Heresy 191 The Crows

[ravenous reader]

Just now, Black Crow said:

Oh very much so...

OK, so the question is why?  Why the metaphorical similarity of the Others to the trees -- and wolves?

[LynnS]

40 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

The use of the indefinite vs. definite article might be significant.

In line with the 'a' vs. 'the' crow, it's interesting when Bran first meets Bloodraven and asks his if he's the crow, Bloodraven answers with confusion '...a crow?  aye once...'  So he admits to being 'a crow' once as member of the Night's Watch, but not 'the crow'!

Yes, I'm not so certain anymore that BR is appearing to Bran as THE crow; but rather as a tree.  Bran tells Jojen at one point that he has three kinds of dreams; wolf dreams, crow dreams and tree dreams.

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"Do trees dream?"

"Trees? No . . ."

"They do," Bran said with sudden certainty. "They dream tree dreams. I dream of a tree sometimes. A weirwood, like the one in the godswood. It calls to me. The wolf dreams are better. I smell things, and sometimes I can taste the blood." CoK Bran I

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Jojen sat on Bran's bed. "Tell me what you dream."

He was scared, even then, but he had sworn to trust them, and a Stark of Winterfell keeps his sworn word. "There's different kinds," he said slowly. "There's the wolf dreams, those aren't so bad as the others. I run and hunt and kill squirrels. And there's dreams where the crow comes and tells me to fly. Sometimes the tree is in those dreams too, calling my name. That frightens me. But the worst dreams are when I fall." He looked down into the yard, feeling miserable. "I never used to fall before. When I climbed. I went everyplace, up on the roofs and along the walls, I used to feed the crows in the Burned Tower. Mother was afraid that I would fall but I knew I never would. Only I did, and now when I sleep I fall all the time." CoK Bran V

I think it's interesting that Bran sometimes experiences both the crow and the tree in the same dream together.  There is also the crow dream involving Ned's ghost and crypts:

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The mention of dreams reminded him. "I dreamed about the crow again last night. The one with three eyes. He flew into my bedchamber and told me to come with him, so I did. We went down to the crypts. Father was there, and we talked. He was sad."

"And why was that?" Luwin peered through his tube.

"It was something to do about Jon, I think." The dream had been deeply disturbing, more so than any of the other crow dreams. "Hodor won't go down into the crypts." GoT Bran VII

 

What follows is that Bran, Osha and Luwin go down to the crypts and find Rickon there who has had the same dream. 

Curiously. most of Jon's recurring dreams are located at Winterfell where he is looking for his father. 

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Jon Snow laughed with him. Afterward they sat on the frozen ground, huddled in their cloaks with Ghost between them. Jon told the story of how he and Robb had found the pups newborn in the late summer snows. It seemed a thousand years ago now. Before long he found himself talking of Winterfell.

"Sometimes I dream about it," he said. "I'm walking down this long empty hall. My voice echoes all around, but no one answers, so I walk faster, opening doors, shouting names. I don't even know who I'm looking for. Most nights it's my father, but sometimes it's Robb instead, or my little sister Arya, or my uncle." The thought of Benjen Stark saddened him; his uncle was still missing. The Old Bear had sent out rangers in search of him. Ser Jaremy Rykker had led two sweeps, and Quorin Halfhand had gone forth from the Shadow Tower, but they'd found nothing aside from a few blazes in the trees that his uncle had left to mark his way. In the stony highlands to the northwest, the marks stopped abruptly and all trace of Ben Stark vanished.

 

"Do you ever find anyone in your dream?" Sam asked.

 

Jon shook his head. "No one. The castle is always empty." He had never told anyone of the dream, and he did not understand why he was telling Sam now, yet somehow it felt good to talk of it. "Even the ravens are gone from the rookery, and the stables are full of bones. That always scares me. I start to run then, throwing open doors, climbing the tower three steps at a time, screaming for someone, for anyone. And then I find myself in front of the door to the crypts. It's black inside, and I can see the steps spiraling down. Somehow I know I have to go down there, but I don't want to. I'm afraid of what might be waiting for me. The old Kings of Winter are down there, sitting on their thrones with stone wolves at their feet and iron swords across their laps, but it's not them I'm afraid of. I scream that I'm not a Stark, that this isn't my place, but it's no good, I have to go anyway, so I start down, feeling the walls as I descend, with no torch to light the way. It gets darker and darker, until I want to scream." He stopped, frowning, embarrassed. "That's when I always wake."

The notion that Jon screams in his dreams and just before he wakes is mirrored in Bran's coma dream.  Just before Bran wakes; the crow screams.

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The crow opened its beak and cawed at him, a shrill scream of fear, and the grey mists shuddered and swirled around him and ripped away like a veil, and he saw that the crow was really a woman, a serving woman with long black hair, and he knew her from somewhere, from Winterfell, yes, that was it, he remembered her now, and then he realized that he was in Winterfell, in a bed high in some chilly tower room, and the black-haired woman dropped a basin of water to shatter on the floor and ran down the steps, shouting, "He's awake, he's awake, he's awake." GoT Bran III

 

[LynnS]

38 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

In this example, the advice 'the show is done...you had best run back' vs. 'hiding and sewing' is analogous to 'fly' vs. 'die' respectively.

I'm also reminded of Jon steadying Bran during Gared's execution and the coma dream has something of the same flavor.

[LynnS]

3 hours ago, Black Crow said:

And just an observation springing from the last...

 

Gared [indirectly] led Jon to Ghost, and some of us have speculated may have had an active role in bringing the unborn Ghost over or under the Wall to Winterfell

Jon and the rangers are led to the bodies of Othor and Jafer by Ghost - who Jon uncomfortably realises is uncannily like a weirwood - when they went beyond the Wall to that weirwood grove

This is a puzzle.  I personally lean towards Gared bringing the direwolf with him and killing her with the antler knife. If there were direwolves on the south side of the wall; Arya hasn't seen any in her wolf dreams.  It's a vast landscape though.  The real question is why the WW let Gared go; so that does fit with the notion that the wolf was sent with him.  Ghost seems to be BR's creature.  

[Black Crow]

2 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

OK, so the question is why?  Why the metaphorical similarity of the Others to the trees -- and wolves?

because they are all connected?

[ravenous reader]

On 11/24/2016 at 4:31 PM, Black Crow said:

because they are all connected?

Indeed, must be.  You are tantalizingly cryptic!  Care to elaborate how you envision that working?

On 11/24/2016 at 2:41 PM, LynnS said:

I'm not so certain anymore that BR is appearing to Bran as THE crow; but rather as a tree.  Bran tells Jojen at one point that he has three kinds of dreams; wolf dreams, crow dreams and tree dreams.

So you're assuming different 'avatars' for different dream agents?!

On 11/24/2016 at 2:41 PM, LynnS said:

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"Do trees dream?"

"Trees? No . . ."

"They do," Bran said with sudden certainty. "They dream tree dreams. I dream of a tree sometimes. A weirwood, like the one in the godswood. It calls to me. The wolf dreams are better. I smell things, and sometimes I can taste the blood." CoK Bran I

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Jojen sat on Bran's bed. "Tell me what you dream."

He was scared, even then, but he had sworn to trust them, and a Stark of Winterfell keeps his sworn word. "There's different kinds," he said slowly. "There's the wolf dreams, those aren't so bad as the others. I run and hunt and kill squirrels. And there's dreams where the crow comes and tells me to fly. Sometimes the tree is in those dreams too, calling my name. That frightens me. But the worst dreams are when I fall." He looked down into the yard, feeling miserable. "I never used to fall before. When I climbed. I went everyplace, up on the roofs and along the walls, I used to feed the crows in the Burned Tower. Mother was afraid that I would fall but I knew I never would. Only I did, and now when I sleep I fall all the time." CoK Bran V

I think it's interesting that Bran sometimes experiences both the crow and the tree in the same dream together.  There is also the crow dream involving Ned's ghost and crypts:

If the weirwood in question calling him in his dreams represents Bloodraven, then perhaps it's significant that Bran notes the tree is 'like the one in Winterfell', implying that it's not the same one.  In that case, perhaps that tree represents the one at Raventree Hall, the Blackwood weirwood which is frequently accompanied by ravens -- which would be fitting considering it's representative of Bloodraven's magical maternal lineage.  Perhaps that's also why the trees and the birds frequently go together in the dreams?

On the other hand, the fact that Bran fears the tree 'that frightens me' does not rule out the possibility that that tree might in fact be the one in Winterfell -- the heart tree which I consider Bran's tree and his destiny.  When Bran lived at Winterfell, he at first feared that tree even though it's destined to be his home in a very literal as well as figurative sense -- representative of how a child fears growing up ('kill the boy' etc.).

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A Game of Thrones - Bran II

Finally he got tired of the stick game and decided to go climbing. He hadn't been up to the broken tower for weeks with everything that had happened, and this might be his last chance.

He raced across the godswood, taking the long way around to avoid the pool where the heart tree grew. The heart tree had always frightened him; trees ought not have eyes, Bran thought, or leaves that looked like hands. His wolf came sprinting at his heels. "You stay here," he told him at the base of the sentinel tree near the armory wall. "Lie down. That's right. Now stay."

His fear is very mysterious and ironic, considering it's Bran himself -- his future, eternal self -- already looking out at him through those very same eyes -- his eyes.

Similarly -- bear with me, I have an intriguing thought coming up -- perhaps the fact Jon fears the crypts does not rule out the possibility of his destiny perhaps lying in wait for him there.  He could very well be the 'three-eyed crow,' since it seems very at home in the crypts!

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A Game of Thrones - Jon IV

"Do you ever find anyone in your dream?" Sam asked.

Jon shook his head. "No one. The castle is always empty." He had never told anyone of the dream, and he did not understand why he was telling Sam now, yet somehow it felt good to talk of it. "Even the ravens are gone from the rookery, and the stables are full of bones. That always scares me. I start to run then, throwing open doors, climbing the tower three steps at a time, screaming for someone, for anyone. And then I find myself in front of the door to the crypts. It's black inside, and I can see the steps spiraling down. Somehow I know I have to go down there, but I don't want to. I'm afraid of what might be waiting for me. The old Kings of Winter are down there, sitting on their thrones with stone wolves at their feet and iron swords across their laps, but it's not them I'm afraid of. I scream that I'm not a Stark, that this isn't my place, but it's no good, I have to go anyway, so I start down, feeling the walls as I descend, with no torch to light the way. It gets darker and darker, until I want to scream." He stopped, frowning, embarrassed. "That's when I always wake." His skin cold and clammy, shivering in the darkness of his cell. Ghost would leap up beside him, his warmth as comforting as daybreak. He would go back to sleep with his face pressed into the direwolf's shaggy white fur. "Do you dream of Horn Hill?" Jon asked.

Perhaps Jon, like Bran, is afraid of himself?

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A Game of Thrones - Bran VII

"I dreamed about the crow again last night. The one with three eyes. He flew into my bedchamber and told me to come with him, so I did. We went down to the crypts. Father was there, and we talked. He was sad."

"And why was that?" Luwin peered through his tube.

"It was something to do about Jon, I think." The dream had been deeply disturbing, more so than any of the other crow dreams. "Hodor won't go down into the crypts."

Assuming the three-eyed crow was in the crypts for the conversation with Ned, then the three-eyed crow knows something about Jon he himself doesn't know, because 'Jon Snow knows nothing' -- least of all about himself.  If the three-eyed crow is indeed Jon's future self, then it's similar to the weirwood making eye contact with Bran in the coma dream with a deep 'knowing' glance (although Jon doesn't actually visualize the crow, only sensing some nefarious presence waiting for him down there).

[Black Crow]

11 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

Indeed, must be.  You are tantalizingly cryptic!  Care to elaborate how you envision that working?

 

 

 

At a very basic level, what some of us were arguing long before the mummers stuck their oar in, was that the Children, the Old Gods, the weirwoods and the crows are all connected. Factor in GRRM's gnomic comment in the Barcelona interview about a connection between the children and the walkers and we then have the basis for speculation that the latter were created by the children to even up the odds in fighting men.

Whilst its possible that Craster's boys may still be doing the children's dirty work, its more likely we're looking at magic being a sword without a hilt and that they are out of control, an army of the damned out to regain what was once theirs.

[ravenous reader]

6 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

At a very basic level, what some of us were arguing long before the mummers stuck their oar in, was that the Children, the Old Gods, the weirwoods and the crows are all connected. Factor in GRRM's gnomic comment in the Barcelona interview about a connection between the children and the walkers and we then have the basis for speculation that the latter were created by the children to even up the odds in fighting men.

Whilst its possible that Craster's boys may still be doing the children's dirty work, its more likely we're looking at magic being a sword without a hilt and that they are out of control, an army of the damned out to regain what was once theirs.

Ah, that makes sense symbolically, just on the basis of the text, without considering the mummers' version.  Could you kindly provide me the link to 'GRRM's gnomic comment in Barcelona' to that extent; I'd be interested in that.  Thanks!

[LynnS]

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

So you're assuming different 'avatars' for different dream agents?!

Yes, The flying dreams with the crow may include a weirwood that would seem to be another entity altogether.  It's possible that the tree is WeirBran as we see him in the coma dream, who doesn't yet recognize himself or it could be Bloodraven.  The crow is the messenger or go between rather than the tree itself. There is also this dream of Jon's:

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"Drink this." Grenn held a cup to his lips. Jon drank. His head was full of wolves and eagles, the sound of his brothers' laughter. The faces above him began to blur and fade. They can't be dead. Theon would never do that. And Winterfell . . . grey granite, oak and iron, crows wheeling around the towers, steam rising off the hot pools in the godswood, the stone kings sitting on their thrones . . . how could Winterfell be gone?

When the dreams took him, he found himself back home once more, splashing in the hot pools beneath a huge white weirwood that had his father's face. Ygritte was with him, laughing at him, shedding her skins till she was naked as her name day, trying to kiss him, but he couldn't, not with his father watching. He was the blood of Winterfell, a man of the Night's Watch. I will not father a bastard, he told her. I will not. I will not. "You know nothing, Jon Snow," she whispered, her skin dissolving in the hot water, the flesh beneath sloughing off her bones until only skull and skeleton remained, and the pool bubbled thick and red. SoS Jon VI .

This puts me in mind of Ned's ghostly return and Rickon's insistance that his father is home.   I suspect that Jon was present when Bran dreamed of his father in the crypts.  Whatever was learned about Jon was more disturbing than any other dream so far and doesn't elaborate or doesn't remember.  His memory of Jaimie pushing him off the tower is also repressed.  The crow tells him to put it away, he doesn't need it now. I suspect the same with Jon and this is why 'he knows nothing".  He knows 'something'.  Bran also hears his father's voice in the coma dream.  If the crow is taking Bran to his father in the crypt; it seems more likely to me that this would be Jon than Bloodraven. 

     

[LynnS]

On 2016-11-24 at 1:41 PM, Black Crow said:

Well its possible of course but as time and our understanding goes on I'm increasingly looking to more straightforward explanations. GRRM appears irritated by attempts to elevate the significance of the Nights KIng as a man which is why I'm tending more to look at him not as an important figure in himself but rather as a symbol of the passing of the old order and the ascendency of the Seven over the Old Gods; the rest being legendary embellishments. And ultimately too I think that will be the significance of that duplicated passage about the lords commander of the Watch and the hint that there's something wrong with the list.

I have trouble with the notion that the Watch was sacrificing children to the old gods or that the Wildlings did the same.  Given the infant mortality rate and the hardships of living beyond the Wall.  I don't even see the Watch having any animosity towards the free folk until the Andals came.  So far the only sacrifice we have seen was of an adult and the trees don't appear to have the faces of children.  The World Book even says that the NW traded with the CotF and that brings to mind Craster's Keep which may well have served as a trading outpost at one time for the Watch.   The rise of the Night's King may have been a response to the Andal threat; the sacrificing of his children, 'the 'prentice' boys something along the lines of the narrative we are getting with the Stark kids.  Not the norm but a response to a threat.         

[Black Crow]

10 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

Ah, that makes sense symbolically, just on the basis of the text, without considering the mummers' version.  Could you kindly provide me the link to 'GRRM's gnomic comment in Barcelona' to that extent; I'd be interested in that.  Thanks!

http://www.westeros....w_in_Barcelona/

 

Is there a closer relationship between the children of the forest and the Others than there might seem to be?
Possibly, possibly. It's a topic that will be developing as the story continues, and so I can't say much more right now.

 

 

[Black Crow]

1 hour ago, LynnS said:

I have trouble with the notion that the Watch was sacrificing children to the old gods or that the Wildlings did the same.  Given the infant mortality rate and the hardships of living beyond the Wall.  I don't even see the Watch having any animosity towards the free folk until the Andals came.  So far the only sacrifice we have seen was of an adult and the trees don't appear to have the faces of children.  The World Book even says that the NW traded with the CotF and that brings to mind Craster's Keep which may well have served as a trading outpost at one time for the Watch.   The rise of the Night's King may have been a response to the Andal threat; the sacrificing of his children, 'the 'prentice' boys something along the lines of the narrative we are getting with the Stark kids.  Not the norm but a response to a threat.         

Its not necessarily the case that the Nights King or the Watch were sacrificing [human] children at all; I'm suggesting its just a "blackening"  of reputations.

We know, from various bits of text that back in the day the Watch and the [inhuman] children were on friendly terms. Now they're quite literally not speaking. I'm suggesting that the answer to this particular mystery is the overthrow of the Nights King.

[LynnS]

6 hours ago, Black Crow said:

Its not necessarily the case that the Nights King or the Watch were sacrificing [human] children at all; I'm suggesting its just a "blackening"  of reputations.

We know, from various bits of text that back in the day the Watch and the [inhuman] children were on friendly terms. Now they're quite literally not speaking. I'm suggesting that the answer to this particular mystery is the overthrow of the Nights King.

I agree.  Going back to something I've wondered about.... In Jon's confrontation with Othor; Jon repeats the word eyes and I've come across another instance with Sam doing the same thing:

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The hooded man lifted his pale moon face, and Jon slashed at it without hesitation. The sword laid the intruder open to the bone, taking off half his nose and opening a gash cheek to cheek under those eyes, eyes, eyes like blue stars burning. Jon knew that face. Othor, he thought, reeling back. Gods, he's dead, he's dead, I saw him dead.

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"Jon would never. Lord Snow did. Sometimes there is no happy choice, Sam, only one less grievous than the others."

No happy choice. Sam thought of all the trials that he and Gilly suffered, Craster's Keep and the death of the Old Bear, snow and ice and freezing winds, days and days and days of walking, the wights at Whitetree, Coldhands and the tree of ravens, the Wall, the Wall, the Wall, the Black Gate beneath the earth. What had it all been for? No happy choices and no happy endings.

This puts me in mind of Mormont's raven repeating and emphasizing specific words.  But why Jon and Sam?  They both spend time around Mormont's raven and they took their vows together and said their words to the old gods.  They sound like ravens or crows.

 

[LynnS]

It's curious that in Sam's inner dialogue, he thinks nothing of Bran and his companions.  What fills that space is The Wall, The Wall, The Wall.  I think it's worth noting that Sam took three oaths of silence; repeated to Coldhands, Jojen and Bran.  So perhaps the oath is represented by the Wall.  What could this mean for Jon?  Eyes, eyes, eyes or three eyes?

[LynnS]

As I was mulling this over; I recalled Melisandre saying that since coming to the Wall, her every word and gesture had more power.  Recall the word she spoke that echoed around the corners of the room; turning like a worm in the ear; a word that Jon and Mance both heard differently.  She also tells Jon that the wall has power; if only he'd use it.

I think in Sam's case saying the oath to three green men at the black gate has the power to silence him and even block the very thought of Bran and company.  I wonder how this is significant with Jon.  He knows nothing or he's not supposed to remember what he knows.  That's almost like an incantation as well.  Remember Jon, you know nothing; he can't remember what he has 'seen' with his 3rd eye at this point.  It's not even opened yet.  The terrible knowledge!

Hodor!

[Pain killer Jane]

 

On 11/23/2016 at 7:04 AM, LynnS said:

Mormont tells Jon that although men will call his brother Robb, a King; they will call him a 'crow'.   If the Watch is now made up of thieves, rapists and bastards; is this why Old Nan says that all crows are liars?   The wildlings designate all the men of the Night's Watch as crows.  Was it the Night's Watch who were the intermediaries between the CotF and Men?

 

On 11/23/2016 at 1:31 PM, LynnS said:

On 11/23/2016 at 1:06 PM, ravenous reader said:

P.S. @LynnS you might be interested in this idea by @Pain killer Jane regarding what she cleverly terms 'scared crow' vs.' scarecrow' symbolism

Thank you!  I'm always interested in what Pain Killer Jane has to say.

Hi @ravenous reader and @LynnS!!! Sorry I have been absent on the forums, personal life is in a bit of transition. I will give a bit of context on the scared crow and scarecrow. 

Scarecrows are symbols of protection, fear, sacrifice and punishment. The most prominent association of the scarecrow is the crucified savior as a criminal i.e. Jon being told he is a crow and will forever be associated with the criminality of his brothers. Remember that Jesus was executed as a criminal alongside two other people who were thieves and would have been viewed as a criminal. Another crucified savior will probably be Aegon VI but I will explain that later. 

Now the next association is a bit abstract because it ties Jesus, Odin, and scarecrows together through imagery. Jesus' actual death occurred when Longinus, a blind centurion, pierced him with a spear through the heart. (Lightbringer being forged from the pierced heart of NissaNissa) Odin hung himself on Yggdrasil and pierced himself with spear in order to learn the magic of runes. Both of these images are men on poles and therefore are scarecrows. (By the way, Calvary Hill/Golgotha was identified by Queen Helena, the mother of Constantine I, on the site of a temple of Aphrodite. If you consider Aphrodite as Venus -the morning/evening star - Aphrodite as the goddess born from the semen contained in the genitalia of a sacrificed rain/sky god. This is where @LmL's research on the creation of Lightbringer links with his Weirwood Compendium and why the fandom is more partial to accepting Lightbringer as people or dragons. Golgotha also links that imagery of severed heads as the name literally means the place of the skull. The skull in question according to different traditions is either the crushed skull of the snake that seduced Eve or the skull of Adam.) 

So these men-on-poles images is a symbol of protection and fear (using the cross to combat all sorts of evil things) which is the purpose of the scarecrow. And we have a ton of images of that. The most prominent of these for me are the slave children on the road to Meereen. These children were sacrificed to place fear in the slaves of Meereen and therefore bestow protection and power on the Masters. (The sacrifice of children and the power it bestows on people is another aspect but I don't want to go on a tangent.)

Now these men-on-poles being used as protection is the basis of @sweetsunray's bear essays and the bear hunting ritual. This also why so many people are identified as bears because they are also scarecrows. There is also another animal that is seen on poles and that is the cloth dragon or as we identify it as being representative of Aegon VI. So for me the cloth dragon isn't just a faux dragon, it is symbolic of a crucified scarecrow savior and yes in this context would mean the crucifixion of a faux savior. But I don't think it will have the same effect for the faceless masses as it will for us the readers. 

So this protection and fear can also be deconstructed into the aspect of using the dead bodies of humans to instill fear in people and provide protection for other people. Basically using a virus to boost immunity against the same virus. This is a concept @LmL explained in his Tyrion Targaryen episode with the examination of the gargoyles which are dragons or demons turned into stone and are now used to provide protection from their own brethren. This is expressed in the Others being called Craster's sons or the boy's brothers ("I am become a Stranger unto my brethren, and an alien unto my mother's children" Psalms 69:8); Old Nan saying that wildling women laying with Others and producing half-human children; and the Night's King possibly being a Brandon Stark. That last one is very in line with the symbolism of using something to protect from itself i.e. Jon being a crucified scarecrow savior being at the wall to protect from people that are potentially related to him. Bran also falls into this category. 

So now you are thinking where does the scared crow fit in. This is embodied by Sam Tarly who is both a scared crow (a brother of the night's watch) and craven raven (him becoming a maester). This symbolism links maesters with scarecrows in the sense that they sacrifice for knowledge which is what Odin did when he hung himself on Yggdrasil and pierced himself with a spear and the Grey King and his burning bush allusions. Therefore the maesters are the representation of the Scottish Gaelic name for scarecrows being translated as "Old Man in the Rookery" (the Isle of Ravens). I suggested in another thread that this name and its link to the Rook, the chess piece, and the massive amounts of towers and the fact that the Hightowers are symbolized by a tower with a signal fire is not a coincidence. Especially in the light of the knowledge that GRRM could be considered a chess master. Anyway, @ravenous reader found lots on the rook, the best i the knowledge of the rook being depicted as having horns and thus it would be horned rook. So this links scarecrows to stag men and their fertility powers and they were also sacrificed for this power. 

Sam is also linked to gargoyles in the scene where Maester Cressen stands between the wyvern and hellhound. And this also links Sam to Qyburn because The Mountain was also described as a hellhound, now I just need to find who the wyvern is in the trio. (I would be tempted to say Cersei and that would lend abstract credence to the theory that Cersei and Jaime are Aerys' children, as a wyvern is a dragon but not a dragon, but I am skeptical of that. Personally I think it would be poetic justice if Cersei, Jaime nor Tyrion were not of Tywin's seed. But I digress.) 

Also we need to say that scarecrows are also straw knights (the scarecrow brothers made on the wall, the straw knight Tommen fights, the snowmen on the battlements on Winterfell). And they also should be considered shadows as well because it is the scarecrow's shadow that casts protection. Therefore we can link, the Nights' Watch to The Others (snowmen-white shadow scarecrows) to Kingsguard (white shadows) to Maesters (knights of the mind) to the Order of the Greenmen (stagmen knights).

Edit: Scarecrows are also burning effigies so we get the burning stag man or someone like Guy Fawkes (Fox) which is why you have a descendant of Florys the Fox (Selyse) married to a Burning Stag man (Stannis). @ravenous reader i figured out why there is this obsession with burning ears or cutting ears off. It has to do with DNA and personal identification. Ears like fingers and eyes due to their shape can be used to identify people and also identify paternity. 

There is more like the links between scarecrows and fools and bards but that is a separate theory altogether. So I will leave you with this 

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Outside a holdfast called Briarwhite, some fieldhands surrounded them in a cornfield, demanding coin for the ears they'd taken. Yoren eyed their scythes and tossed them a few coppers. "Time was, a man in black was feasted from Dorne to Winterfell, and even high lords called it an honor to shelter him under their roofs," he said bitterly. "Now cravens like you want hard coin for a bite of wormy apple." He spat.

"It's sweetcorn, better'n a stinking old black bird like you deserves," one of them answered roughly. "You get out of our field now, and take these sneaks and stabbers with you, or we'll stake you up in the corn to scare the other crows away."

Arya III, aCoK

And you need to remember that Yoren is thought of as a bear by Arya. 

Edit: Take a look at the Emerald City trailer to see that the scarecrow has become a man crucified with covered in tar and hay. This feeds into my belief that GRRM is making allusion to The Wizard of Oz novels among others through this concept of scarecrows with the Scarecrow and the little known character of Jack Pumpkinhead. He also is alluding to Dany being Dorothy. 

[Black Crow]

19 hours ago, LynnS said:

I agree.  Going back to something I've wondered about.... In Jon's confrontation with Othor; Jon repeats the word eyes and I've come across another instance with Sam doing the same thing:

This puts me in mind of Mormont's raven repeating and emphasizing specific words.  But why Jon and Sam?  They both spend time around Mormont's raven and they took their vows together and said their words to the old gods.  They sound like ravens or crows.

 

Sorry for the delay in responding, but I'd no internet last night 

Its an interesting idea, but I've re-read the confrontation with Othor [not got around to Sam yet] and I'm not convinced it isn't just a typo. Its written by GRRM - obviously - but neither said by Jon nor thought by him as indicated a couple of lines later in italics. I think there's an extraneous eyes and that the passage should probably read "those eyes, eyes like blue stars burning."

[Black Crow]

3 hours ago, Pain killer Jane said:

 

 

Hi @ravenous reader and @LynnS!!! Sorry I have been absent on the forums, personal life is in a bit of transition. I will give a bit of context on the scared crow and scarecrow. 

 

Oh I do like this, whether or not GRRM is really paralleling so deeply, this is good. 

[LynnS]

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Outside a holdfast called Briarwhite, some fieldhands surrounded them in a cornfield, demanding coin for the ears they'd taken. Yoren eyed their scythes and tossed them a few coppers. "Time was, a man in black was feasted from Dorne to Winterfell, and even high lords called it an honor to shelter him under their roofs," he said bitterly. "Now cravens like you want hard coin for a bite of wormy apple." He spat.

"It's sweetcorn, better'n a stinking old black bird like you deserves," one of them answered roughly. "You get out of our field now, and take these sneaks and stabbers with you, or we'll stake you up in the corn to scare the other crows away."

Arya III, aCoK

And you need to remember that Yoren is thought of as a bear by Arya. 

Thank you Sweetsunray!  This is splendid.  Puts me in mind of Mormont's Raven as well constantly asking for corn, corn, corn.... And Mormont, the Old Bear.  The two are inseparable until Jon takes over and becomes the next scarecrow with a raven perched on his shoulder.  The crown of blue roses with it's hidden thorns seems also to allude to Jon; not to mention his nemesis Alliser Thorne and the mockery he heaps on Jon Snow.  This is a reference to the crown of thorns as well.

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Sorry for the delay in responding, but I'd no internet last night 

Its an interesting idea, but I've re-read the confrontation with Othor [not got around to Sam yet] and I'm not convinced it isn't just a typo. Its written by GRRM - obviously - but neither said by Jon nor thought by him as indicated a couple of lines later in italics. I think there's an extraneous eyes and that the passage should probably read "those eyes, eyes like blue stars burning."

i don't think it's a mistake.  I think it's a deliberate choice, like up stutter.  Reek and Patchface also repeat words in jingles and rhymes. Melisandre says that her every word and gesture has more power at the Wall. She also said that she dreamed of Jon at one point and tells him that the wall has power, if only he would use it.   Note this passage where she refers to Jon as 'the' Crow:

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Melisandre touched the ruby at her neck and spoke a word.

The sound echoed queerly from the corners of the room and twisted like a worm inside their ears. The wildling heard one word, the crow another. Neither was the word that left her lips. The ruby on the wildling's wrist darkened, and the wisps of light and shadow around him writhed and faded.

The bones remained—the rattling ribs, the claws and teeth along his arms and shoulders, the great yellowed collarbone across his shoulders. The broken giant's skull remained a broken giant's skull, yellowed and cracked, grinning its stained and savage grin.

And Patchface also refers to Jon as 'the crow' rather than 'a crow'.  This is very specific.

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They found Her Grace sewing by the fire, whilst her fool danced about to music only he could hear, the cowbells on his antlers clanging. "The crow, the crow," Patchface cried when he saw Jon. "Under the sea the crows are white as snow, I know, I know, oh, oh, oh." Princess Shireen was curled up in a window seat, her hood drawn up to hide the worst of the greyscale that had disfigured her face.

 

 

[LynnS]

It would seem that BR is the 3EC looking at Bran's POV in DwD.  He was 'a crow', a brother of the Night' Watch and he is a greenseer requiring the third eye; but Jon is also now a 3EC and like Bran hasn't yet realized his full potential.  The passing of the old guard to the new.  It's curious that Bran first asks Sam if he's the 3EC, then he's picked up by Coldhands another brother of the NW and taken to BR, yet another brother of the NW. If Melisandre had identified BR as the man limned in flame;  I'd go with it.  But she identifies Jon.  This harkens back to MMD ritual where she wakes powers old and dark:  the great wolf and the man limned in flame.  Dany and Melisandre see the same vision; but Dany doesn't know Jon, while Melisandre recognizes him.

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No, Dany wanted to say, no, not that, you mustn't, but when she opened her mouth, a long wail of pain escaped, and the sweat broke over her skin. What was wrong with them, couldn't they see? Inside the tent the shapes were dancing, circling the brazier and the bloody bath, dark against the sandsilk, and some did not look human. She glimpsed the shadow of a great wolf, and another like a man wreathed in flames.

 

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The flames crackled softly, and in their crackling she heard the whispered name Jon Snow. His long face floated before her, limned in tongues of red and orange, appearing and disappearing again, a shadow half-seen behind a fluttering curtain. Now he was a man, now a wolf, now a man again. But the skulls were here as well, the skulls were all around him. Melisandre had seen his danger before, had tried to warn the boy of it. Enemies all around him, daggers in the dark. He would not listen.

This isn't to say that Jon is transformed by fire (he may be at some point); only that viewing someone through a fire gives them the appearance of being wreathed or limned in flame.

Bloodraven may have watched Bran all his life; but he is more tree now than man and suspect that he shows up in Bran's dreams as the weirwood tree who calls to him rather than the crow.  He can't go to Bran so he needs the 3EC to intercede as well as Jojen, Sam and Coldhands. I suppose we won't find out until we see how the story develops but I wouldn't rule Jon out as the 3EC.