Tywin Lannister, OMG may not be that bad afterall

[Suzanna Stormborn]

Tywin's biggest mistake was that he failed to save Elia, killing her children was a necessary act, even Dorn would understand that, but have Elia rapped and killed is completely unecessary and unforgiveable, it would only buy himself a powerful enenmy who would cause so many troubles to him.

P.S no one care a lowborn like Tysha, no one would care what happened to her in the realm.

I dont think Dorne would have been ok with the just the kids dying and not Elia. Arianne, Oberyn and the Sand Snakes would still be equally mutinous towards the IT.

[SeanF]

What's shocking to contemporaries is that it's *Elia of Dorne* who was raped and murdered, along with her two children.

Had it been Elia the miller's wife, most of the Lords, Maesters etc. wouldn't have found it remarkable (there are people like Ned, Catelyn, Edmure etc. who would be upset, but they're a minority).

I go back and forth about this, but I now think Oberyn was right. The rape and murder of a Princess was a deliberate and calculated atrocity.

[Chaircat Meow]

What's shocking to contemporaries is that it's *Elia of Dorne* who was raped and murdered, along with her two children.

Had it been Elia the miller's wife, most of the Lords, Maesters etc. wouldn't have found it remarkable (there are people like Ned, Catelyn, Edmure etc. who would be upset, but they're a minority).

I go back and forth about this, but I now think Oberyn was right. The rape and murder of a Princess was a deliberate and calculated atrocity.

Well, I didn't really believe it mostly, until I read the world book. Now I do though. But I think Oberyn was wrong to think it was about the Martell marriage. It was revenge for Aerys's rape of Joanna.

[SeanF]

Tywin's biggest mistake was that he failed to save Elia, killing her children was a necessary act, even Dorn would understand that, but have Elia rapped and killed is completely unecessary and unforgiveable, it would only buy himself a powerful enenmy who would cause so many troubles to him.

P.S no one care a lowborn like Tysha, no one would care what happened to her in the realm.

Kill the children, and you have to kill Elia. In fact, realpolitik dictates killing the entire Martell family, once you begin with Aegon and Rhaenys.

[SeanF]

Well, I didn't really believe it mostly, until I read the world book. Now I do though. But I think Oberyn was wrong to think it was about the Martell marriage. It was revenge for Aerys's rape of Joanna.

Tywin had good reason to hate Aerys, who was a shit of the first order, even before Duskendale. But, Elia, her children, and the inhabitants of Kings Landing weren't legitimate targets.

[Chaircat Meow]

Tywin had good reason to hate Aerys, who was a shit of the first order, even before Duskendale. But, Elia, her children, and the inhabitants of Kings Landing weren't legitimate targets.

I'm just saying I now think it makes sense in terms of motivation, where it didn't really before.

[David Selig]

Yandel is a major Lannister asslicker and Pycelle (aka Tywin's personal asslicker) fan. He did everything possible to make Tywin look good (that bit about Elia possibly murdering her children was such a desperate grasp at straws, LOL) and he still comes across as a monstrous scumbag. Zero sympathy from me. Oh, no, his wife might've cheated on him, boo hoo, can you blame her? Who'd want to stay faithful to a boring shithead like Tywin?

[marsyao]

I dont think Dorne would have been ok with the just the kids dying and not Elia. Arianne, Oberyn and the Sand Snakes would still be equally mutinous towards the IT.

Yes, Dorn would be angry, but far less so as the rape and death of Elia, because that was not personal, this was a price to pay for royal family members when they lost in the game of thrones.

[The Wolves]

Yandel is a major Lannister asslicker and Pycelle (aka Tywin's personal asslicker) fan. He did everything possible to make Tywin look good (that bit about Elia possibly murdering her children was such a desperate grasp at straws, LOL) and he still comes across as a monstrous scumbag. Zero sympathy from me. Oh, no, his wife might've cheated on him, boo hoo, can you blame her? Who'd want to stay faithful to a boring shithead like Tywin?

Lol!!

[SeanF]

Yandel is a major Lannister asslicker and Pycelle (aka Tywin's personal asslicker) fan. He did everything possible to make Tywin look good (that bit about Elia possibly murdering her children was such a desperate grasp at straws, LOL) and he still comes across as a monstrous scumbag. Zero sympathy from me. Oh, no, his wife might've cheated on him, boo hoo, can you blame her? Who'd want to stay faithful to a boring shithead like Tywin?

I think Yandel is reliable up to the last year or so Aerys' reign, when he becomes disgustingly partial.

[Stallion That Mounts Texas]

I think Yandel is reliable up to the last year or so Aerys' reign, when he becomes disgustingly partial.

This. Its when the really horrible crimes that can be laid at Tywin’s feet come about that Yandel turns up the puffery. Up until then, I love the wealth of detail that he has provided.

[Dofs]

Never really hated Tywin. Him being an awful human being was balanced for me with his rough pragmatism and being a great ruler. That being said, Reynes and Tarbecks can only blame themselves in what happened with them and their families. They rebelled in the first place only because they were massive assholes so no sympathy for them.

[Winterfell is Burning]

Everything after Jaehaerys II is very unreliable information because the main source is Pycelle, who clearly embelishes too much of Tywin's actions, and of course his own. Plus the book is dedicated first to Robert and then his "children", and so there's no interest in making the father of the queen/grandfather of the king look too bad.

Or are people thinking that Robert was a wise leader that gave the realm much prosperity? LOL. Or that Aerys, maybe even Elia herself, killed the children?

Even considering this, the maester still says Tywin provoked the Reynes into war and gave them no chance to negotiate surrender, while also murdering every Tarbeck soldier.

[the conquering bastard 25]

If the idea that you got from the Aerys and Tywin read that Tywin wasn't that bad we must not have been reading the same book. I mean I understand that some might pity Tywin because of all the shit that he had to take off of Aerys. However, but, comma, that does not give Tywin free reign to kill not one but two ancient and noble houses. There were ways to make them bend the knee that did not require him to kill the entire line. However I agreed with what he did before I read the world book.

What I took away from the Aerys and Tywin dynamic was that Tywin was grasping for power and eventually Aerys figured it out. Then Rheagar exploiting his father's weakness(madness), and the animosty that Tywin felt for his father. Getting Jamie named to the KG was only the first part of the ways that Rheagar exploited their twisted and sick relationship. More than likely Tywin helped back Rheagar and the Tourney as once King Rheagar could have addressed and righted some of the wrongs done to his family by the mad king. The one that actually is cast in some ambigious light is Aerys. How much of his madness was induced by Twyin(killing his kids so that Rheagar was the only heir, and none could contest his and Cersei's children. Remember in the Mercy chapter Tywin took a trip to Lys on the orders of Aerys, how much you wanna bet to make a marriage pact with the Valyrian nobility(Blackfyre/Brightflame descendent) for Rhaegar, and just like Steffron Baratheon he failed. Which is weird in of itself seeing as the red viper was able to turn on of side daughter of Volantis (pure Valyrian blood kind of) into his mistress but unable to get one for his own son the crowned Prince of Westeros? Strange indeed, unless that was the Red Viper's doing while he was in exile to force the King into excepting a marriage between Elia and Rhaegar and under Elia's queenship he would be made Hand. This would have a little before Duskendale and the tourney at Lannisport. Which could have appealed to Steffron more than being Aerys hand, because he would have seen the treatment between King and childhood friend Tywin. He also would have seen what type of man that Rhaegar had grown into, figuring like most of the men that were around him that he would make a better king than Aerys.

I would not put it past Tywin to have had a hand in having Varys sold and castrated, and his twin being sold into a pillowhouse in Lys only for Varys to send for her to work in a pillowhouse in Pentos(the Titan's Bastard leader of the second sons tells Dany he fucked her twin in Pentos, and the fat man does say that Dany and his second wife looked remarkably alot alike and he wanted her for that purpose because of that resembelce.), nor would I have put it past Tywin making his desire known to Pycell that he wished the queen to miscarry or if that didn't work out right murder. I think some of Aerys madness was driven by paranoia of Tywin. Like the old saying says just because your paranoid does not mean that someone isn't out to get you.

Some of the things that Aerys said when he was supposedly in a mad state ring remarkable true. He told Pycell he wanted Tywin out of the Hand job but dared not remove him because he thought that Tywin would kill him or something along those lines. He felt that someone was killing his children as I've explained the details that we get about the his mistress and her family were behind the death of his child. What could they hope to gain or gather from the death. He's married, he's got an heir and he's known to have a passing fansy for women and gets bored quickly. This book was also suppose to be a gift originally to Robert whom might not have cared his good father was presented as the monster and murder that he was, but then he died and then it was the Lannister Queen that ruled and the author had to change some aspects of the book to make her father and the king's grandfather and Hand look good or at least better than most would have thought he to be like. Like the tale of him not wanting the leavings of another man. He fucked Tyrion's leavings the night he died. He was more than likely the hand that had the tunnel built to a whore house, so whose leavings was he getting then, also this lends credence to the tell of the hill bastard on the Wall, being a son of the Lannisters like he claimed. Yet so he would not and could not compete or so no one would know about him he sent his bastard to the wall.

So this must be denial that you are feeling if its for Tywin babykiller Lannister.

Even though most of what Tywin did or tried to do would be moves that I would have made if I was in his position as well.

[Victarion10]

Tywin is the greatest Westerosi of all time.

[Winterfell is Burning]

Also, should be noticed that Tywin reversed many of Egg's policies that granted more rights to the smallfolk.

[Lion of the West]

Yandel is a major Lannister asslicker and Pycelle (aka Tywin's personal asslicker) fan. He did everything possible to make Tywin look good (that bit about Elia possibly murdering her children was such a desperate grasp at straws, LOL) and he still comes across as a monstrous scumbag. Zero sympathy from me. Oh, no, his wife might've cheated on him, boo hoo, can you blame her? Who'd want to stay faithful to a boring shithead like Tywin?

I agree that they go a bit over the top. Still Tywin is neither a monster nor a scumbag. In regards to his wife I do think that fidelity is a virtue regardless of your personal opinions regarding someone's spouse.

Also, should be noticed that Tywin reversed many of Egg's policies that granted more rights to the smallfolk.

Also should be noted that these policies were causing unrest and thus more suffering for the smallfolk. The nobility still held the power and its clear Westeros is far from ready for such reforms.

[complexphoenix]

I think Yandel is reliable up to the last year or so Aerys' reign, when he becomes disgustingly partial.

His partiality is subtle at first, and I don't think he put in any outright falsehoods for the period prior to the Rebellion. Rather, I believe he lied by omission, exhaustively detailing all of Aerys' lapses while never acknowledging any of Aerys' good points except as necessary to make Tywin look good, and detailing all of Tywin's good work while omitting anything that would make him look bad. Ser Barristan tells Dany that there was much good to be said of Aerys, but you'd never know that from reading what Yandel wrote. Yandel makes it sound like Aerys was a completely useless and shitty king even before he went insane, and credits everything that went right in his reign to Tywin.

You also see the slant in how Rhaegar is portrayed. Everyone we meet in the novels who knew Rhaegar personally describes him as amazing, but Yandel ignores or downplays all of his virtues except his courage and skill at arms - which is really just to make Robert, who slew him, look better.

I don't really blame Yandel for all this - politics is dangerous, and offending powerful people who are still living is generally a bad idea. But being able to see the slant and correct for it is key if we, the readers, want to get at the truth of what happened.

[complexphoenix]

Also should be noted that these policies were causing unrest and thus more suffering for the smallfolk. The nobility still held the power and its clear Westeros is far from ready for such reforms.

There's no such thing as "ready" by your definition. Elites always resist having their power and privilege reduced, and reforms never come without a fight. Tywin could have used his skills to quell the unrest and cement Aegon's reforms, but instead he chose to use his skills to do away with them and restore the power and privilege of his own class. Tywin is an elitist with no regard for the smallfolk, he's demonstrated it time and again. He didn't do this for the good of the realm, he did it for the good of himself and his own kind.

[David Selig]

Still Tywin is neither a monster nor a scumbag.

Sure he is. How many more thousands did he need to order to be murdered, raped or tortured for his fanboys to admit it?

Also should be noted that these policies were causing unrest and thus more suffering for the smallfolk. The nobility still held the power and its clear Westeros is far from ready for such reforms.

Absolutely, we all know how deeply Tywin cares about the smallfolk. It had nothing to do with keeping his own power, no, Sir.