Astronomy of Ice and Fire: the Language of Leviathan

[LmL]

 
If there's a horned lord vs. fiery lord battle going on at any point, there's some great parallels to Robert v. Rhaegar.  Throw in the whole gemstone/eye theme, and the rubies broken from Rhaegar's armor (wouldn't it be grand if there were a thousand of them?)...

Yep, Robert vs Rhaegar. You better believe there were " a thousand" rubies! They flashed like fire, I am pretty sure.

I've looked up house Morrigen before, following trhe same thought process. One thing is that black on green was the description of the shadowsword in Renly's tent.

"Black crow" probably refers to the NW, right? That would make the LH (Guyard) a NW, and affiliated with fire (Stannis). That makes sense to me. But who is this resurrected Renly who kills him, leading an army of demons?

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

If there's a horned lord vs. fiery lord battle going on at any point, there's some great parallels to Robert v. Rhaegar.  Throw in the whole gemstone/eye theme, and the rubies broken from Rhaegar's armor (wouldn't it be grand if there were a thousand of them?)...

 

GRRM once said that "it's all there in the first book", meaning the core story (which we will later start guessing is cyclical, or repeated rehashings of the same archetypal characters) is set out in literary allusions in book 1. 

 

There's a lot of speculation of which bits of AGOT could allude to what, but the clash between Robert and Rhaegar is crucial in so many ways.

• One, it's already in the past, a myth in some way, by the time it's told to us - it's the perfect place to pack some old mythology.
• There's also the dragon and the horned lord imagery.
• Red rubies flying from the body of the dragon (who is in black armour) and falling into the Trident = flaming moon meteors from the blackened/burnt moon, falling into the sea.
• Then there's the usurpation angle to their conflict - the importance of which only reveals itself in the Worldbook, where a usurpation is said to be at the core of what caused the Long Night.
• Along these lines, Robert was of the (envious) younger family branch, who did usurp and kill the thoroughly legitimate Rhaegar. 

 

Of course, it's only usurpation from the dragon's point of view, because from a lot of peoples' POVs, it's a liberation. From the dragon's tyranny, by the Horned Lord / Garth character.

 

To circle back to the discussion above, this is exactly what Renley provides at Blackwater by crushing Stannis (AA). Again, to Stannis, this is a usurpation by his younger brother (if only in fake ghost form), but for KL, this is a liberation/rescue from Stannis (the "Dragon").

 

If the Horned Lord seems to be doing the usurping/liberating, against AA/the dragon, that brings up the story of the first Hightower, who's specifically said to have gotten rid of the dragons living in the fortress on Battle Isle in the Dawn Age. Yes I can't image those dragons, literal and/or metaphorical Fire Dragons, would have moved out without a big ole Battle.

 

And further to this, also hmm:

- we have the Dragon falling to the Horned Lord at the Ruby Ford (near mouth of the Trident)

- we have the Dragon metaphorically falling to the Horned Lord at Blackwater Bay (mouth of the Blackwater)

- do we not have the same thing happen at Battle Isle, at the mouth of the Honeywine?

 

I wonder if a burning bridge of ships is how they got across to Battle Isle... ;)

 

I can't go down this rabbit hole any further right now, too close to bedtime.

 

 

Fun fact: there is a strong etymomlogical correlation between the brightness of fire and the blackness of being burnt.

 

If you go all the way back to the Proto-Indo-European language, the language spoken by the early Aryan tribes (the linguistic ancestors of almost every language spoken in Europe, Iran, and India), they had a word, bhleg that meant 'to burn'.  In Latin, it became blancus, which then was inherited by the Roman languages as blanche, blanco, branco, etc (English got blank from this same root).  The meaning, white, ultimately comes from the brightness of a fire.  However, in the Germanic languages, the meaning shifted from 'to burn' to 'burnt,' becoming blakaz, or, as we know it in English, black.  In this case, what is left after a fire is usually dark.

 

This Romance/Germanic divide could have some connections to a Valyrian/Westerosi, as Valyria is supposed to be our stand-in for Rome, and Westeros is basically England, a Germanic country.

 

I love PIE stuff, very interesting find! I haven't considered this in the ASOIAF context much.

[LmL]

 
If there's a horned lord vs. fiery lord battle going on at any point, there's some great parallels to Robert v. Rhaegar.  Throw in the whole gemstone/eye theme, and the rubies broken from Rhaegar's armor (wouldn't it be grand if there were a thousand of them?)...

Yep, Robert vs Rhaegar. You better believe there were "a thousand" rubies! They flashed like fire, I am pretty sure. ;)

Basically, those are our two type of "horned" lords. Dragon horns and antlers horns. The black Goat Vargo has a helm with black steel goat horns. Might as well call him Ser Baphomet.

I've looked up house Morrigen before, following the same thought process. One thing is that black on green was the description of the shadowsword in Renly's tent.

"Black crow" probably refers to the NW, right? That would make the LH (Guyard) a NW, and affiliated with fire (Stannis). That makes sense to me. But who is this resurrected Renly who kills him, leading an army of demons?

Also, consider that Guyard used to be one of Renly's rainbow guard. So there's a former ally / betrayal thing going on there.

House Morrigen of Crow's Nest is a noble house from Crow's Nest in the stormlands.

Their arms are a black crow in flight on storm-green.

Dickon Morrigen was killed alongside the Bastard of Blackhaven by Meraxes during the Last Storm.[3]

Ser Damon the Devout, the captain of the Warrior's Sons, died during a trial of seveninvolving King Maegor I Targaryen.[4]

Ser Grance Morrigen participated in the tourney at Ashford Meadow.

Storm green makes that black crow a "Stormcrow," which is a term I already was thinking about. Danny's sell swords are the second sons (suns) and the Stormcrows. Those are black meteors, the stormcrows. Their sigil is kind of awesome - crossed lightning bolts. We know lightning is associated with the Others and burning trees, though I am still puzzling the exact details.

The Warriors sons represent the Others, with their crystal swords in the darkness and mirror like armor. The Nights King was the warrior without fear, and his sons have the crystal swords. A morrigan, a black crow, led them. That's our NK, right? And morrigan fighting for Stannis is more of the same, since Stannis is like a fiery stag man who transforms into the NK, essentially. The 1 + 12 math can be either LH or NK math, and we still don't know if they are the same person.

This leads me to something I wanted to bring up. The Kingsguard, another stand in for the Others since their cloaks and armor are always described as snowy and they are also pale shadows like the Others, were created by Visenya. Visenya is the ice moon bride to Aegon, and on Visenya's hill we have the white marble sept of Baelor with their warriors sons. Visenya may be playing the NQ role, if AA becomes the NK. But the point is - a dragon King, armored in black, is protected by white shadows. That's the same idea as a black crow leading the Others.

In the scene were Renly is about to be killed, we have some interesting stuff.

The long ranks of man and horse were armored in darkness, as black as if the Smith had hammered night itself into steel. There were banners to her right, banners to her left, and rank on rank of banners before her, but in the predawn gloom, neither colors nor sigils could be discerned. A grey army, Catelyn thought. Grey men on grey horses beneath grey banners. As they sat their horses waiting, Renlys shadow knights pointed their lances upward, so she rode through a forest of tall naked trees, bereft of leaves and life. Where Storms End stood was only a deeper darkness, a wall of black through which no stars could shine, but she could see torches moving across the fields where Lord Stannis had made his camp. The candles within Renlys pavilion made the shimmering silken walls seem to glow, transforming the great tent into a magical castle alive with emerald light.
[...]
It was pleasantly warm inside, the heat shimmering off the coals in a dozen small iron braziers.
[...]
The kings armor was a deep green, the green of leaves in a summer wood, so dark it drank the candlelight.

Shadow Knights and dead trees. Being armored in darkness - Jon "dresses in darkness" (a double entendre), and is armored in black ice. The Smith is Azor Ahai, who forged Lightbringer in the sacred fires. So the implication is Azor Ahai being associated with those dead trees and shadow knights. They all went over to Stannis when he killed Renly. Again that was where the shadowswords was black on green, and cold.

To wrap this up, we have this concept of something turning black after being burnt, as Dominus suggested. Contrast that with things being bright and shiny after being frozen in ice. Ice is cold but leaves things luminescent; fire is hot but leaves things cold and dead and black. The red streaks of fire turn to rivers of black ice at sunset - I take that as yet another example of the fiery meteors leading to black steel (Neds sword is "black Ice.")

All of this confirms my ideas about swords, that Dawn (Ice) gives of icy brightness, white light or maybe white and blue, while the dragon sword, AA's LB, was black and shadow associated. The black steel always has a cold bite, and drinks blood and sunlight both. Meanwhile, nothing burns like the cold (prologue of AGOT).

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

Heh, not sure if anyone's mentioned this before, surely someone has. I'm trying to work out which Baratheon brother is which colour, based on their sigils, and I got something funny about Stannis:

- Robert is a black stag

- Renley is a golden stag

- Stannis is a red stag, and it's in his sigil even though the stag is black, because his real sigil a fiery heart / ie a red hart (archaic for "stag")

 

Also this, which is probably nothing, but the names of the places where the Horned Lord felled the dragon match the colours of the Horned Lord brothers:

Ruby Ford, Blackwater Bay, Honeywine (which is mead, golden)?

[LmL]

Heh, not sure if anyone's mentioned this before, surely someone has. I'm trying to work out which Baratheon brother is which colour, based on their sigils, and I got something funny about Stannis:
- Robert is a black stag
- Renley is a golden stag
- Stannis is a red stag, and it's in his sigil even though the stag is black, because his real sigil a fiery heart / ie a red hart (archaic for "stag")
 
Also this, which is probably nothing, but the names of the places where the Horned Lord felled the dragon match the colours of the Horned Lord brothers:
Ruby Ford, Blackwater Bay, Honeywine (which is mead, golden)?

Nope, haven't seen that mentioned. I like it, especially the heart / hart thing. ;) There's also the horned moon occurrences to check out. The horned moon likes to "dance on the waters" and "ride the sky."

The horned lord is a greenseer of some kind or another, that much is sure. But the horned lord is actually the stallion who mounts the world. The constellation "horned lord" in the north is the stallion in the south, for starters. The stallion thing goes back to Odin and his horse. Odin's horse is personified two ways. One is Slepnir, an eighth legged (!) horse which enables astral projection. The Yggdrasil tree is also a manifestation of Odin's horse, as this is one translation of Yggdrasil. It to enables astral projection. If the world tree is the horse, then mounting that tree (as the greenseers do) means mounting the astral realm - and this is EXACTLY what the greenseers do. The stallion who mounts the world is the horned lord, using weirwoods to mount the world via astral projection. THE horned lord is the one who dropped the hammer of the waters. Azor Ahai, in other words. In the main story, there are two candidates for SWMTW- Dany, of course, but also Bran. Dany and Bran have completely parallel arcs in so many ways, so this make sense to me. And in the prophecy of the SWMTW, there is a strange amount of cold imagery. Araks shining like razor grass, covering the world? Sounds like the ghost grass that will cover the world - and their stalks are milkglass, alive with light, glowing with the souls of the damned. The horned lord seems to have created the Others - that fits with AA = NK.

[LmL]

The Horned Lord is famous for saying that sorcery was like a sword without a hilt.

What else is a sword with no hilt?

A comet. And the Horned Lord certainly grasped the comet, in more ways than one. He grasped the actual comet - he's the one who caused it to hit the moon (I know how, but I have to save something for a future essay). Then he used sorcery to make an actual sword from the comet. That one had a hilt I imagine, but the comet did not.

[Cagey Bee]

 
He does have a spear, but he has to have a weapon in a battle, and nothing here identifies it as particularly fiery.
 
And isn't it weird that it's a spear, if he's meant to be an AA character in full armour? I know it can be a metaphor, but in that moment, when he's being described in full gear, and he's holding a spear, not a sword... contributes to me thinking this may be someone other than AA.
 

Well.. Spears and suns and all. To tie it back to fire.. somehow.

[LmL]

Well.. Spears and suns and all. To tie it back to fire.. somehow.

Exactly. Sun-spear. If need be, anyway. Not all spears have to be fiery, but fiery spears are the sun-spear. The fiery hand of R'hllor has 1,000 "fingers," and each one has a fire spear.

[Bluetiger]

Do you think that Ygritte "kissed by fire" has something to do with Ygg the World Tree being "kissed by fire" by Storm God's lightling?

[LmL]

Do you think that Ygritte "kissed by fire" has something to do with Ygg the World Tree being "kissed by fire" by Storm God's lightling?

 

Oh man - I never put that together. Ygritte, fucking duh.  Nissa Nissa means helpful elf, so it's very likely that she was part Old Ones. The fact that the God-Empress comes from Leng is probably meant to suggest that the God Emperors took wives from Leng. Or at least, the one god emperor who is relevant to the story probably did so. 

 

Ygritte is clearly Jon's Nissa Nissa, his fire bride, and so by naming Ygritte with the "Yg-" prefix, George is creating another link from Nissa Nissa to weirwoods (and thus greensight), and specifically ones kissed by fire. 

Nissa Nissa, fiery Old One. 

 

She was probably waaaayyyy hot. 

 

See what I did there? Did you? Ba-bum-CH!!

 

Great catch, Blue Tiger!

[hiemal]

On the topic, of Yigg/yggdrasil/weirdwood connection- I just put together the fact that the intermediate who relays messages and insults between Nidhogg and the eagle who perches in the upper boughs (whose name I can't remember) is a squirrel named Ratatosk (iirc) and that the giants called the CotF the "squirrel people". The fact that they use pyschopomic ravens (Hugin and Munin analogs) to relay their own messages only clouds the issue.

[LmL]

That's definitely where I think he got the idea of cotf as squirrels. What they are doing is relating messages from the underworld to the heavens, and from both to the surface realm. The cotf could supposedly speak to the dead.

[Bluetiger]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yggdrasil

It's interesting that Yggdrasil is an ash... Ashford

[Bluetiger]

There is a CoTF named Ash...

[Bluetiger]

ASHa Greyjoy, Oberyn's ash spear= sun spear, ASsHai

[hiemal]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yggdrasil

It's interesting that Yggdrasil is an ash... Ashford

When the lighting-struck tree image crops up in myth it is almost always either an ash or an oak. Both crop again and again in place and House names.

[hiemal]

That's definitely where I think he got the idea of cotf as squirrels. What they are doing is relating messages from the underworld to the heavens, and from both to the surface realm. The cotf could supposedly speak to the dead.

Singing the song of the earth.

Were human souls a part of this process from the beginning? The "second-life" of skinchangers contrasted with Bran's experience of the children's souls in ravens makes me wonder.

[LmL]

When the lighting-struck tree image crops up in myth it is almost always either an ash or an oak. Both crop again and again in place and House names.

Great stuff Blue Tiger and Heimal. ;)

Heimal can you expand on the ash / oak connection? George is doing something specific with Oaks and I haven't figured it out.

All the important spears are ash wood. Makes for a nice comet symbol, a black iron point trailing ash. In the case of Oberyn's sun spear, it's even a black oily poison spear tip, and of course poisoning blood is a key part of the moon destruction.

Also, red viper of Dorne = red serpent of the sun

[hiemal]

Great stuff Blue Tiger and Heimal. ;)

Heimal can you expand on the ash / oak connection? George is doing something specific with Oaks and I haven't figured it out.

All the important spears are ash wood. Makes for a nice comet symbol, a black iron point trailing ash. In the case of Oberyn's sun spear, it's even a black oily poison spear tip, and of course poisoning blood is a key part of the moon destruction.

Also, red viper of Dorne = red serpent of the sun

Hmmmm, beyond both being prone to lightning strikes, and thus to being considered mystical by those who venerate storm or thunder gods, like Thor (there was a sacred tree in Germany called Thor's Oak during the period when Christianity came loudly knocking that caused a few stories) both are considered mystical or sacred anyways.

The Rowan or mountain-ash may be even more mystical  than larger versions, and is also represented in Westeros.

"Ellum do grieve, and oak do hate, willow do walk if you travels late".

Odin's spear Gungnir is carved from the world-ash.

The first man in the next creation, after ragnorok, will be named Ash.

Both Rowan and Ash are protections against fairies.

Ugh, coming up empty. If more treevia comes to me I will return.

[DominusNovus]

ASHa Greyjoy, Oberyn's ash spear= sun spear, ASsHai

 

I hesitate to tell you the name of the river that runs through Asshai...