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When did the Andals leave Essos?


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FNR,

 

I'd agree that the Stark graves would be accessible unless some of them didn't collapse over time. We learn that the section which is visited by the POVs has older graves at the top and the younger deeper down, but we don't know if that's also the case in the other older sections. We also don't know whether tradition alone or inscriptions identify the dead lords and kings. Even if every grave is identified you would be at a loss if you don't know more than the name of the dead Stark. And even if all dead Stark kings have a grave in the crypts (which I'd doubt) this doesn't help you all that much determining how much time past between the first and the last since you don't know how long the king ruled, or if his successor was his son or his brother. You can make a good guess, I imagine, but nothing more than that. And then there is the question how old Winterfell itself is (unclear), and how old the crypts are. I'd not be surprised if they had been in use even before the Long Night or during a time when Winterfell was not yet a real keep but only a settlement.

 

As to oral tradition:

 

I was thinking of certain German stories that are supposed to be handed down orally until they were written down in the Middle Ages - the 'Nibelungenlied', for instance, and other versions of the same stories (Siegfried the Dragonslayer, the Kings of Burgundy killing him, and then his wife Kriemhild avenging). Now, those stories were written down around 1200 or so, but supposed took place in the early Middle Ages or Late Antiquity with the people showing up there being based on real historical figures like King Attila (King Etzel in the story) or Theoderic the Great who himself was transformed in the legendary hero Dietrich von Bern.

 

But you cannot possibly take anything written in that story as serious history. Another matter would be how certain local legends grow around of certain events - say, how exactly certain prominent people died during the Wars of Roses, or the various adventures of local heroes or saints.

 

I admit that I have no clue about cultures that are still most oral today, but if you look at various new cults on New Guinea or other places (people building a religion around pilots who may or may not have visited the island during the Second World War with a plane) I'm somewhat skeptical about that.

 

Martinworld has the advantage that its 'oral tradition' may be based on the very real knowledge of the greenseers up to a point, so this would clearly be much better than real life oral tradition, but it doesn't seem likely that Old Nan herself (or, say, her grandmother) had direct access to a greenseer. I'm not dismissing Old Nan's stories in general, of course, but I still doubt that a lot of details there might be wrong - but she certainly is right about the existence of the Others. Andal oral tradition or the early writings of pious septons wouldn't be interested in historical accuracy at all, which means that they are even less accurate than First Men oral tradition which may, eventually, be based on greenseer knowledge.

 

King lists:

 

If the story of the Battle of the Seven Stars is completely rooted in ancient stories written down by septons, then the early accounts on the Arryn kings may be based on similar sources. Which means that tradition rather than good historical evidence tells us who the first couple of Arryn kings were. I'd not go as far as to assume that some of them were invented but their deeds may have been exaggerated. Whether there is a full list of Arryn kings from Artys to Ronnel is doubtful - I imagine there are multiple contradictory lists, and I'd also assume that the septons in the Vale only focused on the early kings, telling the story of the Conquest and the subsequent building of the Eyrie, and did not find it all that important to write similar accounts on every other Arryn king during the early years.

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King lists:

 

If the story of the Battle of the Seven Stars is completely rooted in ancient stories written down by septons, then the early accounts on the Arryn kings may be based on similar sources. Which means that tradition rather than good historical evidence tells us who the first couple of Arryn kings were. I'd not go as far as to assume that some of them were invented but their deeds may have been exaggerated. Whether there is a full list of Arryn kings from Artys to Ronnel is doubtful - I imagine there are multiple contradictory lists, and I'd also assume that the septons in the Vale only focused on the early kings, telling the story of the Conquest and the subsequent building of the Eyrie, and did not find it all that important to write similar accounts on every other Arryn king during the early years.

Are there multiple contradictory lists, or a single BUT unverifiable one?

Who would have produced a contradicting version? For what motives?

There are contradictory lists about ancestors of Jesus - even the name of his grandfather is unknown. BUT there are no contradictory lists about the names ancestors of Zedekiah: there is only one list of names from Adam through David to Zedekiah, from Genesis through Kings. But the dates DO have contradictory versions. Masora and Septuaginta agree that Adam lived 930 years, but while Masora says Adam had Set age 130, Septuaginta gives Adam´s age as 230 at that time.

Existence of a non-contradictory ancestor list does not serve as a reliable proof that Adam did live 930 years. But neither does the mention of Adam having lived 930 years prove that David never existed in any form (yet there is NO contemporary independent corroboration for David, either).

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And yet History gives confident list of a number of first Arryn kings, with years even.
1) Ser Artys Arryn
2) Artys´ eldest son
3) Artys´ second eldest son (sat in Gates of Moon, commanded some additions)
4) Roland Arryn, Artys´ grandson
 We are told that:
By that time, perhaps in the lifetime of Ser Artys and certainly in the time of his son, such a feature - "Andal king in the riverlands" - existed. Andal invasion had advances from Vale to Riverlands, then.
Further details:
Interestingly, he did not find any great castles of First Men in Vale.
His death is given in detail:
Years now.
Then next kings:
5) Roland I-s son - continued building
6) Roland I-s grandson - ditto
7) Roland II - went to war in Riverlands instead. 6 Kings and 5 generations after Artys, we hear that:
So, we have the count of generations between Artys and Tristifer.
8) Robin Arryn, Roland II-s brother - resumed building Eyrie
9-12):
Exact years - rather few for 4 kings.
We have a fairly detailed account of first 12 Arryn kings then.

If this is delivered with confidence and details, how can there be a serious doubt as to whether Alyssa lived 6000 or 2000 years ago?

Just wanted to say that actually the first Arryn they list is actually a story of contradiction as Artys from the andal invasion is also connected to a Hero from the Age of Heros called the Winged Knight. Contradicting Arty's date of rule. Most maesters count them as seperate and associated to gain favor with the Arryn's. If you actually research the story and all the people connected with the tales. It makes more sense that Artys is the Winged Knight and that this was the start of the major Andal migration. Arrtys is called the first king of the Mountain and Vale but his only tale mentions his defeating the first men in the Vale, nothing about how he conquered the mountain peoples. The Winged Knight (Knight implying Andal) defeated the Griffin King upon the Giants Lance (mountains).  Griffin king is also referred to as the last of the mountain kings (Likely Robar II Royce, the last Bronze King). So if you combined the two stories of the Andal warlord Artys and the Andal Winged Knight, then you get a more complete story of how the first Andal king in the Vale came to be. Which is also an example of how your Alyssa Arryn has date confusion. The confusion is because the people seem to think the Age of Heroes was along time ago, before the Andal invasion. If you actually read all the accounts it tells of the the Age of heros connecting to the beginning of the Andal Invasion, and that the Main Andal invasion was likely no more than 2000 years ago. 

  The Andals Invaded in the Vale first, then took the Riverlands, after they moved into the Reach and the Rock. Look up the known Kings in all the families and you can piece it together more your self. Take notes tho or your bound to miss stufff when compiling all the info together. Ive only the Reach left to do, but ive already done house Lannister, House Durrandon, House Gardener, House Stark, The Grey Kings and Iron Island kings, ruling houses of the Riverlands and Dorne. Ive also compiled all Kings beyond the Wall, Lord Commanders, Rulers of Yi-ti and other info including a list of all the cities, who founded them and ruled them and more. Eventually im gonna post them all connected into one piece linking people and events across different families and areas for everyone to compare and scrutinize :)

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I stumbled across an interesting observation during the discussion on Theon Stark. Theon's lifetime is actually a remarkably good good marker in the timeline of Westeros, mostly because of the number of prominent events and figures that were contemporaneous with him.
 
1. We know the biggest Andal invasion of the North occurred during his lifetime.
2. We know the Vale was already under Arryn control.
3. We know Harrag Hoare was King of the Iron isles and warred against Theon. In fact, Theon slayed his son Ravos in battle.
4. We know Theon conquered the Three Sisters.
5. We know Theon landed an army in the Fingers.
 
 
From the above we can deduce a remarkable amount of likely truths.
 
From Argos Sevenstar's military campaign in the North,  we know that the Andal invasion was still in full swing during Theon's lifetime. We also know that the invasion was not close to its start, because the Vale was already firmly ruled by the Arryns. Furthermore, we know that Harrag Hoare only came to power once the Andals had extinguished House Greyiron's line on the Iron Isles. And we know that the Iron Isles only fell to the Andals late in the Andal invasion - after the Vale and Riverlands had already fallen.
 
So from the above we know that Theon Stark lived at least a couple of centuries after the Andals first landed in the Vale.
 
Theon's conquest of the Three Sisters is also noteworthy if you think about it for a moment. It seems that before the Rape of the Three Sisters, the Northmen had never conquered the Three Sisters, but had instead been satisfied with building the Wolfsden to protect the White Knife from the Sistermen.
 
Note that the World Book states that after Theon slew Argos Sevenstar, he raised his own fleet to invade Andalos. This implies that the Starks did not have a fleet before that. This, together with the reference to the Starks joining with the Boltons to defeat Argos, and with the footnote about Belthasar Bolton making his tent from the flayed skins of 100 Sistermen during the Rape of Sisterton, strongly suggests that it was Theon's fleet built for the invasion of Andalos that gave him the naval ability to invade the Three Sisters thereafter. Before that, he did not have a fleet with which to do so.
 
Given that the Sistermen then called on the Arryns to aid them, it would also explain why Theon landed an army in the Fingers. Why else pick a fight with the Arryns?

So the above strongly supports the conclusion that Theon was the Stark who executed the Rape of the Three Sisters.
 
And as a side note, Theon's wars in Andalos, the Sisters and the Vale are eerie echoes of Robb taking his army South and leaving the North vulnerable to Ironborn attack. Indeed, we then read that Harrag Hoare attacked the North's west coast and took Cape Kraken and Bear Island from the Starks. Why would he do this, knowing Theon's warlike reputation? Obviously because the cream of the North's forces were away in Andalos, the Sisters and the Vale and Harrag felt they were ripe for the picking.
 
Only, unlike Robb, Theon Stark returned to the North and repelled the Ironborn from Cape Kraken and Bear Island, slayring Harrag's son Ravos in the process.
 
Given the dating of the Rape of the Three Sisters as 2000 years ago by the maesters this gives us a nice marker for the latter stages of the Andal invasion. This also ties in very nicely with a separate dating, given by Lord Blackwood's bookish son, who stated that the Andals conquered the Iron Isles either 4000 years ago, or 2000 years ago, depending on which timeline to believe.
 
Well, given that Harrag Hoare was the king chosen at a Kingsmoot shortly after the Andal conquest of the Iron Isles, we now know that this Kingsmoot happened during the lifetime of Theon Stark. And since the Starks first conquered the Three Sisters during the Rape of Sisterton, we know that Theon is very likely to have been the Stark that did so. And that in turn tells us that the last Kingsmoot must have happened in the same generation as the Rape of the Three Sisters.
 
Also, unless someone is seriously suggesting that Theon Stark lived 4000 years ago - which is impossible given all the corroborating evidence to the contrary - all of the above tells us that the dating of 2000 years ago for both the last Kingsmoot, the arrival of the Andals in the Iron Islands, the North's invasion by Argos Sevenstar, and the Rape of the Three Sisters is the correct one.
 
To me the above is pretty much incontrovertible proof that the Andal invasion finally conquered the Iron Isles a few generations before Harrag, who lived 2000 years ago, not 4000 years ago. This conquest happened during the lifetime of Harrag's ancestor, Harras, who was the first Hoare King. Meaning that the Andals likely first arrived in the Vale a few centuries  before that. Which in my book places the Andal invasion between around 2400 and 1800 years ago, depending on how many further invasion attempts there were after Theon scared the living daylights out of Argos's kin on their home turf.
 
For all we know it was Theon Stark who finally put an end to the Andal invasions for good, by bringing war and devastation to Andalos itself, thus convincing the Andals to rather stay home from that point onwards. In which case the Andal invasion likely started around 2400 years ago, and ended around 2000 years ago.
 
Thanks to Theon, and the information we have on his lifetime, we can connect a lot of dots about that period of history.
 
EDIT
 
Note that there is the well known discrepancy between the statement that Urron Redhand Greyiron was the last king chosen at a Kingsmoot, and Aeron Greyjoy's statement that Harrag Hoare was chosen at a Kingsmoot. Since House Hoare ruled the Iron Isles after House Greyiron became extinct, both cannot be true.
 
Nevertheless, this does not change my above timeline analysis, since the date of the last kingsmoot is not crucial to it. The dating of Harrag's lifetime is what's important, and we know he lived after the Andals had conquered the Iron Isles, and contemporaneous with Theon Stark's lifetime.
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Going back to Sam's unfinished comment, if it is interpreted to mean that the oldest written record was during the Andal invasion, and if it is interpreted to mean that there have been 324 LCs since the oldest written record,

8,000 (oldest Long Night date) divided by 998 times 324 is 2,597
6,000 (younger Long Night date) divided by 998 times 324 is 1,947

Of course, there are a number of ifs in my opening sentence (that he is referring to Andal invasion, that there have been 324 since oldest written record, rather than 674), but I find it interestinf that it comes out in the same general time frame above.
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Note that there is the well known discrepancy between the statement that Urron Redhand Greyiron was the last king chosen at a Kingsmoot, and Aeron Greyjoy's statement that Harrag Hoare was chosen at a Kingsmoot. Since House Hoare ruled the Iron Isles after House Greyiron became extinct, both cannot be true.

 

Or Harrag Hoare, like Qhored the Cruel, were driftwood kings chosen in a kingsmoot much before Urron Redhand, much before the Greyirons defeated and much before the Hoares became the hereditary iron kings.

 

You have other leaps in your assessment too.

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Yandel´s book quite systematically lacks certain pieces of information which should be expected to be available in the world, and be quoted in the books which exist there.

For example, Yandel praises Arryns for keeping written records. Then a full official list of Arryn kings should exist.

Even though listing 200+ names in about 6000 years would be too tedious for a general reference work, the number of Arryn kings should be exactly known, and the number of years they have reigned.

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Or Harrag Hoare, like Qhored the Cruel, were driftwood kings chosen in a kingsmoot much before Urron Redhand, much before the Greyirons defeated and much before the Hoares became the hereditary iron kings.
 
You have other leaps in your assessment too.


By all means name them, so that we can debate them.

Placing Harrag as a Driftwood king before the Greyiron dynasty would force you to move Theon back by a thousand years or more too, and that is not possible given Theon's comparative place in the Stark crypts, his conquest of the Sisters and given the known timeframe of the War with the Vale.

Harrag has to exist in Theon's time, and Theon has to exist around 2000 years ago.
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Thanks, FNR, makes a lot of sense.

 

For all we know it was Theon Stark who finally put an end to the Andal invasions for good, by bringing war and devastation to Andalos itself, thus convincing the Andals to rather stay home from that point onwards. In which case the Andal invasion likely started around 2400 years ago, and ended around 2000 years ago.

That's probably linked to Quarlon, the Andal king uniting the Andal kingdoms on Essos, starting from Lorath. That was happening between 1850 and 1950 years ago, basically the next generation.

 

He probably exploited the weaknesses of the coastal kingdoms caused by Theon's terror campaign, at least until he clashed with Norvos and got Andalos wiped out by the Valyrians.

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Cool as it would have been to have the numbers, even if they know the exact number of Arryn kings, and the exact number of years of each of their reigns, there is still enough information missing to lead to huge disagreements in the span of time they covered. 

Precisely which information is missing to allow huge disagreements?

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Precisely which information is missing to allow huge disagreements?

 

How did they count the years of a reign? Did they count the first year immediately upon succession, or did they wait until the new year to count it? Did all kings do one or the other consistently? Were there any gaps where there was no Arryn king but where an Arryn eventually reestablished rule? How many times? How long were the periods? How often were there coregencies? Over a span of thousands of years (which isn't historical, obviously) it adds up, especially when it comes to coregencies.

 

Let's use the Old Testament kingdom of Judah as an example. If you count the kings starting with Solomon you get 21, and if you combine the lengths given for each of their reigns you get about 434 years. But in reality, the period from the beginning of Solomon's reign to the end of the reign of the last king was about 384 years, 50 years less than the combined total, because a number of the reigns overlapped to some extent or another.

 

Let's say we were told there were 300 Arryn kings and lords whose reigns combined amounted to 6,000 years. That is not enough information on its own to say the first Arryn ruled 6,000 years ago. Maybe there is no overlap at all, and only the years an Arryn ruled on their own are counted in that 6,000. Maybe there is considerable overlap of decades or centuries or a millennium.

 

There may be records of how many Arryns have ruled, and how long each one ruled, but that doesn't mean they have all of the information needed to be able to accurately determine exactly how long ago the Arryns first began to rule. So with that information, you may have different schools who use yet other information to try to sync them with this or that event or person, and thus come to quite different timelines. Or those who consider the number of kings or years they ruled unreliable for whatever reason, and so come up with another interpretation based on other information.

 

I am just giving examples, but my point is just that even with two significant pieces of information like an exact number of kings, and an exact number of years each ruled, there would still too much missing information to determine how they overlap and fit together, and how far back they really go.

 

In the case of the Targs it is pretty simple as the years are dated by their conquest, so we know they established their kingdom 300 years ago.

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An important problem that is actually somewhat discussed by Yandel is the dating stuff. Even if a maester has a splendid source on war X or the life of king Y it should be difficult to precisely determine when exactly that happened. After all, the contemporaries may count years differently, say, 'in the 6th year of the reign of King Y happened this or that, and that was it'. Unless the events were connected to a major event in some other kingdom which is precisely dated things may be rather unclear. You can have a pretty thorough account on a certain historical event and still have no clue when exactly the event supposedly took place. Prior to the Conquest there was apparently no universally accepting dating system in Westeros, and we don't know of any independent kingdom having established something of this sort on its own. If the people just counted the years of the reigns of kings the maesters are effectively fried unless they have full and correct lists of all the kings - which they don't have. Another problem is to identify the king in question, a problem Yandel discusses with the multiple kings named Durran.

 

 

I'm sure that the kingdoms had their own way of dating things, and most probably had their own year 0 at some point.

 

Another problem is telling exactly what a year is; obviously at some point the year has been measured to be approximately 12 moons, but since the year isn't directly related to the weather, we can't be sure that the ancient First Men would have even had ways of accurately measuring years in the same way modern Maesters do, what if the years before a certain point are just Maesters applying their own dating system to the past, what if they used a different number of months for a year in the past?

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I'm sure that the kingdoms had their own way of dating things, and most probably had their own year 0 at some point.
 
Another problem is telling exactly what a year is; obviously at some point the year has been measured to be approximately 12 moons, but since the year isn't directly related to the weather, we can't be sure that the ancient First Men would have even had ways of accurately measuring years in the same way modern Maesters do, what if the years before a certain point are just Maesters applying their own dating system to the past, what if they used a different number of months for a year in the past?

I want to say that this exact issue is alluded to in TWOIAF. The seasons seem to have screwed up during the Long Night, and if it's true that the seasons used to be normal - think about that. It might have taken them a while to adjust to the new seasons and figure how to keep track of what a "year" is. What if they just went by the seasons for a while? "Years" might have been several years long.

The thing that pushes back against this level of uncertainty is the fact that the maesters were in consistent contact with the cotf in their earlier days, and may have gotten some manner of reliable information from them.
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I want to say that this exact issue is alluded to in TWOIAF. The seasons seem to have screwed up during the Long Night, and if it's true that the seasons used to be normal - think about that. It might have taken them a while to adjust to the new seasons and figure how to keep track of what a "year" is. What if they just went by the seasons for a while? "Years" might have been several years long.

The thing that pushes back against this level of uncertainty is the fact that the maesters were in consistent contact with the cotf in their earlier days, and may have gotten some manner of reliable information from them.

 

Well, on your last point, even today, Bran will by now be able to tell Samwell precisely when the Andals arrived, when the Long Night happened, when the first First Man set foot in Dorne. The weirwoods retain all the information exactly.

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I'm sure that the kingdoms had their own way of dating things, and most probably had their own year 0 at some point.

 

Another problem is telling exactly what a year is; obviously at some point the year has been measured to be approximately 12 moons, but since the year isn't directly related to the weather, we can't be sure that the ancient First Men would have even had ways of accurately measuring years in the same way modern Maesters do, what if the years before a certain point are just Maesters applying their own dating system to the past, what if they used a different number of months for a year in the past?

Just look at the Islamic calendar. Today is the 10/19/1436, despite the year zero being 1393 years ago (according to the Gregorian calendar).

 

 

Well, on your last point, even today, Bran will by now be able to tell Samwell precisely when the Andals arrived, when the Long Night happened, when the first First Man set foot in Dorne. The weirwoods retain all the information exactly.

Unlikely. The information may be available, but it's not properly indexed.

 

Bran would have literally relive the entire time period from each action to the present, count each and every single day, and calculate the years from there. That's practically impossible.

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Just look at the Islamic calendar. Today is the 10/19/1436, despite the year zero being 1393 years ago (according to the Gregorian calendar).

 

Unlikely. The information may be available, but it's not properly indexed.

 

Bran would have literally relive the entire time period from each action to the present, count each and every single day, and calculate the years from there. That's practically impossible.

 

Well, we don't know if the trees retain memories of each tree ring that is added, or some other mechanism for recording time. Also, the greenseers who live on in the trees know how long each one of them lived, which others were their contemporaries etc, going back to the beginning of their race. So if Bran really wanted to he could piece it together. Of course, we won't read about it in the books.

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Ran has said that the Ironborn section of TWoIaF was written by George after he wrote the other histories, and without cross-referencing everything - which explains a lot of the inconsistencies in there since Ran and Linda didn't realize that until it was too late. When in doubt, the stuff in the other sections should be preferred.

 

In regards to Theon Stark and others Ran has also indicated that Yandel's sources on the distant past are usually the stories and legends about them which are prone to exaggeration and stuff. That goes for Theon as well as for the ancient Ironborn kings, the guys from the Age of Heroes, and so on. The singers may even have invented whole characters, campaigns, and wars. As Yandel points out repeatedly he does usually give the official story. Sometimes he quotes scholars who have investigated a certain topic and critically examined the sources, but he never focuses too much on the present-day scholarly consensus on a certain topic. Even when he criticizes magical traditions or certain stories he first gives us the story, and then cites the authorities who dismiss them for this or that reason. But we never learn, say, how a critical history of the history of certain kingdom looks in the mind of this or that maester.

 

Considering that the Andals did seem to migrate to the Iron Islands from Westeros we have to assume that this only began after the Andals had taken at least the Riverlands but possibly also already the Westerlands since only relative closeness to the western coast would given them enough incentive to care about them. There wasn't really anything worth taking on those dreadful isles, after all.

 

We don't know if there is a Year 0 kind of thing going on in any of the kingdoms, so we cannot assume that this is the case. Even if we assume that it is, it would most likely be guesses and approximations considering that the people founding the various kingdoms wouldn't know what they were doing until much later. Not to mention that lots of kingdoms were swallowed up by others. I'm not sure how much use accounts counting the years after the founding of kingdom of Duskendale or Maidenpool actually are would be.

 

Another thing is that there is no reason to assume that ancient folk would actually have counted the years - especially not while there had not yet developed the means to do so - but rather the seasons. Especially in light of the changed seasons after the Long Night trying to count the years doesn't look the thing you would put a lot of resources to.

 

Therefore my guess is that years were only counted after it was a common practice to precisely reckon them - which most likely developed as a means to reckon how long exactly a season was, in an attempt to predict how much food was needed for winter. One would assume that learned places like Oldtown would have thorough records back into the most ancient of days considering how old the Citadel is supposed to be - founded by the younger son of the first known Hightower king - but this actually doesn't seem to be the case unless we assume Yandel isn't privy to important information or holding stuff back. But then, if the ancient maesters were First Men - as they would have been - they would have known about greenseeing and/or practiced it, not to mention that George actually seems to imply that the ancient maesters also were capable of the whole magical raven thing in the uncorrupted version.

 

As to the revelation of the real dates:

 

As I've said before, I agree with BBE there - unless Bran takes his time count every day, year, or tree ring personally it would be impossible for to give more than approximations as to how much time has passed. But there is no reason to assume that he will care about all of that. What we most likely can expect from Bran is a lot of information on what happened why and how, but not necessarily good information on the when besides the fact that it happened in the past. This story works perfectly well without verified time stamps. I don't even expect much insight or revelation on certain legendary characters from the past unless absolutely necessary for the plot. George didn't introduce legendary figures of the past which are supposed to be larger than life just to give us 'the truth' on them later on.

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How did they count the years of a reign? Did they count the first year immediately upon succession, or did they wait until the new year to count it? Did all kings do one or the other consistently? Were there any gaps where there was no Arryn king but where an Arryn eventually reestablished rule? How many times? How long were the periods? How often were there coregencies? Over a span of thousands of years (which isn't historical, obviously) it adds up, especially when it comes to coregencies.

Yes, the errors add up - but so does the timespan.

Let's use the Old Testament kingdom of Judah as an example. If you count the kings starting with Solomon you get 21, and if you combine the lengths given for each of their reigns you get about 434 years. But in reality, the period from the beginning of Solomon's reign to the end of the reign of the last king was about 384 years, 50 years less than the combined total, because a number of the reigns overlapped to some extent or another.

 
Precisely the kind of example I´m thinking of.
Kings and Chronicles are both muddled in their exact chronology. But they agree on the list of 21 Kings of Judah. The timespan is around 400 years. Whether 434 or 384, it certainly is not 200 years. Nor 600.
I should expect that if the official chronicles of Arryn kings state the number of years from Artys to Ronnel as 5700 (and provide a reasonable breakdown), there might be a reasonable argument as to whether the true number was 5500 or 5900, but certainly not 5000, let alone 2000!
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