The Heresy essays: X+Y=J- Howland + Lyanna=Jon

[wolfmaid7]

And again SFDanny you are incorrect this has nothing to do with canon or not.That's your own spin on it.The point is the info in the app is written from the point of view of a Maester for whom we have no idea where he got his info.What did Ned tell us about the local where Lyanna was found?

Plus your doing it again Frey Family Reunion put forth where he thought Lyanna was and instead of addressing that it had to be turned into TOJ.

So you can't turn around now and say the toj has nothing to do with if a theory is true when you dont stick to what the OP presented and refute or validate based outside merit.

[corbon]

Plus your doing it again Frey Family Reunion put forth where he thought Lyanna was and instead of addressing that it had to be turned into TOJ.

So you can't turn around now and say the toj has nothing to do with if a theory is true when you dont stick to what the OP presented and refute or validate based outside merit.

Stop whining. The Op introduced the ToJ element and made bad arguments to try to dismiss it. Those arguments are what have been addressed. Thats directly part of the OP.

 

[wolfmaid7]

Stop whining. The Op introduced the ToJ element and made bad arguments to try to dismiss it. Those arguments are what have been addressed. Thats directly part of the OP.

 

Corbon before you start getting disrespectful and accuse me of whinning get the point of what i'm saying.Did miss SFDanny's poignant remark on the god's eye and the Isle of faces...Hmmmmm i must have mist that among the insinuation the FFR brought this entire thing up because of an arguement about canon.

[SFDanny]

Howland + Lyanna

By Frey Family Reunion

<snip>
The Actual Location of Lyanna’s Death

There is common assumption is that Eddard and Howland found Lyanna at the tower of joy after they defeated the three kingsguards. Many posters have noted the similarity between the tower of joy and the Joyous Gard, Lancelot’s castle, where in some of the Arthurian tales, Lancelot and Guinevere run off to.

But the only thing that really places Lyanna’s death at the tower of joy and after Ned battles the kingsguards is Ned’s dream. Martin referred to it as a fevered dream and warned that not all of it might be literal. And that is a funny thing about dreams they tend to jumble chronology and have no geographic restraints. So let’s revisit our common assumption that Lyanna died at the tower of joy after Ned’s battle with the kingsguards.

For this theory to work, Lyanna is tucked away in a small tower perhaps for the entirety of Robert’s rebellion (a tower that took only two persons to disassemble). Presumably at least one servant or wet nurse is in attendance. And of course after the battle while Eddard and Howland bury the combatants where they were killed, he somehow is able to cart Lyanna’s body first to Starfall where he returns Arthur’s sword, and then presumably back to Winterfell. Not only does this seem a bit unwieldy, I would think that carrying your dead sister’s body around along with her newly born child, might cause some questions to be raised.

If Lyanna was in fact taken around the shores of the God’s Eye, and if Rhaegar or his companions needed to secrete Lyanna for a period of time, then she would have been brought to location not far from the God’s Eye and perhaps on boat to a castle in league with Rhaegar or one of his closest confidants. I think the most logical location is Maidenpool, the seat of House Mooton. Or perhaps in the neighboring town of Saltpans if in fact the Knight of Saltpans was one of House Mooton’s vassals.

The books have given us two towers in each location. And both towers interestingly enough, have the respective lords locked within. The current head of House Mooton is placed under house arrest, while the Knight of Saltpans has willingly locked himself in his tower to avoid the bloodshed that for some reason the brave companions unleashed upon his town. These two locations are more practical locations for someone to stay for an extended period of time, while pregnant, as opposed to an apparently tiny tower in the middle of a mountain pass.

Then there is the Quiet Isle which lay across the tidal flats from both towns. If Lyanna had fallen ill, or if there were complications with her pregnancy, this would have been the perfect place to have brought her. An isle populated with monks some who are known for their healing skills, who have also taken a vow of silence. These Brothers could also have seen to the preparation of Lyanna’s body, which would have allowed Eddard to have returned her to Winterfell, as opposed to the bodies of the Kingsguards and his companions at the tower of joy, who had to be buried where they died.

We are told of cottages on the isle specifically set aside for women visitors.

I think the description of the cottages as beehives could be a nod to one of Martin’s other works, a Song for Lya. In a song for Lya, Lya dies and her consciousness is joined with other aliens and humans in what is referred to as a mass/hive mind. If Lyanna was ultimately brought to this beehive like cottage on the Isle of Faces when she fell ill or when it was time for the birth of her children, then this is also the likely location of where she died and thus where Eddard finally found her.

And while the tower of joy could be a reference to Lancelot’s Joyous Garde, the Quiet Isle resembles another location in Guinevere abduction myths. In one of the earliest abduction scenarios, Guinevere is kidnapped by Melwas, “King of the Summery Country”, and held prisoner in his stronghold at Glastonbury. Like the Quiet Isle, Glastonbury is located on a salt water tidal flat, and when the tide is high the town basically becomes an island (or did before drainage canals were utilized). Also like the Quiet Isle, Glastonbury contains a prominent Abbey, and a rich history of religious lore. It is the alleged location where Joseph of Arimathea landed in Britain, and guarded the Holy Grail. Folklore also has tied Glastonbury to King Arthur’s Avalon, and as the final resting place of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere.

So if Martin is referencing Arthurian folklore, the Quiet Isle is another possible parallel to the Guinevere abduction tales.

<snip>

FFR states "But the only thing that really places Lyanna’s death at the tower of joy and after Ned battles the kingsguards is Ned’s dream." This is false. Not only does portions of Ned's dream and the introduction to it support Lyanna being at the tower and dying there, but the aforementioned entry in the AGoT appendices and the Lyanna entry World of Ice and Fire app also support this view. FFR pretends these pieces of evidence do not exist. Note, that while FFR rightly references Martin's caution concerning the dream, he does not in anyway then analyze the evidence in the dream which puts Lyanna at the tower. So, in the first part of the frame in which from outside the dream state Ned opens with saying, "He dreamt an old dream, of three knights in white cloaks, and a tower long fallen, and Lyanna in her be of blood." (AGoT 354) That this clearly places the elements of the old dream in place together - the Kingsguard knights, the tower, and Lyanna dying is completely skipped over in FFR's "analysis." So too is the fact Ned hears the scream of his name, "Eddard!" in Lyanna's voice in the dream proper. There is, in fact, no analysis at all here of the strength or weakness of the case put forward in the text and in the app for Lyanna being at the tower. There is only the misuse of Martin's caution in order to skip to speculation.

Speculation rules the day. Which isn't to say informed speculation isn't welcomed, but much of this is misinformed or used to deceive the reader in order to build support for speculation where none exists. For instance, FFR uses the rather nasty thought of carrying Lyanna's dead body around from the Tower to Starfall and on to Winterfell as an argument against Lyanna dying at the Tower. There is nothing necessary in the traveling with Lyanna's decaying corpse to Dorne and on to Winterfell if she does indeed die at the tower. Lyanna's corpse can be rendered to bones for transport either at the tower itself, or in someplace close by. We do not know how remote the Tower is from town or villages or how close it is to the road that traverses the Prince's Pass. We do know the Silent Sisters, as part of their religious duties, take charge of  corpses and both render them to bone for burial, but also transport bones across long distances. Ned's own bones and the Silent Sisters that bring them to Riverrun and are last seen going to Winterfell tell us this. How close is the tower from Silent Sisters who would do this is unknown, but the idea Lyanna's body need be transported to Starfall and on to Winterfell decaying all the way is not only false, but a smokescreen used deceive the reader.

We also don't know much about the "they" who find Ned with Lyanna's body. Only that there are at least two people, Howland and one other, who do find Ned and Lyanna. At least two, could mean more than two. It could mean a maester who is in attending Lyanna as she dies. A maester who likely would have the knowledge of how to render bodies to bone. We also can't assume Howland Reed goes on Ned's journey. If Howland is ordered by Ned to take his sister's body to the nearest Silent Sister, and then take her bones back to Winterfell, while Ned embarks on his journey to Starfall, there is no reason to think he wouldn't follow his liege lord's orders. Instead FFR ignores all of these possibilities and conjures the idea of Lyanna's decaying corpse over a long journey in order to support the idea that Lyanna somehow could not really have been at the tower. It is total nonsense.

After this bit of misdirection, we are launched in full scale speculation with nothing to support it. Where in the text is any reference to Lyanna being in Maidenpool or to the Quiet Isle? There is none. There is only references to other stories, Arthurian legends and a Song for Lya. Martin using themes and motifs as inspiration is not evidence for what happens in this story. It simply isn't.

Where in the text, in the accompanying histories, author's comments or the app, do we get any hint of a romance between Howland and Lyanna? We don't. This defines "castles in the air" stuff. It can be entertaining if it's not meant to mislead, but without support it is not serious analysis.

Wolfmaid, others have pointed some of this out already so I did not see the need to quote FFR's essay extensively. Hope this satisfies your concerns. We can go through an analysis of Lyanna being at the God's Eye and/or the Isle of Faces with Howland, when we have evidence she was "taken at swordpoint" by Rhaegar's party which consists of at least himself, Ser Arthur Dayne, and Ser Oswell Whent if you want, but the immediate topic is was Lyanna at the Tower of Joy. The evidence points to her being there.

 

[Regular John Umber]

That does not make any sense,

 

 The argument that Lyanna and Ned's last conversation is unknown to us? It makes total sense.

 

and is, frankly, a cop-out answer to this very specific scenario.

 

 I agree. It's all cop outs, because we know so little. Like I said, we'd have to delve into fan-fiction to figure out explanations.

 

In this case Howland and Lyanna are married and love each other and had a son. Why should Ned take Howland's legitimate son?

What Ned promised is not necessarily relevant, if Jon is Howland's son. It is completely unreasonable that Ned could promise to Lyanna that Ned would raise the son AND Ned stay friends with Howland*.  "Sorry Howland, I have to keep the boy because Lyanna asked me to." That is absurd.

 

 Yes, that scenario is absurd*. But, as I pointed out, the open-endedness of the final scenes between the Stark siblings means that we can't say for sure what was said, or promised, and if said promises were even kept.

 

 * You actually put an idea in my head there: Ned and Howland don't seem to do much together post-rebellion. For two guys who were such close allies and friends, they don't seem to interact much. It's possible that they didn't remain friends.

 

 

[Rhaenys_Targaryen]

And again SFDanny you are incorrect this has nothing to do with canon or not.That's your own spin on it.The point is the info in the app is written from the point of view of a Maester for whom we have no idea where he got his info.What did Ned tell us about the local where Lyanna was found?
 

Where did you get that from? That app contains information that a maester wouldn't know.

[Ygrain]

Speculation rules the day. Which isn't to say informed speculation isn't welcomed, but much of this is misinformed or used to deceive the reader in order to build support for speculation where none exists. For instance, FFR uses the rather nasty thought of carrying Lyanna's dead body around from the Tower to Starfall and on to Winterfell as an argument against Lyanna dying at the Tower. There is nothing necessary in the traveling with Lyanna's decaying corpse to Dorne and on to Winterfell if she does indeed die at the tower. Lyanna's corpse can be rendered to bones for transport either at the tower itself, or in someplace close by. We do not know how remote the Tower is from town or villages or how close it is to the road that traverses the Prince's Pass. We do know the Silent Sisters, as part of their religious duties, take charge of  corpses and both render them to bone for burial, but also transport bones across long distances. Ned's own bones and the Silent Sisters that bring them to Riverrun and are last seen going to Winterfell tell us this. How close is the tower from Silent Sisters who would do this is unknown, but the idea Lyanna's body need be transported to Starfall and on to Winterfell decaying all the way is not only false, but a smokescreen used deceive the reader.

Completely agree, this reasoning is as false as it gets.

'Sides, there is a very easy way to reduce a body to a portable state - cremation. No Silent Sisters needed, only wood.

[wolfmaid7]

@ Ygrain and SFDanny: How can you all accuse people of speculating and turn around and do the very same thing. This boogles my mind .There is no evidence any of what you said were involved.You all are putting stuff that isn't there and calling it reasoning?

What is not there- Any evidence that Ned and Howland started a fire to burn Lya. No blackedned stone,no plume of smoke that darkened the Dornish sky no smell of wood....Nothing.

You all are guessing and guessing from nothing.

What we have is common sense.

We have evidence of what Ned did with the bodies of his friends and the KGS.It would have taken the author nothing to say Howland wrapped up Lya's body or that Ned burnt it.

And i'll say it again think about what IS there what the author chooses to show us.We aren't clairvoyant. Smell of roses in a room where she died.Look at the environment that they are in.Look at the climate they are in.What is heppening around them?If we aren't sure where she is ,then use your senses to realize where she isn't

And SFDanny  i'm not saying FFR didn't mention the toj ;this is just a suggesstion if you all try so hard to prove that she was at the tower instead of prove that she wasn't on the IOF then not only do we go in a circle but we kind of fail at our focus.You see what i'm saying?

RT you asked about the Maester and how they know that info: The same way Ned's men who weren't there "knew" that Arthur and Ned did single combat. See how that works.So who told the Maesters? Ned? Howland? Or is people coming to their own conclusion again.

[Rhaenys_Targaryen]

 

RT you asked about the Maester and how they know that info: The same way Ned's men who weren't there "knew" that Arthur and Ned did single combat. See how that works.So who told the Maesters? Ned? Howland? Or is people coming to their own conclusion again.

That is not what I asked, though. You say the app is written from a maester's POV. I asked, where did you get that info from?

There is stuff in that app that no maester can know, not even from rumours. Think about Arianne having slept with Darkstar, for example. That Youg Griff might be Aegon Targaryen (as he has not yet revealed himself by the end of Dance), or that Illyrio had been watching Viserys and Daenerys during their time travelling from city to city, long before he took them into his home.

[Ser Leftwich]

This sounds like a case of "my speculation is sound and perfectly infallible, but your speculation is completely absurd and without sense!"

[SFDanny]

@ Ygrain and SFDanny: How can you all accuse people of speculating and turn around and do the very same thing. This boogles my mind .There is no evidence any of what you said were involved.You all are putting stuff that isn't there and calling it reasoning?

What is not there- Any evidence that Ned and Howland started a fire to burn Lya. No blackedned stone,no plume of smoke that darkened the Dornish sky no smell of wood....Nothing.

You all are guessing and guessing from nothing.

What we have is common sense.

Once again you missed the point - purposefully or not. I don't know what was done with Lyanna's body. Ygrain doesn't know what was done with Lyanna's body. Our examples of what could have happened to her corpse if she dies at the tower are only to show the false choice FFR poses between Lyanna dying at tower, and therefore Ned having to carry her decaying body to Starfall and back to Winterfell, or Lyanna dying someplace else and Ned being relieved of such a horrible task. Our examples show FFR is wrong in limiting the reader to his choices, not that we know the answer to what happened to Lyanna's body.

[The Ned's Little Girl]

And i'll say it again think about what IS there what the author chooses to show us.We aren't clairvoyant. Smell of roses in a room where she died.Look at the environment that they are in.Look at the climate they are in.What is heppening around them?If we aren't sure where she is ,then use your senses to realize where she isn't

I think someone would absolutely need to be clairvoyant to make all these assumptions for the purpose of casting doubt on Lyanna being at the tower of joy when she died.

The statement that the room where Lyanna died smelled of roses is incontrovertible. However, these are the assumptions that you are making as follow-up to that fact, in order to raise questions about Lyanna's presence at the ToJ:

1. Assumption: The smell of roses means there must be fresh flowers present and there is no other possibility to explain the scent.

2. Assumption: It's impossible for roses/flowers to grow at the tower of joy due to the climate/environment and there is no other possibility to explain the scent.

3. Assumption: Since the room must contain fresh flowers (and no possibility of anything else), riders must have been sent all over the place to gather them and there is no other possibility to explain the scent.

4. Furthermore, riders can't have been sent all over the place to gather flowers because a war is happening all around them. (?)

Here's why these questions about the roses fail to poke holes in the "Lyanna at the ToJ" idea: firstly, they're assumptions with no textual citations to indicate that they might be true and secondly, there is no possibility allowed for alternate explanations.

How do we know that the flowers must be fresh (especially in light of the fact that the only flowers described in the text are "dead and black")? How do we know that there are no gardens at or near the tower? How do we know that people have been galloping about picking flowers for Lyanna? There needs to be some indication in the text for these assertions to have any validity, otherwise they are completely baseless and useless.

I have been questioning you specifically on the roses/flowers but others have been questioning you on some of your other ideas, but all we are getting is you continually repeating the same things over and over with no support from the text. Seriously, if you're unable to defend your assertions when they are questioned, perhaps you should re-think asserting them.

 

[Ygrain]

Once again you missed the point - purposefully or not. I don't know what was done with Lyanna's body. Ygrain doesn't know what was done with Lyanna's body. Our examples of what could have happened to her corpse if she dies at the tower are only to show the false choice FFR poses between Lyanna dying at tower, and therefore Ned having to carry her decaying body to Starfall and back to Winterfell, or Lyanna dying someplace else and Ned being relieved of such a horrible task. Our examples show FFR is wrong in limiting the reader to his choices, not that we know the answer to what happened to Lyanna's body.

Thank you for getting the message across - hopefully.

BTW, fire as means of defleshing the body is mentioned in Barristan's PoV when he ponders what to do with Quentyn's body so that his bones could be sent to Dorne.

 

I think someone would absolutely need to be clairvoyant to make all these assumptions for the purpose of casting doubt on Lyanna being at the tower of joy when she died.

The statement that the room where Lyanna died smelled of roses is incontrovertible. However, these are the assumptions that you are making as follow-up to that fact, in order to raise questions about Lyanna's presence at the ToJ:

1. Assumption: The smell of roses means there must be fresh flowers present and there is no other possibility to explain the scent.

2. Assumption: It's impossible for roses/flowers to grow at the tower of joy due to the climate/environment and there is no other possibility to explain the scent.

3. Assumption: Since the room must contain fresh flowers (and no possibility of anything else), riders must have been sent all over the place to gather them and there is no other possibility to explain the scent.

4. Furthermore, riders can't have been sent all over the place to gather flowers because a war is happening all around them. (?)

Here's why these questions about the roses fail to poke holes in the "Lyanna at the ToJ" idea: firstly, they're assumptions with no textual citations to indicate that they might be true and secondly, there is no possibility allowed for alternate explanations.

How do we know that the flowers must be fresh (especially in light of the fact that the only flowers described in the text are "dead and black")? How do we know that there are no gardens at or near the tower? How do we know that people have been galloping about picking flowers for Lyanna? There needs to be some indication in the text for these assertions to have any validity, otherwise they are completely baseless and useless.

I have been questioning you specifically on the roses/flowers but others have been questioning you on some of your other ideas, but all we are getting is you continually repeating the same things over and over with no support from the text. Seriously, if you're unable to defend your assertions when they are questioned, perhaps you should re-think asserting them.

 

Am I having a deja vu? I'd bet that the "point" of ToJ being in the middle of a desert has been countered and proven false recently, to one particular poster, at least twice, yet it keeps popping up again. Curiouser and curiouser.

[The Ned's Little Girl]

BTW, fire as means of defleshing the body is mentioned in Barristan's PoV when he ponders what to do with Quentyn's body so that his bones could be sent to Dorne.

Now, that's how to do textual support.  

 

[wolfmaid7]

No that's not evidence what's wrong with you guys?That's call "precedence"

That does not prove Ned did that with Lyanna. You all can guess it you can't prove it because there's NO evidence it was done.....at all at the tower.

[Ser Leftwich]

 

For this theory to work, Lyanna is tucked away in a small tower perhaps for the entirety of Robert’s rebellion (a tower that took only two persons to disassemble). Presumably at least one servant or wet nurse is in attendance. And of course after the battle while Eddard and Howland bury the combatants where they were killed, he somehow is able to cart Lyanna’s body first to Starfall where he returns Arthur’s sword, and then presumably back to Winterfell. Not only does this seem a bit unwieldy, I would think that carrying your dead sister’s body around along with her newly born child, might cause some questions to be raised.

If I may, I believe that The Ned's Little Girl's point is that: This is a false dilemma. The OP says that they must have carted Lyanna's body around. That is not the only possibility of what to do with a body.

To depend on "they must have carted Lyanna's body around" as a necessary part of the argument weakens the argument, since there are other things that could have been done with the body, textual evidence of the ToJ or not.

[The Ned's Little Girl]

No that's not evidence what's wrong with you guys?That's call "precedence"

That does not prove Ned did that with Lyanna. You all can guess it you can't prove it because there's NO evidence it was done.....at all at the tower.
 

It still supports the idea that this is the procedure that Ned could have followed (please note: could have) in dealing with Lyanna's body. It's definitely more support than carting her carcass all over the place on his way back to Winterfell.

Furthermore, nobody is asking for evidence (at least, I'm not). I'm asking for support for your suppositions from the text. Precedence is textual support.

 

[wolfmaid7]

I'm asking for evidence that happened because that's what counts. This could have happened is nil because there's no evidence in.

1.The aftermath of his dream where he gives vivid details of what he did with tge dead.

There is no "he build 8 cairns on the ridge and a pyre for Lyanna.

Which wouldn't have not been a big deal to mention if its obvious she was there.

Which again is futile at this point.Precedence does not equate evidence.

[kimim]

I'm asking for evidence that happened because that's what counts. This could have happened is nil because there's no evidence in.

1.The aftermath of his dream where he gives vivid details of what he did with tge dead.

There is no "he build 8 cairns on the ridge and a pyre for Lyanna.

Which wouldn't have not been a big deal to mention if its obvious she was there.

Which again is futile at this point.Precedence does not equate evidence.

What do you do with the introduction to Ned's dream, that "He dreamt an old dream, of three knights in white cloaks, and a tower long fallen, and Lyanna in her bed of blood"?

This is not a part of the fever dream; it's the intro, which tells us that this is an "old dream," ie., a dream Ned's had before. The "old dream" has three components: knights, tower, and Lyanna.

This is straightforward textual proof that the knights, the tower, and Lyanna's death in her "bed of blood" are connected in Ned's mind. We know who the three guards are. We know the tower is toj. Add Lyanna, and the text is telling you where she died, and who was with her when she was in her "bed of blood." Trust the text.

btw, the "old dream" doesn't say who the father is. It can be Arthur Dayne, Aerys, or even a mystery Dornish goatherd. It can't be Howland Reed, however.

 

[SFDanny]

Thank you for getting the message across - hopefully.

BTW, fire as means of defleshing the body is mentioned in Barristan's PoV when he ponders what to do with Quentyn's body so that his bones could be sent to Dorne.

It doesn't look like the message is getting across, but I'm not terribly surprised. Thanks for pointing out the use of fire as a possibility. I should have included it. I know you've raised this method before. 

Wolfmaid, however, is never going to admit this obvious flaw in FFR's argument. Ser Leftwich's restatement is a good one but I doubt it will work.