Why don't maesters know the circumference of the planet?

[Bright Blue Eyes]

30% more superficy? That would mean a lot more mass. And less iron? It's not the heaviest of element to start with, what's replacing it that's so much lighter? And if there's less iron into the core, why would it be as common on the surface as on Earth? Err... Nevermind, really. Yeah, I gonna keep imagining Planetos is just like Earth, same size, same composition, same gravity... It shouldn't come up in the story anyway.

The distances in Westeros don't work out otherwise. Otherwise Oldtown would be in the southern hemisphere or the like. The rest is just making it work with the published facts.

[RumHam]

because Manderly ate all the Pi's...

drumroll please...i win the internet, is that not the expression??

You've got my vote.

[John Doe]

Minus the dragons bit, do you think our cultures at similar levels were any different? The ruling elite is always concerned with keeping itself in power more than educating the masses.

The ancient greeks discovered the world was round, and from the free cities the masters should have better equipments than they had. For a guild devoted to knowledge, they are pretty lame (in this regard, not story wise).

[eyenon15]

Was Erathosthenes some one of a kind superstar? or could other ancient Greeks have done what he did?

If it's the former, the answer is there is no mathematical superstar in westeros

[Bright Blue Eyes]

Everybody and their mother tried their hand at calculating the circumference of Earth. Eratosthenes was neither the first nor the last, but for a long time the one with the best approximation, further benefitting from his calculation method being written up and still existing today.

[Blind Beth the Cat Lady]

because Manderly ate all the Pi's...

drumroll please...i win the internet, is that not the expression??

:lol:

[Roose is Azor Ahai]

They know. It is stated in The World of Ice and Fire that "the wise men have long ago agreed that the world is indeed a circle."

[Waters Gate]

Was Erathosthenes some one of a kind superstar? or could other ancient Greeks have done what he did?

If it's the former, the answer is there is no mathematical superstar in westeros

Erathosthenes was foremost a scholar at the greatest center of scholarship in the ancient world, the great library of Alexandria. Quite similar to the Citadel, the Great library was a repository of knowledge and a center for study and teaching for a great part of the world, and it was a huge loss to mankind as a whole when it went up in flames. Erathosthenes actually was the boss of the library in his time, well kinda like an archmaester of the Citadel, and he tutored many subjects like math, philosophy, astronomy, history, ...

Erastothenes could fall back on the knowledge of many great greek philosophers and mathematicians, and with that knowledge he could do such experiments as trying to calculate the earths circumference.

That the world is round is going to be obvious to any respectable scholar, and once a scholar has the required mathematical knowledge and points of reference it's not so hard to try to calculate it. it should therefore not surprize you that Erathosthenes wasn't the only one who made a fair appoximation of the actual circumference, it's just that he got closest to the exact number. If the Maesters don't know the circumference of their planet, even if it obviously must be a set number given they know that the world is round, then it must be that they don't have the mathematical knowledge to make the calculations. To some extend the lack of tall constructs in Westeros might indicate that the westerosi their mathemathical knowledge for what regards construction is also limited. However, it's also fairly basic geometry really, it's kinda weird that you would have a center of scholarship opperating for century's and then having difficulty getting something like basic geometry.

[Bright Blue Eyes]

"Lack of tall buildings?" Even neglecting the Wall and the Hightower, Storms End, the walls of Winterfell, the Great Sept, the Eyrie and a whole bunch of other buildings are damn impressive.

Furthermore, with all the astronomy, geometry has to be pretty advanced.

Just accept that the Maesters know, or at least have a reasonable approximation and Maester Yandel just did not include it.

[Taenqyrhae]

This could be explained by my theory that the speed of light is extremely variable near Planetos. That would explain why the moon phase is almost always wrong much better than "GRRM doesn't care about have moon phases match his calendar" - even if he just didn't care what would be the correct phase for it's time and position, he should still be right some of the time, and he isn't. I believe this is deliberate, not only does it explain a number of other odd details in the series, it would also affect the ability to measure the planet by extrapolating the curvature, because the apparent distance to the horizon would vary based on the speed of light where the observer was. The Maesters almost certainly know how to measure distance and the basic math to extrapolate circumference from it - maybe they have tried in the past and gave up because they could not all agree on a single figure because they all got different measurements.

[Waters Gate]

"Lack of tall buildings?" Even neglecting the Wall and the Hightower, Storms End, the walls of Winterfell, the Great Sept, the Eyrie and a whole bunch of other buildings are damn impressive.

Furthermore, with all the astronomy, geometry has to be pretty advanced.

You make the error to not distinct magic constructions that are so old they existed century's or millenia even before the Maesters existed, and the relative lack of tall constructions in the Westeros of the time of Asoiaf.

Wall? Thousands of years old, build by magic. The hightower? Likely build on a highly advanced foundation that also takes a fair part of it's height and allows the actual understrenght to carry a cosntruction that would otherwise sink in other ground with worse building technique's. Likely build in part with magic. Storms end? Winterfell? All back to the time when Bran the magic builder was around. Eyrie looks as old as ever too, who knows who build that, i wouldn't be surprized if Some great birds had something to do with it too, seems difficult otherwise to haul up all the required stone on the "logistical infrastructure".

The great Sept? The one of Baelor the Blessed? Well MAYBE we can talk here, now atleast that is relativly recent, not like so ancient that noone has a bloody clue on how it was build or who build it but having some legendary stories about it.

And most of kings landing is fairly modern too. Oh and even i guess Harrenhall could be seen as fairly recent. but be fair, how many tall costructs are there of a fairly recent date? And even when it comes to Kings landing you might think that it maybe was helped also by an infusion of Valyrian architectural technique's. Deffinatly the Valyrians seemed to be better builders than the Westerosi.

Heck, the Westerosi don't even have a half decent road network. The "Kings road" is nothing but a mudtrack up north, that hardly seems very regal.

The late medieval time in our history was one which in part could be called "the age of the cathedrals". So many great cathedrals got started around the 13th to 15th century, it was in part a revival and advancement of old and new building technique's.

Westeros is extremely static in regards to development, things don't change much it seems over a few century's in regards to constructions.

[Kikajon]

This knowledge would require an aluminim link and they still don't know how to forge it.

[Blind Beth the Cat Lady]

Erathosthenes was foremost a scholar at the greatest center of scholarship in the ancient world, the great library of Alexandria. Quite similar to the Citadel, the Great library was a repository of knowledge and a center for study and teaching for a great part of the world, and it was a huge loss to mankind as a whole when it went up in flames. Erathosthenes actually was the boss of the library in his time, well kinda like an archmaester of the Citadel, and he tutored many subjects like math, philosophy, astronomy, history, ...

Erastothenes could fall back on the knowledge of many great greek philosophers and mathematicians, and with that knowledge he could do such experiments as trying to calculate the earths circumference.

That the world is round is going to be obvious to any respectable scholar, and once a scholar has the required mathematical knowledge and points of reference it's not so hard to try to calculate it. it should therefore not surprize you that Erathosthenes wasn't the only one who made a fair appoximation of the actual circumference, it's just that he got closest to the exact number. If the Maesters don't know the circumference of their planet, even if it obviously must be a set number given they know that the world is round, then it must be that they don't have the mathematical knowledge to make the calculations. To some extend the lack of tall constructs in Westeros might indicate that the westerosi their mathemathical knowledge for what regards construction is also limited. However, it's also fairly basic geometry really, it's kinda weird that you would have a center of scholarship opperating for century's and then having difficulty getting something like basic geometry.

My take on this is that GRRM, while a total genius at storytelling, world building, plot strategy, and character development, does not seem to be much of a math person. He may be unaware that it seems weird for Maesters not to know the circumference of the earth. I didn't know it was weird until I read this post. Wise men knowing the circumference of the earth is not a usual thing in medieval-ish fantasy, probably because scholars in Europe during the actual medieval period were unlikely to know due to a lot of knowledge being lost to the general population after the fall of the Roman Empire.

Basically, it seems like the size of the planet is indeterminate for these plot reasons:

- GRRM wanted a ginormous land mass, and he wanted it all in the northern hemisphere of his planet

- He wanted to focus the story on this land mass and part of a neighboring land mass, and he didn't care a whole lot about developing the whole planet

- GRRM is on record as saying he wanted everything in his world to be bigger and more impressive than in the real world; hence Hadrian's Wall becomes 800 feet high and made of ice, Westeros becomes a continent the size of two continents (he's said its roughly the size of north and south america), and by extension the planet it's on also becomes huge, but that's not really the point as this is fantasy and not sci-fi. So the total size of the planet gets left out because it's not really that important.

OR

- The rest of Planetos will be revealed later, and there is some upcoming plot point concerning yet another continent that Gerion Lannister has discovered and will come back to tell people about. Maybe all the Others will get sent to this new continent to start a prison colony or something, lol.

[TheSovereignGrave]

Wall? Thousands of years old, build by magic. The hightower? Likely build on a highly advanced and base that also takes a fair part of it's height and allows the actual understrenght to carry a cosntruction that would otherwise sink in other ground with worse building technique's. Likely build in part with magic. Storms end? Winterfell? All back to the time when Bran the magic builder was around. Eyrie looks as old as ever too, who knows who build that, i wouldn't be surprized if Some great birds had something to do with it too, seems difficult otherwise to haul up all the required stone on the "logistical infrastructure

He said disregarding the Wall and Hightower. And as for Storm's End and Winterfell, they were both built during the Age of Heroes, so they weren't necessarily 'hundreds or thousands of years' before the maesters existed. The maesters are an ancient order that was founded when the Hightowers were still Kings. And as for the Eyrie, we know exactly who built it: construction was began by Roland Arryn, the fourth King of Mountain and Vale, and completed generations later.

[Waters Gate]

He said disregarding the Wall and Hightower. And as for Storm's End and Winterfell, they were both built during the Age of Heroes, so they weren't necessarily 'hundreds or thousands of years' before the maesters existed. The maesters are an ancient order that was founded when the Hightowers were still Kings. And as for the Eyrie, we know exactly who built it: construction was began by Roland Arryn, the fourth King of Mountain and Vale, and completed generations later.

So how "tall" are these more recent buildings?

I can figure the sept of Baelor to be fairly big, but big can also be wide withought necceraliy being that high. And we actually don't know the height of most of those constructions, but th impression is made that for ex. the red keep is smaller than Winterfell. Most recent buildings hardly compare really to the older constructions.

Wise men knowing the circumference of the earth is not a usual thing in medieval-ish fantasy, probably because scholars in Europe during the actual medieval period were unlikely to know due to a lot of knowledge being lost to the general population after the fall of the Roman Empire.

You have something of a point. Afcourse scholars in medieval times often were clerics, and that played a part sometimes in their ignorance. University's only started to pop up in the late medieval period, deffinatly in what is called the dark age there was not a lot of scholarship and learning going on in the barbarian parts of Europe. It's less about knowledge getting forgotten and more about systems of educations falling away with the west roman empire collapsing. The Byzantine's for their part were likely less ignorant, so were the muslims and i figure the Chinese.

Instabbilety and societal collapse can lead to perceived loss of knowledge. Otoh Westeros has known quite a lot of peace in the last century's, despite youre occasional war. (really not comparable to the dark ages that)

And it has something you could call a real university, free even from religious preconceptions. Hoever 1 university isn't that much neither, and withough a competing university it might fall to it's own preconceptions too. indeed it seems that some topic's and/or views are not so easily discussed in the Citdel, many maesters and hlf maesters attest of the fact that students and would be scholars often have their difference's with the citadels leaderships, even to the point where people seem to drop out. The maesters there concerns regarding Qyburns experiments to some extend reflect some form of censorship existing in the Citadel.

[Light a wight tonight]

They know. It is stated in The World of Ice and Fire that "the wise men have long ago agreed that the world is indeed a circle."

A circle is round and flat at the same time. Welcome to Discworld.

[Bright Blue Eyes]

Harrenhal's towers are at least 100 m high, even in their ruined and broken state. The smallest is "half again as Winterfell's keep", which itself is higher than the inner walls of Winterfell at ~35 m.

Apart from that, guesses are our best bet, because GRRM rarely puts any measurements on the table.

[Jasta11]

So how "tall" are these more recent buildings?

I can figure the sept of Baelor to be fairly big, but big can also be wide withought necceraliy being that high. And we actually don't know the height of most of those constructions, but th impression is made that for ex. the red keep is smaller than Winterfell. Most recent buildings hardly compare really to the older constructions.

Yeah, that's part of a larger problem of Westeros having advanced at a snail's pace compared to Earth, as well as ye olde fantasy trope of more ancient civilizations building better stuff than modern ones.

I mean cripes, even if the Wall was magic or giant-assisted, it's still a 700 feet tall, hundred feet wide gigantic fuck-off wall of ice that spans hundreds of kilometers. The Great Wall of China has got absolutely nothing on it, let alone inadequately shameful displays like Hadrian's Wall. This was made by a realm that barely controlled the North, a poorer region of the continent. Yet as you said, the Iron Throne which ruled over all but Dorne at the time with all the tax money and workforce this implies as well as being thousands of years later, considers it an achievement to build a simple road which ends up not even being completed. The Romans are hanging their heads in shame, they would built roads on the way to building bigger structures all over their empire.

Albeit some of it might easily be explained by the seasons; with years-long winters, you probably put more emphasis on practical constructs rather than spam cathedrals all over the place. Still doesn't explain how Westeros has not moved on from feudalism in 8 000 years, while within this timespan we went from proto-states using barter economy and copper tools to, well, modern society.

[TheSovereignGrave]

So how "tall" are these more recent buildings?

I can figure the sept of Baelor to be fairly big, but big can also be wide without necessarily being that high. And we actually don't know the height of most of those constructions, but the impression is made that for ex. the red keep is smaller than Winterfell. Most recent buildings hardly compare really to the older constructions.

Well Harrenhal is rather recent in the grand scheme of things, and the Red Keep was only completed a few decades after Harrenhal. But I don't think we're given exact height and size, or even the relative height and sizes, of most castles. So it's kinda difficult to compare them.

Albeit some of it might easily be explained by the seasons; with years-long winters, you probably put more emphasis on practical constructs rather than spam cathedrals all over the place. Still doesn't explain how Westeros has not moved on from feudalism in 8 000 years, while within this timespan we went from proto-states using barter economy and copper tools to, well, modern society.

It probably hasn't actually been 8,000 years of absolutely nothing. If I recall correctly, the maesters put their estimates of when things happened as far more recently than what is widely considered true.

[Waters Gate]

Something besides the original topic here, but i noticed a quant little detail when comparing the great library to the citadel.

Did anyone noticed before, that Historical Alexandria and Oldtown actually have 2 very specific landmakrs in coman? Both have the world largest center of learning, and both have a hughe ass lighthouse not sitting to far from that.

Lets hope for Oldtown that both are not going to get the fate that the great library and Pharos got.