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Lyanna's winter rose crown


Vaedys Targaryen

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On 9/4/2017 at 10:47 AM, Lord Highland said:

Is it possible that the winter rose became her favorite flower after and because of the tourney? Is there any evidence she liked them before it?

I like that idea.

1 hour ago, The Twinslayer said:

I think Selmy pretty much admits that he threw the final tilt to let Rhaegar win the tournament.

Are these what you are referring to? I don't agree, I don't see any evidence here that he is admitting he threw the list at all. It would go against his own personal view of honour to do something like that so I highly doubt it.

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If I had been a better knight … if I had unhorsed the prince in that last tilt, as I unhorsed so many others, it would have been for me to choose the queen of love and beauty …

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If I had unhorsed Rhaegar and crowned Ashara queen of love and beauty, might she have looked to me instead of Stark?

He would never know. But of all his failures, none haunted Barristan Selmy so much as that.

 

 

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4 hours ago, The Twinslayer said:

In AGOT, Ned tells us that in an earlier round, Rhaegar unhorsed Brandon.  I have sometimes wondered whether Brandon was part of the conspiracy and if he let Rhaegar win, too.

That would give Brandon added reason to be angry at Rhaegar for first crowning Lyanna queen of beauty and later abducting her.  "I let you win the tournament and you repay me by using that victory  as a means to insult my house and try to seduce my sister?"

Good catch! Brandon being "in" the Raper Prince's PR campaign would had been a wonderful twist!

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9 hours ago, Makk said:

I like that idea.

Are these what you are referring to? I don't agree, I don't see any evidence here that he is admitting he threw the list at all. It would go against his own personal view of honour to do something like that so I highly doubt it.

 

Those quotes are part of it.  Selmy says that if he had been a better knight, he would have unhorsed Rhaegar.  He also says that his failure to do that haunted him more than all his other failures.  So we need to figure out what, in Barristan's opinion, makes a good knight.  Is it skill at arms?  Or something else?

Fortunately for us, he tells us in the Kingbreaker chapter:

"As the afternoon melted into evening, he bid his charges to lay down their swords and shields and gather round.  He spoke to them about what it meant to be a knight.  'It is chivalry that makes a true knight, not a sword,' he said.  'Without honor, a knight is no more than a common killer.  It is better to die with honor than to live without it.' The boys looked at him strangely, he thought, but one day they would understand."

So there you have it.  Skill at arms does not make a good knight.  Honor does.  So when Barristan says that had he been a better knight, he would have defeated Rhaegar in the joust, it does not mean he would have won if he was a better jouster.  It means he would have won if he had been more honorable.  

The dishonorable thing he did was to let Rhaegar win when he could easily have dispatched Rhaegar.  If he had done the honorable thing, and won, then Ashara, Rhaegar, Lyanna, Brandon, Arthur, and all the rest might still be alive.

That is why he is haunted.  It has nothing to do with being beaten by a better jouster.

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5 hours ago, The Twinslayer said:

Those quotes are part of it.  Selmy says that if he had been a better knight, he would have unhorsed Rhaegar.  He also says that his failure to do that haunted him more than all his other failures.  So we need to figure out what, in Barristan's opinion, makes a good knight.  Is it skill at arms?  Or something else?

Fortunately for us, he tells us in the Kingbreaker chapter:

"As the afternoon melted into evening, he bid his charges to lay down their swords and shields and gather round.  He spoke to them about what it meant to be a knight.  'It is chivalry that makes a true knight, not a sword,' he said.  'Without honor, a knight is no more than a common killer.  It is better to die with honor than to live without it.' The boys looked at him strangely, he thought, but one day they would understand."

So there you have it.  Skill at arms does not make a good knight.  Honor does.  So when Barristan says that had he been a better knight, he would have defeated Rhaegar in the joust, it does not mean he would have won if he was a better jouster.  It means he would have won if he had been more honorable.  

The dishonorable thing he did was to let Rhaegar win when he could easily have dispatched Rhaegar.  If he had done the honorable thing, and won, then Ashara, Rhaegar, Lyanna, Brandon, Arthur, and all the rest might still be alive.

That is why he is haunted.  It has nothing to do with being beaten by a better jouster.

I'm still not personally convinced but will admit you have put up a logical argument.

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8 hours ago, The Twinslayer said:

Those quotes are part of it.  Selmy says that if he had been a better knight, he would have unhorsed Rhaegar.  He also says that his failure to do that haunted him more than all his other failures.  So we need to figure out what, in Barristan's opinion, makes a good knight.  Is it skill at arms?  Or something else?

Fortunately for us, he tells us in the Kingbreaker chapter:

"As the afternoon melted into evening, he bid his charges to lay down their swords and shields and gather round.  He spoke to them about what it meant to be a knight.  'It is chivalry that makes a true knight, not a sword,' he said.  'Without honor, a knight is no more than a common killer.  It is better to die with honor than to live without it.' The boys looked at him strangely, he thought, but one day they would understand."

So there you have it.  Skill at arms does not make a good knight.  Honor does.  So when Barristan says that had he been a better knight, he would have defeated Rhaegar in the joust, it does not mean he would have won if he was a better jouster.  It means he would have won if he had been more honorable.  

The dishonorable thing he did was to let Rhaegar win when he could easily have dispatched Rhaegar.  If he had done the honorable thing, and won, then Ashara, Rhaegar, Lyanna, Brandon, Arthur, and all the rest might still be alive.

That is why he is haunted.  It has nothing to do with being beaten by a better jouster.

Actually this si pretty cool. I've considered sometimes that perhaps Rhaegar didn't win because of his real skill, but I always saw Selmy saying he was not enough of a good knight to mean that Rhaegar was simply better in combat or jousting. Which seemed a bit contradicting because sometimes Selmy seemed to imply that Rhaegar wasn't as good of a soldier/knight as Viserys had Daenerys believe (especially when he had compared Rhaegar to Arthur Dayne). This is a very good explanation that I also think lines up with Selmy's character. It makes sense that he would judge letting the crown Prince win to be the diplomatic choice and not the knightly and honest way. (Ned also uses the same argument against Robert when he wants to fight in the melee, that because he's the King, people would not fight fairly out of fear of hurting the King)

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1 hour ago, Lifestream said:

Actually this si pretty cool. I've considered sometimes that perhaps Rhaegar didn't win because of his real skill, but I always saw Selmy saying he was not enough of a good knight to mean that Rhaegar was simply better in combat or jousting. Which seemed a bit contradicting because sometimes Selmy seemed to imply that Rhaegar wasn't as good of a soldier/knight as Viserys had Daenerys believe (especially when he had compared Rhaegar to Arthur Dayne). This is a very good explanation that I also think lines up with Selmy's character. It makes sense that he would judge letting the crown Prince win to be the diplomatic choice and not the knightly and honest way. (Ned also uses the same argument against Robert when he wants to fight in the melee, that because he's the King, people would not fight fairly out of fear of hurting the King)

What makes you think this? It wasn't just members of the kingsguard that Rhaegar defeated but also Lord Yohn Royce and Brandon Stark. And at a previous tournament at Storms End...

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"When he was young, His Grace rode brilliantly in a tourney at Storm's End, defeating Lord Steffon Baratheon, Lord Jason Mallister, the Red Viper of Dorne, and a mystery knight who proved to be the infamous Simon Toyne, chief of the kingswood outlaws. He broke twelve lances against Ser Arthur Dayne that day."
"Was he the champion, then?"
"No, Your Grace. That honor went to another knight of the Kingsguard, who unhorsed Prince Rhaegar in the final tilt."
Dany did not want to hear about Rhaegar being unhorsed. "But what tourneys did my brother win?"
"Your Grace." The old man hesitated. "He won the greatest tourney of them all."
"Which was that?" Dany demanded.
"The tourney Lord Whent staged at Harrenhal beside the Gods Eye, in the year of the false spring. A notable event. Besides the jousting, there was a mêlée in the old style fought between seven teams of knights, as well as archery and axe-throwing, a horse race, a tournament of singers, a mummer show, and many feasts and frolics. Lord Whent was as open handed as he was rich. The lavish purses he proclaimed drew hundreds of challengers. Even your royal father came to Harrenhal, when he had not left the Red Keep for long years. The greatest lords and mightiest champions of the Seven Kingdoms rode in that tourney, and the Prince of Dragonstone bested them all."
"But that was the tourney when he crowned Lyanna Stark as queen of love and beauty!" said Dany. "Princess Elia was there, his wife, and yet my brother gave the crown to the Stark girl, and later stole her away from her betrothed. How could he do that? Did the Dornish woman treat him so ill?"
"It is not for such as me to say what might have been in your brother's heart, Your Grace. The Princess Elia was a good and gracious lady, though her health was ever delicate."
Dany pulled the lion pelt tighter about her shoulders. "Viserys said once that it was my fault, for being born too late." She had denied it hotly, she remembered, going so far as to tell Viserys that it was his fault for not being born a girl. He beat her cruelly for that insolence. "If I had been born more timely, he said, Rhaegar would have married me instead of Elia, and it would all have come out different. If Rhaegar had been happy in his wife, he would not have needed the Stark girl."
"Perhaps so, Your Grace." Whitebeard paused a moment. "But I am not certain it was in Rhaegar to be happy."
"You make him sound so sour," Dany protested.
"Not sour, no, but . . . there was a melancholy to Prince Rhaegar, a sense . . ." The old man hesitated again.
"Say it," she urged. "A sense . . . ?"
". . . of doom. He was born in grief, my queen, and that shadow hung over him all his days."

I think from this you can take it that Rhaegar was an exceptional jouster and Arthur and Barristan were not afraid to hit him with a lance (the person who actually beat Rhaegar was of course Barristan Selmy who is telling the story). I admit that I never considered that they all deliberately lost to Rhaegar before now and that was possibly naive. The motive to make Rhaegar look awesome and gather more support as king is plausible. To me it lessons the love story and casts his life in a very different light which George does at times like doing.

But I am still not convinced. We were inside Barristans head at other times when he was thinking about Harrenhal, imo that would have been the time for GRRM to actually reveal the truth about it if he did throw the tournament (unless he plans to return to it later but I find that unlikely). The way he spoke in the passage above does not sound to me like he was lying. If we don't get any future confirmation I am still going to believe Rhaegar won the tournament on merit.

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12 hours ago, Makk said:

What makes you think this? It wasn't just members of the kingsguard that Rhaegar defeated but also Lord Yohn Royce and Brandon Stark. And at a previous tournament at Storms End...

I think from this you can take it that Rhaegar was an exceptional jouster and Arthur and Barristan were not afraid to hit him with a lance (the person who actually beat Rhaegar was of course Barristan Selmy who is telling the story). I admit that I never considered that they all deliberately lost to Rhaegar before now and that was possibly naive. The motive to make Rhaegar look awesome and gather more support as king is plausible. To me it lessons the love story and casts his life in a very different light which George does at times like doing.

But I am still not convinced. We were inside Barristans head at other times when he was thinking about Harrenhal, imo that would have been the time for GRRM to actually reveal the truth about it if he did throw the tournament (unless he plans to return to it later but I find that unlikely). The way he spoke in the passage above does not sound to me like he was lying. If we don't get any future confirmation I am still going to believe Rhaegar won the tournament on merit.

I was referring to this exchange of theirs:

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"The Sword of the Morning!" said Dany, delighted. "Viserys used to talk about his wondrous white blade. He said Ser Arthur was the only knight in the realm who was our brother's peer."
 
Whitebeard bowed his head. "It is not my place to question the words of Prince Viserys."
 
"King," Dany corrected. "He was a king, though he never reigned. Viserys, the Third of His Name. But what do you mean?" His answer had not been one that she'd expected. "Ser Jorah named Rhaegar the last dragon once. He had to have been a peerless warrior to be called that, surely?"
 
"Your Grace," said Whitebeard, "the Prince of Dragonstone was a most puissant warrior, but . . . "
 
"Go on," she urged. "You may speak freely to me."
 
"As you command." The old man leaned upon his hardwood staff, his brow furrowed. "A warrior without peer . . . those are fine words, Your Grace, but words win no battles."
 
"Swords win battles," Ser Jorah said bluntly. "And Prince Rhaegar knew how to use one."
 
"He did, ser, but . . . I have seen a hundred tournaments and more wars than I would wish, and however strong or fast or skilled a knight may be, there are others who can match him. A man will win one tourney, and fall quickly in the next. A slick spot in the grass may mean defeat, or what you ate for supper the night before. A change in the wind may bring the gift of victory." He glanced at Ser Jorah. "Or a lady's favor knotted round an arm."
 

Barristan is very hesitant to praise Rhaegar's combat ability for some reason. if anything he seems to imply that Rhaegar was better in other areas. And this is Barristan we're talking about who really loved, respected and admired Rhaegar. Why is he having such a hard time calling Rhaegar a good warrior? Look at the last paragraph. Is he being completely truthful there or making that up for Daenerys' sake. Barristan, as we all know, went on a solo mission and brought back the King. So i find it a bit hard to believe that such a man as hismelf, would really believe such a thing. I mean perhaps he does, but would he for such a legendary warrior as Rhaegar (at least that's what the tales say).

 

i wouldn't be surprised if Barristan doesn't want to destroy Daenerys' version of Rhaegar but still, it's weird how he only calls Rhaegar a good warrior (if even that comes from his real opinion) when Daenerys and Jorah insist on it, so as not to antagonize them. Jorah might have seen Rhaegar at some point fight (I don't remember well), but Daenerys hasn't. She's only heard tales from Viserys, who's also been telling her bullshit about how Targaryens don't get sick or something. The only one who was truly around Rhaegar and with enough experience to be able to judge his skill was Barristan Selmy.

 

Barristan when asked about Aerys:

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Whitebeard did his best to hide his feelings, but they were there, plain on his face. "His Grace was . . . often pleasant."

"Often?" Dany smiled. "But not always?"
 
"He could be very harsh to those he thought his enemies."
 
"A wise man never makes an enemy of a king," said Dany. "Did you know my brother Rhaegar as well?"

Even when it came to Aerys, Barristan had a hard time expressing the truth to Daenerys. Would it be impossible for Barristan to find it harder to express his honest opinion of Rhaegar to his sister, who never got to meet him? And unlike Aerys who was pretty terrible, Rhaegar was the total opposite (in Barristan's opinion at least).

 

I might be missing some more info from the following chapters, but I'm currently basing my opinion on this exchange between the two. When I re-read his chapters or his other interractions with Dany I'll try to take notice of how he talks about Rhaegar.

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4 hours ago, Lifestream said:

Barristan is very hesitant to praise Rhaegar's combat ability for some reason. if anything he seems to imply that Rhaegar was better in other areas. And this is Barristan we're talking about who really loved, respected and admired Rhaegar. Why is he having such a hard time calling Rhaegar a good warrior?

I think Barristan is trying to explain how uncertain battles can be. Even if you are the greatest warrior in the world, you are never invincible. Luck does play a role in victory, and some things that are simply out of a person's control, like the wind, could also factor in. Of course, a talented warrior will always have the upper hand, but it's never certain. 

The thing about Rhaegar is that he was a great person, talented, and very good with a sword. But he still lost the match at the Trident to Robert, who was brutishly strong and wielded a massive war hammer. So no matter how good or well versed in the art of war Rhaegar was, he lost the fight that mattered the most. If Robert had come at him with a sword, it may have been different. But Robert was still physically stronger, so Rhaegar may have always been at a disadvantage. 

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On 9/4/2017 at 4:44 AM, White Ravens said:

I always assumed that the winter rose was a hellebore flower which is often referred to as a winter rose.  Hellebores don't grow in true winter conditions but they are one of the very earliest flowers to appear in the spring.   I live in a mild Canadian city and my wife has grown hellebores that were in bloom as early as January.

Winter roses or blue roses do not occur in real life. They are made up for the story. We don't really know what causes the roses to bloom. Could they really survive the harsh winters of the north? Also, how come we never see them in the current times? Winter roses are only mentioned in the past, and always in connection to Lyanna. 

It's possible that the blue roses at the tourney came not from the north, but Highgarden. It's more likely that the roses were white roses dyed blye by talented gardeners, like in real life. Otherwise, how would they transport blue roses from the north to south perfectly intact in those times?

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8 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Winter roses or blue roses do not occur in real life. They are made up for the story. We don't really know what causes the roses to bloom. Could they really survive the harsh winters of the north? Also, how come we never see them in the current times? Winter roses are only mentioned in the past, and always in connection to Lyanna. 

It's possible that the blue roses at the tourney came not from the north, but Highgarden. It's more likely that the roses were white roses dyed blye by talented gardeners, like in real life. Otherwise, how would they transport blue roses from the north to south perfectly intact in those times?

Winter roses do occur in real life.  Their true name is hellebore but their common name is winter rose and some varieties of winter rose are blue in colour.  Like any other flower they don't live in true winter conditions but they bloom so early in spring that there is often snow on the ground. 

It is just as believable to me that GRRM is referencing real life blue winter roses (hellebore) than he is traditional white roses that have been dyed blue. 

 

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8 hours ago, White Ravens said:

Winter roses do occur in real life.  Their true name is hellebore but their common name is winter rose and some varieties of winter rose are blue in colour.  Like any other flower they don't live in true winter conditions but they bloom so early in spring that there is often snow on the ground. 

It is just as believable to me that GRRM is referencing real life blue winter roses (hellebore) than he is traditional white roses that have been dyed blue. 

 

I googled some pics of blue hellebore and they don't look anything like roses. I think GRRM used blue roses specifically for its magical connotations. There are probably blue roses that grow naturally in Westeros. There could also be artificially made blue roses in Highgarden as in real life. 

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