Heresy 32

[Melifeather]

I guess I wouldn't assume that it was Bloodraven watching through the eyes of the dragons. The dragons are part of "fire", so if anyone was watching, there would be a fire equivalent to Bloodraven.

[Uncat]

I had rather the impression that it is the North and the Old Gods rejectecting Cat: the southron woman does not belong there. And the same goes for the dragons. The ice girl does not belong in this keep of Fire.

Hell, now that I'm writing it: I never really got it that the Red Keep of the Targs is red as in red as fire and red in red as Mel and the red lot.

Anyway, might have been BR in the tree and maybe even in the dragons but basicaly the scenes show a place literaly frowning on some one, who does not belong there - or even is the enemy of old like Ice would be to Fire.

[Black Crow]

I agree, and this is one of the reasons why I'm wary of blaming everything on Bloodraven. The trees and the eyes were around long before him, and what Qhorin Halfhand is getting so worried about is that the trees have eyes again and the old powers are wakening.

[Black Crow]

There's a wiki entry on Craster where it says "Although the father's name is never mentioned, the name given to his son sounds very like Stark.". I checked all the chapters it references and couldn't find anything though. It always made me wonder if he was the son of a Karstark sent to the wall. He, having Stark blood could be useful to the others.

It would be even more interesting if it wasn't his father that was the ranger, but an ancestor who was a Greystark sent to the wall. The Greystarks being a the cadet branch of the Starks that were wiped out when they sided with the Boltons in a rebellion against the Starks. Course that fits even less, but I like the idea of a line of Craster's bearing the curse for rebelling against the Kings of WInter.

Dodgy things Wiki entries...

As it happens there is a real Craster. Its a fishing village in Northumberland just a few miles up the coast from where I'm sitting right now - famous for its smoked fish.

If anybody was to ask me, I'm venture to suggest that's where GRRM plucked the name from rather than it being a cunning anagram.

[Little Wing]

Old Nan also tells Bran there are ghosts in the Red Keep, Bran remembers it in his chapter when they are preparing to leave and he goes for his climb... I dunno, I don't think the skulls would be somehow "off limits" for a greenseer if there's still something stirring in them... It doesn't make Bloodraven more powerful then he already is suspect to be. Also, don't forget that later on Arya sees the skulls as friends and not as threatening at all...hm, did Cat also had a change of heart when heart trees were in question later? I'll have to get a move on on my re-read, lol.

I like the idea of the dragon's bones and weirwoods (white bone like) remembering in this way and keeping a trace of magic, latent magic, in the world. The bones remember :P

[Gar Weg Wun Sygerrik]

If anybody was to ask me, I'm venture to suggest that's where GRRM plucked the name from rather than it being a cunning anagram.

Hmm, I interpreted the quote as "Craster, your father was a <insert word that sounds like stark>". Not necessarily that someone is saying 'Craster' sounds like a Stark(?) or that he had another name originally. However since i can't verify it, its all nonsense :)

[Black Crow]

I'm fairly hazing about all these stories as I read them all in my youth so I will have to brush up a bit and dig out the books but what do you all think? Basic comparisons could be made no? Any theories of how they correspond?

Having spent the last year and more trying to make sense of all this, we're confident that a lot of Celtic mythology is going into the Song of Ice and Fire, with the caveat that a lot of mixing and matching is going on. Its plausibly been suggested that there's a lot of Cu Chulainn in the Hound (Sandor) but also in Jon - his defence of the Wall being very reminiscent of the defence of Ulster at the ford. Bran comes from the Mabinogion, and the Crow is the Morrigan. We've discussed a lot of this, especially the Morrigan quite recently, so ask away.

[Black Crow]

Speaking of the Morrigan/Crow on the dying Cu Chulainn's shoulder. Mention was made earlier of the dream of the man without a face on the bridge at Pyke, with a drowned crow on his shoulder, but there's another more immediate reference in the village that isn't Whitetree, when Small Paul comes for the baby. He has Mormont's (and now Jon's) raven on his shoulder, eating at his face as he walks

[Uncat]

Old Nan also tells Bran there are ghosts in the Red Keep, Bran remembers it in his chapter when they are preparing to leave and he goes for his climb... I dunno, I don't think the skulls would be somehow "off limits" for a greenseer if there's still something stirring in them... It doesn't make Bloodraven more powerful then he already is suspect to be. Also, don't forget that later on Arya sees the skulls as friends and not as threatening at all...hm, did Cat also had a change of heart when heart trees were in question later? I'll have to get a move on on my re-read, lol.

I like the idea of the dragon's bones and weirwoods (white bone like) remembering in this way and keeping a trace of magic, latent magic, in the world. The bones remember :P

Makes the Royces kind of the Bones of the Vale :)

But this "the bones remember" stuff is somehow important for the series

[Little Wing]

Makes the Royces kind of the Bones of the Vale :)

But this "the bones remember" stuff is somehow important for the series

Har! Yeah - the bones remember, we remember - now if only somebody would translate these runes... *scratches head ponderously* :laugh:

[Melifeather]

Just a little status update regarding the research. I am still currently on searching the word, "years". I just wanted to point out that 8000 years so far seems to be a key time for many occurrences:

House Stark was established 8000 years ago. - Clash of Kings, Bran POV

The Andals came 8000 years ago - Game of Thrones, and Clash of Kings

Moat Cailin was the stronghold of the First Men during the Andal invasion. - Game of Thrones

The Others and the Children are believed dead, gone for 8000 years. - Game of Thrones

The Wall has stood for 8000 years. - Game of Thrones, Ned POV

LC Mormont states that the Long Night happened 8000 years ago. - Game of Thrones, Jon POV

[Black Crow]

The Long Night, the Wall and the establishment of the Starks are all consistently linked in histories of Westeros

However, can you provide a reference for that suggestion of the Andals coming 8000 years ago? The earliest we know of is the dodgy reference to the Vale 6,000 years ago, and is in any case contradicted by the later stuff, like Hoster Blackwood.

The Others are certainly believed to have been out of circulation for 8,000 years, in the context (wrongly we know) of not having been seen since the Long Night ended, but the Children were certainly around long after that.

[brut]

Sorry for the off-topic, but when we say of hammer of water, or hammer of ice, or the Wall, or ice magic, think about this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YoA_Z7y8f6Q#!

[Melifeather]

The First Men arrived in Westeros 12,000 years prior to the current story. When they signed the Pact, that ended the Dawn Age and began the Age of Heroes. The Pact lasted 4000 years. Depending upon how long the First Men and the Children fought before the Pact, the earliest age for the Age of Heroes is 8000 years prior to the story. It was only centuries after the Pact was signed when the Andals arrived. - electronic version, Kindle, Game of Thrones page 617-618.

The Pact endured not only through the Long Night, but through the birth of the Seven Kingdoms. - page 618. I think this is where some confusion has been in the past, because if you only say the Pact endured through the Long Night, it makes it sound like the Long Night happened before the Andal invasion. But, if you read the whole sentence with the Pact enduring through the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, you understand that it does not confirm that the Long Night happens prior to the invasion.

ETA: If we slide the end date of the Pact to the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, then the Age of Heroes and the Andal invasion could be around 6000 years prior.

[Black Crow]

And here we have the passage in question, Maester Luwin's history lesson without the interruptions:

They [the Children] were people of the Dawn Age, the very first, before kings and kingdoms. In those days, there were no castles or holdfasts, no cities, not so much as a market town to be found between here and the sea of Dorne. There were no men at all. Only the children of the forest dwelt in the lands we now call the Seven Kingdoms.

They were a people dark and beautiful, small of stature, no taller than children even when grown to manhood. They lived in the depths of the wood, in caves and crannogs and secret tree towns. Slight as they were, the children were quick and graceful. Male and female hunted together, woth weirwood bows and flying snares. Their gods were the gods of the forest, stream and stone, the old gods, whose names are secret. Their wise men were called greenseers, and carved strange faces in the weirwoods to keep watch on woods. How long the children reigned here or where they came from, no man can know.

But some twelve thousand years ago, the First Men appeared from the east, crossing the Broken Arm of Dorne before it was broken. They came with bronze swords and great leathern shields, riding horses. No horse had ever been seen on this side of the narrow sea. No doubt the children were as frightened by the horses as the First Men were by the faces in the trees. As the First Men carved out holdfasts and farms, they cut down the faces and gave them to the fire. Horror-struck, the children went to war. The old songs say that the greenseers used dark magics to make the seas rise and sweep away the land, shattering the Arm, but it was too late to close the door. The wars went on until the earth ran red with the blood of men and children both, but more children than men, for men were bigger and stronger, and wood and stone and obsidian make a poor match for bronze. Finally, the wise of both races prevailed, and the chiefs and heroes of the First Men met the greenseers and wood dancers amidst the weirwood groves of a small island in the great lake called God’s Eye.

There they forged the Pact. The First Men were given the coast-lands, the high plains and bright meadows, the mountains and bogs, but the deep woods were to remain forever the children’s, and no more weirwoods were to be put to the axe anywhere in the realm. So the gods might bear witness to the signing, every tree on the island was given a face, and afterward, the sacred order of green men was formed to keep watch over the Isle of Faces.

The Pact began four thousand years of friendship between men and children. In time, the First Men even put aside the gods they had brought with them, and took up the worship of the secret gods of the wood. The signing of the Pact ended the Dawn Age, and began the Age of Heroes.

So long as the kingdoms of the First Men held sway, the Pact endured, all through the Age of Heroes and the Long Night and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, yet finally there came a time, many centuries later, when other peoples crossed the narrow sea.

The Andals were the first, a race of tall, fair-haired warriors who came with steel and fire and the seven pointed star of the new gods painted on their chests. The wars lasted hundreds of years, but in the end the six southron kingdoms all fell before them. Only here, where the King in the North threw back every army that tried to cross the Neck, did the rule of the First Men endure. The Andals burnt out the weirwood groves, hacked down the faces, slaughtered the children where they found them, and everywhere proclaimed the triumph of the Seven over the old gods. So the children fled north -

[Black Crow]

The First Men arrived in Westeros 12,000 years prior to the current story. When they signed the Pact, that ended the Dawn Age and began the Age of Heroes. The Pact lasted 4000 years. Depending upon how long the First Men and the Children fought before the Pact, the earliest age for the Age of Heroes is 8000 years prior to the story. It was only centuries after the Pact was signed when the Andals arrived. - electronic version, Kindle, Game of Thrones page 617-618.

The Pact endured not only through the Long Night, but through the birth of the Seven Kingdoms. - page 618. I think this is where some confusion has been in the past, because if you only say the Pact endured through the Long Night, it makes it sound like the Long Night happened before the Andal invasion. But, if you read the whole sentence with the Pact enduring through the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, you understand that it does not confirm that the Long Night happens prior to the invasion.

ETA: If we slide the end date of the Pact to the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, then the Age of Heroes and the Andal invasion could be around 6000 years prior.

Have to disagree. Luwin quite clearly says that: "the Pact endured, all through the Age of Heroes and the Long Night and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, yet finally there came a time, many centuries later, when other peoples crossed the narrow sea."

He then goes on to say that: The wars lasted hundreds of years, but in the end the six southron kingdoms all fell before them. In other words the Seven Kingdoms are established before the Andals arrive and spend hundreds of years gradually conquering the six southern ones, and its when the Andals start in on the children and the weirwoods that they flee north (beyond the Wall says Osha)

[Melifeather]

Have to disagree. Luwin quite clearly says that: "the Pact endured, all through the Age of Heroes and the Long Night and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, yet finally there came a time, many centuries later, when other peoples crossed the narrow sea."

He then goes on to say that: The wars lasted hundreds of years, but in the end the six southron kingdoms all fell before them. In other words the Seven Kingdoms are established before the Andals arrive and spend hundreds of years gradually conquering the six southern ones, and its when the Andals start in on the children and the weirwoods that they flee north (beyond the Wall says Osha)

The way that he phrases it does make it sound like the Andals came after the Long Night, but if that is literally true, then the Seven Kingdoms were also formed before the Andals came.

ETA: and we know that's not the case.

[Black Crow]

ETA: and we know that's not the case.

Since when?

Here's Old Nan on the Long Night:

“Now these were the days before the Andals came, and long before the women fled across the narrow sea from the cities of the Rhoyne, and the hundred kingdoms of those times were the kingdoms of the First Men, who had taken these lands from the children of the forest.

Along comes the Long Nights, kings and kingdoms fall, and then after the Long Night the survivors regroup (and judging by the way Maester Luwin refers to it, non-too peacefully) into just Seven Kingdoms. Then the Andals tool up and we have hundreds of years of war as the kingdoms fall one by one, until Tristifer Mudd is killed and the North is the only one left. Makes perfect sense to me and entirely consistent :cool4:

[Little Wing]

I wonder what the original gods of the First Men were... Did it say in the books and I've missed it? They took up the Old Gods of the Children, but what did they believe previously? Also, Maester Luwin is telling all of this to Bran, and how no man will ever know how long the Children reigned and where they came from - and Bran may well be the one to find out about even that!

[Runaway Penguin]

Luwin's quote establishes the timeline (not exact dates, mind you) pretty well. Seven kingdoms after the Night but before Andals. Andals came also gradually - it is anyone's guess whetehr "many hundreds of years" refers to "less than 10" or "more than 10", but my guess is definitely more than 500 years...