Brombrom Posted June 17, 2016 Share Posted June 17, 2016 ok, new to the board, don't know if this has been looked at yet. So there I was pondering random shit about hypothetical what ifs. Suddenly it hit me... How many horse would Rome get if they conquered the Dothraki? The why and how were unimportant, I wanted to know how many. This is a rough estimate I came up with: There are around 2 dozen Khalasars in the Dothraki Sea. (according to Wiki of Ice and Fire) Average size of a Khalasar (according to Wiki of Ice and Fire) approx. 20,000 warriors. so 240,000 warriors. Assume similar numbers of women. so 480,000 total Dothraki. Slaves are very prevalent, this means usually around 30-40% population in ancient cultures on earth. GRRM made an insane fantasy world where places can have orders of magnitude more slaves than free populations (Slaver's Bay). This is were it gets tricky, Do we assume ancient earth levels or crazy fantasy levels? Lets slit the difference and say 2 per person because, as we will see later, shitloads of horses. 2 per population. is 960,000 slaves Medieval society had a birthrate of 4-8 during the lifetime of a woman between the ages of 14 and 30, so lets assume 3 for this exercise due to the nomadic nature of the Dothraki. 720,000 children. Slave shildren are at an assumed rate of 3 as well so an additional 1.5 million Total Numbers: 1,440,000 Dothraki. approx. 2.5 million slaves. Why is this important? Because GRRM basically design the Dothraki to use Horse meat as their staple food... They had no agriculture. That is a fuck ton of Horse consumed. Based on the Pastoralist diet of the Dothraki let's assume that each person eats approximately 75% of their diet came from horses. Milk, Cheese, Blood, Meat. lets low ball it and say 20 % of that 75% was from meat. Assume AVERAGE caloric consumption of the individual to be around 2000 calories due to the heightened activity levels of the people and the lower food rates given to slaves. (the typical Roman legionnaire consumes around 44,000 calories in a week while at the march. I assume the nomadic Dothraki is moving around a lot.) 15% of that diet will be meat based on the above assumptions. 300 calories Which ends up being .38 pounds of horsemeat per day based on google nutrition info on horse meat (it exists) 300cal/795cal per lb =0.377 lb. .38 per day for 3,940,000 people is 1,497,200 lbs. of horse meat per day consumed by the Dothraki. Assume a 65% butcher efficiency (about the same as a cow) and an average adult horse weight of 1200 lbs. (Dothraki sea is nothing but food for them) means that each butchered horse is around 780lbs of uncooked meat. 1,497,200lbs of meat per day/ 780lbs of meat per horse is 1919 horses per day. Assume 13 month 28-day lunar month (it is a given that the world uses a lunar calendar due to the seasonal cycle) which gives 364 days for a year. 1919 horses per day x 364 days per year is 698,516 horses eaten per year. Horse population statistics according to BLM foal rate of wild herds is 42% with a 89% survivability rate. Total growth rate = 89% of 42% or 37.38% To ensure that 698,516 horses are born each year that survive till adulthood: 698,516/0.3738 Total stable population (without further heard growth) = 1,868,689 horses in the Dothraki herd. That is a shitload of horses. Anyone see where this can be improved? I am hoping to do a work in progress. ( I also want to try to figure out the populations and wealth off slaver's bay at some point in the future.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MinotaurWarrior Posted June 17, 2016 Share Posted June 17, 2016 I think you're overestimating the amount of horse meat consumed by a Dothraki. The main component of a historical mongolian diet was equine dairy, and we see this supported in the way the Dothraki eat, with the most frequently mentioned foodstuff being fermented mare's milk. All dothraki would also have access to herds of 'lesser' animals (goats, bovines), game, and foraged vegetables. The Dothraki also engage in trade and pillaging. We see large casks of wine being sold in Vaes Dothrak, and Drogo's Khalasar takes a Lhazarene village like it's nothing. The Dothraki may have something of a tributary empire. Drogo, at least, had a palace in Pentos. It's possible they've got something like a Golden Horde / Golden Yolk situation going on here, where while they are not agriculturalists, they collect tribute from agriculturalists. The slaughter of horses by the dothraki is almost certainly more efficient than you're estimating. Mongolians squeezed as much blood as they could during the slaughter, to give you a sense of how little they wasted. The dothraki don't seem to really be a slave-holding culture, so much as a slave-capturing culture. I'm skeptical about your estimate of their slave population. It's unlikely the slaves and lower-class dothraki get as much "good" (horse-based) food. That being said, there are currently ~14 million horses in asia, so ~2million isn't actually that extreme. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Lash Posted June 17, 2016 Share Posted June 17, 2016 Woe unto Mr Ed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brombrom Posted June 17, 2016 Author Share Posted June 17, 2016 MinotaurWarrior you make a good point about there being other herds than horses among the Dothraki, I remember reading that the Dothraki preferred horsemeat so went with the assumption that the vast majority of meat consumed would be from horses. Figuring out the right amount would be incredibly difficult (Why isn't there a pub med for ancient Mongolian or Turkish horse tribes?) The tribute/trade system is how I assumed they received around 25% of their diet based on historical information of societies practicing a pastoralism based diet. I assume 75% of the diet is from horse products (Be it milk, or blood products). I only assumed that 20% of the horse products consumed was meat which ended up being only 15% of their diet (How much of that 15% was horse? like you pointed out not really determinable but I am hoping we can in some way estimate it). , while 60% was from other horse products The butchered efficiency is for meat only, since I was using meat consumption as the sole way of determining horse consumption. Blood wasn't a factor in the estimate because I assume they used a similar method to other steppes cultures and bled live animals that they could bleed again later so I am pretty confident on that aspect. The caloric intake was based on a total average, Dothraki warriors probably burned and consumed substantially more than their slaves did I figured the slaves would have a high fat diet low on grains because in a pastoralism based society, grains are a high demand commodity. You definitely pointed out the two weakest points in the estimate, which were the diet composition (a lot of guesstimates) and the numbers of slaves (very rough guestimates) I think a good template is there to figure this out, if we can shore up the weak points. If anyone else has anything to add please feel free to jump in, I am trying to get as accurate as we can. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arbor Golden Posted June 17, 2016 Share Posted June 17, 2016 always wanted to try horse meat. that is all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StarkofWinterfell Posted June 17, 2016 Share Posted June 17, 2016 3 hours ago, Brombrom said: ok, new to the board, don't know if this has been looked at yet. So there I was pondering random shit about hypothetical what ifs. Suddenly it hit me... How many horse would Rome get if they conquered the Dothraki? The why and how were unimportant, I wanted to know how many. This is a rough estimate I came up with: There are around 2 dozen Khalasars in the Dothraki Sea. (according to Wiki of Ice and Fire) Average size of a Khalasar (according to Wiki of Ice and Fire) approx. 20,000 warriors. so 240,000 warriors. Assume similar numbers of women. so 480,000 total Dothraki. Slaves are very prevalent, this means usually around 30-40% population in ancient cultures on earth. GRRM made an insane fantasy world where places can have orders of magnitude more slaves than free populations (Slaver's Bay). This is were it gets tricky, Do we assume ancient earth levels or crazy fantasy levels? Lets slit the difference and say 2 per person because, as we will see later, shitloads of horses. 2 per population. is 960,000 slaves Medieval society had a birthrate of 4-8 during the lifetime of a woman between the ages of 14 and 30, so lets assume 3 for this exercise due to the nomadic nature of the Dothraki. 720,000 children. Slave shildren are at an assumed rate of 3 as well so an additional 1.5 million Total Numbers: 1,440,000 Dothraki. approx. 2.5 million slaves. Why is this important? Because GRRM basically design the Dothraki to use Horse meat as their staple food... They had no agriculture. That is a fuck ton of Horse consumed. Based on the Pastoralist diet of the Dothraki let's assume that each person eats approximately 75% of their diet came from horses. Milk, Cheese, Blood, Meat. lets low ball it and say 20 % of that 75% was from meat. Assume AVERAGE caloric consumption of the individual to be around 2000 calories due to the heightened activity levels of the people and the lower food rates given to slaves. (the typical Roman legionnaire consumes around 44,000 calories in a week while at the march. I assume the nomadic Dothraki is moving around a lot.) 15% of that diet will be meat based on the above assumptions. 300 calories Which ends up being .38 pounds of horsemeat per day based on google nutrition info on horse meat (it exists) 300cal/795cal per lb =0.377 lb. .38 per day for 3,940,000 people is 1,497,200 lbs. of horse meat per day consumed by the Dothraki. Assume a 65% butcher efficiency (about the same as a cow) and an average adult horse weight of 1200 lbs. (Dothraki sea is nothing but food for them) means that each butchered horse is around 780lbs of uncooked meat. 1,497,200lbs of meat per day/ 780lbs of meat per horse is 1919 horses per day. Assume 13 month 28-day lunar month (it is a given that the world uses a lunar calendar due to the seasonal cycle) which gives 364 days for a year. 1919 horses per day x 364 days per year is 698,516 horses eaten per year. Horse population statistics according to BLM foal rate of wild herds is 42% with a 89% survivability rate. Total growth rate = 89% of 42% or 37.38% To ensure that 698,516 horses are born each year that survive till adulthood: 698,516/0.3738 Total stable population (without further heard growth) = 1,868,689 horses in the Dothraki herd. That is a shitload of horses. Anyone see where this can be improved? I am hoping to do a work in progress. ( I also want to try to figure out the populations and wealth off slaver's bay at some point in the future.) I am interested in how Rome ties into this. Like if the Dothraki attacked Rome or something? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brombrom Posted June 17, 2016 Author Share Posted June 17, 2016 It was just a random, what would happen if a Roman general landed in Westeros and has 10 years to build up his forces when starting with just one legion. Like I said random thoughts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Free Northman Reborn Posted June 17, 2016 Share Posted June 17, 2016 If I recall correctly, George gave the Dothraki an impossibly high warrior to total population percentage. Something like 40%, in fact. I base this on the recollection that Drogo's Khalasar numbered 100k people in total, of which 40k were warriors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Light a wight tonight Posted June 17, 2016 Share Posted June 17, 2016 11 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said: If I recall correctly, George gave the Dothraki an impossibly high warrior to total population percentage. Something like 40%, in fact. I base this on the recollection that Drogo's Khalasar numbered 100k people in total, of which 40k were warriors. If you count 60% as women and children you have all the adult males as warriors. (Warriors seldom reach retirement age.) Since the Dothraki seem not to have any professional traders, craftsmen, farmers, or other occupations this could work in a fantasy setting. Obviously not in a real-world situation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brombrom Posted June 18, 2016 Author Share Posted June 18, 2016 That changes some things if 240,000 warriors is only 40% of the population. I don't know what that would mean for slave population, how much do they rely on women for labor as opposed to slaves? Anyone have any thoughts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Lash Posted June 18, 2016 Share Posted June 18, 2016 It will rapidly decline to 0 when the Alpo factory sets up shop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dukhasinov Posted June 18, 2016 Share Posted June 18, 2016 On 6/17/2016 at 1:38 AM, Free Northman Reborn said: If I recall correctly, George gave the Dothraki an impossibly high warrior to total population percentage. Something like 40%, in fact. I base this on the recollection that Drogo's Khalasar numbered 100k people in total, of which 40k were warriors. This is not an impossible figure at all. Every able-bodied male would be a warrior. That doesn`t mean that they are professional soldiers as in settled societies. Every family has its own herd of livestock, so the men must know how to ride to manage their herds. And any man who rides to manage their herds must know how to handle a bow to protect his herds from predators and rustlers. Even if a man is also a metalworker or woodworker, he is also, by necessity, a horseman and archer, which means he is also a warrior. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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