ethnicities

[Graydon Hicks]

just how many ethnicities are there in the series? i know we have First Men, Andals, Valyrians, Rhoynar, the Summer Islander seem to of Black persuasion, sorry if that offensive, just cant think of any other way to describe them. the people of Slavers Bay seem to be ghiscari in origin, and beyond the bones you have yi ti-ish, lengees. but what the people of the free cites, the dothraki,and lharzeen? anyone managed to put a list together?

[Wolfgirly]

There are the wildlings.

The Starks have werewolf like traits.

There are people in Starfall with features unique to them.

 

[Graydon Hicks]

the wildings are First Men Blood. so are the starks, at till Robb and his siblings. they have andal blood from their mother.

i think the Dayns of starfall are First men blood, but the eye and hair traites that crop up are a little strange. i think maybe some valyrian blood was introduced at some point, maybe even pre-conquest.

[Universal Sword Donor]

There are three types of Dornish: salty, sandy, stony

[Joy Hill]

the Qartheen

[Lion of the West]

Don't forget that the Wildlings divides themselves into a great number of different tribes, so there's that as well as the different clans of the Mountains of the Moon. I for one can't say these are a single ethinicity or if each clan should be counted as one. The use of the term "clan" hints that they probably are not counted as distinct ethnicities.

[GyantSpyder]

Well, obviously a big theme in the series is everybody intermarrying with everyone else, all over the world, so to a degree ethnic and racial distinctions are cultural and everybody is related to everybody. But there also appear to be hereditary traits that are more persistent or more important than the things you see in real life, so that undermines the idea that it's all constructed.

But there are some persistent divisions that seem to have both phenotypical and cultural associations, and it's also not really clear who is "human" and who is something else. And there are also ethnicities that see each other as different, but also seem connected. Here's a quick list. Am I missing any?:

• The Others
• The Giants, who may be related to the (WMBRTT) Brindled Men, the Sothoryi
• The Children WMBRTT Ifequevron
• The Lhazar WMBRTT Dothraki
• The Qaathi/Qartheen
• The Sarnori, the Tall Men, WMBRTT Lengii (or, maybe even to the Others, if you define them by their height)
• The Great Empire of the Dawn/Dragonrider platinum haired folks, including the Valyrians, the Targaryans and Velaryons, some Lyseni, the Hightowers, and the Daynes
• People from Asshai WMBRTT people from YiTi who are not the platinum-haired folks, or WMBRTT the Dragonrider folks
• The Summer Islanders WMBRTT Sarnori
• The extinct peoples of Sothoryos, where something very bad appears to have happened of a biological nature WMBRTT anybody
• The Ghiscari, including the Slaver's Bay people WMBRTT Dothraki and Rhoynar
• The Rhoynar - who are ancestors to the various types of Dornish in different proportion
• The non-Dragonrider, non-Ghiscari, non-Rhoynar, non-Dothraki former people of the Valyrian Freehold, WMBRTT anybody or everybody else, including the Andals on both sides of the Narrow Sea and most of the population of the Free Cities.
• The First Men, including the Wildlings
• The Ironborn, WMBRTT one of these groups of people and not the First Men or Andals, but we don't know which
• The Lannisters, ditto
• The Sistermen, who may be an ethnicity or might just be one family with an inbred mutation (although the difference between those two things is debatable)

The vast proliferation of different peoples living in places for thousands of years that were in contact with each other and had free travel between them reinforces the idea suggested from old legends that human life did not begin on this planet but instead came here from the stars, where it had developed all these different ethnicities on different worlds or different continents on some other world that's been forgotten. But that's hard to prove.

Like, if the Tall Men and the Qaathi originated in more or less the same place, but the former have coal-black skin and the latter have milk-white skin, it's hard to argue that their divergence as ethnicities is the product of an evolutionary pressure of a natural or sexual selection sort that began on the continent of Essos, rather than somewhere else.

Either that or it also seems possible that there is a magical or non-magical form of genetic engineering that existed at some point on this planet.

[Rhae_Valarie]

First of all, you have to define what is actually considered "human" vs. simply humanoid.

for example, the Giants and the Children don't seem to be considered humans, despite the fact that they are humanoid. The Ibbenesse, however, are considered men, despite that fact that they seem to be Neanderthals. It makes sense that they would still be considered humans because Neanderthals are of the same genus as modern humans, known as Homo Sapiens. They are simply as subspecies of humans. In our work they died out, but it makes sense that in a world with other species coexisting with humans, various kinds of humans could coexist together.

so going off that we have what I am going to call humans and nonhumans.

Nonhumans:

Giants

Children of the Forest 

Wood Walkers ( similar to the children)

Others

Humans:

   A. Homo Sapiens - 

Andals (influenced much of Westeros, gave rise to many of the current noble houses, referred to as tall and fair)

Rhoynar (influenced much of Dorne, seem to be dark complected and originate in Essos, could be comparable to Mediterranean cultures)

First Men ( influenced the North, Starks and Wildlings. Then s are said to be the last of the first men. The clansmen from the Mountains of the Moon are also said to be descended from First men)

There are obviously many ethnicities in Essos, but I can't claim to be familiar with all of them. The big ones are:

Ghiscari - ancient empire built on slavery, destroyed by Valyria. Lives on in Slaver's Bay through Astapor, Yunkai, Meereen and New Ghis.

Valyrians- silver haired, purple eyed Dragonlords. Most died in the doom. Lived on in Westeros due to the Targaryens and Velaryons. The Daynes could also have some Valyrian blood. The Valyrians also live on in the Free Cities, which were cities of the Valyrian Freehold before the Doom. Eight of them (Lorath, Norvos, Qohor, Myr, Lys, Tyrosh, Pentos, and Volantis) are mostly influenced by Valyrian culture, with varying degrees of Andal influence (for instance, Pentos has more Andal influence than anywhere but Westeros).

Bravosi- A hidden city formed by escaped Valyrian slaves, the ninth of the Free Cities. Bravosi are a mix of people, cultures and languages.

Dothraki- horse lords with their own distinct culture. Dark haired and skinned. Comparison to Native Americans of the Great Plains can be made, as well as other real life cultures.

Summer Islanders - black people who live on the tropical Summer Islands. Were drawn into the slave trade until a ruler united the islands and ended it. They are a very peaceful people. Their wars are said to be short lived and do little harm to anyone. Though they are amazing sailors, they have never sought to conquer.

Naathi- Naath is North West of Sothoryos, in the Summer Sea. The Naathi are dusky skinned with round, flat faces, and large amber/gold eyes. They are extremely peaceful and do not eat meat. Immune to the "butterfly fever" that kills invaders.

Quartheen- citizens of the city Quartz and the last remnants of the Qaathi people.

Cymmerri- lived in the hills of Essos

Gipps- long legged, carried wicker shields and had lime stiffened hair.

Zoqora - brown skinned, pale haired, rode to war on chariots

Tall Men- tall, long limbs, brown skin, with hair and eyes as black as night. United the Cymmeri, Gipps and Zoqora brought them under the rule of the Tall Men. The Kingdom of Sarnoff was the greatest of the Tall Men's civilazations. Destroyed by Dothraki.

Lhazarene - shepherds of Lhazar. Coppery skin and amber eyes like Dothraki but with shorter, squashed faces and short hair. They are preyed upon by the horselords.

Miscellanious: Asshai'i, Yi Tish, Leng (Eastern civilizations that I don't know much about)

   B. Non Homo sapiens, or humans in the genus Homo, but are varying subspecies of Humans

the Ibbenese- basically Neanderthals, hairy and have a sloping forehead. Unable to reproduce with other humans, indicating a difference in sub species.

The Hairy Men- thought to be the ancestors of the ibbenese, but could actually be another sub species in the genus Homo. Said to ride to battle on unicorns.

Skagosi- island off in the north of Westeros (Skagos). The Skagosi are speculated to be descendensts of the Ibbenese. However we have seen that the Ibbenese can't reproduce with Westerosi, so this seems unlikely. More likely is that they are simply another subspecies of humans. Like the Hairy Men, the are associated with Unicorns, so perhaps the Skagosi are related to them.

Bonus: 

Mazemakers- mysterious ancient culture we know little about. Similar to ancient mound builders in America.

[John Doe]

On 7.6.2017 at 4:51 PM, Universal Sword Donor said:

There are three types of Dornish: salty, sandy, stony

That's not really different ethnicities though, more different degress of intermingling between First Men and Rhoynar. 

[Graydon Hicks]

well, i would think that the stony dornish almost as pure first men as the northerners, the salty dornish are nearly pure rhoynar, and the sandy dornish might be a varying degree of mixing.

[Wolfgirly]

There are many types of people on that world. Are demons and wizards considered an ethnicity? 

[TMIFairy]

On 7.06.2017 at 4:51 PM, Universal Sword Donor said:

There are three types of Dornish: salty, stony, sandy,

And all three are randy

[Luddagain]

If you look at the companion world book there are as many races ethnicity as in our real world plus a few semi humans. Just about every nation on the planet gets a look in EXCEPT the Americas.

We have Chinese, Japanese, Caribbeans, Greeks, Italians Scandinavians, Spanish, North Africans, Vikings Germanic peoples Celts pre Celts

[Graydon Hicks]

arent the lharzeen and dothraki supposed the same ethnicity?