Heresy 4

[Ibbison from Ibben]

3. that the Night's Watch defeat of the Others in "The Night that Ended" also belongs to this period, possibly relating to the Night's King, and resulted in the final expulsion of the Children from the kingdoms below the Wall.

("this period" refers to the time of the Andal invasion)

This should be rejected due to the evidence provided by the Moat Cailin story.

What are thinking of here in particular Ibbison? Could you fill that out a bit for me please?

Glad to. In aGoT, Catelyn relates the history/legend of how the FM and the CotF stopped the Andal Invasion at the Neck. The CotF called down the Hammer of the Waters (while actually in the Children's Tower at MC, no less) in an attempt to create a water barrier, much like they did with the Arm of Dorne. It was only partially successful. (I've always assumed that instead of breaking the continent in two, creating a strait between North and South Westeros, they weren't powerful enough and only managed to create bogs. It was still enough to stop the Andals, in conjunction with the defensive efforts of the FM.)

This shows that at the time of the Andal Invasion, the FM and the CotF were allies. There is no sign of major lingering animosity between the FM and the CotF. There is no sign that the FM then turned on the CotF and drove them north of the Wall. The Night's Watch at this time would have been manned entirely by FM, of course, and there is no sign they were involved at all.

OK as per a couple of posts it's possible the children just died out naturally in the Stark kingdom, but we know that the Children at one time delivered 100 obsidian arrowheads (?) to the watch every year up until a time recent enough that this was recorded in writing - but then it stopped for reasons unknown.

We need to be very careful with our sources here. There is no evidence that the person who wrote the source Sam read ever saw the CotF delivering obsidian to the NW. The writer is simply recording legends in writing. His dating was probably a guess. (He would reason, "If the CotF were giving the NW obsidian, that must mean the CotF and the FM/NW were on friendly terms. Therefore, it must have been during the Age of Heroes, after the Pact.")

As for the ending of the yearly delivery, a couple simple explanations come to mind:

1) The NW told the CotF, "We've got enough obsidian. You can stop now." After all, obsidian is only useful against the WW, not the more numerous wights. After 200 years, the NW would have 20,000 obsidian daggers. How many do they really need? (I would guess that the gift could actually have been a mix of daggers, spearheads, and arrowheads, but the the point is still valid. There's no reason to keep piling the obsidian up for thousands of years when it's only good against a limited number of foes.)

2) The CotF got cut off from the source of obsidian. Obsidian sources are rare. (In actual history, obsidian was traded over large distances, but flint was more widely available, and just as useful.) Where (besides Dragonstone) is obsidian available in Westeros? When did the Valyians first occupy Dragonstone? We don't know.

[Ibbison from Ibben]

Well, I think it’s because of the info we have on the Long Night. Regardless of who/what they are, who/what has created them and so on and so forth, the accounts we have of the Long Night speak of winter lasting for ‘a generation’ (and I understand it wouldn’t be the same span as we use the term), endless night, snow and cold etc. The explanation that they only come out when it’s dark, or that it gets dark when they come out doesn’t matter; the egg or the chicken coming first wouldn’t matter here – what does matter is that for them to be (or because they become) ‘active’, you’d get no sun, and everlasting night and winter, making it impossible for other species to survive.

:agree:

The Long Winter would have hurt the CotF almost as much as it hurt the FM. We get a description of what the CotF eat in aDwD, and, except for mushrooms, none of it will get them through a 20 year long winter without sunlight. I doubt they can live on mushrooms for 20 years. And as Kissedbyfire said, the Long Winter would also wipe out other life forms that the CotF value.

This is one reason I can't accept the premise that the CotF unleashed the Long Winter to force the FM to agree to the Pact. Doing so would be unleashing a doomsday weapon that would wipe out everything, including themselves.

[kissdbyfire]

Obsidian sources are rare. (In actual history, obsidian was traded over large distances, but flint was more widely available, and just as useful.) Where (besides Dragonstone) is obsidian available in Westeros? When did the Valyians first occupy Dragonstone? We don't know.

There may be obsidian north of the Wall ff there's a volcano at Hardhome... :dunno:

[Eyron]

As an aside, I'm wondering if all the Children really did flee north of the Wall. Could they perhaps have gone underground instead? I know I've harped on the notion that I think something's up down below, but remember the House of the Undying - the woman being raped by the four little rat men? An anthropomorphized (gynecomorphized?) Westeros, of course, with the rat men representing the kings fighting over her. But this idea that Westeros is a body - with a Neck, and Fingers, and a broken Arm, and (most tellingly, imo) a High Heart - is linked to the idea that the surface of the world is like its skin. So much of this story is about the spirit beneath the skin - the binding, the enslaving, the hiding, the moving, the sharing of that spirit or life force, whether it be through skin-changing or blood magic or necromancy or mummery, and so on - that I can't help but wonder if the world's "spirit" somehow also lies beneath its surface.

also if you look at eh map the north looks like a head, also the COTF could be the "Brain" they have all the memory and the tree system is kind of like a nerveus system.

Great ideas guys!

I know I might be alone in this but I think the Children's singing is important and that they are singing for this spirit, and I think of the spirit as the "mother" somehow. Leaf calls the giants their brothers (and bane) which both gives me the idea that they consider themselves and the giants the children of the earth, and that the theme of rival brothers goes deep into the beginning of time, and that history is repeating itself over and over.

I'm also stuck on the relevance of the God's Eye, thinking in lines of what you two said above, but all I can gather is that the place is very important and is strongly protected. The Andals have not gone there which strikes me as odd, so either it is protected by spells (or something like that) or the Andals never bothered with it, perhaps they did not realise it's importance.

High heart is interesting too, it's huge weirwoods were cut down by the Andals, but it still holds some magic and I think the remaining roots keep the system going. Maybe it works something like mycelium. Going with the idea of the earth as a body; the red sap suggests it is the bloodstream of Westeros, the arteries? The trees with blue leaves in Essos, and blue sap perhaps veins? Yeah, I'm just brainstorming here, but sometimes it leads to other relevant ideas... The base for these ideas is that I think the splitting of Westeros and Essos into two continents can have something to do with the magic going wack and growing strong in it's respective continent. Nevermind me though :drunk: It's not like these things will ever be revealed to us...

[kissdbyfire]

I'm also stuck on the relevance of the God's Eye, thinking in lines of what you two said above, but all I can gather is that the place is very important and is strongly protected. The Andals have not gone there which strikes me as odd, so either it is protected by spells (or something like that) or the Andals never bothered with it, perhaps they did not realise it's importance.

I agree with a lot of what you're saying. Just edited to save space, really. I think there may be something metaphorical to the CotF's singing, but I have no idea formed about that yet...

The God's Eye... well, that's another issue that has been bugging me for ages! We know (?) there are greenseers on the God's Eye since the Pact. Ok. And I assume they are there to 'oversee' (or would it be 'overgreensee'?) that the Pact is held... And that Howland Reed went there in the year of the false spring. So, these greenseers, what are they seeing? And, are they acting on what they're seeing? We're not told this, but wouldn't it make sense for them to act - don't ask me how or doing what, I've no idea.

Also, trees - red leaves + red sap / blue leaves + blue sap: interesting! And isn't red the colour we associate with fire and blue the colour we associate with ice? And it's swapped, ice in Essos, fire in Westeros... I've no idea where I'm going with any of this, though. :eek:

[hotweaselsoup]

Glad to. In aGoT, Catelyn relates the history/legend of how the FM and the CotF stopped the Andal Invasion at the Neck. The CotF called down the Hammer of the Waters (while actually in the Children's Tower at MC, no less) in an attempt to create a water barrier, much like they did with the Arm of Dorne. It was only partially successful. (I've always assumed that instead of breaking the continent in two, creating a strait between North and South Westeros, they weren't powerful enough and only managed to create bogs. It was still enough to stop the Andals, in conjunction with the defensive efforts of the FM.)

This shows that at the time of the Andal Invasion, the FM and the CotF were allies. There is no sign of major lingering animosity between the FM and the CotF. There is no sign that the FM then turned on the CotF and drove them north of the Wall. The Night's Watch at this time would have been manned entirely by FM, of course, and there is no sign they were involved at all.

The whole "Hammer of the Waters" thing is a bit murky, and I'm not sure it can be assumed from the three, very sketchy references we have to the Hammer that the Children were allied with the First Men against the Andals when they used it. What if, for instance, Moat Cailin was originally built by the Children, and not the First Men? The basalt stones of the fortress are said to be enormous - the size of cottages - which hints that the castle may have needed magical help to be raised. Maybe the Children, losing the war against the First Men, decided to take a page from their enemies' book and build a giant stone castle at the doorway to the north, in the hopes of defending their dwindling realm from the ever-encroaching men? And yes, there is a "Children's Tower" at Moat Cailin, but there is also a Drunkard's Tower. The Drunkard's Tower is so named because it leans, and looks in danger of falling. It's not likely that the Drunkard's Tower was so named when the castle was first built. Likewise, the Children's Tower may have been so named simply to describe the tower from which, years ago, the Children of legend had called down their magical weapon. In other words, the current name of the tower doesn't necessarily mean that the Children's Tower was so named when Moat Cailin was first constructed, and so also doesn't imply that the Children were allied with the First Men.

The Long Winter would have hurt the CotF almost as much as it hurt the FM. We get a description of what the CotF eat in aDwD, and, except for mushrooms, none of it will get them through a 20 year long winter without sunlight. I doubt they can live on mushrooms for 20 years. And as Kissedbyfire said, the Long Winter would also wipe out other life forms that the CotF value.

This is one reason I can't accept the premise that the CotF unleashed the Long Winter to force the FM to agree to the Pact. Doing so would be unleashing a doomsday weapon that would wipe out everything, including themselves.

On the other hand, we know that the Children live in caverns underground, and maybe even have their "secret cities" below the earth. We also have the example of Meera catching fish from the underwater lake. If the Children did unleash the Long Night - in desperation, maybe - could they not have laid by stores and gone into hiding deep below ground? Yes, many things they cherished would have died, and their own race would have suffered enormously. But what if they felt they had no other choice?

[Eyron]

Also, trees - red leaves + red sap / blue leaves + blue sap: interesting! And isn't red the colour we associate with fire and blue the colour we associate with ice? And it's swapped, ice in Essos, fire in Westeros... I've no idea where I'm going with any of this, though. :eek:

I think it in the story to tell us the sides of magic that we see are essentially the same thing, like the idea of the seven facets of one god. We are just seeing manifestations of one thing, magic. Something split the world in two and separated the ice from the fire, so it appears like different sources.

If we think of the continents like bodies, maybe Essos is trying to compensate the lack of warmth in it's veins with fire, and Westeros it trying to cool down the hotness in it's arteries? Uh, I'm crackpotting again... Sorry! I realised that if this is true, there is little anyone could do to fix it! Rebuild the Arm of Dorne? No, that's just crazy.

[hotweaselsoup]

I think it in the story to tell us the sides of magic that we see are essentially the same thing, like the idea of the seven facets of one god. We are just seeing manifestations of one thing, magic. Something split the world in two and separated the ice from the fire, so it appears like different sources.

If we think of the continents like bodies, maybe Essos is trying to compensate the lack of warmth in it's veins with fire, and Westeros it trying to cool down the hotness in it's arteries? Uh, I'm crackpotting again... Sorry! I realised that if this is true, there is little anyone could do to fix it! Rebuild the Arm of Dorne? No, that's just crazy.

In some ways, the western coast of Essos seems to line up with the eastern side of Westeros - as though the two continents were once joined before being split by the Narrow Sea.

The God's Eye is really intriguing, I agree. I liked your idea that it might possibly be the crater left behind by a meteor. The fact that it is so close to High Heart, made me envision a fiery sword streaking out of the sky, and striking at the heart of Westeros.

[FanTasy]

Ow ,,, you certainly have been busy heretics!

Free Northman, please bear with me ... I'm a bit on a wild thought trip again

Names.

Joramun - what do we know of him. King of the wildlings. Had a nice horn. Could he be ancestor to the Mormonts? Or is it coincidence that there is a Jeor and a Jorah at the House that rules Bear Isle?

Othor - the first wight we meet in the books. Nice touch! I suspect it is no coincidence that his name is so alike Other.

Hodor - after five books this bugs me more then if R+L=J. Why o why ... say it a few times fast and it is pretty like 'hodder' ... other?

Mind you, I'm not saying Hodor has white walker-blood - if they have blood. It may be Nan told her stories about the others and he picked up the word Other.

[Eyron]

About Moat Cailin, I think that story could be wrong, because the Andals had ships so what good would making a water barrier do?

The reason for the hammer of water must have been something else.

We have gone through this discussion before too in heresy 2 in which I think Tze (again) made a post that I agree with, here: http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/60086-heresy-2/page__view__findpost__p__2859681

If the bogs were not there when they built the towers and curtain wall, it was a strange place to build a defence post (Moat Cailin is not a castle for permanent residence like Winterfell I think, but that may be wrong), the enemy could just ride around it. I think it was built after the hammer of water was used, if it ever was used, to block the causeway just like we see it used in the books.

Maybe the HoW was an attempt to prevent the First Men from coming further north when they invaded. Many of the Children probably fled north then too, being pushed back by the invaders, to then repopulate the south when the pact was made. Moat Cailin was then built after the pact. In any case I have been trying to figure out the purpose of that place, but I can't.

[Black Crow]

As always a lot of this comes back to unreliable history. On the one hand we have Maester Luwin’s summary which not unreasonably tells us that the Pact with the Children endured until the Andal invasion which began in earnest according to the best authorities (ie: GRRM) about 4,000 years ago. Over the course of several hundred years the Andals then conquered the South, but not the North, and in the process not only took over the six kingdoms but slaughtered the Children and burned their weirwoods. Given that the North did not fall to the Andals the Pact should have endured there, but it didn’t and instead we have convergence of a number of possible related events.

First there’s the matter of the annual gift of Dragonglass from the Children to the Watch, or rather the stopping of the giving of Dragonglass for some unspecified reason

Next we have the commanders of the Nights Watch and the 674 names on a list probably compiled between 2,500 and 3,000 years ago. Using the eight year average and adding the subsequent 322 Lord Commanders that would be sufficient to take us back to the building of the Wall some 8,000 years ago, but Sam is unhappy. Unless there’s an unexplained jump in the numbering between the compilation of the list and the current generation, the only reason for doubting there have been 998 Lord Commanders since the Wall was built is something in the list indicating that those named served for a much shorter time and that if the Watch has been around for 8,000 years there ought to be more than 998 commanders. Based on the Celtic precedents discussed above which we know GRRM has already used in Pentos, a term of a year and a day is likely (albeit unproven), and that would date the first of the recorded ones to sometime between 3,000 and 4,000 years ago, smack in the middle of the Andal Wars.

Following on from that, as we’ve been discussing there comes the Night’s King. We’re told that all records of him were destroyed, but if it was a clean sweep which included all the records before him – say the destruction of a stone – then the first on that list of 674 names found by Sam would be the man who succeeded him. Bringing the Night’s King forward to this period then allows us, as we’ve discussed, to propose that the Watch defeated him and sent the Children fleeing beyond the Wall at this point, thus explaining the use of steel swords and the ending of the Pact (and the giving of dragonglass) in the North.

The next related event, as I hinted before heading off to work this morning is Ygritte’s story of a big battle in the north about 3,000 years ago. Osha hinted during Maester Luwin’s history lesson that they tell things differently north of the Wall and Ygritte (“you know nothing”) tells of a big battle in which the Wildings came south, were defeated by the Watch and Stark of Winterfell, and tried to escape north again through the tunnels, but became lost down there, although their children, Gendel’s children, can still sometimes he heard moving around in the dark. Having moved on in the story we now know that “Gendel’s children” are not Wildlings but the Children.

So, allowing for this and other “misty” bits of unreliable oral narrative, there’s a very high probability that the battle celebrated in “The Night that Ended” was the same one involving the Watch, Stark of Winterfell and Gorme and his brother Gendel, and that this marked the ending of the Pact and the flight of the Children and that if the revised dating for the Night’s King and the suggestion that his overthrow is the legendary version of the ending of the Pact, them his name may very well have been Gendel Stark.

[Elaena Targaryen]

@ Black Crow...I love this idea, it's why I was asking about the timelines in Heresey 3. I was thinking the Stark and Joramum had to stop the business of the Night's King and somehow it related to the Andals. ( Maybe Joramun had different reasons ) With the striking of all the records before ( if that's what happened ) could indicate that maybe the Night's King was doing what was traditionaly always done before. Like "laying with others" and sacrificing similar to Craster giving his sons to the gods. If the Andals were being intergrated in the north, the north would hide that I'm sure.

I love your idea about Gendel also. If Gendel's children were The Children wasn't their a story about his children would eat you. That makes the COTF creepy. Not sure how true that part of the story is though.

I do have one question about the timeline. I don't mean to make it anymore complicated. I seem to remember something about the Lord Commanders elections can take several years to decide. Maybe I should just reread that. I guess everything in these threads is speculation so it shouldn't really matter.

[Free Northman]

You misinterpret Sam's reference to 674 commanders, instead of 998. Sam is unhappy because he doesn't find older lists, with fewer commanders on them. All this means is that no surviving records have been found for about two thirds of the Watch's existence. Only the last third has been properly recorded, or else the older records have simply rotted away.

Using the conventional history, writing should have reached the wall maybe a thousand years after the Andals arrived, giving their literary skills time to migrate all the way up to the First Men territory and the Wall. So lets say proper records have been kept for 5000 years. Before that, nothing. Just First Men runes on rocks and oral histories.

So that means that about half of the written records have survived, going back to the 674th Lord Commander, about 2500 years ago.

Nothing strange about that.

[Black Crow]

No what Sam says is that the oldest list, not the longest list, has 674 names on it. That's completely different from a list stretching back 674 names from Lord Commander Mormont.

[Black Crow]

I do have one question about the timeline. I don't mean to make it anymore complicated. I seem to remember something about the Lord Commanders elections can take several years to decide. Maybe I should just reread that. I guess everything in these threads is speculation so it shouldn't really matter.

You're quite right, there are stories of long elections and there are stories of Lord Commanders holding office almost from the cradle to the grave, but the fact Sam thinks there's something wrong with the 997 plus John, despite the eight year average comfortably implied by nearly a thousand Lord Commanders in 8,000 years suggests that there's something in that oldest list suggesting the earliest recorded ones each served for a very much shorter time - the other alternative that there were fewer would seem to be contradicted by the lists; as I've just responded to Free Northman the one on question was oldest, not the longest list. By any logical reading of that passage the oldest list contained those 674 names, the next oldest, say 700 names, the next 750 and so on up to the present.

[slayer420]

he says all the older papers are rotted away.

as I've just responded to Free Northman the one on question was oldest, not the longest list. By any logical reading of that passage the oldest list contained those 674 names, the next oldest, say 700 names, the next 750 and so on up to the present.

Your adding info thats not there. so you cant say thats logical, when 1/2 of the people dont read it that way. Just because its the Oldest doesnt mean its the not the longest. What i think he is saying when he says the oldest list I think he means that he can only go back 674 LC's. That he cant find the names of the first LCs. How would they have there names if there were no writing. If there were lists with 750 he would of said that, because that would add to the overall number of LCs. Why even talk about the list wit 674 if there were a list of 750?

[Black Crow]

No, you're misunderstanding it. If, hypothetically, using the 8 year average, a list compiled back in say 3,000AL contained 674 names, a subsequent list compiled in 2,500 AL might be expected to have 736 names on it, ie; the 674 names on the first list plus the 62 appointed since it was compiled.

But the passage isn't actually about the Lord Commanders but the absence of early records and therefore needs to be read in context...

"The oldest histories we have were written after the Andals came to Westeros. The First Men only left us runes on rocks, so everything we think we know about the Age of Heroes and the Dawn Age and the Long Night comes from accounts set down by septons thousands of years later. There are archmaesters at the Citadel who question all of it. The old histories are full of kings who reigned for hundreds of years, and knights riding around a thousand years before there were knights. You know the tales, Brandon the Builder, Symeon Star-eyes, Knight’s King…we say that you’re the nine-hundred-and-ninety-eighth Lord Commander of the Knight’s Watch, but the oldest list I’ve found shows six hundred seventy-four commanders, which suggests that it was written during-“

“Long ago,” Jon broke in…

What he's actually saying here is that the fact it shows 674 names up to the point at which it was written suggests it only dates back a third of the way into the Watch's history and that therefore the two thirds of the Watch's existence before that point is undocumented.

[slayer420]

Where I dont agree is it says shows, not has 674 names on it. In other words he didnt say the oldest list I've found has 674 names on it. he says shows. Thats the key word. He is saying that it goes back 674 total LCs. Thats how I read it, a could be wrong. But I dont really think you can say one way or the other for shore because it is not writen clear. Hard to base any theroys on it, if we dont know what it really means.

[Free Northman]

My view is that the oldest surviving list already shows 674 Lord Commanders that have gone before. Meaning that it was compiled at the time of the 674th Lord Commander.

I interpret it the same way that Black Crow does, therefore, but he seems to derive a totally different conclusion from that interpretation than I do.

To me, it simply means that at the time when the 674th Lord Commander lived, a list was compiled that showed all the Commanders that went before, based either on earlier (now lost) written records, or based on oral histories, or on a combination of the two.

I find this entirely normal, and in no way supportive of any outlandish theory contrary to history as we know it.

[slayer420]

My view is that the oldest surviving list already shows 674 Lord Commanders that have gone before. Meaning that it was compiled at the time of the 674th Lord Commander.

I interpret it the same way that Black Crow does, therefore, but he seems to derive a totally different conclusion from that interpretation than I do.

To me, it simply means that at the time when the 674th Lord Commander lived, a list was compiled that showed all the Commanders that went before, based either on earlier (now lost) written records, or based on oral histories, or on a combination of the two.

I find this entirely normal, and in no way supportive of any outlandish theory contrary to history as we know it.

but if this is right, then why does sam question that Jon might not be the 998th LC. If they had a list from 1 to 674th. Then what happened to the 674th to 998th list? Also why wouldnt the keep up dating the lists like we see with the book that Ned reads about the Noble familys. It was up to date. Why would you make a list from 1 to 674th then not update it, If it was written at the time of of the 674th. Doesnt make since to me.