Puns and Wordplay

[Sandy Clegg]

12 minutes ago, Evolett said:

The iron grating can be compared to a weir or dam. More to a classic weir because its function is to regulate water flow. So the "mad" swimmers are those who dismantle the dam. 

As 'weir' is such a key term in the books, I thought I'd check my Chambers app:

 

1. Weir (noun) = a dam .... wall, blockade, embankment, barrier, obstruction

2. Weir (verb) = to  guard .... cover, shield, watch, screen,  sentinel, hedge, fence, preserve. Scots: wear/weir

 Some interesting usages I hadn't considered before, including hedge (hedge knight, anyone?) and sentinel. Preserve as in jam (Hot Pie!) is probably a stretch, but GRRM does like his jokes  

 

EDIIT: George has mentioned his interest in Scots history so the usage of 'wear' for 'weir' is likely familiar to him, giving me some nice tinfoil errands to run. Here's a couple of wear/weir puns that, if deliberate by George, are more than a little eye-opening:

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"Boy or man, he had no right to that throne."

"Perhaps he was tired," Robert suggested. "Killing kings is weary work.

 - Eddard II

Quote

Chunks of coal burned in iron braziers at either end of the long room, but Jon found himself shivering. The chill was always with him here. In a few years he would forget what it felt like to be warm.

The weariness came on him suddenly, as he donned the roughspun blacks that were their everyday wear

- JON III

Quote

Jaime closed his eyes to listen, but opened them again when he began to sway. I am more weary than I knew.

- JAIME I, AFFC

Swaying (like a tree?) and weiry? Ok, this is all seeming like a stretch somewhat as there are over 150 uses of the word weary in the books, and I feel like I'm cherry-picking. Still, fun!

Edited February 4, 2023 by Sandy Clegg
Additional guff

[Evolett]

7 minutes ago, Sandy Clegg said:

Maesters, in their grey robes and talent for stitching people’s wounds, can also be metaphorical ‘sewer rats’ I suppose …

Yes, I would think so too. I recall Lady Dustin naming the maesters "grey rats." The maesters highlight another element, knowledge, which Tyrion has in common with them. In Dany's circles, everything "is known" ("it is known"). Not so at the Wall where Jon Snow knows nothing and the North has difficulty in remembering the past. Patchface is a fountain of knowledge, if only his so called prophecies could be decoded by those around him. I definitely see acquiring knowledge as paramount to finding solutions to the problem. Not only the knowledge gathered through the weirwoods but that of the maesters and other learned scholars as well. 

[Evolett]

1 minute ago, Sandy Clegg said:

As 'weir' is such a key term in the books, I thought I'd check my Chambers app:

Have you had a look at my two posts on the etymology of "weir" and the PIE "wer?"

Hedge is great too. Basically, almost anything that serves to obstruct. 

[Sandy Clegg]

7 minutes ago, Evolett said:

Have you had a look at my two posts on the etymology of "weir" and the PIE "wer?"

Yes, I enjoy these greatly -although my interest in PIE is very much that of a layman, so I rarely dip my toes into those waters. As the well-spring of many of our words it feels like a very deep ocean which I could easily get lost in. I do know that many words with a gu- beginning became words with a w- beginning, so ward/guard have common etymology, as do ghost/host/guest. This is just from listening to the History of English podcast, which I highly recommend. 

Do we think GRRM is exploiting PIE deliberately in his wordplay? Or is he drawing from discrete languages, and so the PIE references are incidental to this? I have my own personal hunch that ever since he introduced Patchface (who speaks 4 languages) in ACOK, George expanded a lot of his wordplay tactics to include non-English aspects. Perhaps he felt that the ones in AGOT were too easy? 

[Sandy Clegg]

22 hours ago, Evolett said:

Old English beo wulf, literally "bee-wolf," "a wolf to bees;" a kenning for "bear." 

I think I read that they used this euphemistic term because they were superstitious about naming bears by their actual name. Something to do with the belief that by saying the name bear, one might accidentally summon one into ones vicinity? I know that arctic means 'bear place' in Old Germanic languages (?) and so antarctic means 'place of NO bears'. Presumably because there was no Old Germanic word for 'penguin' (which is incidentally a Welsh word).

[sweetsunray]

On 1/30/2023 at 11:54 PM, Seams said:

I'm wondering whether there is wordplay on "Sam + Meera = Summer"? It's not an exact fit, so there must be more to it, but GRRM seems to go to some trouble to have them introduced to each other (Sam is caught in Meera's net) and to show Gilly coming out of the well while the direwolf Summer jumps down from the dome. 

The repeat of Sam here (with capitals) in a rebirth scene is for me a reference to Lord of Light by Zelazny. Protagonist Sidharta is rebirthed into a body (from Nirvana) and he goes by the name of Sam (an acronym). George considers it one of the top 5 sci fi fantasies ever written, and has admitted that Samwell was named for Zelazny's character.

Gilly is for a second time featured as a stand in for the corpse queen, aka the thing that only comes in the night, at the Nightfort (the rat cook's kitchen to be precise). Summer scares the bejebus out of the corpse queen and makes her son (an Other) cry.

Edited February 4, 2023 by sweetsunray

[sweetsunray]

6 minutes ago, Sandy Clegg said:

I think I read that they used this euphemistic term because they were superstitious about naming bears by their actual name. Something to do with the belief that by saying the name bear, one might accidentally summon one into ones vicinity? I know that arctic means 'bear place' in Old Germanic languages (?) and so antarctic means 'place of NO bears'. Presumably because there was no Old Germanic word for 'penguin' (which is incidentally a Welsh word).

There are no penguins in the arctic, only the antarctic.

But yes, names for bears are euphemistic terms: brown, honey eater, etc.

More here: https://sweeticeandfiresunray.com/bears-and-maidens/

[Seams]

Excellent insights.

18 minutes ago, Evolett said:

maybe the weir-route in question is foul and blocked (thinking of the poisoned Raventree weirwood) and needs to be "cleaned," as Tyrion restores the flow at Casterly Rock.

I think this must be right.

In terms of parallels, I think we have to add Arya into the mix. She is in the lower level of the Red Keep, emerging from the mouth of a dragon skull (kissed by fire?) when she overhears two men that readers believe to be Varys and Ilirio Mopatis discussing the death of the hand and other treasons. She becomes lost in the tunnels and ends up emerging from a sewer.

I like the thought of Patchface as a parallel, too. At the same time this sewer scenario is playing out offstage in Dany's POV (or closely juxtaposed in the book), Tyrion is on trial with Oberyn Martell stepping in as his champion. In Jaime's POV, he is returning to King's Landing after Joffrey's death and sorting out his relationship with Cersei, deciding to get a gold hand and to fight with his left hand, establishing his command over the kings guard and to giving Oathkeeper to Brienne. The Jaime stuff seems like cleaning up aspects of his past while setting the groundwork for his future commitment to honor. And since we know he has had shit for honor, this is a direct match to cleaning out a sewer. 

I think the Tyrion trial chapters are also part of the sewer clean-up: his first choice of champion is Bronn, who I believe to be a brown part of the green/brown symbolism of the life cycle of plants (leaves and compost feeding each other). He wants Bronn to defeat Ser Gregor Clegane (Green Grace Log) who is a green character. Bronn refuses because he is now serving as fertilizer for house Stokeworth, the bread basket for King's Landing. The man who steps up as champion is Oberyn Martell. I realized that Oberyn must be part of the "bore" group of names - always showing up when it's time for a king to die. (If I'm right about the word "grace" being hidden in an anagram of Ser Gregor's name, he is a symbolic king.) With his last name in the mix, Oberyn Martell could also be part of the "Bael" group of characters - a fool / king who gains entry surreptitiously and then impregnates the princess or symbolically "fathers" the next generation. (I think Prince Baelor in the Dunk and Egg stories is a father figure for Dunk and Petyr Baelish is a father figure for Sansa / Alayne.)

As for the battering ram and sex against the wish of the woman, this passage is helpful in understanding Oberyn and Tyrion combined into one battering ram:

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"Has she seduced you yet?" Tyrion asked, unsurprised.

Oberyn laughed aloud. "No, but she will if I meet her price. The queen has even hinted at marriage. Her Grace needs another husband, and who better than a prince of Dorne? Ellaria believes I should accept. Just the thought of Cersei in our bed makes her wet, the randy wench. And we should not even need to pay the dwarf's penny. All your sister requires from me is one head, somewhat overlarge and missing a nose."

ASoS, Tyrion IX

Oberyn is talking about having lusty sex with Cersei and Ellaria, and then switches gears to talk about Cersei wanting Tyrion beheaded. It dawned on me that GRRM is saying that noseless Tyrion is like a big penis. He has cleared out the sewers at Casterly Rock and now he has battered down the door at King's Landing like Joso's Cock. (Or so Cersei believes - Tyrion didn't actually kill Joff, as far as we know, and he was acting Hand of the King, not the actual Hand, so he didn't really have power, even though he sat on the throne.) 

But all of this ties back into bowls of brown, the favorite food of small folk in Flea Bottom. Tyrion and Bronn put a singer into the stew at a pot shop. Arya caught a pigeon to sell to a pot shop (but it fell from her belt and she lost it). Joffrey died from eating pigeon pie. I think Joffrey's time had come - he was a moon boy and it was time for the moon to set. Just as the transition from brown to green and back to brown is an endless cycle, it was Joffrey's time to die (and Jaime arrived back in town immediately after his death). Arya dreams of Nymeria dragging Catelyn's body out of the Green Fork just about the time that Jaime lets Brienne come out of the tower cell where he had put her for her own safety until she could explain to Ser Loras just what happened when Renly died. (Renly and Ser Loras are green characters and Brienne will team up with brown characters Dick Crabb and Ser Hyle Hunt as well as seed character "Pod" Payne.)

And the moon boy / moon symbolism takes us back to sewers because of the traditional crescent moon on an outhouse door - the moon door. Sansa is stuck at the Red Keep until the fool Ser Dontos shows her the way out - symbolically leading her through the "sewer" (and she is a sewer - the other meaning and pronunciation - having learned embroidery from Septa Mordane). When they emerge, he delivers her to a Bael character who starts to nurture the seeds that have been planted (butterflies in her tummy, put there by Joffrey). 

Here's a wordplay theory to tie it all together: maybe GRRM uses "shit story" as an anagram of "history." The characters have to clear out the "shit" from past history (clear a sewer) in order to evolve to the next level. This might also explain why a character named Mushroom is an historian: mushrooms live in the dark and feed on shit. 

I think this is coming together!

This just broke a dam  for my attempts to analyze The Sworn Sword. Like Tywin, Ser Eustace Osgrey is constipated: his home is even named Holdfast. He spends his days looking at old relics and remembering the glory of his ancestors. The brown character, Ser Bennis of the Brown Shield, hangs around doing nothing. Dunk is the fool who becomes the ram. He crosses "her moat" (a mother). The log jam is symbolically broken, Ser Bennis disappears with a lot of the family heirlooms, the water flows, and the next generation can begin to nourish the fields (the berry patch as well as the small folk named after beans and vegetables as well as the melons rotting in the fields). 

This also makes sense with the wolf / fowl / flow wordplay discussed earlier in this thread.  

[Seams]

1 hour ago, Evolett said:

The iron grating can be compared to a weir or dam.

We'll have to look at Brynden "Blackfish" Tully as well. Not only is he a pretty close parallel to Brynden "Bloodraven" Rivers, but he sort of "cleans the sewer" by setting Hoster Tully's pyre/boat on fire as it floats. He swims under the grate to escape Riverrun.

He also spent years overseeing the Moon Gate (not the Moon Door) at the Eyrie.

[Sandy Clegg]

35 minutes ago, sweetsunray said:

here are no penguins in the arctic, only the antarctic.

I know. Hence why they had to call it ‘place of no bears’ instead of ‘penguin place’

EDIT: thanks for assuming I didn't know that there are no penguins in the arctic by the way! I know the British education system is bad, but it's not that bad!

Edited February 4, 2023 by Sandy Clegg

[Sandy Clegg]

On 1/30/2023 at 10:54 PM, Seams said:

I'm wondering whether there is wordplay on "Sam + Meera = Summer"?

Well my rule is that if you have to force  it too much, better to look elsewhere. There are only so many vowel+consonant pairings you can make in English. So you’re bound to come across things that play tricks with your eyes, and this is probably one instance of that. Not to say that GRRM doesn’t ever use phonetic clues, of course. He loves them!
 

It might be useful to look another way here and find alternate meanings of thematic words GRRM commonly uses and see how that works. So a ‘summer’ would be ‘one who sums’ or ‘counts’. Bowen Marsh is known for counting things so he might be an unexpected symbolic ‘summer’ for example. 

[Sandy Clegg]

23 minutes ago, Seams said:

He also spent years overseeing the Moon Gate (not the Moon Door) at the Eyrie.

I don't know if it's a common idiom in the US, and perhaps some non-native English speakers on this forum might also be unaware of this, but here in the UK 'to moon' means to insultingly show your bare arse in public. See the film Braveheart for an example of epic Scots mooning toward the English troops. 

So having a 'moon gate' or a 'moon door' in connection with sewers does, well .... kind of feel very appropriate in a Monty Python kind of sense 

Edited February 4, 2023 by Sandy Clegg

[Seams]

10 minutes ago, Sandy Clegg said:

I don't know if it's a common idiom in the US

Yes it has the same meaning on this side of the pond. 

I thought of another variation GRRM might have used in those closely-presented ASoS chapters: The Hound hits Arya with the flat of an axe to keep her from saying too much. Would a mature author at the height of his powers make a pun on "butt axe" and "buttocks"? There are a number of references to axes in those surrounding chapters, so the Hound's axe might be part of a different motif. 

[Sandy Clegg]

1 minute ago, Seams said:

Yes it has the same meaning on this side of the pond. 

I thought of another variation GRRM might have used in those closely-presented ASoS chapters: The Hound hits Arya with the flat of an axe to keep her from saying too much. Would a mature author at the height of his powers make a pun on "butt axe" and "buttocks"? There are a number of references to axes in those surrounding chapters, so the Hound's axe might be part of a different motif. 

Perhaps not a 'butt axe' pun but I certainly think axes + butts in that sentence together are no accident. Axes are extremely prominent in the world of ASOIAF. If we look at Norvos, the axe symbol is very holy and is tattooed onto Areo Hotah's chest. There is a peninsula called 'The Axe'. Axe carvings have been found in the Vale which go back to the Andal invasion. So the 'axe' is clearly representative of some kind of entity that was worshipped by the Andals pre-invasion. And if it's an entity, it can have a butt. Unless it's one of those worms that don't have butts which I saw on National Geographic once. Eww.

[Seams]

I don't want to derail this fascinating discussion of shit and butts, but I did think of another portmanteau that might have important meaning in the series:

Gregor + Sansa = Gregor Samsa.

The main character of Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis is named Gregor Samsa. One day he wakes up and he has turned into a giant cockroach. 

There are a lot of bugs in Sansa's POVs: fluttering in her tummy after seeing the high council looking like butterflies; moth eggs (actually seed pearls) on the dress she chooses to wear for her escape from the Red Keep; she compares dust motes to tiny golden insects.

The German title of Metamorphosis is Die Verwandlung. I wonder whether Wenda the White Fawn is somehow linked to wordplay with Die Verwandlung. Jaime thinks about wanting to be Ser Arthur Dayne but turning out to be The Smiling Knight - a transformation - just before he gives Oathkeeper to Brienne so she can go find Sansa. He also says that The Smiling Knight was the previouls generation's equivalent of Gregor Clegane. 

My guess is that the death of Ser Gregor and return of Sansa will signal a "metamorphosis" for one or more characters. Sansa is already in the process of turning Sweetrobin into the Flying Knight.

[Sandy Clegg]

7 minutes ago, Seams said:

I don't want to derail this fascinating discussion of shit and butts,

That’s ok, we should have a crack at some other topics I guess. 

[Evolett]

4 hours ago, Seams said:

I don't want to derail this fascinating discussion of shit and butts,

Dany sending Jorah into the sewers and flushing him down the loo ...... The day after taking Meereen Dany holds court. She dresses most royally, in purple, donning her crown and wearing.... stilettos on her feet .

Quote

Today she wore a robe of purple samite and a silver sash, and on her head the three-headed dragon crown the Tourmaline Brotherhood had given her in Qarth. Her slippers were silver as well, with heels so high that she was always half afraid she was about to topple over. 

I found another Myrish stiletto reference, Rhaegar Frey's mustache:

Quote

One of the Freys stepped forward, a knight long and lean of limb, clean-shaved but for a grey mustache as thin as a Myrish stiletto. 

Rhaegar Frey probably ended up in a Frey Pie, to be eaten and ejected into a sewer at some point. This reminds me of Symon Silver Tongue being cooked up in a bowl of brown. Singer's Stew. Rhaegar Frey is Rhaegar Targaryen's name sake and the latter was well known for his songs, he was a singer, in fact, like Symon. So the fecal motif coupled with cannibalism (even unknowing) appears to extend to singing and songs too.  

We have Lysa on our shortlist of characters being "flushed." And we've also thought of her as "fertilizer." Marillion the singer gained her favour but I just realised she's had a "singer" beside her all along. Her son Sweetrobin. That is if GRRM is drawing on the robin. It's a popular bird among gardeners, well known for its distinctive melodious song. 

Lately I've been comparing Gilly to Lysa. Lysa's prime concern is to keep Sweetrobin by her side. She refuses to give him away to be fostered and  threatens to even kill her sister if she should so try. She continues to breastfeed him way past the toddler age. Is she continuously fertilizing him? Gilly also wants to keep her baby from becoming an offering to the cold gods. She accomplished that with Sam's help but was tragically forced to give him up (in respect of Lysa and Sweetrobin, both Stannis and Tywin are cold characters).

I think GRRM may be drawing on the symbolism of the lotus flower in buddhism. Gilly grows up under the harsh rule of her father on the "midden heap" that is Craster's Keep, forced to marry him and bear his children, her sons designated as offerings to the gods. Yet amid this midden heap / pile of shit, grows a beautiful flower, she Gilly, named after the Gillyflower. The lotus flower represents purity and enlightenment. Even though it emerges from muddy murky waters, its blooms rise above it, strong and beautiful.

I expect her to have passed this "pure flower" to her son. Maybe he is the most valuable of all Craster's sons so far, most valuable to the Others. He is the pure flower grown and fertilized by the midden heap they require. He's too young to be a singer but Gilly asked Sam for a song for him. He chose the song of the Seven which focuses on keeping little children safe. With all the connections to bowls of brown, fertilizer and cannibalism, it seems likely he is to be food or fertilizer for the Others. This really does tie into other things I've been looking at. Hopefully Sam's song will keep him safe. 

Edited February 4, 2023 by Evolett

[Sandy Clegg]

I was just reading that catspaw thread when I recognised the Joffrey line. It's where he says he is "no stranger to Valyrian steel", which is an anagram of 

a stony strangler revelation

 ... all of which means nothing, apart from the fact that I really need to take up a hobby of some sort and get out of the house more

 

 

[Seams]

Moon's turn / Tourney / Bend the knee / the letter J

I had started to wonder why GRRM often uses the word "tourney" but rarely "tournament" to describe the contests involving jousting and other mock combat. (Primarily Starks, with an emphasis on Sansa, use the word "tournament.")

Then I finally watched the first episode of "Fire and Blood" (because it was available as a free sample online) and noticed that the jousting lists and the camera view are set up in such a way that we can see the mounted knights turn to make another run at their opponent after each pass. 

I wondered whether there is a deliberate emphasis on the word "turn" in each tourney. This fits with the idea that GRRM uses tourneys as major turning points in the story: Dunk and Egg at Ashford Meadow and at Whitewalls, Rhaegar and Aerys (and Lyanna) at Harrenhal, Renly and Loras and Brienne at Bitter Bridge, Ned and The Hound (and many others) at the Hand's Tourney. We can see the foreshadowing of who will be defeated and who will take away a prize in each match or in the overall contest - some people literally fall from power while others gain in social status due to surprise victories - Ser Jorah, Ser Barristan, Brienne, Glendon Flowers.

I find it fascinating that Jaime was appointed to the kingsguard at Harrenhal but then sent away, preventing his participation in the key contests at that turning point. Joffrey receives "groom's gifts" to support a tourney knight but he never gets to use them. Tyrion declines to be Joffrey's champion but later participates in the mummer jousting to keep the sailors amused and discourage them from harming him and Penny and the dog and pig. So some of the symbolism involves who gets to participate at all or their reasons for participating.

My wordplay radar tell me that the symbolism of a "tourney" is probably linked to the "bend the knee" phrase (turn knee) that is unique to ASOIAF. Men in the north do not become knights and the free folk are disdainful of northmen who "bend the knee" by pledging to support the Targaryen monarch. Perhaps the underlying literary meaning is that northmen (and others) should stay out of the "game" of thrones that is embodied in each tourney.

Staying away from tourneys is Ned Stark's instinct, but he has to acquiesce to King Robert's insistence that there should be a Hand's Tourney with an expensive prize. Catelyn is similarly disdainful of Renly's tourney at Bitter Bridge ("The knights of summer, Catelyn thought." - ACoK, Catelyn III). We know that Bran wanted to be a knight, in spite of the traditions of the north and that he had not heard the story of the little crannogman until Meera tells it to him. Readers are fairly sure that the Knight of the Laughing Tree in Meera's story is a Stark of some kind - certainly the weirwood sigil seems likely to represent a northern House. So Meera is stoking Bran's dream of an honorable and victorious tourney knight from the north in spite of the tradition of Starks and Stark bannermen staying out of the fray. (Get it? Fray / Frey, also a synonym for melee.) Bran is no longer able to bend his knees, of course, so readers will have to stay tuned to see how the tourney / bend the knee symbolism will work for his arc.

Perhaps also worth noting: after he leads Brienne to The Whispers, the first thing that happens to Nimble Dick is that his knee is smashed by Shagwell's morningstar weapon. No more bending the knee for Dick Crabb.

Yet another layer of meaning:

I think the turn / tourney symbolism could be part of the larger symbolism of the passage of time and the messed up seasons in Westeros. GRRM has coined the phrase "a moon's turn" to stand in for the word "month". The idea of turning as the passage of time could help us to sort out other clues connected to words such as wind (a strong breeze but also a verb describing what one does to the "spring" of a clock to keep it running), hands (hour and minute hands), the Night's Watch and the City Watch, Dawn, the Morningstar, rise and set, and the flow of a river (a traditional expression for the passage of time). I even wonder whether the name "Tommen" is supposed to be wordplay on "moment," another word associated with the passage of time. We have heard Theon described as a turn cloak and we see other people and things turning (or refusing to turn) at key moments in the story. 

I explored "whirled" and "world" as a wordplay pair a while ago, iirc. These words also tie the idea of turning to the passage of time (the rotation of the earth). A search on the word "whirled" can also show the significant moments when characters whirl or encounter whirling. (I think there is also a pun on "whirled peas" and "world peace," with pea soup and hummus / humus as major symbolic elements.)

Finally, I think this set of symbols may relate to the letter J, particularly in relation to the names of key characters. "Jousting" starts with the letter J but the letter itself is shaped to make a turn - a change of direction. Someone pointed out long ago in this forum that Jon and Joff could somehow represent "on" and "off" - like flipping a switch to get one or the other but never both at the same time. Jojen has two letters J, which might explain why he has magical visions - he can look in two directions or "see" in both light and dark. Joanna Lannister, Janos Slynt, Jorah and Jeor Mormont, Jon Arryn. I think these are all key characters with some special powers that brought about turning points in the story. 

Edited February 8, 2023 by Seams

[Sandy Clegg]

Extremely random ramblings regarding candles.

Candles pop up here and there in ASOIAF (in both wax and glass variety) and there is even a house sigil (Wickenden) with candles on it. So here are some related findings:

The Thief (aka the Red Wanderer)

Found this alternate meaning of 'thief' in Chambers. Copied this definition from my beloved 'old books' website:

Quote

Thief In a Candle

Part of the wick or snuff, which falling on the tallow, burns and melts it, and causing it to gutter

And when the Thief was in the Moonmaid, that was a propitious time for a man to steal a woman, Ygritte insisted. "Like the night you stole me. The Thief was bright that night."

Then I found this on wikipedia, nice and revolting  :

A Hand of Glory is the dried and pickled hand of a hanged man, often specified as being the left (Latin: sinister) hand, or, if the person was hanged for murder, the hand that "did the deed."

Old European beliefs attribute great powers to a Hand of Glory combined with a candle made from fat from the corpse of the same malefactor who died on the gallows. The candle so made, lighted, and placed (as if in a candlestick) in the Hand of Glory would have rendered motionless all persons to whom it was presented. The process for preparing the hand and the candle are described in 18th-century documents, with certain steps disputed due to difficulty in properly translating phrases from that era.