Samantha Stark Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 Has there ever been any mention of ravens being trained and used outside of Westeros? It seems a bit odd if that isn't the case, that advanced civilizations in the east like Old Valyria and Yi Ti aren't able to do the same as their counter parts in Westeros. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Vance II Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 Hmmm. It's possible they're only indigenous to Westeros. Did Varys use them to communicate with Jorah or was that all with little birds? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Corlys Velaryon Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 No, intriguingly there isn't. Though keep in mind that Valyria had glass candles, dragonroads & of course dragons - they simply didn't need ravens, presumably even for their outpost cities & the Free Cities. Even post-Doom, the Free Cities have been too divided to have ever come together to think of & try to implement such (the Triarchy of the Three Daughters being notably anti-Westerosi & Targaryen in particular which only helped to unite them, before ultimately such helped to divide them) & their "vassals" being well within riding distance. The same basically goes for Slaver's Bay. Yi Ti may have also had/have magical communication means like say glass candles, but have also been incredibly divided among themselves for thousands of years, with each of the "city-states" nominally loyal to the Emperor of the time at best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Corlys Velaryon Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 8 minutes ago, Lord Vance II said: Did Varys use them to communicate with Jorah or was that all with little birds? Illyrio was the go between with the likes of Byon Votyris (caravan captain, delivers the letter warning of Robert's calling for Viserys & Dany's execution) as a messenger. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gertrude Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 If I recall correctly, Bloodraven tells Bran that ravens used to be used to communicate messages because they could talk. They would actually say the message instead of just delivering a note. I think it was because the children and First Men could warg them. My memory is a little dim on the details, but because of that tradition they continued to use ravens. I'm sure that other cultures use a similar method of communication (if they don't have better methods). It's just that they use boring carrier pigeons or similar. I get the impression that ravens are harder to care for than placid pigeons or the like. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Corlys Velaryon Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 @Gertrude You may find this I wrote the other day on r/asoiaf of interest to your first paragraph & on your second, good point. After all, at least part of the maester's method for training ravens is probably compatible to such as pigeons are/have been IRL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YOVMO Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 2 hours ago, Lord Corlys Velaryon said: maester's method It would seem pretty clear (though correct me if I am wrong) that raven training all falls under the auspices of the citadel and the maesters. It is fair to assume, I believe, that the Maester's would have guarded the methods on which they trained the ravens pretty closely. While the story makes clear that people other than Maesters can send a trained raven, I feel that it is only the Maesters who do the training. That said, other forms of communication, better or worse, that originated outside the prevue of the Maesters, would necessarily have had some deviations and, for lack of a better word, local flavor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Corlys Velaryon Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 11 minutes ago, YOVMO said: It would seem pretty clear (though correct me if I am wrong) that raven training all falls under the auspices of the citadel and the maesters. It is fair to assume, I believe, that the Maester's would have guarded the methods on which they trained the ravens pretty closely. While the story makes clear that people other than Maesters can send a trained raven, I feel that it is only the Maesters who do the training. That said, other forms of communication, better or worse, that originated outside the prevue of the Maesters, would necessarily have had some deviations and, for lack of a better word, local flavor. Interesting & well said, thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaak Posted June 28, 2016 Share Posted June 28, 2016 Interestingly, even Kingdom of Stepstones was not in raven communication... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bright Blue Eyes Posted July 1, 2016 Share Posted July 1, 2016 Yes. The reason is infrastructure. Training, but even more distributing, ravens is incredibly expensive. Some guy has to take a couple cages with ravens from for example the Crag to Bear Island, then Bear Island can send two or three messages to the Crag before said guy has to make the trip again. And Bear Island has to keep a thousand ravens, two or three for each other castle. As I said, incredibly expensive. The city states of Essos have neither the money, nor the interest, to connect a bunch of distant castles or whatever to each other. Mostly because they don't have much distance in the first place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaak Posted July 2, 2016 Share Posted July 2, 2016 21 hours ago, Bright Blue Eyes said: The reason is infrastructure. Training, but even more distributing, ravens is incredibly expensive. Expensive, but not incredibly so. 21 hours ago, Bright Blue Eyes said: Some guy has to take a couple cages with ravens from for example the Crag to Bear Island, then Bear Island can send two or three messages to the Crag before said guy has to make the trip again. And Bear Island has to keep a thousand ravens, two or three for each other castle. I believe Dragonstone complained of running out of ravens with slightly over 100 ravens sent with Stannis´ claims? 21 hours ago, Bright Blue Eyes said: As I said, incredibly expensive. The city states of Essos have neither the money, nor the interest, to connect a bunch of distant castles or whatever to each other. Mostly because they don't have much distance in the first place. They have a distance between each other. Say, Tyrosh to Braavos. An overland messenger would have to detour around Sea of Myrth, and no Valyrian road there. A ship would be faster - but a raven would be even faster. If creating raven connection to Essos is completely impossible - how about Prince of Dorne acquiring an agent in Gulltown? Like in-laws? When there are news of market movements in Tyrosh, like ships en route, political events in Volantis etc., a ship brings news to Sunspear, a raven is sent to Gulltown, then ship Gulltown to Braavos - so the Dornish agent in Braavos knows what to buy. Faster than the ship sailing the full length of Narrow Seas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
house of dayne Posted July 2, 2016 Share Posted July 2, 2016 Possibly the breed of ravens used to communicate is native only to westeros...others may have tried and failed and with local birds.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hyoubal Posted July 2, 2016 Share Posted July 2, 2016 6 hours ago, house of dayne said: Possibly the breed of ravens used to communicate is native only to westeros...others may have tried and failed and with local birds.. This would make sense. The barrier of not having people to train them does not seem like enough on it's own to be reason why it doesn't appear. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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