Ramsay wrote the pink letter

[aryagonnakill#2]

There have long been theories that Ramsay did not write the pink letter.  Over the years these theories have grown ever more fanciful, whereas they started out a straightforward Stannis or Mance or Asha, now I am seeing people suggest that Mance and Stannis are in cahoots, or Mance and Barbery Dustin are in cahoots with Mors Umber or Manderly etc etc.

While Stannis, Mance, Asha, and Ramsay all potentially have the ability to know the information contained in the contents of the letter i.e. the names of the people at the wall being demanded and the fact that Mance was sent to retrieve Arya instead of being burned, only 1 person has a valid motive for writing it.  I would like to stress the world VALID as most people claiming someone other than Ramsay wrote the letter tries to form some far fetched motive, but has yet to succeed.  

Take for example the most recent Stannis wrote the Pink Letter thread.  The OP claims that Stannis wrote the letter not to gain reinforcements as earlier theories have suggested, but simply to get Jon to break his vows and come to WF so Stannis can name him lord as he wanted to do.  So this theory suggests that Stannis is able to perfectly predict Jons reaction to said letter, but is unable to predict the reaction of the other NWmen.  

Ok, lets look past that for a second and get to the real concrete reason why this doesn't make sense, the theory as it is put forth momentarily acknowledges that Stannis does not know about Tormund and his wildlings, and I am not sure if it acknowledges that Stannis should know the Thenns have been dispatched to Karhold so he should not think Jon has any wildling warriors with him.  It then ignores the fact it just acknowledged to say that Stannis knew the letter would provoke Jon to leave the watch, and since that's what he did it ends there.  What is being missed is that Jon only reacted the way he did because of the thousand or so willing warriors he had at his disposal.  If it were just Jon and the NW and old/young/wounded willings who could not fight, Jon would have had to literally ride to WF by himself.  What in gods name would he think he was accomplishing in this scenario?  Jon only acted the way he did after an hour long talk with Tormund where Tormund clearly had Jons back.  In other words Stannis would have no way of predicting that Jon would react that way, because with the information Stannis has Jon could not have possibly acted that way.

Every motive I have ever seen put forth for Stannis unravels in the same fashion, when you look a little deeper there really is no motive.

Now let us discuss Mance

There is a whole lot of speculation involving Mance.  Some is grounded in the text, some is not.  It is fair to speculate whether or not Stannis knows he is alive as there is some text to indicate this, but people are pulling stuff out of nowhere these days to suggest that he met up with Stannis on his way to WF, that he is in league with Mors Umber, that he is in league with Barbery Dustin, or Manderly, or I don't even know who else.  

My original objection to Mance writing the letter was very simple, where the hell did a bastard born ranger turned wildling learn to read and write?  Eventually it was pointed out that he knew ABEL and BAEL were anagrams, and so I concede that tho it makes no sense, he can read/write.

I have seen a couple different versions of the Mance wrote the letter theory.  First that in the moments directly after the escape was discovered and the guards blew the horns that Mance was able to sneak out of the great hall, break into the rookery and write the letter to Jon, then hide in the crypts to wait it out.  2nd is that Mance snuck out of the great hall and went straight to the crypts to hide and when Ramsay returned victorious but without Theon and Jeyne he broke into the rookery and wrote the letter to Jon.  Last is that Mance somehow came across Ramsay by himself(the versions of this get pretty fantastic) and used the Ruby to somehow glamour himself as Ramsay and Ramsay as Abel and is now acting as Ramsay, and thus wrote the letter pretending to be Ramsay.  How the glamour works and why Ramsay was alone idk, I'm sure the posters who believe this will be on this thread at some point.

With that said the same reason why Stannis did not likely write the letter applies to Mance as well, lack of motive.  Mance believes there are some 300 wildling warriors near the wall, and that they are in no way loyal to Jon, along with the sheer distance making Jon weeks away, the whole reinforcement argument just is not valid.  Warning Jon could be considered a valid motive, but it would not explain why he would pretend to be Ramsay, identifying himself as Mance and validating this with a little one liner like I kicked your ass as lord o bones would make Jon more likely to immediately believe anything in the letter.  Then Mance could simply say Ramsays coming to get you with a force you cannot overcome, please get the innocents like Val and my son to safety.  

The main reasons given for believing either Mance or Stannis wrote the letter are the presence of words/phrases that supposedly only a wildling or only Theon would use.  It is stated that only willings use the phrase "black crows" and that Theon uses the word "whore" excessively and that Ramsay has not used that word in the text.  What seems to be getting lost on the people proposing 1 of the 2 of those above arguments, is that if Stannis wrote the letter with Theons help and that is why the word whore is used, then in fact people other than wildlings would use the term "black crow" if it suited their needs, and if it was Mance than the word "whore" is not exclusively Theons to use.  What is also missed in this analysis is that Mance would not refer to Val as a wildling princess.  

Basically people are selectively choosing which phrases can only be used by which people, without applying that same logic to everyone.  If "black crows" would only be used by a wildling, but "wildling princess" is a term only a southerner would use, then clearly no one could have written the letter.  The simple answer to this problem is that the letter was written as insultingly as possible by a non wildling, and was written after extracting information from wildlings.

This brings us to Ramsay.

In the moments after the end of the chapter where Theon and Jeyne escape 2 or 3 spear wives have been killed/captured.  There are still a few more, but given how quickly things happened the one pretending to be Jeyne is in real trouble.  Mance is also in trouble as well.  While it is possible he snuck off in the confusion, as soon as the spear wives are identified as his daughters the entire castle will be looking for him.  As much as people like to make Mance out to be a superhero, he is in fact a mortal man trapped by stone walls filled with thousands of men who are looking for him.  The simplest answer to the question of what happened to him is obviously that he was captured along with any remaining spear wives.  We can be reasonably sure that the Freys and Manderlies would continue to exit the castle especially since we know the Freys fell into the pits dug by Mors Umber and his green boys.  While Theon is sure that Ramsay would be coming after them now that he and Jeyne escaped, I also think we can conclude that he would want to be involved in getting the info from Mance, after all Ramsay is already pissed and definitely loves torture.  While people often try to say that the Boltons would not know when they got the truth or that Mance wouldn't talk, those are pretty ridiculous arguments.  With more than 1 hostage, meaning only 1 spear wife needed, hey can simply compare the stories, when they match, you have the truth.  Plus no 1 is going to identify themselves as Mance Ryder to a Bolton unless they are shit out of luck and or lies to tell.

So now in possession of the knowledge contained in the letter and that Theon and Jeyne are headed to Stannis, Ramsay heads off behind the Freys and Manderlies to find his bride and reek.  Pretty much everyone agrees on some version of the night lamp theory where the Freys drown and Stannis wins, then passes Karstarks head off as his own along with his sword to send some of the mountain clans disguised as Karstark men into WF along with Manderlies or something along those lines.

While Ramsay would surely want to send men after Jeyne and Theon, he cannot just send his entire force, their are supply issues, and surely a Manderly knight or "Karstark" or whoever will tell Ramsay that they already sent scouts after them, but have no idea how much of a head start they have, and that they probably have guides from the mountain clans.

So Ramsay heads back to WF thinking he is victorious in regards to Stannis, but knowing there is a serious threat in the form of Theon and Jon and what they know/will soon know.  Ramsay being a hot head surely wants to ride straight to CB with a Bolton force and kill Jon/ the NW and get Jeyne and Theon.  Roose however is calmer as always and realizes that the situation is much more complicated than that.

First of all you need the 3-1 rule, 3 times as many men attacking as defending, and that is a minimum.  5-1 is more responsible.  That means the Boltons would have to march some 2k troops 6-700 miles through a blizzard to get to CB to do the deed.  Can they even spare those supplies or men?  IDK, they just lost the Freys and so now barely outnumber the other northmen in WF.  Would they really want to cut their force in half and instead be outnumbered?  Would they send everyone home so they weren't within the walls, but would also loose track of them?  The food in the castle was largely Manderlies to begin with, how much did he bring?

2nd of all is that Jon has all the ravens he needs to tell everyone northern lord that Jeyne is in fact Jeyne and not Arya.  A simple Starks have grey eyes line after swearing to it would get every lord to ask their masters who would look at their lineage books and go ya Starks have grey or blue eyes not brown.  Not only that but Theon could tell Jon that it was the Boltons and not the Ironborn who slaughtered Rodrik and his men and then burned WF.  This is not information that the Boltons can afford to get out.  Considering this we can see that the letter is as much about blackmailing Jon not to tel the realm about these things as it is a threat against him.  If Jon tells about Bran & Rickon & Arya, the Boltons tell about Mance.

Last is that the NW is a respected institution in the north, the lord of WF/warden of the north can't just attack the NW.  Many if not most northern houses have family there, and no one has attacked it since the Night King.  The Boltons can't just slaughter them, it's very similar to the Lannisters/Tyrells not being able to simply massacre the faith even though they have the military power to do so.  They have to be diplomatic and either get what they want via negotiation, or be able to point to their attempts and say we had no choice they were harbouring Stannis' family who were still plotting against the throne.  Since the NW gets a lot of its supplies from the north, hey have an awful lot of leverage in any negotiation.

Eventually Ramsay realizes Roose is right and writes the letter, which is opened at the wall before being given to Jon, hence the smear of pink wax rather than the seal.  As I have pointed out before, the fact that Jon does not note the handwriting means it was Ramsays, as there is no reason to point out that it is Ramsays writing, there would obviously be a reason to point out that it wasn't, which is not done.

Again the key to remember here is that Ramsay does not know about the thousand or so wildling warriors Jon has.  Without those warriors Jon cannot react aggressively, it is not an option, he can't fight them himself and if he runs by himself the watch will hunt him down as well as other northern lords.  His only options are to do nothing, surrender the people he has, or send them all off to Essos or some place like that.

Bonus point.  I think Ramsay kills Roose shortly after returning to WF with Stannis sword and Karstarks head.

I don't feel the need to discuss Asha as I have not seen anyone suggest that in a long time.

[Curled Finger]

Yep.  Concur completely.  

For my own part the language of the letter gives the Identity of the Author away.   Who else could write nutjob like that?  Lots of alternate theories and ideas bubbling up from the abyss of time between books.  Though fun and often very interesting to read, it's unlikely anyone but Ramsay has all the information spit out in the letter.   And I doubt very seriously that Stannis would be so cavalier about finding out Mance is alive.  Stannis is becoming such a badass without his counselors.   And he's got much better grammar skills than revealed in the letter.  I can't see Stannis smearing wax, either.   He's too fastidious.   

As for Mance there really is no VALID (as you say) reason for him to send this.  He's got to fear Stannis finding out about his lack of death eventually.  Mance may be up to all sorts of things inside Winterfell, but I think his main objective was accomplished.    No need to call Jon out for any reason.   

I'm really enjoying your recent spurt of posts, @aryagonnakill#2.   Well done. 

[Free Northman Reborn]

1 hour ago, aryagonnakill#2 said:

There have long been theories that Ramsay did not write the pink letter.  Over the years these theories have grown ever more fanciful, whereas they started out a straightforward Stannis or Mance or Asha, now I am seeing people suggest that Mance and Stannis are in cahoots, or Mance and Barbery Dustin are in cahoots with Mors Umber or Manderly etc etc.

While Stannis, Mance, Asha, and Ramsay all potentially have the ability to know the information contained in the contents of the letter i.e. the names of the people at the wall being demanded and the fact that Mance was sent to retrieve Arya instead of being burned, only 1 person has a valid motive for writing it.  I would like to stress the world VALID as most people claiming someone other than Ramsay wrote the letter tries to form some far fetched motive, but has yet to succeed.  

Take for example the most recent Stannis wrote the Pink Letter thread.  The OP claims that Stannis wrote the letter not to gain reinforcements as earlier theories have suggested, but simply to get Jon to break his vows and come to WF so Stannis can name him lord as he wanted to do.  So this theory suggests that Stannis is able to perfectly predict Jons reaction to said letter, but is unable to predict the reaction of the other NWmen.  

Ok, lets look past that for a second and get to the real concrete reason why this doesn't make sense, the theory as it is put forth momentarily acknowledges that Stannis does not know about Tormund and his wildlings, and I am not sure if it acknowledges that Stannis should know the Thenns have been dispatched to Karhold so he should not think Jon has any wildling warriors with him.  It then ignores the fact it just acknowledged to say that Stannis knew the letter would provoke Jon to leave the watch, and since that's what he did it ends there.  What is being missed is that Jon only reacted the way he did because of the thousand or so willing warriors he had at his disposal.  If it were just Jon and the NW and old/young/wounded willings who could not fight, Jon would have had to literally ride to WF by himself.  What in gods name would he think he was accomplishing in this scenario?  Jon only acted the way he did after an hour long talk with Tormund where Tormund clearly had Jons back.  In other words Stannis would have no way of predicting that Jon would react that way, because with the information Stannis has Jon could not have possibly acted that way.

Every motive I have ever seen put forth for Stannis unravels in the same fashion, when you look a little deeper there really is no motive.

Now let us discuss Mance

There is a whole lot of speculation involving Mance.  Some is grounded in the text, some is not.  It is fair to speculate whether or not Stannis knows he is alive as there is some text to indicate this, but people are pulling stuff out of nowhere these days to suggest that he met up with Stannis on his way to WF, that he is in league with Mors Umber, that he is in league with Barbery Dustin, or Manderly, or I don't even know who else.  

My original objection to Mance writing the letter was very simple, where the hell did a bastard born ranger turned wildling learn to read and write?  Eventually it was pointed out that he knew ABEL and BAEL were anagrams, and so I concede that tho it makes no sense, he can read/write.

I have seen a couple different versions of the Mance wrote the letter theory.  First that in the moments directly after the escape was discovered and the guards blew the horns that Mance was able to sneak out of the great hall, break into the rookery and write the letter to Jon, then hide in the crypts to wait it out.  2nd is that Mance snuck out of the great hall and went straight to the crypts to hide and when Ramsay returned victorious but without Theon and Jeyne he broke into the rookery and wrote the letter to Jon.  Last is that Mance somehow came across Ramsay by himself(the versions of this get pretty fantastic) and used the Ruby to somehow glamour himself as Ramsay and Ramsay as Abel and is now acting as Ramsay, and thus wrote the letter pretending to be Ramsay.  How the glamour works and why Ramsay was alone idk, I'm sure the posters who believe this will be on this thread at some point.

With that said the same reason why Stannis did not likely write the letter applies to Mance as well, lack of motive.  Mance believes there are some 300 wildling warriors near the wall, and that they are in no way loyal to Jon, along with the sheer distance making Jon weeks away, the whole reinforcement argument just is not valid.  Warning Jon could be considered a valid motive, but it would not explain why he would pretend to be Ramsay, identifying himself as Mance and validating this with a little one liner like I kicked your ass as lord o bones would make Jon more likely to immediately believe anything in the letter.  Then Mance could simply say Ramsays coming to get you with a force you cannot overcome, please get the innocents like Val and my son to safety.  

The main reasons given for believing either Mance or Stannis wrote the letter are the presence of words/phrases that supposedly only a wildling or only Theon would use.  It is stated that only willings use the phrase "black crows" and that Theon uses the word "whore" excessively and that Ramsay has not used that word in the text.  What seems to be getting lost on the people proposing 1 of the 2 of those above arguments, is that if Stannis wrote the letter with Theons help and that is why the word whore is used, then in fact people other than wildlings would use the term "black crow" if it suited their needs, and if it was Mance than the word "whore" is not exclusively Theons to use.  What is also missed in this analysis is that Mance would not refer to Val as a wildling princess.  

Basically people are selectively choosing which phrases can only be used by which people, without applying that same logic to everyone.  If "black crows" would only be used by a wildling, but "wildling princess" is a term only a southerner would use, then clearly no one could have written the letter.  The simple answer to this problem is that the letter was written as insultingly as possible by a non wildling, and was written after extracting information from wildlings.

This brings us to Ramsay.

In the moments after the end of the chapter where Theon and Jeyne escape 2 or 3 spear wives have been killed/captured.  There are still a few more, but given how quickly things happened the one pretending to be Jeyne is in real trouble.  Mance is also in trouble as well.  While it is possible he snuck off in the confusion, as soon as the spear wives are identified as his daughters the entire castle will be looking for him.  As much as people like to make Mance out to be a superhero, he is in fact a mortal man trapped by stone walls filled with thousands of men who are looking for him.  The simplest answer to the question of what happened to him is obviously that he was captured along with any remaining spear wives.  We can be reasonably sure that the Freys and Manderlies would continue to exit the castle especially since we know the Freys fell into the pits dug by Mors Umber and his green boys.  While Theon is sure that Ramsay would be coming after them now that he and Jeyne escaped, I also think we can conclude that he would want to be involved in getting the info from Mance, after all Ramsay is already pissed and definitely loves torture.  While people often try to say that the Boltons would not know when they got the truth or that Mance wouldn't talk, those are pretty ridiculous arguments.  With more than 1 hostage, meaning only 1 spear wife needed, hey can simply compare the stories, when they match, you have the truth.  Plus no 1 is going to identify themselves as Mance Ryder to a Bolton unless they are shit out of luck and or lies to tell.

So now in possession of the knowledge contained in the letter and that Theon and Jeyne are headed to Stannis, Ramsay heads off behind the Freys and Manderlies to find his bride and reek.  Pretty much everyone agrees on some version of the night lamp theory where the Freys drown and Stannis wins, then passes Karstarks head off as his own along with his sword to send some of the mountain clans disguised as Karstark men into WF along with Manderlies or something along those lines.

While Ramsay would surely want to send men after Jeyne and Theon, he cannot just send his entire force, their are supply issues, and surely a Manderly knight or "Karstark" or whoever will tell Ramsay that they already sent scouts after them, but have no idea how much of a head start they have, and that they probably have guides from the mountain clans.

So Ramsay heads back to WF thinking he is victorious in regards to Stannis, but knowing there is a serious threat in the form of Theon and Jon and what they know/will soon know.  Ramsay being a hot head surely wants to ride straight to CB with a Bolton force and kill Jon/ the NW and get Jeyne and Theon.  Roose however is calmer as always and realizes that the situation is much more complicated than that.

First of all you need the 3-1 rule, 3 times as many men attacking as defending, and that is a minimum.  5-1 is more responsible.  That means the Boltons would have to march some 2k troops 6-700 miles through a blizzard to get to CB to do the deed.  Can they even spare those supplies or men?  IDK, they just lost the Freys and so now barely outnumber the other northmen in WF.  Would they really want to cut their force in half and instead be outnumbered?  Would they send everyone home so they weren't within the walls, but would also loose track of them?  The food in the castle was largely Manderlies to begin with, how much did he bring?

2nd of all is that Jon has all the ravens he needs to tell everyone northern lord that Jeyne is in fact Jeyne and not Arya.  A simple Starks have grey eyes line after swearing to it would get every lord to ask their masters who would look at their lineage books and go ya Starks have grey or blue eyes not brown.  Not only that but Theon could tell Jon that it was the Boltons and not the Ironborn who slaughtered Rodrik and his men and then burned WF.  This is not information that the Boltons can afford to get out.  Considering this we can see that the letter is as much about blackmailing Jon not to tel the realm about these things as it is a threat against him.  If Jon tells about Bran & Rickon & Arya, the Boltons tell about Mance.

Last is that the NW is a respected institution in the north, the lord of WF/warden of the north can't just attack the NW.  Many if not most northern houses have family there, and no one has attacked it since the Night King.  The Boltons can't just slaughter them, it's very similar to the Lannisters/Tyrells not being able to simply massacre the faith even though they have the military power to do so.  They have to be diplomatic and either get what they want via negotiation, or be able to point to their attempts and say we had no choice they were harbouring Stannis' family who were still plotting against the throne.  Since the NW gets a lot of its supplies from the north, hey have an awful lot of leverage in any negotiation.

Eventually Ramsay realizes Roose is right and writes the letter, which is opened at the wall before being given to Jon, hence the smear of pink wax rather than the seal.  As I have pointed out before, the fact that Jon does not note the handwriting means it was Ramsays, as there is no reason to point out that it is Ramsays writing, there would obviously be a reason to point out that it wasn't, which is not done.

Again the key to remember here is that Ramsay does not know about the thousand or so wildling warriors Jon has.  Without those warriors Jon cannot react aggressively, it is not an option, he can't fight them himself and if he runs by himself the watch will hunt him down as well as other northern lords.  His only options are to do nothing, surrender the people he has, or send them all off to Essos or some place like that.

Bonus point.  I think Ramsay kills Roose shortly after returning to WF with Stannis sword and Karstarks head.

I don't feel the need to discuss Asha as I have not seen anyone suggest that in a long time.

Largely agree. I would add that there is a motive for Mance to be in cahoots with Ramsay, as Mance is not really a friend of either Jon or Stannis, and an alliance with Ramsay could secure his people a safe haven in the North. But I find it unlikely that Ramsay would be able to see the strategic value of such an alliance through the red rage that no doubt consumes him after Mance's role in Jeyne's escape.

That said, I still don't quite know why Ramsay would be interested in Mance's family to such a degree if Mance didn't have some stake in the letter.

Anyway, I agree Ramsay wrote it. Mance remains the mystery. He does still have the ruby (we assume), so can presumably change his appearance in a pinch. So whether he is definitely captured remains up in the air as far as I am concerned. But he is not strictly needed, as Ramsay could have gleaned all his information from a tortured spear wife.

Interesting about the role of Arnolf Karstark's head, and disguising Mountain Clansmen as Karstark men. I haven't seen that bit of speculation before. It is certainly possible, although I don't know why Karstark's head would do better than any other random head as Stannis's double.

Lastly, I sincerely hope that Ramsay does not kill Roose. Roose is by far the scarier, more believable villain, and one would hope that vengeance for his prime role in the Red Wedding will be left for someone like Arya or even Jon, rather than the bumbling Ramsay killing him. In truth, while the Show made Ramsay their primary Northern villain, he hasn't done much to the Starks as such. He has terrorized Theon and Jeyne, but it is Roose who killed Rob Stark and caused the death of thousands of Northern troops at Duskendale and at the Twins. He is the one that should go down last and in a satisfying manner, not Ramsay.

But otherwise, I am on board with your view of what transpired, in broad strokes.

[rotting sea cow]

I think we should start a thread where each of us can write a single post about its personal theory. So when tWoW is published we can tell our grandchildren, look little weasels, Granpa was right!

Maybe I'll do it later... if I find the time

[Consigliere]

I lean towards Ramsay being the author as well. Something not mentioned in the OP is Ramsay's handwriting which seems to be pretty distinctive - described by both Asha and Jon as huge and spiky. Since Jon had previously received a letter from Ramsay, I would consider it to be a glaring omission that the difference in handwriting is not mentioned wrt the Pink Letter had it not come from Ramsay.

[Free Northman Reborn]

1 minute ago, rotting sea cow said:

I think we should start a thread where each of us can write a single post about its personal theory. So when tWoW is published we can tell our grandchildren, look little weasels, Granpa was right!

Maybe I'll do it later... if I find the time

Well, sarcasm aside, I found Aryagonnakill's thread very much needed, as the frankly ridiculous alternatives - particularly the idea that Stannis wrote the letter - were gaining way too much legitimacy. It was time that someone just put the facts straight, which this thread largely did.

[rotting sea cow]

2 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Well, sarcasm aside, I found Aryagonnakill's thread very much needed, as the frankly ridiculous alternatives - particularly the idea that Stannis wrote the letter - were gaining way too much legitimacy. It was time that someone just put the facts straight, which this thread largely did.

I'll try to read the post later. I'm actually in the camp that the letter is mostly from Ramsay, with some modifications done at the Wall.

[Free Northman Reborn]

1 minute ago, rotting sea cow said:

I'll try to read the post later. I'm actually in the camp that the letter is mostly from Ramsay, with some modifications done at the Wall.

Something interesting to ponder on is whether Martin originally intended to include the letter at all. Consider that it allows for a cliffhanger ending to Dance. But Martin originally intended to include both the Battle of Ice and the Battle of Meereen in this book. So by the end of Dance we would already have known the outcome of the Battle at the Ice Lake. The letter, if it was then still sent, would have had an entirely different meaning to us then.

I suspect that this letter, like in the Show, comes inbetween the Battle at the Lake and a still to come Battle at Winterfell itself. And with the outcome of the Battle of Ice already known to us, it would not have had the intention of creating any suspenseful theorizing about its author. Instead, the suspense would largely have been around Jon's assassination and whether or not he would be resurrected.

I don't think the authorship of the letter was originally intended to be a matter of serious debate. That is something that probably just occurred over time because of boredom among the fandom during the long wait for the next book.

[aryagonnakill#2]

3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Largely agree. I would add that there is a motive for Mance to be in cahoots with Ramsay, as Mance is not really a friend of either Jon or Stannis, and an alliance with Ramsay could secure his people a safe haven in the North. But I find it unlikely that Ramsay would be able to see the strategic value of such an alliance through the red rage that no doubt consumes him after Mance's role in Jeyne's escape.

That said, I still don't quite know why Ramsay would be interested in Mance's family to such a degree if Mance didn't have some stake in the letter.

Anyway, I agree Ramsay wrote it. Mance remains the mystery. He does still have the ruby (we assume), so can presumably change his appearance in a pinch. So whether he is definitely captured remains up in the air as far as I am concerned. But he is not strictly needed, as Ramsay could have gleaned all his information from a tortured spear wife.

Interesting about the role of Arnolf Karstark's head, and disguising Mountain Clansmen as Karstark men. I haven't seen that bit of speculation before. It is certainly possible, although I don't know why Karstark's head would do better than any other random head as Stannis's double.

Lastly, I sincerely hope that Ramsay does not kill Roose. Roose is by far the scarier, more believable villain, and one would hope that vengeance for his prime role in the Red Wedding will be left for someone like Arya or even Jon, rather than the bumbling Ramsay killing him. In truth, while the Show made Ramsay their primary Northern villain, he hasn't done much to the Starks as such. He has terrorized Theon and Jeyne, but it is Roose who killed Rob Stark and caused the death of thousands of Northern troops at Duskendale and at the Twins. He is the one that should go down last and in a satisfying manner, not Ramsay.

But otherwise, I am on board with your view of what transpired, in broad strokes.

I definitely wouldn't rule out Mance co operating willingly rather than being tortured, but I am not sure he would want his son or Val in the possession on the Boltons.  Whatever his feelings towards Jon, I doubt he thinks his son is in danger while Jon is in charge.

 

2 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Something interesting to ponder on is whether Martin originally intended to include the letter at all. Consider that it allows for a cliffhanger ending to Dance. But Martin originally intended to include both the Battle of Ice and the Battle of Meereen in this book. So by the end of Dance we would already have known the outcome of the Battle at the Ice Lake. The letter, if it was then still sent, would have had an entirely different meaning to us then.

I suspect that this letter, like in the Show, comes inbetween the Battle at the Lake and a still to come Battle at Winterfell itself. And with the outcome of the Battle of Ice already known to us, it would not have had the intention of creating any suspenseful theorizing about its author. Instead, the suspense would largely have been around Jon's assassination and whether or not he would be resurrected.

I don't think the authorship of the letter was originally intended to be a matter of serious debate. That is something that probably just occurred over time because of boredom among the fandom during the long wait for the next book.

This is my feeling also.

[aryagonnakill#2]

3 hours ago, rotting sea cow said:

I think we should start a thread where each of us can write a single post about its personal theory. So when tWoW is published we can tell our grandchildren, look little weasels, Granpa was right!

Maybe I'll do it later... if I find the time

When I commented on the Stannis wrote the letter thread, I was specifically asked to make this thread by the OP, and my future comments were not responded to, so I did.

[three-eyed monkey]

5 hours ago, aryagonnakill#2 said:

Take for example the most recent Stannis wrote the Pink Letter thread.  The OP claims that Stannis wrote the letter not to gain reinforcements as earlier theories have suggested, but simply to get Jon to break his vows and come to WF so Stannis can name him lord as he wanted to do.  So this theory suggests that Stannis is able to perfectly predict Jons reaction to said letter, but is unable to predict the reaction of the other NWmen.  

Actually, the OP was reposted recently but it is it's third incarnation. I have been arguing against the reinforcement theory for some time. And if you read the thread, I say that the author of the letter could expect Jon to do one of three things. 1) be cowed by the letter and do as it demands. 2) do nothing. 3) take the fight to Ramsay with whatever means were available. I never said anything about Stannis perfectly predicting how Jon would react, more gambling that Jon, from what Stannis has seen of him at the Wall, would not take the letter lying down.

4 hours ago, Curled Finger said:

  And I doubt very seriously that Stannis would be so cavalier about finding out Mance is alive.  

When readers miss details like this, it's no wonder they think Ramsay wrote the letter.

4 hours ago, Consigliere said:

I lean towards Ramsay being the author as well. Something not mentioned in the OP is Ramsay's handwriting which seems to be pretty distinctive - described by both Asha and Jon as huge and spiky. Since Jon had previously received a letter from Ramsay, I would consider it to be a glaring omission that the difference in handwriting is not mentioned wrt the Pink Letter had it not come from Ramsay.

You really need to look at this issue from the writers point of view. GRRM has set up Ramsay's huge spiky hand twice, once with Jon and once with Asha. That was intentional. Writers do this. If GRRM wanted us to be clear that the letter was from Ramsay, and clarity is very important in the writing process, then he would have used the set-up he had already invested in, i.e. the huge spiky hand. Or blood for ink. Or a piece of Mance. Or the signatures of the northern lords. That these things are absent from the text is also intentional and has nothing to do with Jon not mentioning them because he had seen them before.

I propose that Tybald actually penned the letter, but they are Stannis words. A maester's hand but the king's words, just like the letter Jon received from Deepwood Motte.

4 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Well, sarcasm aside, I found Aryagonnakill's thread very much needed, as the frankly ridiculous alternatives - particularly the idea that Stannis wrote the letter - were gaining way too much legitimacy. It was time that someone just put the facts straight, which this thread largely did.

The difference between the ridiculous alternative that Stannis wrote the letter and this thread, which largely puts the facts straight, is that the ridiculous alternative supports every point with text while these straight facts remain opinion and speculation.

Take for example motive. That Stannis wants Jon as his Lord of Winterfell is, again, set-up in the text. The obstacle to Stannis achieving that goal, namely Jon's vows, is also set-up.

“I need more than a sword from you.”

Jon was lost. “My lord?”

“I need the north.”

...

“Your fathers lands are bleeding, and I have neither the strength nor time to stanch the wounds. What is needed is a Lord of Winterfell. A loyal Lord of Winterfell.”

He is looking at me, Jon thought, stunned. “Winterfell is no more. Theon Greyjoy put it to the torch.”

“Granite does not burn easily”, Stannis said. “The castle can be rebuilt, in time. It’s not the walls that make a lord, it’s the man. Your northmen do not know me, have no reason to love me, yet I will need their strength in the battles to come. I need a son of Eddard Stark to win them to my banner.”

...

The King set the cup aside. “You could bring the north to me. Your father’s bannermen would rally to the son of Eddard Stark. Even Lord Too-fat-to-sit-a-horse. White Harbor would give me a ready source of supply and a secure base to which I could retreat at need. It is not too late to amend your folly, Snow. Take a knee and swear that bastard sword to me and rise as Jon Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North.”

How many times will he make me say it? “My sword is sword to the Nights Watch.”

This back and forth between Jon and Stannis happens several times, and from a basic story-telling point of view we should see some elevated attempt to resolve the issue on Stannis behalf. Or else GRRM is just wasting ink, but I'm pretty sure that's not the case.

1 hour ago, aryagonnakill#2 said:

When I commented on the Stannis wrote the letter thread, I was specifically asked to make this thread by the OP, and my future comments were not responded to, so I did.

Really? I don't remember specifically asking you, I thought I just joked that someone should make a Ramsay wrote the pink letter thread. But I did respond to all of your comments, anyone can just go to the Stannis thread and see that for themselves.

[Clegane'sPup]

4 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I don't think the authorship of the letter was originally intended to be a matter of serious debate. That is something that probably just occurred over time because of boredom among the fandom during the long wait for the next book.

I would go so far as to say Martin never intended anything to be of serious debate. He spun a tale. He thought he could continue to spin his tale. Except he didn’t.

Years have displayed that his ambiguous usage of terms, names, and the history, legends and old Nan tales, just to name a few has created a beast.  His lack of follow through since the release of DwD and the TV show has put him and his writing ability on the front burner. Fame has its pitfalls.

Martin wrote this pink/bastard letter into his story. I gotta look at it one of two ways. The letter is relevant to his story or he is punking his audience.

This is a fan site unless I am mistaken. Either Martin is one of the best fantasy writers since sliced bread or he is a mediocre hack. One thing he ain’t, he ain’t a Tolkien.I’m sorry fame and glory have interfered with his passion of writing all those ASOIAF stories he has floating around in his head. Print the frekking stories. He's got the fame and glory. He’s got the fan base. $$$ is going to roll in. Even the fake history book sold.

What hasn’t occurred is any Dunk & Egg tales that are supposed lying around. Nor any of the Starks of WF nor any of the Targ stories (since Princess and the Queen). Oh, buy the next anthology so I can read the short story. That was the Rogue Prince 2014 in another anthology.

Back to the pink/bastard letter. Someone please tell me why Martin wrote it the way he wrote it in the book he wrote it in if it is not intended to be an exercise in mental masturbation.

[Curled Finger]

1 hour ago, three-eyed monkey said:

When readers miss details like this, it's no wonder they think Ramsay wrote the letter.

I read your entire post in this topic and found nothing to back up the insult.   I'm really sorry your feelings are hurt.   Corrections are always welcome.  I don't remember even reading another Stannis wrote the Pink Letter topic.   I happen to enjoy this particular OP in general and share many of his/her views.  In addition to doubting Stannis would be cavalier about finding out Mance isn't dead I doubt I've posted anything directed at you, your topic or your ideas.  

[Hodor the Articulate]

I came back from holiday and the How do some people honestly think Ramsay wrote the pink letter? thread closed before I could reply to @sweetsunray's super loooooong post, so I'll post it here. It seems relevant, since it's debating whether or not Ramsay wrote the Pink Letter.

So yeah, this is my counter-argument to this post:

@sweetsunray Your main point of evidence seems to be that Ramsay uses various derogatory terms for women in the Pink Letter, but has only done the same once in dialogue. This ignores the context and emotional state of Ramsay in each of example scenes you presented. In the scenes where Ramsay uses euphamisms for the girls' names, he is in control. There's an ironic tone in his speech, like he’s teasing – he knows everyone knows he didn’t treat Lady Hornwood as a wife, and there’s nothing anybody can do about it. In contrast, the letter is angry and emotional, perhaps even desperate. Ramsay doesn’t have power over Jon. He isn’t in control of the situation. Hence, he loses all pretense and calls women by what he really thinks of them.

btw, using Ramsay whispering "bitch" that one time as evidence that he was not the author of the letter, is reaching. That whole exchange was whispered, not just the word "bitch". I thought the original argument was that Ramsay specifically avoided the word "whore", anyway. What happened to that goalpost?

[Hodor the Articulate]

5 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I don't think the authorship of the letter was originally intended to be a matter of serious debate. That is something that probably just occurred over time because of boredom among the fandom during the long wait for the next book.

I didn't even question the authorship of the letter while I was reading the book. For me, the mystery was whether or not the contents of the letter were true.

[three-eyed monkey]

33 minutes ago, Curled Finger said:

I read your entire post in this topic and found nothing to back up the insult.   I'm really sorry your feelings are hurt.   Corrections are always welcome.  I don't remember even reading another Stannis wrote the Pink Letter topic.   I happen to enjoy this particular OP in general and share many of his/her views.  In addition to doubting Stannis would be cavalier about finding out Mance isn't dead I doubt I've posted anything directed at you, your topic or your ideas.  

It's not an insult, apologies if you took it as such. I'm simply pointing out that it is very common for readers to think Stannis did not know about the Mance/Rattleshirt switch, even though it is very clear from the text that he was the one who allowed Mance to live. Both Mel and Mance make the point.

"And he owes you his very life."

"Me?" Snow sounded startled.

"Who else, my lord? Only his life's blood could pay for his crimes, your laws said, and Stannis Baratheon is not a man to go against the law...but as you said so sagely, the laws of men end at the Wall."

...

"Stannis burned the wrong man."

"No." The wildling grinned at him through a mouth of brown and broken teeth. "He burned the man he had to burn, for all the world to see. We all do what we have to do, Snow. Even kings."

So Mel says Mance owes his life to Jon, because it was Jon's sagely advice to Stannis that convinced the king to let Mance live. And Mance says Stannis burned the man he had to burn, for all the world to see, which means he burned "Mance" to satisfy the law, but actually kept him alive because Stannis knows the value of Mance.

"The only man who can bind them to your cause is Mance Rayder.”

“I know that,” Stannis said, unhappily. “I have spent hours speaking with the man.”

The Mance situation is in fact very similar to the Jon situation, from Stannis point of view, in that both men have a certain political value to Stannis. Mance can bind the Wildlings to his cause, as well as knowing much and more about the Others, while Jon can bind the North to his cause. The law was the main obstacle to Stannis doing what he wanted with Mance, as the law demanded Mance dead. But Stannis found a way around the law, with subterfuge, and thanks to Jon who told him the laws of men end at the Wall. Jon's vows are the main obstacle to Stannis getting what he wants from Jon, so why would Stannis not revert to subterfuge once more to accomplish his goals?

 

 

[aryagonnakill#2]

1 hour ago, three-eyed monkey said:

snip

 

Allow me to say that I did not mean to bash you or your thread here, yours is simply the most recent Stannis wrote it thread, so naturally it is the one for me to point out.  

[Aegon VII]

I'm really happy to see this and the thread in support of Stannis. After our comments on the "how do some people still believe.." thread I started putting together a more comprehensive argument for Mance writing the PL. I'm about halfway done so I'll be posting a thread very similar to this here in the next few days, I just hope someone doesn't beat me to it! I'll point out a few things here.

11 hours ago, aryagonnakill#2 said:

Now let us discuss Mance

There is a whole lot of speculation involving Mance.  Some is grounded in the text, some is not.  It is fair to speculate whether or not Stannis knows he is alive as there is some text to indicate this, but people are pulling stuff out of nowhere these days to suggest that he met up with Stannis on his way to WF, that he is in league with Mors Umber, that he is in league with Barbery Dustin, or Manderly, or I don't even know who else.  

 What are your thoughts on Mance colluding with Mors Umber? I think it's about 95% likely. For anyone who disagrees, I would suggest first revisiting the chapter in which Stannis gives Rattleshirt to Jon and then allows him to stay in the war council. Mance, as RS, hears everything he needs to to know that Mors is willing to negotiate and hates wildings because they stole his daughter. Later, Mance requests six young spearwives from molestown for a certain ploy he has in mind. The girls he gets are not young so obviously he was lying about what this ploy was. One of them is Rowan, Mors Umber's Daughter. Why else would she hold stark words sacred, accuse Theon of kinslaying, address stannis in westerosi fashion rather than wilding, etc. If you have a competing theory for Rowan that fits as well I would love to hear it. I think this is enough to convince me Mance is working with the Umbers. The coordinated horn blowing outside WF is only further proof.

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My original objection to Mance writing the letter was very simple, where the hell did a bastard born ranger turned wildling learn to read and write?  Eventually it was pointed out that he knew ABEL and BAEL were anagrams, and so I concede that tho it makes no sense, he can read/write.

I think you thoroughly underestimate Mance.

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I have seen a couple different versions of the Mance wrote the letter theory.  First that in the moments directly after the escape was discovered and the guards blew the horns that Mance was able to sneak out of the great hall, break into the rookery and write the letter to Jon, then hide in the crypts to wait it out.  2nd is that Mance snuck out of the great hall and went straight to the crypts to hide and when Ramsay returned victorious but without Theon and Jeyne he broke into the rookery and wrote the letter to Jon.  Last is that Mance somehow came across Ramsay by himself(the versions of this get pretty fantastic) and used the Ruby to somehow glamour himself as Ramsay and Ramsay as Abel and is now acting as Ramsay, and thus wrote the letter pretending to be Ramsay.  How the glamour works and why Ramsay was alone idk, I'm sure the posters who believe this will be on this thread at some point.

I've come across these theories as well. I'd hate for a good theory to get bogged down in details though. We don't have enough info to know what happened to Mance immediately following the escape and I don't think the text supports one theory any more than the other. The fact that the spearwife says Mance can fend for himself suggests that maybe they know something we don't.

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With that said the same reason why Stannis did not likely write the letter applies to Mance as well, lack of motive.  Mance believes there are some 300 wildling warriors near the wall, and that they are in no way loyal to Jon, along with the sheer distance making Jon weeks away, the whole reinforcement argument just is not valid.

GRRM gives us enough clues to show that Val and Mance could easily have still been speaking when Mance was rattleshirt at the wall. Mance might not have known the wedding would be at WF, but he could certainly climb into her window and tell Val that he was still alive and that she should do all she could to tell the wildling leaders to come to the wall and await further instruction. He already has his ploy in mind at this point, so he could know that he will try to make allies with the umbers and use trickery to take WF. We simply can't say Mance doesn't know the wildlings are at the wall. Furthermore by colluding with the Umbers, there could be a more free flow of information from the wall to Mance than we know.

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 Warning Jon could be considered a valid motive, but it would not explain why he would pretend to be Ramsay, identifying himself as Mance and validating this with a little one liner like I kicked your ass as lord o bones would make Jon more likely to immediately believe anything in the letter.  Then Mance could simply say Ramsays coming to get you with a force you cannot overcome, please get the innocents like Val and my son to safety.  

His duty to his family is probably the only thing that might make Jon desert the NW. He almost did it once before for this resaon and he reflects to himself about the Florent something like, who could sit by and do nothing while their brother burned, showing he clearly is still not okay with it. Even as he walks into Mels room with her where Mance is waiting as RS, the last thing he says is something like, "I can't do anything for her [Arya], as much as I.." and then he sees RS. Mance knows the best chance of Jon leaving WF, especially with an army of wildlings, comes from him being provoked by Ramsay and leaving to rescue Arya.

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The main reasons given for believing either Mance or Stannis wrote the letter are the presence of words/phrases that supposedly only a wildling or only Theon would use.  It is stated that only willings use the phrase "black crows" and that Theon uses the word "whore" excessively and that Ramsay has not used that word in the text.  What seems to be getting lost on the people proposing 1 of the 2 of those above arguments, is that if Stannis wrote the letter with Theons help and that is why the word whore is used, then in fact people other than wildlings would use the term "black crow" if it suited their needs, and if it was Mance than the word "whore" is not exclusively Theons to use.  What is also missed in this analysis is that Mance would not refer to Val as a wildling princess.

Basically people are selectively choosing which phrases can only be used by which people, without applying that same logic to everyone.  If "black crows" would only be used by a wildling, but "wildling princess" is a term only a southerner would use, then clearly no one could have written the letter.  The simple answer to this problem is that the letter was written as insultingly as possible by a non wildling, and was written after extracting information from wildlings.

You're close but I do believe you've come to the exact wrong conclusion. If we have language that seems to be mutually exclusive, it doesn't mean that we are wrong about it being mutually exclusive. Instead it means that the author is pretending to be someone else and using their phrases as well. The text supports only wildings saying black crows. It's used very few times, and about a third of the time it's either by Mance or about mance. Other similar language is "for all the north to see", "red witch", "cut out his heart" and ending statements with "bastard". As far as the words that a wildling doesn't use, well he's trying to be Ramsay and is thinking of what Ramsay would say. You can say this is me picking the language to suit my argument, but based on what we know of who says what, I do believe it's the correct argument. And it does not work for Ramsay or Stannis. If Ramsay is Ramsay he has no reason to use language that he doesn't use. Ramsay would only sound like Ramsay. If it is Stannis, he would be pretending to be Ramsay, so we would expect Ramsay words as well as Stannis words. The only time we would expect wildling words mixed with Ramsays words would be a wildling pretending to be Ramsay. Mance is trying to sound like Ramsay. He's heard him say the, "I'll make a cloak of their skins", he overheard a previous letter from Ramsay in which he had put ironborn on posts which is very similar to heads on walls. And he easily could have actually overheard him say "I want my bride back" "I want my Reek" after he learned they were gone. Et cetera.

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This brings us to Ramsay.

1)   No seal, only a smear of wax, no skin, no evidence it’s written in blood

2)   Threats in letter do not match his MO, e.g. heads on spikes

3)   Language used in the letter is not consistent to any one person, suggesting whomever wrote it was intentionally trying to sound like Ramsay

4)   Jon is now coming to WF with an army of wildlings to kill Ramsay, it’s hard to view this as a positive result for Ramsay if he was the author.

5)   The entire letter eloquently parallels Stannis’s burning of Mance at the wall. Ramsay has no reason to know all this or to write a letter that mirrors it.

 

These are some of the main points why I support Mance over Ramsay, let me know what you think.

 

 

 

[Lost Melnibonean]

It is known. 

[black_hart]

Very welcome thread and OP. People can't see the forest for the tasty squirrel with the pinecone anymore, it seems.

What would be the letter author's motive and how is it furthered by the letter? These two simple questions have simple answers only for Ramsay, while they need severe stretching and assumptions for everyone else put forward. This doesn't mean all the content is necessarily true etc. etc.