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Wow, I never noticed that v.15


Lost Melnibonean

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Wow

I

Ser Harwin Strong, called Breakbones, informed on Prince Daemon Targaryen shortly after his father was called to court and given a seat on the small council...

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Not long after Ser Criston donned his white cloak, King Viserys invited Lyonel Strong, Lord of Harrenhal, to join the small council as master of laws. A big man, burly and balding, Lord Strong enjoyed a formidable reputation as a battler. Those who did not know him oft took him for a brute, mistaking his silences and slowness of speech for stupidity. This was far from the truth. Lord Lyonel had studied at the Citadel as a youth, earning six links of his chain before deciding that a maester’s life was not for him. He was literate and learned, his knowledge of the laws of the Seven Kingdoms exhaustive. Thrice-wed and thrice a widower, the Lord of Harrenhal brought two maiden daughters and two sons to court with him. The girls became handmaids to Princess Rhaenyra, whilst their elder brother, Ser Harwin Strong, called Breakbones, was made a captain in the gold cloaks. The younger boy, Larys the Clubfoot, joined the king’s confessors.

Thus did matters stand in King’s Landing late in the year 105 AC, when Queen Aemma was brought to bed in Maegor’s Holdfast, and died whilst giving birth to the son that Viserys Targaryen had desired for so long. The boy (named Baelon, after the king’s father) survived her only by a day, leaving king and court bereft … save perhaps for Prince Daemon, who was observed in a brothel on the Street of Silk, making drunken japes with his highborn cronies about the “heir for a day.” When word of this got back to the king (legend says that it was the whore sitting in Daemon’s lap who informed on him, but evidence suggests it was actually one of his drinking companions, a captain in the gold cloaks eager for advancement), Viserys became livid. His Grace had finally had a surfeit of this ungrateful brother and his ambitions.

The Rogue Prince

II

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“The first Lady Waynwood must have been a mare, I think. How else to explain why all the Waynwood men are horse-faced?”

Alayne, Winds

Because this...

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Arya took after their lord father. Her hair was a lusterless brown, and her face was long and solemn. Jeyne used to call her Arya Horseface, and neigh whenever she came near

Arya I, Game 7

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"Your father's father had no siblings, but his father had a sister who married a younger son of Lord Raymar Royce, of the junior branch. They had three daughters, all of whom wed Vale lordlings. A Waynwood and a Corbray, for certain. The youngest . . . it might have been a Templeton, but . . . "

Catelyn V, Storm 45          

The seed is strong... whenever the author has a need.

III

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“The Waynwood wheel has a broken spoke, and we have my nuncle here.” Ser Roland gave Wallace a whap behind the ear.  “Squires should be quiet when knights are speaking.”

Alayne, Winds

Shouldn’t that “whap” be a “clout”?

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Ser Wallace reddened.  “I am no more a s-squire, my lady.  My n-nephew knows full well that I was k-k-kni-k-k-kni –“

“Dubbed?” Alayne suggested gently.

“Dubbed,” said Wallace Waynwood, gratefully.

Alayne, Winds

Oh, I guess only squires are clouted, and young knights are whapped.

IV

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Alayne understood all that well enough, but it meant that the burden of getting Sweetrobin safely down the mountain fell on her. "Give his lordship a cup of sweetmilk," she told the maester. "That will stop him from shaking on the journey down."

"He had a cup not three days past," Colemon objected.

"And wanted another last night, which you refused him."

"It was too soon. My lady, you do not understand. As I've told the Lord Protector, a pinch of sweetsleep will prevent the shaking, but it does not leave the flesh, and in time . . ."

"Time will not matter if his lordship has a shaking fit and falls off the mountain. If my father were here, I know he would tell you to keep Lord Robert calm at all costs."

"I try, my lady, yet his fits grow ever more violent, and his blood is so thin I dare not leech him any more. Sweetsleep . . . you are certain he was not bleeding from the nose?"

"He was sniffling," Alayne admitted, "but I saw no blood."

"I must speak to the Lord Protector. This feast . . . is that wise, I wonder, after the strain of the descent?"

"It will not be a large feast," she as**sured him. "No more than forty guests. Lord Nestor and his household, the Knight of the Gate, a few lesser lords and their retainers . . ."

"Lord Robert mislikes strangers, you know that, and there will be drinking, noise . . . music. Music frightens him."

"Music soothes him," she corrected, "the high harp especially. It's singing he can't abide, since Marillion killed his mother." Alayne had told the lie so many times that she remembered it that way more oft than not; the other seemed no more than a bad dream that sometimes troubled her sleep. "Lord Nestor will have no singers at the feast, only flutes and fiddles for the dancing." What would she do when the music began to play? It was a vexing question, to which her heart and head gave different answers. Sansa loved to dance, but Alayne . . . "Just give him a cup of the sweetmilk before we go, and another at the feast, and there should be no trouble."

"Very well." They paused at the foot of the stairs. "But this must be the last. For half a year, or longer."

"You had best take that up with the Lord Protector." She pushed through the door and crossed the yard. Colemon only wanted the best for his charge, Alayne knew, but what was best for Robert the boy and what was best for Lord Arryn were not always the same. Petyr had said as much, and it was true. Maester Colemon cares only for the boy, though. Father and I have larger concerns.

Alayne II, Feast 41

Apparently, those larger concerns of Alayne and her father are more important than young Robert’s health...

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He nodded, offered his arm, led her out onto the floor.  As they waited for the music to resume, Alayne glanced at the dais, where Lord Robert sat staring at them.  Please, she prayed, don’t let him start to twitch and shake.  Not here.  Not now.  Maester Coleman would have made certain that he drank a strong dose of sweetmilk before the feast, but even so...

Alayne, Winds

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It was said the Mother Rhoyne herself whispered to her children of every threat,

Ancient History, TWOIAF

Suggests a greenseer connection. 

And this suggests a power similar to the hammer of the waters...

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Art and music flourished in the cities of the Rhoyne, and it is said their people had their own magic—a water magic very different from the sorceries of Valyria, which were woven of blood and fire.
...
Sar Mell was raided and burned, yet emerged victorious when Rhoynish water wizards called up the power of the river and flooded Volon Therys. Half the city was washed away, if the tales can be believed.

Ancient History, TWOIAF

ETA

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To this day, no one knows what caused the Doom. Most say that it was a natural cataclysm—a catastrophic explosion caused by the eruption of all Fourteen Flames together. Some septons, less wise, claim that the Valyrians brought the disaster on themselves for their promiscuous belief in a hundred gods and more, and in their godlessness they delved too deep and unleashed the fires of the Seven hells on the Freehold. A handful of maesters, influenced by fragments of the work of Septon Barth, hold that Valyria had used spells to tame the Fourteen Flames for thousands of years, that their ceaseless hunger for slaves and wealth was as much to sustain these spells as to expand their power, and that when at last those spells faltered, the cataclysm became inevitable. 

Of these, some argue that it was the curse of Garin the Great at last coming to fruition. Others speak of the priests of R’hllor calling down the fire of their god in queer rituals. Some, wedding the fanciful notion of Valyrian magic to the reality of the ambitious great houses of Valyria, have argued that it was the constant whirl of conflict and deception amongst the great houses that might have led to the assassinations of too many of the reputed mages who renewed and maintained the rituals that banked the fires of the Fourteen Flames.

Ancient History, TWOIAF

"Yandel" pretty much spells it out for us (no pun intended), doesn't he? 

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Visenya bullied her little brother...

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On one occasion in 10 AC, Aegon and Visenya were both attacked in the streets of King’s Landing, and if not for Visenya and Dark Sister, the king might not have survived. Despite this, the king still believed that his guards were sufficient to his defense; Visenya convinced him otherwise. (It is recorded that when Aegon pointed out his guardsmen, Visenya drew Dark Sister and cut his cheek before his guards could react. “Your guards are slow and lazy,” Visenya is reported to have said, and the king was forced to agree.)

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

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Aegon the Conqueror and Balerion the Black Dread visited Winterfell...

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[Aegon] traveled throughout the realm for the rest of his life, until his final progress in 33 AC—making a point of paying his respects to the High Septon in the Starry Sept each time he visited Oldtown, guesting beneath the roofs of the lords of the great houses (even Winterfell, on that last progress), and beneath the roofs of many lesser lords, knights, and common innkeepers. The king brought a glittering train with him wherever he went; in one progress, fully a thousand knights followed him, and many lords and ladies of the court besides.

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

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AGoT, Eddard IX and ADwD, Tyrion V.

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Ned's men had drawn their swords, but they were three against twenty.

"How many jumped?"

"Two," said Tyrion, shivering.

"Three," said Haldon. "Behind you."

Jaime pushed his wet hair back with his fingers and wheeled his horse around.

The dwarf turned, and there he stood.

He saw them cut the legs from Jory's mount. . . . When Ned's horse lurched back to its feet, he tried to rise, only to fall again, choking on his scream. He could see the splintered bone poking through his calf. It was the last thing he saw for a time The rain came down and down and down.

The leap had shattered one of his legs, and a jagged piece of pale bone jutted out through the rotted cloth of his breeches and the grey meat beneath. The broken bone was speckled with brown blood, but still he lurched forward, reaching for Young Griff. His hand was grey and stiff, but blood oozed between his knuckles as he tried to close his fingers to grasp The boy stood staring, as still as if he too were made of stone. . . .

Tyrion kicked the lad's leg out from under him and leapt over him when he fell . . .

The stone man howled. He had been a Summer Islander, before; . . .

"No!" Ned Stark screamed, clawing for his sword.

Tyrion drove a shoulder into him.

It felt like slamming into a castle wall, but this castle stood upon a shattered leg.

Littlefinger and the City Watch found him there in the street, cradling Jory Cassel's body in his arms.

The attack on Ned by Jaime occurs just after Ned has put together the clues and determined that Cersei's children were not fathered by Robert. But the motive for Jaime's attack is to avenge the Lannister honor after Catelyn has taken Tyrion prisoner.

The attack on Tyrion by the stone man occurs just after Tyrion has put together the clues and determined that Young Griff is "a dead boy," Aegon Targaryen. And the stone man does appear to be focused on getting Aegon - Tyrion becomes the target only after he intervenes to protect the boy. (On the other hand, the author tells us that Tyrions kicks the leg out from under Aegon - an idiom meaning that he undermines him, causing him to fail.)

So the stone man is a symbolic Ned? This would be consistent with the stone statues of the Stark lords in the Winterfell crypt. The stone man howls, which sounds like wolf behavior, and he has grey skin, which is a Stark color.

Interesting potential wordplay around castle and Cassel. Jaime's men bring down Jory Cassel, Ned's trusted and loyal servant. Tyrion brings down the stone man like a castle wall.

The Summer Islander reference is also useful. Aside from Bran's direwolf, Starks aren't usually associated with summer. But maybe Winterfell is a symbolic "island" of summer, with its glass house and thermal pools and radiant heat in the walls. Ned left home (and died) so he is no longer a Summer Islander.

If "former Summer Islander" is code for a Stark ghost (Bran wished he had named his direwolf Ghost, but Jon thought of it first), this might help explain why Jalabhar Xho is a lingering presence in the background at the Red Keep. Maybe he also represents Ned's spirit? Or Brandon or Rickard?

By contrast to this Summer Islander who nearly drowned Tyrion, a different Summer Islander saves Sam Tarly from drowning after he is pushed into a canal in Braavos.

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On 03/08/2017 at 2:45 AM, Seams said:

AGoT, Eddard IX and ADwD, Tyrion V.

<snipped quotes>

The attack on Ned by Jaime occurs just after Ned has put together the clues and determined that Cersei's children were not fathered by Robert. But the motive for Jaime's attack is to avenge the Lannister honor after Catelyn has taken Tyrion prisoner.

The attack on Tyrion by the stone man occurs just after Tyrion has put together the clues and determined that Young Griff is "a dead boy," Aegon Targaryen. And the stone man does appear to be focused on getting Aegon - Tyrion becomes the target only after he intervenes to protect the boy. (On the other hand, the author tells us that Tyrions kicks the leg out from under Aegon - an idiom meaning that he undermines him, causing him to fail.)

So the stone man is a symbolic Ned? This would be consistent with the stone statues of the Stark lords in the Winterfell crypt. The stone man howls, which sounds like wolf behavior, and he has grey skin, which is a Stark color.

Interesting potential wordplay around castle and Cassel. Jaime's men bring down Jory Cassel, Ned's trusted and loyal servant. Tyrion brings down the stone man like a castle wall.

That's a truly remarkable link between Tyrion v's stonemen, and Jaime v's Ned.

It might say something about the futility of Ned's efforts in KL - stone so often seems to be a trap, a prison, an oubliette.

It also got me hurrying to check Ned's burial status - and there's a lot I hadn't noticed.

Obviously he hasn't been buried like a good Lord of Winterfell should be - the bones haven't reached home, and the sword isn't one of his own swords.

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Bones, Catelyn thought. This is not Ned, this is not the man I loved, the father of my children. His hands were clasped together over his chest, skeletal fingers curled about the hilt of some longsword, but they were not Ned's hands, so strong and full of life. They had dressed the bones in Ned's surcoat, the fine white velvet with the direwolf badge over the heart, but nothing remained of the warm flesh that had pillowed her head so many nights,  the arms that had held her. The head had been rejoined to the body with fine silver wire, but one skull looks much like another, and in those empty hollows she found no trace of her lord's dark grey eyes, eyes that could be soft as a fog or hard as stone. They gave his eyes to crows, she remembered.
ACOK - CATELYN I

Even worse, there is that powerful sense of non-recognition from Cat - highly suspicious given the number of times we're told that one skull looks just like another.

I looked for clarification, and here it is, a few chapters earlier:

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As they passed beneath the portcullis, he [Tyrion] noted the heads mounted atop the walls. Black with rot and old tar, they had long since become unrecognizable. "Captain Vylarr," he called, "I want those taken down on the morrow. Give them to the silent sisters for cleaning." It would be hell to match them with the bodies, he supposed, yet it must be done....
ACOK - TYRION I

So, no chance of proper burial for Ned, and the most important sword has been destroyed. His spirit must be free as a bird.

(ETA the crows have his eyes? where is he?)

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The Summer Islander reference is also useful. Aside from Bran's direwolf, Starks aren't usually associated with summer. But maybe Winterfell is a symbolic "island" of summer, with its glass house and thermal pools and radiant heat in the walls. Ned left home (and died) so he is no longer a Summer Islander.

If "former Summer Islander" is code for a Stark ghost (Bran wished he had named his direwolf Ghost, but Jon thought of it first), this might help explain why Jalabhar Xho is a lingering presence in the background at the Red Keep. Maybe he also represents Ned's spirit? Or Brandon or Rickard?

By contrast to this Summer Islander who nearly drowned Tyrion, a different Summer Islander saves Sam Tarly from drowning after he is pushed into a canal in Braavos.

This is a great parallel.

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17 minutes ago, Springwatch said:

That's a truly remarkable link between Tyrion v's stonemen, and Jaime v's Ned.

It also got me hurrying to check Ned's burial status - and there's a lot I hadn't noticed.

Obviously he hasn't been buried like a good Lord of Winterfell should be - the bones haven't reached home, and the sword isn't one of his own swords.

You might enjoy this thread from sweetsunray, where she theorizes that Ned's bones might have been returned to the steps of the Sept at King's Landing, along with the pile of bones thought to be the remains of septons and septas who have been killed in the countryside. This was the site of Ned's death, of course. I have seen a number of symbolic parallels that involve Ned's bones - I suspect Rattleshirt is a symbolic Ned (to play off of Mance, who is a symbolic Rhaegar) and Littlefinger, as the "father" of Alayne / Sansa is a symbolic Ned (underscored by the thread of silver Catelyn sees in Petyr's hair and the silver thread she sees holding Ned's skull in place with the rest of his bones). Lady Dustin is determined to keep Ned's bones out of the crypt at Winterfell. What does she know about the power of Stark ghosts at large upon the land?

Thanks for your reply. I probably should have posted this as a separate thread. It seemed like a neat little parallel until I started writing, then I kept noticing more significant details.

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From the list of dragons during the Dance of the Dragons...

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Vermax (Prince Jacearys): Young but strong, killed with his rider at the Battle of the Gullet.

Arrax (Prince Lucerys): Young but strong, killed with his rider by Vhagar above Shipbreaker Bay.

Tyraxes (Prince Joffrey): Young but strong, killed at the Storming of the Dragonpit.

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

;)

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The War of the Ninepenny Kings was only 40 years ago. That means that the fathers and grandfathers of many of the Golden Company fought for the dream of Bittersteel. Could they have lost that 60+ year dream in just one generation? 

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On 05/08/2017 at 0:43 PM, Seams said:

You might enjoy this thread from sweetsunray, where she theorizes that Ned's bones might have been returned to the steps of the Sept at King's Landing, along with the pile of bones thought to be the remains of septons and septas who have been killed in the countryside. <snip>

Excellent thread, thanks for linking.

On 06/08/2017 at 3:39 AM, Lost Melnibonean said:

From the list of dragons during the Dance of the Dragons...

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Vermax (Prince Jacearys): Young but strong, killed with his rider at the Battle of the Gullet.

Arrax (Prince Lucerys): Young but strong, killed with his rider by Vhagar above Shipbreaker Bay.

Tyraxes (Prince Joffrey): Young but strong, killed at the Storming of the Dragonpit.

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

Missed the context for this, but I'll chance a blind bet that each of these princes was also young, but strong.

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6 minutes ago, Springwatch said:

Excellent thread, thanks for linking.

Missed the context for this, but I'll chance a blind bet that each of these princes was also young, but strong.

Strong enough to break bones, I'm sure. 

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One detail I noticed when re-reading Davos' ADWD was how Robett Glover consistently referred to Wex Pyke as "Ironborn" instead of an "Ironman." This is extremely rare; in fact, I'm not sure if we ever see a non-Ironborn character use this term in the series. It's a really subtle way of showing Robett's high regard for Wex, and I really loved seeing that. 

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This is clearly meant to tell us that Aerys was banging Lady Joanna after she was wed to Tywin...

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In 263 AC, after a year as the King’s Hand, Ser Tywin married his beautiful youngcousin Joanna Lannister, who had come to King’s Landing in 259 AC for the coronationof King Jaehaerys II and remained thereafter as a lady-in-waiting to Princess (laterQueen) Rhaella. ...

Sadly, the marriage between Aerys II Targaryen and his sister, Rhaella, was not ashappy; though she turned a blind eye to most of the king’s infidelities, the queendid not approve of his “turning my ladies into his whores.” (Joanna Lannister wasnot the first lady to be dismissed abruptly from Her Grace’s service, nor was shethe last). 

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

Right? 

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2 hours ago, Lost Melnibonean said:

This is clearly meant to tell us that Aerys was banging Lady Joanna after she was wed to Tywin...

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

Right? 

It does seem to imply that, doesn't it? Do we know what year she was dismissed? 

I don't know if any of the Lannister children aren't Tywin's, but the one who seems the most Targaryen-esque, to me anyway, is Cersei. 

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59 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

It does seem to imply that, doesn't it? Do we know what year she was dismissed? 

I don't know if any of the Lannister children aren't Tywin's, but the one who seems the most Targaryen-esque, to me anyway, is Cersei. 

Hmm... There are only three "scurrilous" rumors in ASOIAF. The first was in the Rogue Prince...

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Though the origins of their enmity are much disputed, all men agree that Ser Otto Hightower, the King’s Hand, took a great mislike to the king’s brother. (The king’s fool Mushroom asserts that the quarrel began when Prince Daemon deflowered Ser Otto’s young daughter Alicent, the future queen, but this scurrilous tale is unsupported by any other source.)

The second was in TWOIAF's account of the reign of Baelor I...

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She was thrice wed. Her first marriage was in 176 AC, to the wealthy but aged Ossifer Plumm, who is said to have died while consummating the marriage. She conceived, however, for Lord Plumm did his duty before he died. Later, scurrilous rumors came to suggest that Lord Plumm, in fact, died at the sight of his new bride in her nakedness (this rumor was put in the lewdest terms—terms which might have amused Mushroom but which we need not repeat), and that the child she conceived that night was by her cousin Aegon—he who later became King Aegon the Unworthy.

The third was in TWOIAF's account of the reign of Aerys II...

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The scurrilous rumor that Joanna Lannister gave up her maidenhead to Prince Aerys the night of his father’s coronation and enjoyed a brief reign as his paramour after he ascended the Iron Throne can safely be discounted. As Pycelle insists in his letters, Tywin Lannister would scarce have taken his cousin to wife if that had been true, “for he was ever a proud man and not one accustomed to feasting upon another man’s leavings.”

The second "scurrilous" rumor appears to be all but certain. The first scurrilous tale was spread by Mushroom, and I always assume that Mushroom's account is closest to the truth. So, if the first "scurrilous" rumors are correct, I am going to assume that the third scurrilous rumor is correct. 

ETA

It is pretty difficult to use this to argue that Cersei and/or Jaime were Aerys's, though...

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It has been reliably reported, however, that King Aerys took unwonted liberties with Lady Joanna’s person during her bedding ceremony, to Tywin’s displeasure. Not long thereafter, Queen Rhaella dismissed Joanna Lannister from her service. No reason for this was ever given, but Lady Joanna departed at once for Casterly Rock and seldom visited King’s Landing thereafter.

At first His Grace comforted Rhaella in her grief, but over time his compassion turned to suspicion. By 270 AC, he had decided that the queen was being unfaithful to him. “The gods will not suffer a bastard to sit the Iron Throne,” he told his small council; none of Rhaella’s stillbirths, miscarriages, or dead princes had been his, the king proclaimed. Thereafter, he forbade the queen to leave the confines of Maegor’s Holdfast and decreed that two septas would henceforth share her bed every night, “to see that she remains true to her vows.”

What Tywin Lannister made of this is not recorded, but in 266 AC, at Casterly Rock, Lady Joanna gave birth to a pair of twins, a girl and a boy, “healthy and beautiful, with hair like beaten gold.” This birth only exacerbated the tension between Aerys II Targaryen and his Hand. “I appear to have married the wrong woman,” His Grace was reported to have said, when informed of the happy event. Nonetheless, he sent each child its weight in gold as a nameday gift and commanded Tywin to bring them to court when they were old enough to travel. “And bring their mother, too, for it has been too long since I gazed upon that fair face,” he insisted.

 

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

Tywin wed Joanna in 263. This passage suggests that Joanna was sent away from King's Landing in 263 or 264, and seldom returned. She did not have the twins until 266. 

ETA II

The more likely possibility, from the perspective of timing, is that Tyrion is Aerys's bastard. 

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At the great Anniversary Tourney of 272 AC, held to commemorate Aerys’s tenth year upon the Iron Throne, Joanna Lannister brought her six-year-old twins Jaime and Cersei from Casterly Rock to present before the court. The king (very much in his cups) asked her if giving suck to them had “ruined your breasts, which were so high and proud.” The question greatly amused Lord Tywin’s rivals, who were always pleased to see the Hand slighted or made mock of, but Lady Joanna was humiliated. Tywin Lannister attempted to return his chain of office the next morning, but the king refused to accept his resignation.

Aerys II could, of course, have dismissed Tywin Lannister at any time and named his own man as Hand of the King, but instead, for whatever reason, the king chose to keep his boyhood friend close by him, laboring on his behalf, even as he began to undermine him in ways both great and small. Slights and gibes became ever more numerous; courtiers hoping for advancement soon learned that the quickest way to catch the king’s eye was by making mock of his solemn, humorless Hand. Yet all this, Tywin Lannister suffered in silence.

In 273 AC, however, Lady Joanna was taken to childbed once again at Casterly Rock, where she died delivering Lord Tywin’s second son. Tyrion, as the babe was named, was a malformed, dwarfish babe born with stunted legs, an oversized head, and mismatched, demonic eyes (some reports also suggested he had a tail, which was lopped off at his lord father’s command). Lord Tywin’s Doom, the smallfolk called this ill-made creature, and Lord Tywin’s Bane. Upon hearing of his birth, King Aerys infamously said, “The gods cannot abide such arrogance. They have plucked a fair flower from his hand and given him a monster in her place, to teach him some humility at last.”

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

ETA III

Still, I agree with you that Cersei shares several parallels with the Mad King, and although I think Tyrion might be Aerys's bastard, I believe he is Tywin's son. 

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This might have been the most prescient thing the Mad King ever did...

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The growing rift between the king and the King’s Hand was also apparent in the matter of appointments. Whereas previously His Grace had always heeded his Hand’s counsel, bestowing offices, honors, and inheritances as Lord Tywin recommended, after 270 AC he began to disregard the men put forward by his lordship in favor of his own choices. Many westermen found themselves dismissed from the king’s service for no better cause than the suspicion that they might be “Hand’s men.” In their places, King Aerys appointed his own favorites . . . but the king’s favor had become a chancy thing, his mistrust easy to awaken. Even the Hand’s own kin were not exempt from royal displeasure. When Lord Tywin wished to name his brother Ser Tygett Lannister as the Red Keep’s master-at- arms, King Aerys gave the post to Ser Willem Darry instead.

The Targaryen Kings, ASOIAF

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22 minutes ago, Lost Melnibonean said:

Hmm... There are only three "scurrilous" rumors in ASOIAF. The first was in the Rogue Prince...

The second was in TWOIAF's account of the reign of Baelor I...

The third was in TWOIAF's account of the reign of Aerys II...

The second "scurrilous" rumor appears to be all but certain. The first scurrilous tale was spread by Mushroom, and I always assume that Mushroom's account is closest to the truth. So, if the first "scurrilous" rumors are correct, I am going to assume that the third scurrilous rumor is correct. 

ETA

It is pretty difficult to use this to argue that Cersei and/or Jaime were Aerys's, though...

The Targaryen Kings, TWOIAF

Tywin wed Joanna in 263. This passage suggests that Joanna was sent away from King's Landing in 263 or 264, and seldom returned. She did not have the twins until 266. 

Oh, I definitely believe the first two rumors. Something about posh golden girl Alicent being seduced by the Rogue Prince just feels too right not to be true; I've thought that since the first time I read TRP/TPATQ. And the evidence that Plumm isn't the father is also pretty airtight since, well, he'd been dead for ten months. 

So yeah, something was definitely going on with Aerys and Rhaella. I don't think George would keep bringing it up if there wasn't. I suppose the timeline works out more for Tyrion being a Targ--we know she saw Aerys about a year before his birth, although the exact date is murky--but I really hope George doesn't go that route. Then again, having Genna tell Jaime "Tyrion is Tywin's son" along with his ominous dream of his mother (which I never really thought had any greater meaning than to show her pain at seeing how unhappy her family had become) makes me wonder if the answer is staring us right in the face. . . .

Sigh. We really need TWOW. 

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