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Venus of the Woods (The Weirwood Goddess)


LmL

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18 hours ago, LmL said:

So, here you're getting into whitewashing territory, and we must summon @Pain killer Jane and @ravenous reader and @Blue Tiger. The three Norns were said to whitewash Yggdrasil every day, and there seems to be signs of George using that idea in regards to the weirwoods. I'm not the best to explain it, because I do not understand it fully. I'm not sure if it matters what they used to look like, only that we think of them as transformed and / or corrupted. 

What is thy bidding, my master?

Heavy, mechanical breathing

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I have found that all the key ASOIAF myths, or most of them, seem to have that Prometheus / Adam and Eve theme going on. It's always about man committing some original sin or theft. That is what brought me to looking for ways that magicians might.. somehow.. steer a comet into a moon. As strange as it sounds, that's what is suggested, in my opinion and others. I've actually put this out as an open question a couple of times, and most people seem to think that in a fantasy novel, there probably was original sin that 'caused it.' 

Especially the later... the similarities are numerous:

Spoiler
Book of Genesis

Chapter 3

[3:1] Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God say, 'You shall not eat from any tree in the garden'?"
[3:2] The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden;
[3:3] but God said, 'You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die. '"
[3:4] But the serpent said to the woman, "You will not die;
[3:5] for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
[3:6] So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate.
[3:7] Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.
[3:8] They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.
[3:9] But the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, "Where are you?"
[3:10] He said, "I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself."
[3:11] He said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?"
[3:12] The man said, "The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate."
[3:13] Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this that you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent tricked me, and I ate."
[3:14] The LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, cursed are you among all animals and among all wild creatures; upon your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life.
[3:15] I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel."
[3:16] To the woman he said, "I will greatly increase your pangs in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children, yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you."
[3:17] And to the man he said, "Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree about which I commanded you, 'You shall not eat of it,' cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
[3:18] thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field.
[3:19] By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return."
[3:20] The man named his wife Eve, because she was the mother of all living.
[3:21] And the LORD God made garments of skins for the man and for his wife, and clothed them.
[3:22] Then the LORD God said, "See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever"--
[3:23] therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken.
[3:24] He drove out the man; and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life.

 

 

 

It features a guy whose name starts with A:   Azor (A Biblical name)       Adam

A serpent connected with brining light/wisdom appears: Lightbringer Comet    Lucifer

A tree of knowledge/life appears:                             Weirwoods             The Tree of Life

A flaming sword is featured:                                 Lightbringer                angels with flaming swords

The sword punishes those who reached too high: +                                       +

Giants:                                                               wake from stone              Nephilim

Flood:                                                               Hammer of Waters                   Deluge

 

 

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@LmL

Nice job dragon. Thanks for the shout-outs and advertising 'Killing Word' (I didn't know you were that fond of that essay, lol...)!  Some thoughts which occurred to me while reading:

(1) The catspaw who gets his paw/hand bloodied in the mouth of the weirwood Cat, resulting in the 'red-handed' symbol reminds me of two instances:

--  the Prologue, of course, where Will is described as the hunter 'caught redhanded' skinning the Mallister buck, symbolism which is later reinforced when he gets the 'sticky sap' on his hands and face climbing the tree (before he issues the Killing Word = 'whispered prayer to the nameless gods of the wood', summoning the Others).

--  Then we're seeing the same thing in Jaqen (I can't remember if you mentioned him or not...) who puts his hand into the weirwood's mouth, symbolically facilitating the same 'redhandedness', when swearing his allegiance to Arya. As her sworn (s)word, he becomes Arya's 'right hand man.'  In that scenario, Arya is the Will-greenseer with Jaqen as her Hand/assassin.  Symbolically, as the dominant hand (in most people) used as a tool for most activities (including nefarious ones), the 'right hand' is the bloody red one.  That's why it's the one Jaime has amputated (the same he used to commit kinslaying, oathbreaking, incest and attempted child murder, as he himself points out in the Venus bathtub scene with Brienne, as he suggestively 'thrusts' the ragged stump into her face).  

(2) In conjunction with weirwood as library -- with reference to the convo we had the other day about Dany escaping the warlocks and the HOTU, that can be understood as Dany escaping the weirnet library; and accordingly I think we can draw a parallel with another dragon, Tyrion, who infiltrates, then 'escapes' the Winterfell library, moreover taking 'stolen knowledge of the gods' with him in the form of the books 'borrowed'.  As I recall, wonky seasons/climate change and dragons were the subjects that most interested him -- so, those are likely the books he removed, and also the topics likely to be at the heart of the 'secret knowledge' behind GRRM's core mysteries.

(3) The spine of Cat/NN/the weirwood is analogous to the serpentine steps we find everywhere, e.g. the tortuous external (why is it exterior not interior...most unusual...) spiral staircase Tyrion climbs to access and escape the Winterfell library.  The injunction Dany receives to 'always take the door to your right' might also be interpreted to signify tracing a spiral pathway. It also occurs to me that books also have 'spines,' don't they!

(4) Nice statement of the fool's spirit being absorbed by the tree with Cat taking on the lackwit's characteristics. 'Absorption of a fool's spirit' is also a reiteration of the pun on spirit as the distillation and subsequent imbibing of an intoxicating, mind-altering beverage which we discussed at length on the poetry thread, among others (Jethro Tull and John Barleycorn spring to mind!)  

(5)  It's very interesting how the merging of AA and tree is represented by this kind of mutual mirroring. I think that's what we're seeing with the 'Japanese tentacular' stuff, lol -- the way the weirwood roots penetrate the greenseers mirrors the greenseers having penetrated the weirwoods. Mutual penetration -- like in the Asha 'blurring of the cock and cunt' quote!   And we're seeing the same kind of mutual assimilation of characteristics between the wargs and their wolves (a bit of the wolf remains in the warg; and vice versa). The dialectic of hunter becoming hunted, etc.

(6) The 'whittlestick' carving reference is a brilliant catch! as well as...

(7) LS hissing through her fingers like a weirwood whispering through its branches ...that's also another echo of Will 'lost among the needles' of the sentinel whispering his 'prayer', which if it's in the same language as the one LS now speaks is in Brienne's words 'the language of the damned'. As I keep saying, Will's prayer was not benign.

(8) 'Jaime Lannister sends his regards' ties in to my 'mocking-and-countermocking' theme. The messenger / proxy assassin essentially delivers the killing word!  There's another reference related to this with LF sarcastically telling Ned that he 'bears a token of Brandon Stark's esteem' -- of course LF paid the debt owing to the Starks with interest! (are we sure LF's not a Lannister? He always pays his 'debts'). Sending ones esteem represented by sending a rose (I love the rose as comet) belies the thorns hiding beneath the token (like the thorns hidden in the wreath of blue roses Rhaegar delivered to Lyanna.  If the pattern of the parallel holds, this might imply that another shadowy figure was in effect manipulating Rhaegar to deliver the killing blow.

(9) How do you reconcile the dynamic of a woman sacrificing a maester/fool/stagman to the heart tree with the opposite of a maester sacrificing a woman? About the mirroring, the 'mutual death symbolism' etc. -- it's a difficult concept. Perhaps recap and rephrase next episode. Why do you think GRRM is doing that?

(10) The 'unnatural' descriptor is interesting. Have you done a search for other examples? I remember Cersei referred to the direwolves as 'unnatural' and didn't want them coming south with her.

(11) Good catch of GRRM's macabre steak/stake joke. I think you're right...There's this:

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A Storm of Swords - Samwell II

"Ended," cried his raven. "Ended." Sam was red-eyed and sick from the smoke. When he looked at the fire, he thought he saw Bannen sitting up, his hands coiling into fists as if to fight off the flames that were consuming him, but it was only for an instant, before the swirling smoke hid all. The worst thing was the smell, though. If it had been a foul unpleasant smell he might have stood it, but his burning brother smelled so much like roast pork that Sam's mouth began to water, and that was so horrible that as soon as the bird squawked "Ended" he ran behind the hall to throw up in the ditch.

 

(12)  I loved the scene with Brienne the shy maid 'moon-/dream-' whispering to Jaime, willing him to live. Could there be a connection/parallel with the 3EC whispering in the coma dream to Bran, willing him, likewise the fallen solar figure like Jaime, to live, 'fly or die'...Is the 3EC a woman (the voice is never given a gender, just described as 'high and thin')? @GloubieBoulga once suggested the Crow might be a woman!

(13)  The idea of the stars themselves possessing language and uttering 'killing words' can be found both in the 'stone voices' of the gargoyles that were once lions outlined against the moon in Bran's vision; the moon 'cackling Snow' ominously at Ghost as he attempts to flee towards the cave of night; as well as Sam's encounter with the wights in which he was rescued by ravens:

A Storm of Swords - Samwell III

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Sam made a whimpery sound. "It's not fair . . ." "Fair." The raven landed on his shoulder. "Fair, far, fear." It flapped its wings, and screamed along with Gilly. The wights were almost on her. He heard the dark red leaves of the weirwood rustling, whispering to one another in a tongue he did not know. The starlight itself seemed to stir, and all around them the trees groaned and creaked. Sam Tarly turned the color of curdled milk...

(14) Great connection of the ship mast plus moon being analogous to a tree, a disembodied head on a stick, and a candle (glass candle?)! It's also like a lighthouse tower. It's reminiscent of that dream bran has of the windowless black tower with the moon at the top...so is the windowless black tower analogous to the weirwoods?

(15) Varamyr's prologue: I love the idea of the 'weirwood crutch'...there are many such examples of people leaning on branches for support...and it evokes the idea of someone crippled like Bran. Alternatively, perhaps the 'fallen bran(ch)' is representative of Bran the fallen who will be exploited by another (?BR/COTF) for some nefarious purpose?

(16) A strong finish to your essay! I especially liked your highlighting of the world-shattering event of the greenseer entering the tree etc. supported by all the quotes you pulled. Same thing in the Prologue -- sh** really goes down once Will goes into the tree (and says the damning prayer which is whispered through the leaves/needles).

(17) Could 'frozen blood' be equivalent to 'frozen fire', considering blood and fire are symbolically synonymous? Valyrian steel as frozen blood?

(18) Plunging into the cold lake is interesting. That's the cold black pool at the foot of the weirwood and your 'ice moon'.

 

... with compliments,  your faithful muse (or one of the 3 Norns...)  B)

 

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1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

(12)  I loved the scene with Brienne the shy maid 'moon-/dream-' whispering to Jaime, willing him to live. Could there be a connection/parallel with the 3EC whispering in the coma dream to Bran, willing him, likewise the fallen solar figure like Jaime, to live, 'fly or die'...Is the 3EC a woman (the voice is never given a gender, just described as 'high and thin')? @GloubieBoulga once suggested the Crow might be a woman!

Hi all ! 

I used to interprete the Brienne's dream like a "soft possession" by a greenseer (the tongue cut is the signal)

Congratulations @LmL ! 

I didn't have finished with reading all the stuff, but I was very interested by the chapter where Catelyn and Bran's wolf save Bran from the catspaw and all the connections. So I re-read it, and I found that the wolf wasn't at this moment a "silver smoke", but a "shadow" : it is a detail, but I think that GRRM refers explicitely with this word to the Others :  "silver smoke" is also in the same thematic, but not for the same acting : "shadow" is the killer, and "smoke" is for the "dissipation/dissolution", "silver" is associated with the moon, and for me, if the players are the same, the moment of the story isn't the same

 Before Others (and/or their creatures) appears, if the moon is visible, there is also always a wolf howl (without the moon, the "howling" is a babe's plaint, and I suspect that the "moon maid" lost her first child, as a bastard wolf lost the "moon maid").

The very interesting thing in Catelyn's chapter is that she can't support the wolves howling and want them dead, but, what the hell, why ?? Wolves are Stark's sigil and their 'identity', and she treats them like she did with Jon when he came to see Bran in his bedchamber. 

Then, Bran's wolf kills the catspaw and saves Bran and Cat : the wolf arrives like the "striking hand", the "weapon" of the greenseer = this could be a manner to express that the Others were once the "hand" of a greenseer. But I don't think that Catelyn could here represent the 3EC itself, but sure, she is the mother of a greenseer, and represent imo the ancient mother of the 3EC, who wasn't a greenseer herself but had the gift in her blood-lineage which was preferentialy linked to ravens (I suspect she was from the Blackwood family, without knowing if this lineage had the same name, and I hope we'll receive some answer, one day, concerning Raventree's weirwood... and the true origins of the quarrel between Bracken and Blackwood). 

In think @ravenous reader could finish for me the story I have in mind ^^ (clue : the first hadn't originaly the wolf's blood but stole it to a bastard)

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Little adding : there is also a parallelism between Catelyn and Cersei : after the catspaw's episode, Catelyn flying to KL and capturing Tyrion Lannister to have "justice" for Bran (and Tyrion acquires a skin of a shadowcat during his captivity) is like Cersei demanding to RObert a wolf's skin after Joffrey was bite by Nymeria. 

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13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:
23 hours ago, LmL said:

Hi there friends. I have a question for you. Why do so many women in the story turn into weirwoods? It happens over and over again. Here's what I mean. 

I am not so sure this is a female only issue... even though we are the ones who sprout the next germs of the world;) 

I recently started a reread/relisten, and there is a Ned chapter where his mouth filled with blood, and he tasted blood, etc. And I think Tyrion does in ADWD as well?

Hey Leech, wattup! Great to have you drop by. I will say that you seem to be going off my summary here as opposed to the full essay, so a lot of your questions / observations are addressed in the main essay. Hopefully I've got your interest enough to interest you in the full version, because I can't really go back and forth until you've taken a look at my reasoning there. I will respond to a couple of these, but a lot of it will be "well, in the full essay, I point out that..." so just bear that in mind. 

On this first one, I do address that in the essay. What I have found is that we get a consistent occurrence of the skinchanger / comet person invading the weirwood woman, but when they do so, they merge with the ww woman and they both start sharing the same symbolism. You'll notice the catspaw has his throat torn out - he gets a red smile, just as Cat almost got a red smile, and did get blood in her mouth. The skinchanger / comet person is repeatedly labelled a fool or lackwit, but the ww woman loses her wits at this moment of stigmata as well. 

The other thing I will point out is that I am keying on occurrences of multiple ww symbols, not just when a person gets a bloody mouth, or just bloody hands. I am looking for scenes when we have symbolism of a lightbringer / dragon / comet thing invading a ww symbol, and also being sacrificed to it, and in these moments, the ww woman will manifest most or all of the major ww symbols. I think the bloody mouth / red smile / torn out tongue is probably the most important symbol of the lot, and ties into a larger concept with silence and words and all that. So in scenes where someone has a bloody mouth but not the other ww symbols, we might consider how the torn-out tongue / bloody mouth idea interacts with whatever is going on in that scene. I'd have to go back and study each to be able to give an opinion. Take a look at the full essay and see what you think, and we can run with it and try to grock what is going on with the torn out tongue / red smile idea. 

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:
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The weirwood resembles a bleeding and burning tree person. It has the bloody face, of course - the carved eyes and mouth which 'bleed' red sap. The red, five-pointed leaves are introduced to us in AGOT as looking like "a thousand bloodstained hands." Those hands can also be thought of as the tree's hair - the leaves on a tree look like it's hair, especially when the trunk has a face.

George has a thing for red heads, both in his literature, and in his own real life. His last two romances were both with red heads. Plus the phrase, "red in the head, hot in the hole." That is very Ice and Firey.

@ravenous reader got a big kick out of this, pottymouth that she is. ;) You are more right than you know however, because we (mostly RR) has picked up on this idea of a front door and a back door, with the front door being associated with fire and AA, and the backdoor with the Others and ice. Cold shits, man. All the buggering humor may pertain to this, but you'd have to ask RR. So yeah, red in the head and hot in the hole... the front at least. 

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:
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So, bloody hands, bloody mouth, bloody tears, bloody hair - these are the symbols of the weirwood. I say it looks to be bleeding AND burning based on a quote from ACOK:

Eh :dunno:, I know that posters like to compare and merge the idea that the fire is in everything, but I don't see it nearly as much as others do. George uses a variety of elemental imagery in all of his stories, but what fire means to one character is different than what it means to another character. Kinda like how I may have a dream where I am covered in snakes, and to me that is a soft, warn, fuzzy, nice dream, but to others it is sheer terror.

The train of thought you are missing from the main essay is that the ww women are all moon maidens also. There is ample fire symbolism besides the idea of the ww leaves as "a blaze of flame"and red hair being "kissed by fire." The archetype here is really three parts: tree, woman, and fire. A burning tree woman. So I understand your point of view, but reserve judgement until you see the whole thing, particularly the "shy maiden" line of symbolism in the second half of the essay.

 

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:
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So, that's the fire component, and that is why I describe the weirwoods as perpetually bleeding and burning tree people. In addition to the symbolism of the bloody mouth, bloody hands, red or bloody eyes, and bloody hair, we can also think about red, "kissed by fire" hair, or burning hands, burning hair, shifting robes that make one look on fire (think of Mel and the red priests here) as weirwood symbolism. 

I don't see this as a good thing. The kissed by fire people tend to burn out too quickly. It is a form of extremism and George rewards those who are nice and moderate. A little of this, a little of that.

Well, the key here is the idea of flame that burns but is not consumed. That's Lightbringer, and that's also where the burning bush parallel comes in. I talk about this specifically in the essay, actually, and I think the burning tree symbolism of the weirwood is that of a fire that burns but is not consumed. It's like, frozen in the moment of incineration.

Also, you're right, this may not be a good thing. That's kind of the great debate about the fire of the gods, which is the sword without a hilt. BTW, you will notice that a comet looks like a hiltless sword. When Gendry saw the red comet, he called it the red sword, thinking of a sword red hot out of the forge. That's before the sword is given a crossguard or hilt, and that's when it looks like a comet the best. :) 

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

Mel, I don't think, is weirwood symbolism at all... red and white aside. She follows R'hllor, and thereby Azor Ahai, which is the Pale Child Bakkalon/Simon Kress, and that is not good news in the long haul.

Oh ho! Mel has a ton of ww symbolism, although I completely understand why people wouldn't think so at first. I will simply say "reserve judgement until you read the whole thing." Mel is actually the center of all of this in many ways. 

Also, my premise to this Weirwood Compendium series is that Azor Ahai was a greenseer - that's kind of the overarching theme. There is an interaction between fire and dragon stuff and weirwoods and Westeros that is right at the center of the story. 

Most of this is bad news, yes. 

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:
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There's also a line of symbolism concerning the red smile and having your tongue torn out. The weirwoods are silent - they appear to be screaming or laughing, but make no sound. Their bloody mouths suggest one who has had their tongue torn out,

Or, one who has consumed "paste".

The tongues torn out suggests something more sinister like Euron and Faith/7- Silent Sisters. It is suppression for people, for women in particular. George brings up this issue in a few of his stories, most detailed in Dying of the Light where the researchers straight up tell the other characters (and readers) that women and their achievements have been erased from history by the maesters.

I think these sinister associations with tongue tearing should be placed on the weirwoods. That's the whole point of the bloody, silent scream, I believe. There is a terrible truth buried here. 

As for the Odin comparison, its simply the idea of sacrificing the physical self to gain for the spiritual self. Odin hangs on Yggdrasil, sacrificing his physical self to gain magic power - the runes. He tears his eye out and throws it into Mimir's well, in order to show himself worthy of drinking the water and opening his third eye. Martin is using this idea with Bran, who loses his legs but will be able to fly with his third eye. It's the basic premise behind the greenseer having to sacrifice their physical body to enter the wwnet, whether it be slowly as Bloodraven does, or instantly, in the case of the hypothesized "killing a greenseer to carve the first faces and open up the weirwoodnet."

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

Now, how directly GRRM is going to repeat himself, I dunno :dunno:, but he does like to reuse his own themes. (Nightflyers :wub:)

That's the whole deal. I call ASOIAF a fractal story, with so many repeating patterns (repeating with variations and inversion, of course). I fully expect the Dawn Age drama and the final drama of the main story to match in many ways. Not exactly the same, but probably inverted or harmonizing or whatever. 

 

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:
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Finally, I will leave with one final teaser: Jon and Ghost. It's been pointed out many times in the books that Ghost has the same blood and bone coloring of the weirwood, with red eyes and jaws and white fur. Jon has been sacrificed - given a red smile, in fact, by someone whose name implies wood carving (Wick Whittlestick).

From what we know, Jon is not given any wounds that could translate to a literal or figurative smile.

Hmm, I am curious how you are confused about this. The first wound Jon gets is a slash across the neck, the red smile. That's the one Wick Whittlestick gives him, and I think it's the killing blow.

13 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

He was straight up shanked by the the guys who were really the ones breaking oaths- stabbed in the back. Those who mutinied against their LC either because they were meddling with southron politics, and/or because Melisandre used magics to make them stab Jon. That is the Old God on fire.

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Where is Jon going? Inside his weirwood colored wolf.

Possibly, but his mortal body is not dead-dead if you follow the other examples we have seen already. Nope, I do not mean Berric or Catelyn. They are from something else.

No, I disagree strongly. Jon is dead. Just like in the show, he's dead. That cut across the throat was fatal, and here's how we know. 

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He saw the glint of steel, turned toward it. "No blades!" he screamed. "Wick, put that knife …"

… away, he meant to say. When Wick Whittlestick slashed at his throat, the word turned into a grunt. Jon twisted from the knife, just enough so it barely grazed his skin. He cut me. When he put his hand to the side of his neck, blood welled between his fingers. "Why?"

 

He thought the knife only knicked him, but the blood instantly welling beneath his fingers mean his jugular was hit. Otherwise it would not "well," which indicates the blood issuing from the wound with enough volume and force to push between his fingers. This is consistent with neck wounds, because there are not a lot of nerve receptors on the front of your throat. You don't feel a lot of pain with such a wound, reportedly. But the blood wells quickly because when the jugular is cut.. that's what happens. When you're jugular is opened, you only have about a minute to live.

That's exactly what happens - Jon is already losing feeling in his hand before he's stabbed a fourth time. That's why he never felt the fourth knife. He's already losing consciousness and bleeding out. No magic is needed. It's all super consistent with a partial neck slicing. 

And just to nail this down, the very first lines of the chapter after Jon never felt the fourth knife, only the cold, are these:

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The Dornish prince was three days dying.

He took his last shuddering breath in the bleak black dawn, as cold rain hissed from a dark sky to turn the brick streets of the old city into rivers. The rain had drowned the worst of the fires, but wisps of smoke still rose from the smoldering ruin that had been the pyramid of Hazkar, and the great black pyramid of Yherizan where Rhaegal had made his lair hulked in the gloom like a fat woman bedecked with glowing orange jewels.

Perhaps the gods are not deaf after all, Ser Barristan Selmy reflected as he watched those distant embers. If not for the rain, the fires might have consumed all of Meereen by now.

He saw no sign of dragons, but he had not expected to. The dragons did not like the rain. A thin red slash marked the eastern horizon where the sun might soon appear. It reminded Selmy of the first blood welling from a wound. Often, even with a deep cut, the blood came before the pain.

 

I believe this is one of the many instances of George carrying over a symbolic narrative from the end of one chapter to the beginning of the next. Jon is a Dornish prince in that he was born in the Tower of Joy, and the three days dying seems like an obvious Christ on the cross reference, and of course Jon and the Azor Ahai archetype he plays into have abundant messiah / Jesus symbolism.

The black dawn I see as a reference to Valyrian steel and black ice - Dawn is like white V steel, so a black dawn is v steel. Jon is armored in black ice in his AA dream because the black ice is something of a personal symbol for him. Dragonglass is black ice too, imo, and Jon is compared to dragonglass on several occassions. He is the black sword of all black swords (the NW are black brothers who are also swords in the darkness). I also pointed out that "mourning clothes" are black, so the black brothers are like black swords of the mourning. Black Dawn. The cold rain and rivers in the streets recalls on of Jon's most important scenes, at the Wall before he lets the wildlings through in ADWD:

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Jon Snow turned away. The last light of the sun had begun to fade. He watched the cracks along the Wall go from red to grey to black, from streaks of fire to rivers of black ice. Down below, Lady Melisandre would be lighting her nightfire and chanting, Lord of Light, defend us, for the night is dark and full of terrors.

"Winter is coming," Jon said at last, breaking the awkward silence, "and with it the white walkers. The Wall is where we stop them. The Wall was made to stop them … but the Wall must be manned. 

 

Streaks of red fire turning to black ice - fiery meteors turning to cold black stone to make magic swords with, the first dragon-steel swords if you will. This is when the last light of the sun fades, the solar king turns away and becomes the dark solar king. The cracks in the Wall is where Jon sees the red fire and black ice, and a chink in the Wall is where Dany saw the blue rose in her vision. I see these both as symbols of Jon - the blue rose is for his heritage from Lyanna, and the red fire and black ice show us dragon symbolism which incorporates the frozen fire / black ice symbolism. When Jon dreams of the burning red sword, he is armored in black ice, and I see that as a match to this scene. 

Which brings us to the line about the red slash sunrise. Jon is a solar character, as I mentioned, and his resurrection will be the rising of a new sun. The return of dragons, in a sense. Barristan is looking for dragons, and looking for the rising sun. The place where the sun will appear is marked by the red slash that is like the deep cut which gives blood before pain. That's exactly what just happened to Jon - he had a cut deeper than he realized, and the blood welled before he felt much pain from it. Martin gave us this very detailed account of deep cuts and pain and blood not four paragraphs after Jon was cut, and I obviously am making the case that is done intentionally.

So Jon is dead, I feel confident.

But here's the thing - have you read my Green Zombie series? The main reason most people are holding on to the idea that Jon might not be dead is because they don't want him to become like Beric or Stoneheart, just a remnant. But he won't be like that, precisely because he is a skinchanger and his soul will temporarily be stored inside Ghost instead of beginning to dissipate. Skinchanger zombies, I believe, are of central importance to the story. The last hero was one, Jon will  be one, and Coldhands is one too. According to me, of course. :) I laid all that out in the green Zombie series. The point is that Jon will be the best kind of zombie, the one who is capable of journeying into the cold dead lands and taking on the Others. That's why the Last Hero had to be a skinchanger zombie, like Coldhands - only a zombie is ideal to live in the cold dead lands, because he doesn't need to eat or sleep or be warm, and skinchanger zombie smake the best zombie sby virtue of the animal familiar acting as a soul jar.

In fact, I speculate that Jon will merge with Ghost to some extent, and what comes back to Jon's reanimated corpse will be both Jon and Ghost. He will be a badass wolfman zombie. That's nothing to be disappointed about. 

14 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

Yes, Jon will be reborn very symbolically, but he is not dead-dead.

Yeah he is! =P

14 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

He will have a knowledge awakening where he actually friggin', finally knows something :P

I agree on this, and on your notion of his spirit journeying around, probably visiting the crypts, learning things, etc. He might even face a confrontation in the wwnet. 

 

14 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:
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This is why the weirwood tree works so well being symbolized by women -

Hey man, all hail the mighty V :commie:. Any old hippy who married a feminist from a lesbian restaurant would be happy to do so.

:cheers:

 

14 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

However, there is a weirwood woman that is with Jon at this moment that can, and most likely will, help him recover.

Yes, on Reddit someone was also speculating about Val being a part of raising Jon. She has a lot of Weirwood symbolism, but it's all icy instead of fiery. I would say that is because we have two moons - or had two moons - one of ice, and one of fire. Thus we have icy and fiery moon maidens. Other icy moon maidens would be the Corpse Queen, Lyanna, Sansa AFTER she gets the Eyrie (she is fire before that in KL), Jeyne Pool, Alys karstark ("Winter's Lady"). 

 

14 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said:

I am two behind (sorry) but I will catch up soon. I have LOTS of felting to do this week and it is best when I listen to your casts while I work ;)

Hooray! I love reading to people while they work. It's a win-win. I will await your thoughts after you've gone through some of it. :)

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6 minutes ago, LmL said:

Yes, on Reddit someone was also speculating about Val being a part of raising Jon. She has a lot of Weirwood symbolism, but it's all icy instead of fiery. I would say that is because we have two moons - or had two moons - one of ice, and one of fire. Thus we have icy and fiery moon maidens. Other icy moon maidens would be the Corpse Queen, Lyanna, Sansa AFTER she gets the Eyrie (she is fire before that in KL), Jeyne Pool, Alys karstark ("Winter's Lady").

I didn't agree with the 2 moons' theory, but yes the symbollic reading makes appear icy and fiery maiden, and now that you point it, I wonder if in reality it is not the same, but in 2 different moments : basically the fiery would be before the "marriage", and the icy would be after a "marriage"/alliance undesired (or/and after a rape, after the death of the true love, a child, aso..., I mean a situation where the "maiden" is severly hurt - spiritually, physically or both - and needs to find a new fire to be fiery/vivid again)

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Just now, The Fattest Leech said:

I figured you'd like that :cheers:

Yeah, based on your comment I was elaborating to @LmL earlier about my 'red door' = 'front door' hypothesis, but then he stopped me in the middle of my explication (what a prude that devil can be)...:P

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1 hour ago, GloubieBoulga said:

I didn't agree with the 2 moons' theory, but yes the symbollic reading makes appear icy and fiery maiden, and now that you point it, I wonder if in reality it is not the same, but in 2 different moments : basically the fiery would be before the "marriage", and the icy would be after a "marriage"/alliance undesired (or/and after a rape, after the death of the true love, a child, aso..., I mean a situation where the "maiden" is severly hurt - spiritually, physically or both - and needs to find a new fire to be fiery/vivid again)

There is definitely some transformation going on, whether or not there were 2 distinct moons or one moon with a dual nature. I always make my opinion up based in my best interpretation of symbolism, and that leads me to two moons, but the more important thing is the ice / fire dichotomy which runs through the entire series. The moons are just a manifestation of that. And again, in any scenario, some moon maidens definitely turn from fire to ice, with Sansa being the most obvious one. I am curious to see if Mel remains fiery or turns into something colder, myself. 

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1 hour ago, The Fattest Leech said:

I am going to listen first, I always do (except when bourbon speaks), but I admit upfront that this will be a hard one for me to accept. But I accept the challenge! 

You are putting your finger on an obvious tension between fire and weirwoods, and rightly so. This is a 'problem' for not just Mel, but all the symbolism of the ww as a burning tree. In real life, fire kills trees. But all the mythical world trees like Yggy and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden are things which transfer the fire of the gods to man. So, simultaneously, there is a sense in which the weirwoods hate fire, and another in which they are on fire. The thing is, they don't really conflict - the weirwoods do not seem to like being invaded by greenseers, imo. They do not like acting as a conduit for the fire. They might be doing so heroically and sacrificially, containing the minotaur in their trap for us or mitigating the toxic presence of the meteors or both, or they might being simply being raped and forced against their, like a host to a parasite. 

One thing to notice is that Mel does not ever burn weirwood. She has Stannis or other people do it. Mel herself parallels the burning tree, she doesn't create one. She is one. But anyway... you'll see what I am getting at, even if you care to reinterpret the conclusion. 

1 hour ago, The Fattest Leech said:

I realized last night after I posted my rambles that I should have listened first :dunno:, but I had the house to myself and lots of bourbon on hand and I felt talkative.

Hilariously, @ravenous reader and I were chatting last night and she was reacting to your bawdy talk, and thought you might have been drinking. Nailed that one, RR, lol. You were hanging with Jim or Jack, that's all good baby baby. 

 

1 hour ago, The Fattest Leech said:

I am not in Reddit so I have never seen this, however, I am interested in whatbthat postet says. Do you happen to have a link? 

here's the link, there aren't that many comments so you should be able to find the one about Val. Not a tone said, just someone else noticing her as a potential ww maiden.

 

 

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@LmL

So for more women who turn into ash trees, we should include Lord Rowen's daughter. While she was already a maiden of the tree in this case a golden tree, she can be considered an ash tree because she was struck by lightning. The lightning being Dareon's voice per Maester Aemon saying that his voice is honey poured over thunder. And as Dareon was sent to the wall for her rape then she falls into what we suspect of AA and NN.

Spoiler

We should also include Falia Flowers. As she is turned into a grotesque mocking image of the Mother as the figurehead which is paralleled to Mother figurehead you indentified in your earlier essay about dragonships. And since she is carrying the child of an AA/BSE figure then she is likened to Mel carrying the shadow and the burning mother on Dragonstone carrying Stannis's LB.

 

And on a different note, you should look at House Hewett's sigil. It looks like a melding of House Royce, House Arryn, and House Tully. Which is interesting since Sansa and Falia mirror each other.

Btw I enjoyed this and I have more to add.

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@LmL very interesting essay!  A while ago I theorized about the weirwood symbolism surrounding Lyanna:

  • Ned dreams of her weeping blood
  • after she dies, she gets transformed into a stone statue 
  • In Theon's dream he sees her wearing white and spattered with gore
  • if you believe she was the Knight of the Laughing Tree, which I do, then she outright adopts a weirwood as her personal sigil (a laughing one no less)

I really appreciate your essay for broadening my perspective to see there are other ASOIAF women who similar connections with weirwoods.  Cat and Mel having such a connection is particularly intriguing for me as I've been thinking a lot lately about the comparisons and connections among Cat, Mel, and Lyanna.

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12 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

17) Could 'frozen blood' be equivalent to 'frozen fire', considering blood and fire are symbolically synonymous? Valyrian steel as frozen blood?

Hmm....I tend to think that the frozen blood is Dawn as it is described as milkglass and blood has also been equated as milk. Especially the blood of a craven.

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"Have no fear, Lord Captain," said the Reader. "They will come. His Grace desires it. Why else would he have commanded us to let Hewett's ravens fly?"

"You read too much and fight too little," Nute said. "Your blood is milk." But the Reader made as if he had not heard.

-The Reaver, aFfC

 

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8 hours ago, LmL said:

The train of thought you are missing from the main essay is that the ww women are all moon maidens also.

Aren't they also mermaids? Donella Manderly, a mermaid marrying Halys Horwood and becoming Lady of Hornwood. Thus a tree woman. And Asha being IB and closely associated with the sea can also technically be considered as Lady of Deepwood Motte which considering that Deepwood is near the coast its name literally means a grove of trees deep in the wood, is rather ironic. 

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