight, but a lord is a lord.

In the end, though, this whole strict feudal hierarchy doesn't seem to be so strict at all.

Walder Frey tells us that he sworn oaths to the Crown, too, so every lord seems to have duties to his king as well to the liege the king as set above him (as representative of the king). We see how various kings through the centuries grant rewards, riches, and titles to various mid-tier lords who apparently can easily gain both the favor and rewards of the king without including the liege lord of that lord in their dealings. That suggests that whatever feudal hierarchy there isn't doesn't concern the king all that much. Aerys II does not have to go through, say, Lord Tyrell to grant Lord Merryweather some lands or name him his Hand. He can just do that. And as Hand Lord Merryweather then outranks his own liege lord, Mace Tyrell.

Well again, I think we largely agree.

Petty lords in my view are still lords, with the same rights of pit and gallows.

Also, if you look at Martin's answer to the social structure question, he makes it clear that the great lords like the Karstarks have vassals, who have vassals who have vassals until you get down to the guy with five friends. This strongly suggests that there are multiple levels of lords before you get down to the lowest rung on the ladder.

To me it seems, therefore that the 12 petty lord vassals that Lord Manderly refers to are lords exactly like House Stout, or House Webber or House Charlton who is in service to House Frey, and just like the score of lesser lordlings who owed fealty to House Osgrey when they were the Wardens of the Northmarch, which is now the position occupied by House Rowan. In fact, there is no reason why some of these petty lords could not also have landed knights sworn to them.

On the wiki we see three dozen or more known noble Houses listed for almost every region. I am sure there are many more we don't know of as yet, but even those we do know of makes it clear that there are many more Houses than the prominent ones we read about in the books most of the time. Great or small, they are all lords.

What is clear though is that Manderly makes no distinction between the dozen lords sword to them. From his point of view they are ALL petty lords.

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