Direwolves Don't Cry: A Direwolves Reread II - ACoK

[cgrav]

4 hours ago, Prof. Cecily said:

This is most intriguing!

Where is Winterfell portrayed as an egg in the novels?

In several of Bran's thoughts in CoK, particularly after the castle was burned. 

If you do a word search for "shell", it comes up many times in reference to burned out structures, and Winterfell is the one we see the most. Of course a burned shell reminds us of Dany's dragon eggs and Summerhall, so it carries extra meaning when we recall the rumored dragon eggs at Winterfell, Summer's vision of a dragon in the flames, and of course RLJ. 

The legend of Bael the Bard plays into the fertility symbolism, as well, with someone penetrating the castle and leaving a child in his wake.

[Prof. Cecily]

42 minutes ago, cgrav said:

In several of Bran's thoughts in CoK, particularly after the castle was burned. 

If you do a word search for "shell", it comes up many times in reference to burned out structures, and Winterfell is the one we see the most. Of course a burned shell reminds us of Dany's dragon eggs and Summerhall, so it carries extra meaning when we recall the rumored dragon eggs at Winterfell, Summer's vision of a dragon in the flames, and of course RLJ. 

The legend of Bael the Bard plays into the fertility symbolism, as well, with someone penetrating the castle and leaving a child in his wake.

At https://asearchoficeandfire.com/, I only get one reference to shell and Bran in CoK, and that reference is to Lady Stark's sept, rather than Winterfell.

Quote

Osha called softly through the blowing smoke as they went, but no one answered. They saw one dog worrying at a corpse, but he ran when he caught the scents of the direwolves; the rest had been slain in the kennels. The maester's ravens were paying court to some of the corpses, while the crows from the broken tower attended others. Bran recognized Poxy Tym, even though someone had taken an axe to his face. One charred corpse, outside the ashen shell of Mother's sept, sat with his arms drawn up and his hands balled into hard black fists, as if to punch anyone who dared approach him. "If the gods are good," Osha said in a low angry voice, "the Others will take them that did this work."

 I found two references only to Winterfell as a shell, one from Jon's thoughts. I've spoilered the quotations, as they're from ADWD

Spoiler

 

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The moment Jon set the letter aside, the parchment curled up again, as if eager to protect its secrets. He was not at all sure how he felt about what he had just read. Battles had been fought at Winterfell before, but never one without a Stark on one side or the other. "The castle is a shell," he said, "not Winterfell, but the ghost of Winterfell." It was painful just to think of it, much less say the words aloud. And still …

and the other from the Turncoat

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The entrance to the crypts was in the oldest section of the castle, near the foot of the First Keep, which had sat unused for hundreds of years. Ramsay had put it to the torch when he sacked Winterfell, and much of what had not burned had collapsed. Only a shell remained, one side open to the elements and filling up with snow. Rubble was strewn all about it: great chunks of shattered masonry, burned beams, broken gargoyles. The falling snow had covered almost all of it, but part of one gargoyle still poked above the drift, its grotesque face snarling sightless at the sky.

 

 

 

 

I found more references to the Lord Commander's Tower/Keep as a shell, in fact. Also from ADWD

Spoiler

 

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He was walking beneath the shell of the Lord Commander's Tower, past the spot where Ygritte had died in his arms, when Ghost appeared beside him, his warm breath steaming in the cold. In the moonlight, his red eyes glowed like pools of fire. The taste of hot blood filled Jon's mouth, and he knew that Ghost had killed that night. No, he thought. I am a man, not a wolf. He rubbed his mouth with the back of a gloved hand and spat.

 

 

 

Please don't mind my fact-finding- I'm endlessly curious about the power of GRRM's prose and how deeply a reference of his resonates within us.

[cgrav]

@Prof. Cecily

here are some more referring specifically to Winterfell.

CoK Bran VII: 

Quote

The First Keep had not been used for many hundreds of years, but now it was more of a shell than ever.

Shortly after, Osha says they made enough noise to wake a dragon.

DwD Jon VII:

Quote

 "The castle is a shell," he said, "not Winterfell, but the ghost of Winterfell."

The copious comparison of the Lord Commander's tower to a shell is important because that's Jon the secret Dragon's main setting.

[Prof. Cecily]

Thanks!

I thought I included that second, ADWD quotation, but my quote-fu needs work.

I like your thought about the Lord Commander's Tower as "Jon the secret Dragon's main setting."

So many layers in this series!

[Seams]

Jon VII

Overview

Qhorin’s ranger group continues its mission through the SkirlingPass to reach and spy on the wildling camp. Jon has a “wolf dream” in which he and/or Ghost perceive his brother (presumably Bran) in the face of a weirwood tree. The tree / brother tells him to open his third eye. The dream shifts and Ghost sees “a river of ice several thousand feet high” in the Skirling pass and a huge host of thousands of wildlings massed in a valley. Through Ghost’s eyes, Jon can see that the wildlings are not well-organized even though some seem to be preparing for combat. An eagle attacks Ghost, causing Jon to awaken suddenly. Qhorin and the rangers listen intently as Jon recounts his dream and they discuss skinchanging. “Does he mean the eagle? Jon wondered. Or me?” The ranging party spots an eagle watching them from a spine of rock and Jon discovers the injured Ghost. Because the (suspected) skinchanged eagle had spotted them, Qhorin says it is time to turn back and retreat from the likely wildling attack on their group.

Observations

Jon admits to Qhorin that he did not kill Ygritte, and Qhorin says he had deliberately told Jon only to “do what needed to be done and left you to decide what that would be.”  He wanted to see what Jon’s decision would tell him about Jon as a person and didn’t think it was strategically necessary that Ygritte die.

In the Jon VI chapter and this one, shadowcats are mentioned frequently.

Analysis

"He wants to hunt, Jon thought. Perhaps there were goats in these mountains. The shadowcats must live on something. 'Just don't try and bring down a 'cat,' he muttered. Even for a direwolf, that would be dangerous."

Shadowcats carry layers of meaning I have not seen fully deciphered in this forum:

• My first thought is that Jon's warning to Ghost alludes to Catelyn, who is nicknamed Cat, and who has been Jon's enemy since birth.
• The word "Mutter" is the German word for mother. When a character in ASOIAF mutters, I suspect there is an allusion to a mother figure, although there are obviously many possible ways to interpret or apply that term in the various arcs of the books.
• Tyrion is also associated with shadowcats, as he won a shadowcat cloak from the singer Marillion in a dice game on the way to the Eyrie. He wore that cloak when Bronn defeated Lysa Arryn's champion in Tyrion's trial-by-combat. He also wore the cloak when he visited the alchemists to see their wildfire facility under King's Landing, but the cloak there is referred to as a shadow cloak, no longer a shadowcat cloak. This association with Tyrion is the most intriguing shadowcat aspect, to my mind.
• But Tyrion is also associated with goats, which Jon refers to as the food of the shadowcats. It's possible that Tyrion's wearing of the shadowcat cloak is similar to Jon's upcoming attire during his time with the wildlings: he will wear a sheepskin cloak, making him a "wolf in sheep's clothing." Tyrion at the Eyrie may have been a goat disguised in cat's clothing. (But he’s also a lion?)
• A third layer of meaning for shadowcats came in the previous Jon chapter in ACoK (Jon VI): these animals eat the dead bodies of two wildlings killed by Stonesnake and Jon. When they eat the bodies, the cats crack the bones to get at the marrow. I can't remember who wrote it in this forum, but someone indicated that cracking the bones to extract marrow seems to kill a wight or to prevent a person from being wighted. So burning a body or cracking the dead marrow bones seem to be the two methods of preventing this zombie transformation.

During his "wolf dream" (warg experience) through Ghost's eyes, Jon sees "men down in the valley . . . train[ing] for war," and an encampment with "no plan to it; he saw no ditches, no sharpened stakes, no neat rows of horse lines." This is consistent with Qhorin Halfhand's description of the wildlings as lacking the discipline needed for military strength. But it also sounds similar to the things Sansa will find after her descent from the Eyrie in ASoS to the Vale.

Spoiler

Winds of Winter spoiler:

Spoiler

At the Gates of the Moon, we will see the tournament to select the Brotherhood of Winged Knights for Robert Arryn's personal guard. As with the crowd of wildlings observed by Jon, a tournament is also a sort of mock war, without fortifications and with "hide tents sprouted haphazardly" to house the competitors. 

 

Just before Jon wakes from his wolf dream, he sees a giant riding a mammoth. This might also tie into Sansa's time at the Eyrie, where her snow model of Winterfell was damaged by the "giant" toy doll wielded by Robert Arryn. A giant is also one of the last things Jon will see before he is attacked by his Night's Watch brothers in ADwD.

A further tie to the Eyrie may come through the lake Jon sees through Ghost’s eyes. The lake is apparently the source of the Milkwater river. Elsewhere in this thread and forum, we have noted the references to the mountains climbed or descended separately by Jon and by Sansa as a mother's breast. The Milkwater symbolism appears to be part of that larger motif.

It's not exactly the same as the mother's milk symbol but, at the Eyrie, a waterfall named Alyssa's Tears represents a grieving Arryn widow of legend who lost all of the members of her family, but whose tears never reach the valley floor. The idea of the mother and her dead children may also relate to the mother's milk symbolism, and certainly seems to fit with Lysa and Catelyn's (and Cersei’s?) stories.

In spite of Jon's concern, it is not a cat that is dangerous for Ghost in this chapter, it is an eagle that attacks the direwolf. Later we will learn that the eagle is the companion animal of a wildling skinchanger named Orell, who uses the eagle to scout the surrounding land for the wildling army.

[Seams]

Catelyn VII

Overview

 

Over dinner in the Riverrun Great Hall, Catelyn shares with Brienne the news that Bran and Rickon are dead. She asks Brienne to meet her at midnight, and then visits her father who lingers on his deathbed. At midnight, Catelyn goes with Brienne to the dungeon cell where Jaime Lannister is imprisoned. She and Jaime exchange information.

Observations

“I supposed Theon killed the wolves too. He must have, elsewise . . . I was certain the boys would be safe so long as the direwolves were with them. Like Robb with his Grey Wind. But my daughters have no wolves now.”

This chapter opens with Catelyn and Brienne dining together at Riverrun. The previous chapter, Tyrion XII, opened with Tyrion and Cersei dining together in Cersei’s chambers. Both pairs of diners discuss the news that Theon Greyjoy killed Bran and Rickon Stark. Regarding the deaths of the two boys, “Tyrion remembered how the wolves had howled when the Stark boy had fallen. Are they howling now, I wonder?”

There is a lot in this chapter about throats: people having their hearts in their throats,  a man sent to cut Bran’s throat, Bran’s wolf tearing out a man’s throat, Jaime’s throat being dry and raw, fog swallowing a cry for help, Catelyn’s throat constricting when she learns or tells a painful truth, a cord constricting around Brandon Stark’s throat sixteen years ago.

Analysis

In Tyrion XII, Cersei accuses Tyrion of endangering her children, implying a parallel between herself and Catelyn while comparing Tyrion to Theon (or Ramsay Snow, if the truth were known). Catelyn has some power over Jaime Lannister, who was taken prisoner during a battle, and Cersei notes that she holds Sansa. She also shows Tyrion that she has taken his “whore” as a hostage, to hold him responsible for the safety of Tommen and Joffrey. Only she is mistaken, and has taken Alayaya instead of Shae. So there is an interesting set of parallels and intersections involving vengeful mothers, hostages and would-be slayers of children. There is also some parallel in the fact that Bran and Rickon are not really dead and that Cersei has taken the wrong hostage.

Tyrion and Cersei’s dinner includes “roast swan stuffed with mushrooms and oysters.” Tyrion finds the swan “too rich for his taste” and it is cleared from the table “hardly touched.” In the next chapter, Jaime tells Catelyn, “Be careful, my lady. Tyrion says that people often claim to hunger for truth, but seldom like the taste when it’s served up.” This juxtaposition is useful if it tells us that swans symbolize truth. Arya is associated with swans as she observes black swans swimming on the God’s Eye and she has an “ugly duckling” transformation of sorts when she wears a dress provided by Ravella Swann.

In addition to the contemporary situations of Catelyn and Cersei’s children, Catelyn tells what she knows about the deaths of Rickard and Brandon Stark sixteen years earlier, along with Brandon’s companions. “Aerys accused them of treason and summoned their fathers to court to answer the charge, with the sons as hostages. When they came, he had them murdered without trial. Fathers and sons both.” So here is another echo of the “children in danger” and hostage situation. Jaime compares himself to Brandon, and he is chained uncomfortably while he provides Catelyn with the details of Brandon and Rickard’s deaths, both of whom were chained when they died.

I would also note that the description of Jaime’s cell is very like the description of Ser Ilyn Payne’s cell when Jaime asks him to join the expedition to Riverrun in AFfC.

[Seams]

Theon V

Overview

Theon wakes from a nightmare, haunted by his role in killing the two boys whose heads are now displayed on the wall of Winterfell. Asha arrives from Deepwood Motte and tells him he was a fool to take a castle he could not defend. She leaves him ten men and encourages him to depart, but he says Winterfell is his prize. Reek offers to recruit 200 men from the area, implying that they would help to hold the castle for Theon. Theon has another nightmare, this time about a feast at Winterfell with many dead people in attendance. At dawn, he walks along the outer walls of the castle and contemplates the heads of the two boys – which are the sons of the miller, not Bran and Rickon.

Observations

From behind came a shuddering howl that curdled his blood. Mercy, mercy. When he glanced back over his shoulder he saw them coming, great wolves the size of horses with the heads of small children. . . . He could smell the hot breath of the beasts behind him, a stink of brimstone and corruption. They’re dead, dead, I saw them killed, he tried to shout, I saw their heads dipped in tar, but when he opened his mouth only a moan emerged . . . .

He needed the heads for the wall, but he had burned the headless bodies that very day, in all their finery. Afterward he had knelt amongst the bones and ashes to retrieve a slag of melted silver and cracked jet, all that remained of the wolf’s head brooch that had once been Bran’s. He had it still.

Your prize will be the doom of you. Krakens rise from the sea, Theon, or did you forget that during your years among the wolves?

Analysis

The opening paragraph relates Theon’s dream, and it shares details with the experience of Ser Waymar and Will in the prologue of AGoT. Ser Waymar and Theon are “grabbed” by trees. Will watched as Ser Waymar was killed, as Theon watched the death of the boys, but those dead people come back to life and pursue the watchers. Will is struck mute during his ordeal; Theon tries to shout but is only able to moan.

There is symbolism in this chapter of Theon as a smith. He picks up the melted piece of slag that had been Bran’s brooch and his crown is so ugly that Asha asks him whether he made it himself. Before meeting with Asha, Theon noted that the misshapen crown would have to do, since Mikken was now dead. (He was killed by the Ironborn for refusing to submit to Theon’s authority.) It’s interesting to compare Theon-as-smith to Jon occupying the sleeping chamber of Donal Noye at Castle Black after the Night’s Watch smith is killed by a giant. Among Noye’s possessions, Jon will find a broken brooch.

I don’t know if the melted slag refers to the melted gold “crown” poured over the head of Viserys. In the Theon IV chapter, Theon pricked his finger on the brooch when he put his hand into the bag with Bran and Rickon’s clothes. I’m not an expert on fairy tale symbolism, but I think this might allude to the archetype of the maiden pricking her finger on the thorn of a rose. Maybe Theon being pricked by Bran’s brooch is a symbol of the bond that occurs between their characters. Should we compare the prick by the brooch to Sansa’s attachment to the rose she receives from Ser Loras? Tyrion will prick his finger with a dagger after falling into the Rhoyne river with one of the stone men. Does Arya prick her finger when she tries to sew with Septa Mordane?

The fact that the brooch was a head is significant. There are many beheadings in the books but few situations where the reader is told that someone touches a severed head. I suspect that handling a severed head has a special meaning. In Theon’s introduction in AGoT, we are told that he kicks Gared’s head away when it rolls toward him. Even though the wolf’s head is just a brooch, Theon’s handling of it and the fact that he kept the melted head are probably significant. Of course, the wolf's head brooch could allude to the past fate of the direwolf Lady and the future fate of the direwolf Grey Wind.

In Theon’s second nightmare in this chapter, Mikken and Septon Chayle sit together at a feast of the dead, “one dripping blood and the other water.” Mikken was stabbed, and Chayle was thrown in the well. I think this pair of dinner companions symbolizes swords and words, with the smith and the librarian united. It’s not surprising that blood would be associated with the smith who makes swords, but it might be a new idea that water would be associated with the librarian who oversees books.

Farlen, the kennel master, is executed in this chapter. Theon carries out the beheading himself after (falsely) finding Farlen responsible for the deaths of men who accompanied Theon and Reek to the miller’s home where the boys were killed. The execution of Farlen is like the execution of Eddard Stark, which gives us a new metaphor for Ned: kennel master.

“Reek” (Ramsay) asks that he be allowed to rape Palla, the daughter of Farlen, if he does a big favor for Theon. This foreshadows Ramsay’s “girls” – the women he hunts for sadistic sport and the hunting dogs he names after those women. If it’s accurate to compare Farlen’s execution to Ned’s, then Palla would symbolize Ned’s daughter. Except it will be a fake Arya Stark (Jeyne Poole) that Ramsay will marry and treat brutally.

[Seams]

Sansa VII

Overview

During the battle of the Blackwater, Cersei receives news that the fighting is not going well. When Cersei runs from the room, Sansa takes the initiative to reassure the others within Maegor’s Holdfast that they are safe and the situation outside is under control. Sansa goes to her bedroom and finds the Hound there, drunk. “I could keep you safe,” he rasped. “They’re all afraid of me. No one would hurt you again, or I’d kill them.” He demands that Sansa sing for him and she sings the religious song about the Mother. The Hound leaves and Sansa huddles under the blood and smoke-stained cloak he left behind. After dawn, Ser Dontos arrives and tells her that the forces of Stannis have been defeated by the westermen, whose armies attacked him from the rear. He says that Renly led the vanguard. (We will learn later that this was actually Garlan Tyrell wearing Renly’s armor.)

Observations

Sansa observing Cersei: She’s forgotten me. Ser Ilyn will kill me and she won’t even think about it. This may evoke the beheading of Lady, who was killed to appease Cersei with the sword now carried by Ser Ilyn.

Analysis

This chapter harks back to the Sansa I chapter of AGoT, in which Sansa finds herself caught between the frightening Ser Ilyn and the Hound, whom she bumps into as she backs away from Ser Ilyn. Payne is described as “the third stranger” in that scene, preceded by Ser Barristan Selmy and Lord Renly Baratheon. Lady was by Sansa’s side in that chapter, and she growled at Ser Ilyn. In this chapter, Sansa thinks about Lady and wonders whether she will meet her wolf again when she is dead. She expects death might happen soon because of Cersei's plans to use Ser Ilyn to execute the vulnerable highborn residents of King's Landing if the battle is lost, to keep them out of the hands of Stannis.

With the ghost of Renly leading the vanguard at the Blackwater, only Ser Barristan is missing from this ACoK chapter. It’s possible that Ser Garlan is the equivalent of Ser Barristan in this chapter, even though he also represents Renly. In the AGoT/Sansa I chapter, Renly and Barristan arrived together and seemed to represent youth and age united. So a single person who represents Renly and Ser Barristan might be consistent with the earlier appearance by the two men.

In the AGoT chapter, Joffrey suggests that Sansa leave the direwolf Lady behind so she won’t scare the horses while they ride. He volunteers that he will leave his “dog,” the Hound, behind because he seems to frighten Sansa. In this ACoK chapter, the Hound really does leave Joffrey and the Lannisters altogether. However, after frightening Sansa initially, she finds herself drawn to him and she cups his cheek with her hand. 

[Seams]

 

On 5/12/2017 at 9:10 PM, Seams said:

Theon V

... he had knelt amongst the bones and ashes to retrieve a slag of melted silver and cracked jet, all that remained of the wolf’s head brooch that had once been Bran’s. He had it still.

... In the Theon IV chapter, Theon pricked his finger on the brooch when he put his hand into the bag with Bran and Rickon’s clothes. I’m not an expert on fairy tale symbolism, but I think this might allude to the archetype of the maiden pricking her finger on the thorn of a rose. Maybe Theon being pricked by Bran’s brooch is a symbol of the bond that occurs between their characters. Should we compare the prick by the brooch to Sansa’s attachment to the rose she receives from Ser Loras?

The fact that the brooch was a head is significant. There are many beheadings in the books but few situations where the reader is told that someone touches a severed head. I suspect that handling a severed head has a special meaning. In Theon’s introduction in AGoT, we are told that he kicks Gared’s head away when it rolls toward him. Even though the wolf’s head is just a brooch, Theon’s handling of it and the fact that he kept the melted head are probably significant. Of course, the wolf's head brooch could allude to the past fate of the direwolf Lady and the future fate of the direwolf Grey Wind.

After the fresh reading the Sansa VII chapter, the intent behind some details of the Theon V chapter become clearer.

The Hound holds his dagger to Sansa's throat when he compels her to sing, "She could feel him twisting the point, pushing it into her throat . . . " So that prick by a dagger's tip is probably the match for Theon being pricked by Bran's brooch - the rose from Ser Loras might have thorns, but I don't believe Sansa is pricked by that rose.

Also, similar to Theon holding and keeping the burned wolf's head, Sansa finally touches the burned face of Sandor Clegane. In her first glimpse of him in her bed chamber, she describes, "the blood on his face dark as tar." Tar is used to preserve severed heads that will be displayed as a warning against treason or other crimes, so the severed head symbolism is present here. Just as the melted brooch stays with Theon, the memory of the encounter with the Hound and his burned face will stay with Sansa.

Sansa's choice of the song about the Mother, maternal aspect of the Seven gods, also links to Theon's chapter. In his opening nightmare, Theon pleads several times for mercy; the opening line of Sansa's song is, "Gentle Mother, font of mercy." Theon slept with the miller's wife, mother of the two boys who were killed and substituted for Bran and Rickon. Hard to imagine that she would answer Theon's prayers for mercy.

The Hound is becoming a deserter in this scene, leaving his white kingsguard cloak in Sansa's room. Theon deserted Robb and/or Catelyn (he gave her a vow earlier in the book), so he might be seen as a turncloak already; he will betray the Ironborn later, so he becomes a turncloak to both sides at that point. At the close of the Theon V chapter, as Theon contemplates the heads of the two boys on iron spikes above the gatehouse, "the wind tugged on his cloak with small ghostly hands." The wind and small hands imply that the boy Bran is tugging at Theon's cloak, a situation that will come up again in the Turncloak and other Theon POVs when he returns to Winterfell for Ramsay's wedding. So maybe Theon has individually betrayed Robb, Catelyn, Bran and Rickon already, each in a different way.

Of course, the scene between Sandor and Sansa is a symbolic bedding, with Sansa feeling "the stickiness of the blood, and a wetness that was not blood." (The reader fills in the blank and presumes that Sansa is talking about tears because she is touching the Hound's face, but the ambiguity is surely deliberate.) The Hound's voice is compared to "steel on stone," which could represent his "blade" on Sansa, as she will become Alayne Stone.

Theon also has a "bedding" in Theon V, ordering that Kyra be brought to his bed for sex. Although previously Kyra seemed to be a willing sex partner for Theon, in this chapter he is brutal, and she is injured by his roughness. The relatively gentle non-kiss and non-sex of Sansa's bedding by Sandor is contrasted with the cruel treatment of Kyra by Theon. The latter foreshadows the treatment of fArya / Jeyne by Ramsay in the same bed.

[Seams]

Arya X

Overview

With others among the smallfolk at Harrenhal, Arya discusses the change from Lannister to Bolton rule. In Lord Bolton’s room, the Freys try to convince Roose that Robb Stark should bend the knee to the Lannisters. Arya overhears that Robb has lost the north and Winterfell and that Robb's brothers are dead. Roose announces his plan to hunt wolves that day. He returns with nine dead wolves. Roose tells Arya that he will not be taking her along when he leaves Harrenhal. A raven arrives with the news (it is implied) that Robb has reneged on his agreement to marry a Frey so the alliance is dissolved. After believing that she hears her father’s voice urging her to be strong, Arya persuades Gendry that things will be worse at Harrenhal when Vargo Hoat is in charge, and she urges him to bring swords and escape with her. She uses the coin from Jaqen H’ghar to trick a guard, whom she kills, and then leaves the castle with Gendry and Hot Pie.

Observations

There are numerous references to wolves and direwolves in this chapter.

Ser Aenys Frey: “The country is ash, the villages given over to wolves, the harvest burnt or stolen.”

Arya was gad to hear that the castle of the Darrys would be burned. That was where they’d brought her when she’d been caught after her fight with Joffrey, and where the queen had made her father kill Sansa’s wolf. It deserves to burn.

“It is wolves I mean to hunt. I can scarcely sleep at night for the howling.” Bolton buckled on his belt, adjusting the hang of sword and dagger. “It’s said that direwolves once roamed the north in great packs of a hundred or more, and feared neither man nor mammoth, but that was long ago and in another land. It is queer to see the common wolves of the south so bold.”

And then, far far off, beyond the godswood and the haunted towers and the immense stone walls of Harrenhal, from somewhere out in the world, came the long lonely howl of a wolf. . . . it seemed as if she heard her father’s voice. “When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives,” he said.

You have the wolf blood in you.

. . . I am a direwolf, and done with wooden teeth.

“I’m not an owl,” said Arya. “I’m a wolf. I’ll howl.”

Analysis

 

This chapter marks a big turning point in Arya’s story, as she gives up on returning to Winterfell and instead decides to aim for Robb’s base at Riverrun.

I re-read this chapter a few weeks ago when @heimal began a discussion in the forum of Bolton’s Burnt Book. The timing of that re-read was fortuitous for me, because it helped me to see that this chapter, which I might summarize as “Arya escapes Harrenhal,” shares a lot of details with the chapter in which Jon find the obsidian cache – maybe that chapter could be called, “Jon digs for Treasure.” Why would an escape and the finding of a treasure be similar? At this point, my guess is that the chapters show Jon and Arya taking their own initiative and finding or using important weapons (an obsidian dagger and a coin from the Faceless Men) that they will need for their rebirths – they have largely finished with their initial mentoring phases (both serving as stewards) and begun to venture into the unknown. Both are motivated and guided by direwolves in their adventures: Ghost guides Jon to the spot where the cache is buried, and Arya hears howling and then is reminded by her father’s voice that she is Arya of Winterfell and has “the wolf blood” within herself.

Numerous details are also shared between the two chapters:

•            Storm, rain, hidden stars
•            POV brings spiced wine for his / her mentor
•            POV carries water (or lies about carrying water)
•            “clanking” sound in sand (obsidian clanking in the bundle; mail being cleaned in a barrel of sand)
•            Ghosts, ruins
•            Finding a dagger (Arya takes a dagger from Bolton’s solar)
•            Red eyes (Aenys Frey in Arya’s chapter)
•            Lying to the guard at the exit door
•            A narrow opening (door) in the wall of a fort
•           “turncloak” – the cache is wrapped in a cloak which turns as Jon pulls it out of the ground; Arya wears Bolton livery

I really enjoyed exploring the pattern identified in @Kingmonkey’s thread called the "Puppets of Ice and Fire." He found a motley assortment of elements that would always precede the “hatching” of dragons (including Targaryen family births). I bet there are similar patterns for what might be called the liberation of wolves, and some or all of the elements listed here will always be included.

When the direwolf raised his head, his eyes glowed red and baleful, and water streamed down from his jaws like slaver. There was something fierce and terrible about him in that instant. (ACoK, Jon IV)

The hunting party returned near evenfall with nine dead wolves. Seven were adults, big grey-brown beasts, savage and powerful, their mouths drawn back over long yellow teeth by their dying snarls. (ACoK, Arya X)

[GloubieBoulga]

On 13/05/2017 at 3:10 AM, Seams said:

I don’t know if the melted slag refers to the melted gold “crown” poured over the head of Viserys. In the Theon IV chapter, Theon pricked his finger on the brooch when he put his hand into the bag with Bran and Rickon’s clothes. I’m not an expert on fairy tale symbolism, but I think this might allude to the archetype of the maiden pricking her finger on the thorn of a rose. Maybe Theon being pricked by Bran’s brooch is a symbol of the bond that occurs between their characters. Should we compare the prick by the brooch to Sansa’s attachment to the rose she receives from Ser Loras? Tyrion will prick his finger with a dagger after falling into the Rhoyne river with one of the stone men. Does Arya prick her finger when she tries to sew with Septa Mordane?

For me the allusion was obvious ! (also, the vision of Jon sleeping in a "bed" of ice, loosing memories of the warmth could refers to his "death" after he was "pricked" by daggers, like Aurora the sleeping beauty - the other vision of a sleeping beauty is from Daenerys, the blue flower in the wall of ice)

But I wonder now if there is a wordplay with slag and stag; and if so, the first scene with the she-direwolf killed by an antler in the throat could be also the same theme. 

I'll read the rest, I'm late !

[Seams]

On 5/19/2017 at 10:30 PM, Seams said:

Arya X

Overview

With others among the smallfolk at Harrenhal, Arya discusses the change from Lannister to Bolton rule. In Lord Bolton’s room, the Freys try to convince Roose that Robb Stark should bend the knee to the Lannisters. Arya overhears that Robb has lost the north and Winterfell and that Robb's brothers are dead. Roose announces his plan to hunt wolves that day. He returns with nine dead wolves. Roose tells Arya that he will not be taking her along when he leaves Harrenhal. A raven arrives with the news (it is implied) that Robb has reneged on his agreement to marry a Frey so the alliance is dissolved. After believing that she hears her father’s voice urging her to be strong, Arya persuades Gendry that things will be worse at Harrenhal when Vargo Hoat is in charge, and she urges him to bring swords and escape with her. She uses the coin from Jaqen H’ghar to trick a guard, whom she kills, and then leaves the castle with Gendry and Hot Pie.

Observations

“It is wolves I mean to hunt. I can scarcely sleep at night for the howling.” Bolton buckled on his belt, adjusting the hang of sword and dagger. “It’s said that direwolves once roamed the north in great packs of a hundred or more, and feared neither man nor mammoth, but that was long ago and in another land. It is queer to see the common wolves of the south so bold.”

The hunting party returned near evenfall with nine dead wolves. Seven were adults, big grey-brown beasts, savage and powerful, their mouths drawn back over long yellow teeth by their dying snarls. (ACoK, Arya X)

And then, far far off, beyond the godswood and the haunted towers and the immense stone walls of Harrenhal, from somewhere out in the world, came the long lonely howl of a wolf. . . . it seemed as if she heard her father’s voice. “When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives,” he said.

I was just going back to look over some earlier chapters and stumbled across this from Arya III:

Arya has a direct wolf encounter that requires her to rethink her feelings about wolves: when she needs to urinate, Hot Pie warns her not to go far from the camp because he has heard wolves nearby. Arya pretends to heed his advice but sneaks off anyway. At a vulnerable moment, she is approached by twelve “eyes shining out from the wood,” and one wolf that comes close enough to bare his teeth at her. “[A]ll she could think about was how stupid she’d been and how Hot Pie would gloat when they found her half-eaten body the next morning. But the wolf turned and raced back into the darkness, and quick as that the eyes were gone.”

It's possible that the seven adult wolves killed by Bolton's hunting party were the seven wolves Arya encountered when she was on the road.

I am also thinking about the irony in the advice Arya hears in Ned's voice, about the pack surviving, after Roose has just killed a pack of wolves. But Ned's advice is qualified by the phrase, "When the snows fall and the white winds blow. . . " If Ned's words apply only during winter conditions, for some reason, maybe packs of wolves are more vulnerable in autumn than in winter.

Also from the Arya III post:

Arya tells Yoren that the wolves scared her: 

“Did they?” He spat. “Seems to me your kind was fond o’ wolves.”

“Nymeria was a direwolf.” Arya hugged herself. “That’s different. Anyhow, she’s gone. . . I bet if she’d been in the city, she wouldn’t have let them cut off Father’s head.”

“Orphan boys got no fathers,” Yoren said, “or did you forget that? . . . The only wolves we got to fear are the ones wear manskin, like those who done for that village.”

Yoren’s choice of phrasing – “wolves . . . [that] wear manskin” – is interesting. We know that the Boltons of ancient times wore “wolf” skin when they would flay Starks and turn their skin into cloaks. This is the only mention I can recall of wolves wearing manskin. What does Yoren know of warging, and can it – literally or figuratively – work in reverse, with the wolf entering the human’s mind?

So Yoren was concerned about wolves that wear manskin in that chapter, but the wolves he did not particularly fear may have been killed by a man who wears wolfskin (Bolton) in this chapter. Was Yoren right to fear wolves that wear manskin, but not men who wear wolfskin? If so, was he talking about wargs or about men like Bolton who appears to be a man but might be a vicious killer under the surface?

[Harlaw's Book the Sequel]

I've seen stated on other threads that 9 is a number sacred to the olds gods, with the grove of 9 nine weirwood trees beyond the Wall as an example.  Given that, it's interesting that the numerical amounts of dead wolves potentially have connections to both the old gods and the new.

Regarding the questions posed at the end of the post, I think as a man of the Watch, Yoren probably knows a bit more than most people south of the Wall about wargs and skinchangers.  Also I definitely think Yoren is more worried about men like Yoren then wargs.  

[Seams]

Jon VIII

 

Overview

Qhorin Halfhand leads his ranging group southwest, away from the wildling camp. He instructs Jon to build a fire at one resting place, which Jon takes as a sign that “their end was near.” If the wildlings overtake them, Qhorin commands Jon to yield, appear to be an oathbreaker, do whatever is asked of him, and to spy on the wildlings. Qhorin leads Jon along a passage “through the heart of the mountain,” hidden behind a waterfall. When they emerge on the other side the wildlings soon arrive, confronting them at the mouth of the cave. The leader of the wildling group is Rattleshirt. When Jon surrenders, Rattleshirt tests his intent by ordering him to kill the Halfhand. Qhorin and Jon fight, Ghost bites Qhorin’s leg and finally Jon’s sword slashes Qhorin’s throat. Ygritte persuades Rattleshirt to let Jon live and reveals that Mance is advancing on the Wall.

Observations

Three of the five Night’s Watch men in Qhorin’s group depart before Jon and Qhorin go through the waterfall. Squire Dalbridge died covering the escape of the other four; Ebben is sent to try to reach Mormont, and Stonesnake is sent to Mormont a few days later. One of the wildlings later shows Ebben’s severed head to Jon and Qhorin. Is this another “Ben” character, symbolizing something about the fate of Benjen Stark? I have seen parallels between Benjen and Brown Ben Plumm, so any Ben now interests me as a possible hint about the missing Stark uncle.

The analysis of this chapter (below) will look at parallels with the AGoT prologue. Maybe the severed head of the Night’s Watch brother Ebben is intended to parallel the beheading of Gared, who is featured in that chapter.

Analysis

This chapter echoes or foreshadows situations we see in at least three other chapters:

•       the AGoT prologue (Gared and Ser Waymar and the wildlings-turned-wights), as well as
•       ACoK, Bran VI (Summer and Shaggydog trapped in the godswood while “the sea flows over the walls” of Winterfell).
•       There are also shared elements between this chapter and ADwD, Reek II, in which Theon betrays the Ironborn men holding Moat Cailin.

On a recent re-read of the AGoT prologue, I noticed the constant conflict between youth and experience played out in the dialogue between Gared and Ser Waymar. It struck me that both Gared and Ser Waymar might have valid points and reasons for their points of view, but they did not respect each other so there was no meeting of the minds. There is a similar young/old relationship between Qhorin and Jon, except the more senior Night’s Watch brother is leading the ranging party in this case and he and Jon seem to have mutual respect for each other. He gives Jon some power to make judgment calls (he had told Jon only to “do what needed to be done” with regard to killing or sparing Ygritte) and Jon obeys him in various ways. So we seem to get some opposite details in the AGoT and ACoK scenes, such as the decision whether to light a fire:

Gared dismounted. “We need a fire. I’ll see to it.”

“How big a fool are you, old man? If there are enemies in this wood, a fire is the last thing we want.”

“There’s some enemies a fire will keep away,” Gared said. “Bears and direwolves and . . . other things . . .”

Ser Waymar’s mouth became a hard line. “No fire.” (AGoT. Prologue)

***

When Qhorin Halfhand told him to find some brush for a fire, Jon knew their end was near.

…

Qhorin Halfhand … gestured at the fire. “More wood. I want it bright and hot.” (ACoK, Jon VIII)

Ser Waymar knew that a fire would alert enemies to their location or, perhaps, scare off enemies he wanted to confront. Qhorin’s strategy is to use the fire as a decoy, to draw the wildling pursuers to the location of the fire while he and Jon double back on their trail and follow the hidden passage through the mountain. (Doubling back and resting in a cave is also similar to the strategy Bran and Rickon’s group will use when they create a trail in the wolfwood but then return to Winterfell to hide in the crypt.)

Of course, Ser Waymar (= youth) dies and Gared (= experience) somehow gets away and seems to desert the Night’s Watch, for which Ned beheads him. In this ACoK chapter, Qhorin (= experience) dies and Jon (= youth) appears to desert the NW and manages to survive – although he may pay the price for his desertion when he is stabbed by Night’s Watch brothers in ADwD. We know that Qhorin’s death was a deliberate sacrifice, part of a plan to help Jon infiltrate the wildling group. Does that give us insights into Ser Waymar’s death as well? Was he deliberately trying to “infiltrate” the White Walker group?

Before Qhorin and Jon emerge from the tunnel through the mountain, Jon describes feelings of being pressed, blocked, pinched and with “no way out” from the surrounding cliffs. This is an interesting echo of the feelings of Bran / Summer in Bran VI, where the wolf’s-eye-view conveys the frustration of being trapped in the enclosed godswood with his brother Shaggydog, using the same “no way out” phrase. Bran / Summer can look through “the long stone burrow that ran between the walls” but the wolves cannot get through the gate secured with a “black iron snake.” By contrast, Jon and Qhorin are able to pass through the tunnel in the mountain.

The Bran VI chapter gives us a couple of interesting parallel characters to compare to Qhorin Halfhand: Maester Luwin and Rickon’s direwolf, Shaggy Dog:

Maester Luwin advises Bran that there is no shame in yielding the castle, as Theon has demanded. “A lord must protect his smallfolk.” (ACoK, Bran VI)

Qhorin Halfhand commands Jon to yield and go over to the wildings: “Our honor means no more than our lives, so long as the realm is safe.” (ACoK, Jon VIII)

This brother’s eyes were pools of shadow, but the fur on the back of his neck was bristling. (Summer / Bran, describing Shaggydog, ACoK, Bran VI)

Qhorin Halfhand gazed at him across the fire, his eyes lost in pools of shadow. (ACoK, Jon VIII)

These are the only two places in all of the books where the exact phrase occurs, comparing eyes to pools of shadow. Aside from being dark and possibly mysterious, what does it mean that Shaggydog and Qhorin have eyes like pools of shadow? What does it mean that their eyes are similar to each other?

[Qhorin] unsaddled his horse removed her bit and bridle, and ran his fingers through her shaggy mane. (Jon VIII)

Jon gave his garron the last of the oats and stroked his shaggy mane while Ghost prowled restlessly amongst the rocks. (Jon VIII)

There may be wordplay around “name” and “mane” in the books. When Theon is about to be captured by Ramsay Snow, he notices that his horse’s mane is on fire. Soon after that, Theon loses his name and becomes Reek. So a “shaggy mane” might be alluding to someone named Shaggy.

There are other places in the books where characters are described as shaggy, but the use of the word here may be confirmation that Qhorin should be compared to Shaggydog. Or should he be compared to Rickon? riQhon?

The third parallel scene that this chapter evoked in my mind was Theon’s betrayal of the Ironborn men holding Moat Cailin. As Jon becomes a turncloak here, slaying his Night’s Watch brother, Theon becomes a turncloak in that chapter, slaying Ralph Kenning with his own sword:

When he laid the blade against the swollen throat of the creature on the straw, the skin split open in a gout of black blood and yellow pus. Kenning jerked violently, then lay still. (ADwD, Reek II)

. . . for an instant it seemed that Jon’s slash had not touched him. Then a string of red tears appeared across the big man’s throat . . . only the point of the bastard blade was stained, the last half inch. (ACoK, Jon VIII)

[Seams]

On 5/27/2017 at 11:30 PM, Harlaw's Book the Sequel said:

I've seen stated on other threads that 9 is a number sacred to the olds gods, with the grove of 9 nine weirwood trees beyond the Wall as an example.  Given that, it's interesting that the numerical amounts of dead wolves potentially have connections to both the old gods and the new.

Regarding the questions posed at the end of the post, I think as a man of the Watch, Yoren probably knows a bit more than most people south of the Wall about wargs and skinchangers.  Also I definitely think Yoren is more worried about men like Yoren then wargs.  

Nice catch on the wolf count. It does seem as if it should tie into that larger collection of northern nines. Another possibly relevant nine:

Theon: "I liked you better when you were Esgred," he told her accusingly.

She laughed. "That's fair. I liked you better when you were nine." (ACoK, Theon II)

While we're considering numbers, in analyzing this latest chapter (Jon VIII) I noticed that Theon had included "eleven men, two boys, and a dozen dogs" in his hunting party to seek Bran and Rickon. So 25 altogether. At the conclusion of this chapter, Jon and Yoren are confronted with fourteen wildlings with eight dogs. 22!? How could that be, when the two groups have such similar purposes, and when GRRM has given us hints that Qhorin and Jon are like Shaggdog and Summer? I wanted the numbers to match! One of the wildlings is carrying Ebben's head in her bag, so maybe that brings the total in the wildling group to 23, and Jon "deserts" and joins the wildlings, making 24. I suppose Orell the skinchanger, living on within the eagle, would round out the 25 for the match. But maybe GRRM is just messing with my arithmetic-loving head, creating two "not-quite-parallel" hunting parties.

I'm still pondering Yoren's words of caution about wolves that wear manskin. I'm pretty sure GRRM wants us to compare Yoren and Qhorin. Both are Night's Watch guys, of course. They are also part of that experience / youth, mentor / young hero pattern that was established with Gared and Ser Waymar. The Gared / Ser Waymar partnership failed, but the Yoren / Arya and Qhorin / Jon pairing strike me as successful. The elder men provide some stern guidance (Yoren beats Arya for attacking her "brother" Hot Pie with a wooden sword while Qhorin orders Jon to attack him with a sharp sword) but they also let their Stark pupils learn by thinking things through on their own, providing only questions or ambiguous phrasing that allows the pupil to reach his or her own conclusion.

Qhorin puts up a strong defense against Jon's attack, even though he ordered Jon to follow the instructions of the wildlings. The thing that brings Qhorin down, finally, is that the direwolf Ghost bites his leg just as Jon slashes with his sword. So that may be that man/wolf hybrid that Yoren feared - a wolf in manskin.

The thing that took me by surprise in this re-read is that Roose Bolton fulfills that similar mentor role in Arya's arc at this critical moment of her journey. She had the coin from Jaqen, but she hadn't used it until she had her final "lessons" from Roose: burning letters, handling leeches, manipulating Freys to undermine their loyalty to Robb, destroying the Darry castle and sending a couple of Robb's regiments to useless targets, hunting wolves and making gloves from wolf pups. (Gloves are prominently featured in the Jon VIII chapter with Qhorin.) Only when Roose tells her she can't accompany him further does Arya use the coin as a ruse (!) to commit a murder and start to become ruthless. Yoren reminded Arya that her "kind" was fond of wolves and she says her direwolf would have prevented a beheading. Roose kills wolves and the Arya X chapter began with a display of the smallfolk beheaded at Roose's command.

Arya hearing Ned's voice telling her that the lone wolf might die but the pack survives sounds similar to the advice from Qhorin to Jon and from Maester Luwin to Bran that the guard or the leader might die or yield to protect the larger group. Maybe that voice will come back to her, and we will see her snap out of her career as an assassin, similar to Theon emerging from his Reek identity after his visit to the Winterfell crypt.

[Seams]

Some additional material for

Jon VIII

Another detail of note for the Qhorin / Shaggydog comparison: Shaggydog is “all black, and his eyes were green fire” (AGoT, Bran IV). As far as I know, the reason for this comparison between Rickon’s direwolf and wildfire is not yet clear. Combined with some details from the Qhorin / Shaggydog comparison in this chapter, however, we can pull out a couple details that might reinforce the Shaggydog / wildfire connection.

Tyrion Lannister . . . was garbed in . . . the shadowskin cloak he had acquired in the Mountains of the Moon. . . . The chill in the long dank vault went bone deep. . . . The only light came from the sealed iron-and-glass oil lamp that Hallyne the Pyromancer carried so gingerly. (ACoK, Tyrion V)

***

“You knew this place was here.”

“When I was no older than you, I heard a brother tell how he followed a shadowcat through these falls.” . . . “There is a way through the heart of the mountain.”

He took off his wet cloak, but it was too cold and damp here to strip down any further. . . . The moon shone through the curtain of falling water . . .

. . . the Halfhand had made a half-dozen torches, soaking bundles of dry moss with the oil he carried in his saddlebag. He lit the first one now and led the way down into the dark, holding the pale flame up before him. (ACoK, Jon VIII)

So the vault of the alchemists is compared to the mountain through which Qhorin and Jon travel, setting up a wildfire --> Shaggydog --> Qhorin comparison. Or maybe Qhorin is the pyromancer, not the wildfire itself. GRRM does have some fun with “fire + romance” wordplay in Jon VIII when Qhorin says the first small, flickering flame of the fire is, “As shy as a maid on her wedding night and near as fair. Sometimes a man forgets how pretty a fire can be.”

It is fairly clear that Jon is “reborn” when he emerges from the cave on the other side of the mountain. (Qhorin stays behind him, in the mouth of the cave.) Is Tyrion reborn after emerging from the alchemists’ vault? The Night’s Watch guide Stonesnake had told Jon that, “The mountain is your mother. Cling to her, press your face up against her teats, and she won't drop you.” (ACoK, Jon VI). The wildfire scene with Tyrion in the shadowcat cloak takes place “under the hill of Rhaenys.” So both men are inside “mother” mountains.

This leads us to the next comparison, taking place “beneath the shadow of the Mother of Mountains,” and linked by horse meat to this chapter, in which a horse breaks a leg and is slaughtered for meat by the Night’s Watch rangers:

I am the blood of the dragon, she told herself as she took the stallion’s heart in both hands, lifted it to her mouth and plunged her teeth into the tough, stringy flesh.

Warm blood filled her mouth and ran down over her chin. The taste threatened to gag her, but she made herself chew and swallow. The heart of a stallion would make her son strong and swift and fearless or so the Dothraki believed, but only if the mother could eat it all. (AGoT, Daenerys V)

. . . Qhorin insisted that the rangers mix some of the garron’s blood with their oats, to give them strength. The taste of that foul porridge almost choked Jon, but he forced it down. . . . At break of day, they each chewed a half-frozen strip of horsemeat, then saddled their garrons once again, and fastened their black cloaks around their shoulders. (ACoK, Jon VIII)

And the horsemeat could bring us back to Shaggydog because of the shaggy manes of the garrons. There’s a pattern here, but what does it mean?

My best guess about horses is that they represent power or, maybe, life: Ned’s horse falls on him and breaks his leg just as the Lannisters are taking over in King’s Landing; Theon’s horse catches fire just before he is taken prisoner and tortured; Dany receives her silver from Khal Drogo as a wedding gift; Joffrey receives a saddle, boots and spurs but no horse among his groom gifts. Jon says, “Qhorin’s mount would not last another day” the day before Qhorin dies.

In the Daenerys chapter, the dosh khaleen cheer, “The prince is riding!” when pregnant Dany finishes eating the stallion’s heart. At the end of Jon’s chapter, we learn that Mance is riding, “marching on your Wall.” (Maybe Mance's advance is on foot, along with most of the free folk, who travel without horses.) But the reader eventually learns that Dany’s baby will not live, and Mance’s attack on the Wall will not be successful. Does baby Rhaego’s death foreshadow Mance’s eventual fate? Horses may not represent power, if Mance’s failed invasion and Rhaego’s death are linked to riding. On the other hand, Mance’s goal for the attack is attained when Jon allows the free folk to pass through the Wall, and Dany herself seems to fulfill the destiny foreseen for the Stallion that Mounts the World.

When the sun of her life reached her, Dany slid an arm around his waist. (AGoT, Daenerys V)

Ghost’s muzzle was dripping red . . . Jon pulled the direwolf away and knelt with one arm around him. (ACoK, Jon VIII)

[GloubieBoulga]

Concerning the horses, there is a strong connection with the Stark : a long horse's face is their physical sign; is it like silver hairs for Targaryen ? All Starks don't have horse's faces, nor Targ have blond hair. 

I don't know yet exactly what to do with. 

There is also the "girl in grey flying on a dying horse", or the Other mounted on dead horses (and Dywen having the idea to use dead horses to mount too, which not enjoys Dolorous Edd who said that next step will be use the dead people who won't have any possibility to sleep quietly - Sam II, ASOS). 

4 hours ago, Seams said:

My best guess about horses is that they represent power or, maybe, life:

In christian mythology, the 4rth rider of the Apocalypse is the death (sickness and hungriness) on a pale horse. The Other from Sam's chapter imitates this rider, and there is also the "pale mare" who brings at Meereen sickness and death from Astapor. So the horse figure seems to be ambiguous

[Seams]

14 hours ago, GloubieBoulga said:

Concerning the horses, there is a strong connection with the Stark : a long horse's face is their physical sign; is it like silver hairs for Targaryen ? All Starks don't have horse's faces, nor Targ have blond hair. 

I don't know yet exactly what to do with. 

There is also the "girl in grey flying on a dying horse", or the Other mounted on dead horses (and Dywen having the idea to use dead horses to mount too, which not enjoys Dolorous Edd who said that next step will be use the dead people who won't have any possibility to sleep quietly - Sam II, ASOS). 

In christian mythology, the 4rth rider of the Apocalypse is the death (sickness and hungriness) on a pale horse. The Other from Sam's chapter imitates this rider, and there is also the "pale mare" who brings at Meereen sickness and death from Astapor. So the horse figure seems to be ambiguous

Yes, the Stark connection to horse faces is intriguing. And then we have the story that sprang up around Robb Stark, that he rode his wolf into battle. Arya's first "kill" was of the stable boy at King's Landing, and Hodor was a stable boy before he became Bran's helper. Lyanna and (Uncle) Brandon are described as being horse-like, or something along those lines, by Lady Dustin.

It would be great if we could sort out the connection between the Stark horse symbolism and the Stark direwolf symbolism. Why does one family become associated with two animals?

Interesting point about the pale mare and the four horsemen of the Apocalypse. So maybe horses as a symbol of power is better than horses as a symbol of life.

[GloubieBoulga]

The connection with horses is also strong with Daenerys, though I don't thing that's links physically the Targareyn to the Stark, but I have the intuition that Daenerys is replaying some part of the ancient Stark Story (before Winterfell), and perhaps in my schema, I had forgotten one feminine character. 

That's the fate, yesterday I was just re-reading Robert's death and I was stroken by this : 

Quote

"Ah, fuck you, Ned," the king said hoarsely. "I killed the bastard, didn't I?" A lock of matted black hair fell across his eyes as he glared up at Ned. "Ought to do the same for you. Can't leave a man to hunt in peace. Ser Robar found me. Gregor's head. Ugly thought. Never told the Hound. Let Cersei surprise him." His laugh turned into a grunt as a spasm of pain hit him. "Gods have mercy," he muttered, swallowing his agony. "The girl. Daenerys. Only a child, you were right … that's why, the girl … the gods sent the boar … sent to punish me …" The king coughed, bringing up blood. "Wrong, it was wrong, I … only a girl … Varys, Littlefinger, even my brother … worthless … no one to tell me no but you, Ned … only you …" (Eddard XIII AGOT

No horse here (except if there is a pun with "hoarsely"), but the reader knows the link between Dany and the horses, and with Lyanna too. Several times in this scene, Robert Says "the bastard" instead of "the boar" (remembering that Rabert has some bastards he don't care, and also that a cat is the "real king of the red Keep" and is called "the black bastard" by a guard) ; with "the girl" Dany became also anonym, as if the important "girl" was another one, the mother of another bastard, an ancient bastard (Robert ordered to kill Daenerys because she was pregnant). Ti finish, the "bastard" is served at the funeral feast, but I really wonder if real bastards in the past wouldn't be served at the table of a king, the king of Winter. In the schema of King RObert, I believed from several months that he was playing the part of a bear king, but I very very recently changed my mind about it to see RObert the hunter as a new king of Winter (and a wolf). That's another connection with the feast of the dead at the HOTU

 

So, to resume, I have the intuition of the horse as symbolizing the ancient mother of a black wolf bastard

(my computer is desperatly slow this morning, I can't stay no longer)

[Seams]

On 6/2/2017 at 2:02 AM, GloubieBoulga said:

The connection with horses is also strong with Daenerys, though I don't thing that's links physically the Targareyn to the Stark, but I have the intuition that Daenerys is replaying some part of the ancient Stark Story (before Winterfell), and perhaps in my schema, I had forgotten one feminine character. 

That's the fate, yesterday I was just re-reading Robert's death and I was stroken by this : 

Quote

"Ah, fuck you, Ned," the king said hoarsely. "I killed the bastard, didn't I?" A lock of matted black hair fell across his eyes as he glared up at Ned. "Ought to do the same for you. Can't leave a man to hunt in peace. Ser Robar found me. Gregor's head. Ugly thought. Never told the Hound. Let Cersei surprise him." His laugh turned into a grunt as a spasm of pain hit him. "Gods have mercy," he muttered, swallowing his agony. "The girl. Daenerys. Only a child, you were right … that's why, the girl … the gods sent the boar … sent to punish me …" The king coughed, bringing up blood. "Wrong, it was wrong, I … only a girl … Varys, Littlefinger, even my brother … worthless … no one to tell me no but you, Ned … only you …" (Eddard XIII AGOT)

No horse here (except if there is a pun with "hoarsely"), but the reader knows the link between Dany and the horses, . . .

So, to resume, I have the intuition of the horse as symbolizing the ancient mother of a black wolf bastard

Very interesting. I want to follow this horse symbolism but I think I can loop back to our direwolf focus.

It occurred to me recently that "The Stallion that Mounts the World" and "The Mountain that Rides" are opposites - the horse is on top of the land in the Dothraki legend, and the Mountain is on top of the horse in Gregor's nickname. So the reference to Gregor's head (great foreshadowing there) might be the horse reference in this passage, if we were looking for one. Robert mentions Ser Gregor in seeming acknowledgment that Ned has sent out a party of knights to stop Ser Gregor's raids in the Riverlands. Ned asked Ser Robar Royce to go out and inform King Robert about this decision, and Robert is acknowledging that the messenger reached him. Instead of sending an assassin to kill Dany and her baby (the Stallion that Mounts the World) Ned has sent out some knights to kill his opposite number, Ser Gregor, the Mountain that Rides. And King Robert seems to be saying that this is o.k. and the idea to kill the Stallion that Mounts the World was not right.

Ser Gregor is further connected to horses because he had cut the head off his horse after it was distracted by the horse ridden by Ser Loras in the Hand's tournament. It's interesting that it was the Hound who stopped Ser Gregor from killing Ser Loras and here we have the reference to Gregor's head followed by, "Never told the Hound." As if there were a new beheading by or of Ser Gregor, and the Hound would have stopped it if he had known about it. (Or how would you interpret those ambiguous sentence fragments from Robert?)

Of course, Ser Robar is relevant again because he participated in that same tournament and was defeated by Ser Loras.

The likely wordplay around Robar and Boar (and Robb and Robert) tells me that this is all part of the symbolism around the Boar's Head Festival, which takes place at the turning point of winter - the beginning of the return of the sun and of summer. So Robert dies, but a new summer king is being born. Who does Ser Robar choose to support in the War of the Five Kings? Renly. And Renly is a good fit for the summer king symbolism, with his green armor and his connection to Highgarden. Except Renly then dies with Ser Robar nearby. Catelyn immediately persuades Ser Robar that Brienne was not Renly's killer, and Ser Robar essentially sacrifices his life to help Brienne escape. Is Brienne the next new Summer King?

Later we see Robb Stark die, with similar Boar's Head Festival symbolism. Instead of the beheaded horse of Ser Gregor, or the boar being served at the funeral feast for the king, we have Robb himself beheaded along with his direwolf, Grey Wind. So the Winter King dies, and a new winter king is probably born.

Coincidentally, who is outside of The Twins and unable to stop the beheading of Robb Stark, if he were so inclined? The Hound.

Now I'm not sure I can loop back to the direwolves after all - maybe the quote I remembered is from the show only, not the book. I thought I remembered that there was a rumor that Robb Stark rode his direwolf into battle - part of the tall tales that grew around him after the defeat of Stafford Lannister at Oxcross. But we still have the pun on "dire" and "ride" to link the wolves to the riding symbolism. And the after-death beheading of Robb is like the after-death beheading of Ser Gregor (if our inferences about Qyburn are correct).

GRRM's storytelling is like the Maesters forging links for their chains or like a smith forging links for a suit of mail. The boar / death / riding symbolism may repeat again at the Wall when the wildling skinchanger Borroq shows up with his gigantic boar just before Jon is stabbed by his Night's Watch brothers. Jon had just beheaded Ser Janos Slynt so there is the beheading piece. All we need is a horse (or some kind of rider) and a Royce to complete the pattern.