Howl at the Moon

[ARYa_Nym]

Didamick. Thanks for posting. I've been meaning to reply.

We've discussed that in the water thread. You're invited and anyone else interested. You always have good replies on mythology.

Sometimes when Arya gives a person water they die immediately after.

I posted in that thread that Arya has been associated with cats throughout her story. Cats also have a moon association.

The Greeks/Romans linked the Egyptian god Bast of cats to Artemis/Diana.

'Like the moon it (the cat) comes to life at night, escaping from humanity and wandering over the house-tops with its eyes beaming out through the darkness.' Many people believed the cat was the child of the moon and it was said that 'the moon brought forth the cat'.

To the Greeks, Bast's equivalent was Artemis, and to the Romans she was Diana

By the Middle Ages Diana was the name of the Queen of the Witches. The cat was then becoming linked with witchcraft and goddess worship.

http://www.likeacat.com/Cat-Symbolism_ep_56-1.html

The ancient Egyptians linked cats to the Moon.

The cat's lunar links date back at least as far as the ancient Egyptians, who likened the changing dilation and contraction of the pupils in its glowing eyes to the waxing and waning of the pallid moon, and its nocturnal activity to the moon's night-time visitations. Indeed, according to Egyptian mythology, the cat owes its eyes' shimmering phosphorescence to the sun-god Ra, who entrusted to it the sun's brilliant lustre, to be guarded and diligently transported by it throughout the night - so that our planet would never be entirely without light, and as a promise that the sun would itself return every morning.

He notes that cats can be white or black, "...like the full and dark moon and so depict the extreme opposites of life and death, nourishing milk and dark poison. But they also come striped and so are the pattern of the transformations of the moon which governs the alternating rhythm of the tides, and so the whole great movement of life".

For instance, both in China and Japan the cat was traditionally looked upon as a cunning shape-shifter, capable of transforming itself into many different guises.

Moreover, Japanese sailors actively welcomed cats on account of their supposed ability to ward off dangerous maritime demons.

http://karlshuker.blogspot.com/2009/03/at-sign-of-cat-feline-symbolism.html

[cottog8444]

I am of the camp that believes there may very well be some connection with wargs/skinchangers and the Many-Faced God/Faceless Men. I am not sure where or how, but I also feel that the use of weirwood all over their temple is pretty telling.

As far as volcanoes in HH, I think this is definitely possible, as the Children had to get Obsidian/dragonglass somewhere, and I'm pretty sure it's just like the Obsidian on Earth.

[The Others Take Ya]

Awesome thread! I have to say I'm on board for about 2/3'ds of it, because I don't think the wildlings were actually the ones to have led the slaves to Braavos because they wouldn't have the technology to navigate and operate a ship. However, I think its super close, because I think the wildlings were in Valyria as kidnapped slaves and they were sent to be rescued by this guy:

AGOT Bran VII quote - he shows Osha the Winterfell tomb:

That’s a Brandon, the tall one with the dreamy face, he was Brandon the Shipwright, because he loved the sea. His tomb is empty. He tried to sail west across the Sunset Sea and was never seen again. His son was Brandon the Burner, because he put the torch to all his father’s ships in grief.

I think he ended up crossing the Sunset Sea because he was told to by the godswood at winterfell. The pact between the CotF and man called for the Starks to keep harmony in the realm of man and some wildlings had been kidnapped and enslaved by this rising power called Valyria, so I think the CotF called on Brandon the Shipwright to sail across the sea and he didn't come back because he saved the wildlings and founded Braavos.

There is no time frame given for Brandon the Shipwright's life span but it would explain:

1) why there are moonsinger settlements in the far east at Jhogos Nai and what could have been a settlement the Dothraki called Vaes Tolloro. The moonsingers may have descendants from those tired of sailing and decided to live in Essos. Probably to be expected of a long voyage.

2) What happened to Brandon the Shipwright.

3) Why the moonsingers are called moonsingers - because they were wargs and their direwolves sang to the moon all the time. Also because green magic is the magic of new growth and possibly rebirth - which is a link to MMD's learning birthing songs from there.

4) why we have FM and moonsingers as the two primary places of worship - the living Starks and the many faced god/CotF who give the gift of death

Its also interesting to note how the CotF/weirwoods relationships keep popping up on islands. Here's some brainstorming info from this post in this other thread I created.

The quotes above and the search for a COTF link made me think about the crannogmen a few days ago. At first I wondered why the Naathi would be the only ones supposedly related to the COTF, and they live on an isolated island, but they're not. Crannogmen are said to be related to the COTF too and they live on a fabled island (Greywater watch) that moves around in the bog and makes it hard to find. Could the fabled isle of Naath move too I wonder? And is it their COTF cousins that help them move it? Could COTF prefer islands for some reason - like the ability to move them for their own defense - because so far we have hints at FOUR different islands and FOUR different offshoots of CotF:

1. Naath - the Naathi (new post comment: this link came about in the original post because the descriptions of Naathi match the CotF golden eyes and diminutive stature)
   
2. Greywater Watch - the crannogmen
   
3. Isle of Faces - the green men - an order created at the pact to guard southern weirwoods, not necessarily related to CotF, and according Jojen's story to Bran, they still existed on the isle of faces around the time of Harrenhal. Are the green men in the trees? are they ancient greenseers? At the time of the pact the fable is they carved faces into the trees, but what if its the faces of the greenseers that got shoved into the trees?
   
4. Another thing to note, is that temples in Braavos, including the temple of the many faced god and moonsingers are located on the Isle of the Gods. If the CotF are most comfortable on islands then its another clue that they may also be comfortable working in the home base of the Faceless Men, as we don't really hear about any other places where they have temples or houses of worship yet, other then Braavos.
   

Also in the Theon sample chapter

the weirwood by Asha and Stannis are also located on an island by the settlement they're in. So that's number 5.

Just a stray thought - where were the people in the town when Stannis and his army got there? could they be at the weirwood being protected??? The people probably wouldn't have gone to the winter town at winterfell with Bolton there. Hm.

So if the weirnet is active most across islands, I can see that Brandon the Shipwright could easily have had a lot of help in crossing the Sunset Sea to get to the eastern side of the continent of Essos. He could have had the children helping him hop from island to island.

Also note the materials that make up the titan. His legs are black stone (basalt? though I'm not looking it up to remember exactly) and bronze, reminiscent of the stone from the ruined wall at Moat Cailin. If the CotF can move islands around, they could have been the ones to raise the titan, the islands, and dredge out the natural harbor. Stark had to get them out of Valyria and lead them there.

I think the story may end up revealing that Brandon the Shipwright's tomb is in Braavos if he really was the guy the CotF sent to do the job. :)

edit: forgot to write what book the quote was from. Added context.

edit 2: added extra info to 3 on list of possible explanations

edit 3: Just an additional thought - the sealords of Braavos have a tradition of having their statues put up along the canal reminiscent of the tradition Starks had of having a statue made of their likeness in the tomb. If he circumnavigated the globe and led the slaves to Braavos, then he may be the genesis of the title sealord and the tradition of the statues. And the Stark kings also had statues made of their direwolves...

Suddenly I'm really intrigued to see the sealord die so we can see what happens when he's buried and his statue is put up. Will Arya see her ancestor's statue?

[Artemis]

Bumping this thread because this is relevant information. Also, the mystery of Braavos needs to be further explored - especially with its connections to the North.

This is from an interview with GRRM:

Could you give us any information concerning the moonsingers that were key to the founding of Braavos?

As you know, they were slaves who fled from Valyria and they found a place as far away from Valyria that they could get. What basically happened was that a Valyrian fleet, which was rowed by slaves, was taken over by the slaves after they mutined. And they decided to get as far away to the north as they could, sailing through the narrow sea to find a refuge. The founded Braavos and kept the city secret for about a hundred years. For those first hundred years, practically no one knew of the city's existence. Because the city is founded by slaves, it's not a homogenous population, there were slaves from all sorts of different places with different ethnicities, different homelands, different customs, different religions. So they create a new religion, one with one god that can be applied to all the other fatihs and is tolerant of all the other faiths. Braavos has people of all kinds, all ethnicities and colors, so there's no standard appearance for a Braavosi because it's a conglomerate of differnet people. In the case of the Lyseni, they do have distinct ethnic features because it was a Valyrian colony: it was only and entirely Valyrian, so the Lyseni have common features with the Valyrians. It's another religion, the moonsingers, and they basically continue to follow this religion that I discussed, that's very tolerant and open. They were very important in the founding and early history of Braavos, but they still exist to this day. Beyond that, I don't expect they'll have much importance to the present story.... and where's Elio when I need him?

[setmyheartafire]

I posited this concept at the end of the Heresey 7 thread, and I think it applies here: That the over-arching theme of ASOIF is not actually about Fire + Ice as their own ends, but rather about the need to recalibrate the natural order that's been thrown off by 2 human "sins": tampering with death and slavery. I think that fire and ice are the means that humans have used to to resurrect/ preserve life, as well as devices used for will-binding (slavery), and that it's not so much an issue of duality between fire and ice, but more an issue where balance must be restored by destroying human use of both altogether. (here's the original post where I explain this a bit more: http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/62578-heresy-7/page__st__460

Part of what led me to this notion is the religious aspect. I think it's interesting that the Seven are the only religion that doesn't attempt miraculous intervention, nor interfere with death or any other supernatural phenomena. The Seven strike me as the single human-centric religion of the lot (which, as someone pointed out earlier, stemmed from an anthropomorphic genesis of sorts), designed to reinforce the natural order of life, death and human agency. I know there's a lot of speculation that the Maesters may be in league with/ connected to the 7, but I'm more inclined to think that both institutions may just be on the same side of the human-centric (versus supernatural) coin. Followers of the Sevens' attitude toward the Stranger (i.e., death) is one of quiet respect and acceptance, which makes for an interesting comparison to the singular dominance of the Many Faced God. MFG followers are almost like the "enforcers" of death's natural order-- "3 lives were saved, 3 lives must be taken" as per Jacquen's words to Arya-- and, of course, FM have a direct connection to the issue of slavery as well.

I'd put the "magical" religions-- Rahloo (Fire), Old Gods (Ice) and Drowned Man into their own category. The Drowned Man seems like a less successful foray into the supernatural than the other two, but it is fundamentally focused on resurrection ("that which does not die..."). Both R'holler and the OG seem able to perform resurrection and "projections" (shadow babies, potentially white walkers, depending on how you view them), and extend life unnaturally (which I also include bodily occupation as evidenced by Varymyr). They are also harnessed in order to forcibly will-bind-- "fire and blood" and skin-changing being 2 examples of direct control, as well as the surveillance techniques of weirnet and fire watching.

So this whole thread on the moonsingers is awesome. And there are definitely old tales woven in regarding the sun and moon, dragons, Nissa Nissa, etc. And I'm going to read this entire thread.

But. For now.

Butterbumps, that analysis is fantastically in line with what I have been thinking this series is really about thematically, and what some mysterious things we have seen really mean, and I seriously have to thank you for posting it so concisely here. You just made my own analysis a million times easier to dig into.

Thank you!!!