Heresy 196 and a look at the Wall

[Black Crow]

8 hours ago, LynnS said:

So could this account for the list of LC's being too short for a longer timeline? 

 

Ah no, the problem with Sam's dodgy list is that its far too long

[LynnS]

3 hours ago, Black Crow said:

In a word, warding

I have to go with the wall of ice crossing the tops of mountains because Jon says that Bran the Builder had to place them along the heights.  So yes from sea to sea with Forts on either end.  Anyone who lives far enough North; knows about black ice on the roads and the use of salt to break it down.  So I am going to say that if you throw an ice wight into the salt sea; you turn them into floatation devices.  As for the wights figuring out how to navigate the maze of underground tunnels; well they are zombies after all and if they aren't chasing after hot blood; it looks to me like they just lie around in the snow.  

The salt water question is interesting considering the salt tear that the Black Gate sheds for Bran when he passes.  So I wonder if tasting the salt tear of the Gate gives some kind of immunity to the killing cold stopping wight-ification.  Perhaps this says something about Coldhands and even the religion of the Drowned God.  The drowning of men in the salt sea and drinking salt water for protection against the Storm Lord.               

[Luddagain]

I have a theory as to why Lyanna's children come ahead as KoW - it is the same as the reason that targs marry their sisters - what ever the genetic trigger it needs a woman - possibly only a woman.

The King of Winter will be the eldest son of the eldest daughter of the previous mother of winter.

Thus assuming Lynara stark was one such, then Brandon , then Ned would be KoW, but possibly only after the previous KoW dies.   If Branda stark had a son then he is KoW.  Lyarra son's would follow. if Branda had no daughters then Lyarra Stark  becomes the King's mother If Lyanna is Jon's mother then HE is KoW, not Robb.

[Luddagain]

It occurs to me that some of the stories of the long night have a sense of a nuclear or a volcanic winter.

A huge volcanic eruption could well trigger a very long winter and indeed possibly winters are triggered in this way is vast dust storms shading the sun.

This is of course factual in the sense that the years following Kratatoa were years with no summers. If some of those super volcanoes erupted eg Mt Toba, we might get 5 years with no summer.

The nuclear stuff has little evidence, but the grass seas in Asshai suggest radioactivity.

 

 

[Brad Stark]

5 hours ago, LynnS said:

Back to the Wall....

Does the Wall go from sea to sea or does it stop at the mountains?  Why don't  wights and white walkers bypass the Wall by going underneath as in the tale of Gendel and Gorne? If there is a way underneath the Wall, why don't the Wildlings use it?  What is it about salt water that stops the undead? 

Wights probably can't go under the Wall.  Coldhands could not pass the Black Gate.  If the gate was the only passage once, then possibly they could pass the more recent tunnels.   We have seen people South of the Wall rise as Wights, so either Wights can be carried through the Wall and stay wights, or the dead can be raised on the South side. 

I don't think Wights and Others can cross water.  We see this in the mummers version, I am not sure how much evidence is in the books,  but it makes sense. 

I don't think we know for certain,  but we have evidence the Wall doesn't go all the way west.  Wildlings decend into the gorge to cross,  which shouldn't be possible if the Wall goes all the way to the sea.  This fits with my idea that the Wall was immediately useful,  even before it went the entire way.

[LynnS]

44 minutes ago, Brad Stark said:

Wights probably can't go under the Wall.  Coldhands could not pass the Black Gate.  If the gate was the only passage once, then possibly they could pass the more recent tunnels.   We have seen people South of the Wall rise as Wights, so either Wights can be carried through the Wall and stay wights, or the dead can be raised on the South side. 

I don't think Wights and Others can cross water.  We see this in the mummers version, I am not sure how much evidence is in the books,  but it makes sense. 

I don't think we know for certain,  but we have evidence the Wall doesn't go all the way west.  Wildlings decend into the gorge to cross,  which shouldn't be possible if the Wall goes all the way to the sea.  This fits with my idea that the Wall was immediately useful,  even before it went the entire way.

Yes, good point.  We forget about the Gorge, still a formidable barrier in itself taking some measure of skill to descend but still treacherous.  It might be stretching it to think that wights have the kind of manual skill or brain power to manage it. They are more likely to fall off the cliffs and be swept away in the river. lol  

As for the White Walkers; I'm not all the sure of their purpose.  If it turns out that they are guardians of the weirwood, There may not be a purpose in crossing the wall. 

As for Othor and Jafr, that is an interesting question.  They seem to be conveniently placed for the Watch to find and don't pose any immediate danger.   So you can bring a wight across bodily and once past the ward; they can be activated by 'hot blood'.  The ward doesn't remove the magic; it just blocks it.  The difference is that Othor has a specific target.  Rather than randomly attacking, he goes for the Lord Commander.  There is method and intent. So a wight can be controlled or aimed at someone.  

I image that the White Wakers have the ability to use wights in this way since they demonstrate intelligence and given Coldhands concern about them; it's a possility that they were placed by the wierwood grove by the WW's. But that's where their influence ends once Othor is past the Wall.  What we are told is that Othor's face shone with the light of the moon and I think that's code for a greenseer.

 

[Frey family reunion]

8 hours ago, LynnS said:

Back to the Wall....

Does the Wall go from sea to sea or does it stop at the mountains?  Why don't  wights and white walkers bypass the Wall by going underneath as in the tale of Gendel and Gorne? If there is a way underneath the Wall, why don't the Wildlings use it?  What is it about salt water that stops the undead? 

I think the easiest explanation is that GRRM was modeling his Wall after Hadrian's Wall, and Hadrian's stops just short of going "sea to sea", but it stops short on the eastern side as opposed to the western one.

Looking at the northern map in Lands of Ice and Fire, it almost looks like that the Wall rises up from the gorge.  If the gorge extends all the way from the shivering sea to the bay of ice, and the ice from the Wall was created from a salt waterway, then perhaps you can't go under the Wall.

[LynnS]

1 hour ago, Frey family reunion said:

I think the easiest explanation is that GRRM was modeling his Wall after Hadrian's Wall, and Hadrian's stops just short of going "sea to sea", but it stops short on the eastern side as opposed to the western one.

Looking at the northern map in Lands of Ice and Fire, it almost looks like that the Wall rises up from the gorge.  If the gorge extends all the way from the shivering sea to the bay of ice, and the ice from the Wall was created from a salt waterway, then perhaps you can't go under the Wall.

This is a depiction of the Bridge of Skulls and the Gorge:

http://www.fantasticmaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Bridge_Of_Skulls.jpg

And another:

http://awoiaf.westeros.org/images/b/b5/Bridgeofskullsjcbarquet.jpg

Why is there a man made bridge there at all?
 

Quote

 

A Storm of Swords - Jon IX

Bowen Marsh had chased the wildlings all the way to the Shadow Tower, it seemed, and then farther, down into the gloom of the Gorge. At the Bridge of Skulls he had met the Weeper and three hundred wildlings and won a bloody battle. But the victory had been a costly one. More than a hundred brothers slain, among them Ser Endrew Tarth and Ser Aladale Wynch. The Old Pomegranate himself had been carried back to the Shadow Tower sorely wounded. Maester Mullin was tending him, but it would be some time before he was fit to return to Castle Black.

 

 

[Melifeather]

12 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

Whether the Nights King being the 13th man to lead the Watch and the Last Hero having 12 companions are connected literally or symbolically,  it is an interesting connection.  It is almost more interesting if it is symbolic.  But it could be a complete coincidence - what if I found there were 13 tournaments in the text, or 13 named members of House Mormont?

I don't know how much people are familiar with meditation, but the brain is separated into a left (logic) side and a right (spiritual) side. The pineal gland is like our third eye. The two halves of the brain are covered with a veil that has the appearance of a spider's web. The twelve tribes/12 companions are the twelve cranial nerves that surround the temple/tabernacle/god/Last Hero. Through meditation thought and logic are gently pushed away while focusing on the breath. The goal is to light up the pineal (third eye) and gain entrance into the right side of the brain. When the pineal gland lights up it's like blowing a horn and the walls closing off the right side fall down allowing access. 

[Frey family reunion]

9 minutes ago, LynnS said:

This is a depiction of the Bridge of Skulls and the Gorge:

http://www.fantasticmaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Bridge_Of_Skulls.jpg

 

Yea that was the image I was referring to. And while it's unlikely that the gorge goes from coast to coast, I do wonder if perhaps there was a canal from the shivering sea to wherever the gorge ends, which could have provided a navigable waterway through Westeros until the waters were frozen to help build the Wall. 

[JNR]

On 3/8/2017 at 9:07 AM, LynnS said:

Although I think the foundation ice was put down with magic running east to west as Black Crow suggests and so it's original height was much lower. 

Sure, this is what I had intended to suggest.  If per GRRM the Wall "took thousands of years to be raised to its present height," then clearly it was originally far shorter.  

You also see this in the tale of the Night's King; if he spied his true love from atop the Wall, and knew her to be attractive, he certainly wasn't standing seven hundred feet above her.  Not unless he had military-grade binoculars.

On 3/8/2017 at 9:07 AM, LynnS said:

I don't think the Watch had much to do with it until the arrival of the Andals because I don't think the Watch had the manpower or the knowledge for such a feat.

Bear in mind that following the Long Night, the First Men all over Westeros would have had an incredible incentive to pool resources and build such a barrier.  Half their continent, roughly, had just been devastated. 

And they would have done it in the narrowest geographical location of the Far North, if they possibly could, to minimize the work and time, because they couldn't know when the Popsicles and wights would be back.  They would need to get it done as quickly as they could. Sure enough, that's just what we see on a map.  (If the Stark house words stem from the time, I wouldn't be even the least surprised.)

The Wall -- even its foundation, meaning the oldest part of it -- is made of blocks. Giants and CotF don't build anything out of blocks; there's no exception anywhere in canon.  So the conclusion that men built the Wall isn't much of a leap.

As for the Watch, the conventional idea is that it was founded after the Long NIght to man the Wall, but that is not the same as the idea that it built the initial Wall.  I think that was a joint effort of the First Men generally, due to their powerful shared incentive.

Brandon the Builder, who is said in myth to have built the initial version of the Wall, is not said to have belonged to the Watch.  He was, however, the Stark in Winterfell, who gave the Watch the land known as Brandon's Gift.  So this suggests, IMO, that it was not simply the Watch building the Wall back then... not by a long shot.

However, if the Watch subsequently raised the Wall, as Jeor Mormont tells us, that would have been an incredibly slow process, taking thousands of years.  Which is exactly what GRRM says it did take.

[LynnS]

1 minute ago, Frey family reunion said:

Yea that was the image I was referring to. And while it's unlikely that the gorge goes from coast to coast, I do wonder if perhaps there was a canal from the shivering sea to wherever the gorge ends, which could have provided a navigable waterway through Westeros until the waters were frozen to help build the Wall. 

It's an interesting idea that the foundation ice of the Wall is made of salt water. 

Quote

When the sea water or saltwater freezes, it does so slowly. When it begins to freeze, it slowly crystallizes around a nucleus and keeps on crystallizing outwards. Since it is solidifying slowly, when it forms the lattice, there is no room left for salt inclusions. As a result, all the salt is pushed out on the frontiers of the solidifying mass until it reaches the complete outside of the chunk of ice that has formed. Thus, the iceberg so formed will consist of freshwater as well.

 

[LynnS]

5 minutes ago, JNR said:

You also see this in the tale of the Night's King; if he spied his true love from atop the Wall, and knew her to be attractive, he certainly wasn't standing seven hundred feet above her.  Not unless he had military-grade binoculars.

There it is again... the iron-clad logic.  You keep making perfectly reasonable arguments.  Is somebody helping you?

[Black Crow]

1 hour ago, Frey family reunion said:

I think the easiest explanation is that GRRM was modeling his Wall after Hadrian's Wall, and Hadrian's stops just short of going "sea to sea", but it stops short on the eastern side as opposed to the western one.

Not quite says he, who actually lives there.

On the eastern side it stops at what is now called [with a stunning lack of originality] Wallsend, just below the lowest fording point on the river Tyne. The last couple of miles to the sea were covered by a large fort, corresponding to Eastwatch at the mouth of the Tyne. On the western side it stops on the Solway but then continues as a row of forts along what corresponds in Martin's world to the Frozen Shore.

[Black Crow]

8 hours ago, LynnS said:

I have to go with the wall of ice crossing the tops of mountains because Jon says that Bran the Builder had to place them along the heights.                

Hadrians Wall does this, most spectacularly along the Great Whin Sill, so GRRM has real world precedent enough.

[Frey family reunion]

I guess the best model of what I'm thinking of is the Baltic Waterway in Russia.  It's a series of canals which connect to rivers forming a navigable channel from the White Sea to the Gulf of Finland. 

The Wall being a Sword on eastern half, and a snake on the western, would be consistent with a man made canal being dug from the Shivering Sea to a river, which then snakes it's way to the Bay of Ice gradually forming a gorge through the mountains. 

We know that the Wall goes some distance underground, because the underground wormways go into the Wall itself. 

This would have allowed easy access to the amount of water needed to form the Ice Wall.  And it would also mean that the Wall not only provided a land barrier from north to south, but it also provided a barrier from traveling by waterway from west to east.

[Black Crow]

8 hours ago, LynnS said:

The salt water question is interesting considering the salt tear that the Black Gate sheds for Bran when he passes.  So I wonder if tasting the salt tear of the Gate gives some kind of immunity to the killing cold stopping wight-ification.  Perhaps this says something about Coldhands and even the religion of the Drowned God.  The drowning of men in the salt sea and drinking salt water for protection against the Storm Lord.               

 

As to this one, I've always read this as a salt tear being shed by someone. Or to put it another way the black gate isn't made of weirwood as Bran first thinks, but is indeed an incredibly old man imprisoned by some dark magick

[LynnS]

35 minutes ago, JNR said:

Not unless he had military-grade binoculars.

I'm guessing the Night's King had third eye capability and it wasn't just his looks that made him attractive to the corpse queen.

Quote

A Clash of Kings - Jon VII

He sniffed at the bark, smelled wolf and tree and boy, but behind that there were other scents, the rich brown smell of warm earth and the hard grey smell of stone and something else, something terrible. Death, he knew. He was smelling death. He cringed back, his hair bristling, and bared his fangs.

Don't be afraid, I like it in the dark. No one can see you, but you can see them. But first you have to open your eyes. See? Like this. And the tree reached down and touched him.

And suddenly he was back in the mountains, his paws sunk deep in a drift of snow as he stood upon the edge of a great precipice. Before him the Skirling Pass opened up into airy emptiness, and a long vee-shaped valley lay spread beneath him like a quilt, awash in all the colors of an autumn afternoon.

 

A vast blue-white wall plugged one end of the vale, squeezing between the mountains as if it had shouldered them aside, and for a moment he thought he had dreamed himself back to Castle Black. Then he realized he was looking at a river of ice several thousand feet high. Under that glittering cold cliff was a great lake, its deep cobalt waters reflecting the snowcapped peaks that ringed it. There were men down in the valley, he saw now; many men, thousands, a huge host. Some were tearing great holes in the half-frozen ground, while others trained for war. He watched as a swarming mass of riders charged a shield wall, astride horses no larger than ants. The sound of their mock battle was a rustling of steel leaves, drifting faintly on the wind. Their encampment had no plan to it; he saw no ditches, no sharpened stakes, no neat rows of horse lines. Everywhere crude earthen shelters and hide tents sprouted haphazardly, like a pox on the face of the earth. He spied untidy mounds of hay, smelled goats and sheep, horses and pigs, dogs in great profusion. Tendrils of dark smoke rose from a thousand cookfires.

 

This is no army, no more than it is a town. This is a whole people come together.

 

Across the long lake, one of the mounds moved. He watched it more closely and saw that it was not dirt at all, but alive, a shaggy lumbering beast with a snake for a nose and tusks larger than those of the greatest boar that had ever lived. And the thing riding it was huge as well, and his shape was wrong, too thick in the leg and hips to be a man.

 

[LynnS]

5 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

 

As to this one, I've always read this as a salt tear being shed by someone. Or to put it another way the black gate isn't made of weirwood as Bran first thinks, but is indeed an incredibly old man imprisoned by some dark magick

Oh that is tantalizing!  And think I'm on the same track with you on that one.

[Black Crow]

Well we don't actually know what happened to the Nights King when he was overthrown...