Skinchanger Zombies: Jon, the Last Hero, and Coldhands

[LmL]

9 minutes ago, Blue Tiger said:

He tries to stabb Rhaenyra (moon maiden and Amethyst Empress - her sigil has the Arryn moon and eagle, Targaryen dragon and Velaryon seahorse), but he catches fire... I don't get it - who is who here...

He is the comet, colliding with the fire moon, catching fire (remember I speculate the comet was white and blue at first like a normal comet but was turned red when the other half collided with the fire moon). He catches fire and quickly leaps away, showing is the part of the comet that flew on through the moon fire and came out red. Basically you nailed it when you equated brooms with swords. They are part of the larger "wooden sword" motif which I believe applies to Dawn and having some sort of weirwood connection (making it a wooden sword). Starks play with wooden swords, like, all the time. LB was white hot and smoking when it went in, and red when it came out, and I have suggested that perhaps LB started out as a white sword, or at least what created in imitation of the previously existing white swords of pale fire which belonged to the GEOTD. 

As for the other meanings of bran - a fiery sword, egads - nice work. Again I say this lines up with Bran himself as the lightning bolt, the moon meteor. He is the sword. Og course, Martin is constantly linking people and their swords, people and their animals, people and their shadows. It's all the same to him. 

Well, it seems like i really need to do a Bran-centric episode, and when I do, I'll obviously have to sue this stuff and give you lots of credit.  Cheers!

[Lord Fauntleroy]

1 hour ago, LmL said:

Well, it seems like i really need to do a Bran-centric episode

Just breaking my silent reading/  listening to beg for this please

[ravenous reader]

27 minutes ago, Lord Fauntleroy said:

Just breaking my silent reading/  listening to beg for this please

LOL. @evita mgfs gave us multiple 'Bran-centric episodes' countless moons ago -- if anyone would bother to read her brilliant and pioneering thoughts!

[cgrav]

2 hours ago, Blue Tiger said:

It's stunning how many things Bran's name means 

 

There's one you left out, and it goes right to the "heart" of Bran's role in the story: the Branstokkr.

In the olde Norse tradition, ash trees were grown in the middle of noble courts, sort of shrines to Yggdrasil. Those trees were called branstokkr, and they are the real world counterpart to GRRM's heart trees.

In one Norse myth, Odin sticks a magical sword in a branstokk, which can only be removed by Sigmund. Later, Sigmund's son Sigurd re-forges that sword to slay the dragon Fafnir. You can guess how many forging attempts were required. 

[ravenous reader]

1 minute ago, cgrav said:

There's one you left out, and it goes right to the "heart" of Bran's role in the story: the Branstokkr.

In the olde Norse tradition, ash trees were grown in the middle of noble courts, sort of shrines to Yggdrasil. Those trees were called branstokkr, and they are the real world counterpart to GRRM's heart trees.

And let me guess -- they get burnt in a life-saving, cleansing ritual, right?

[Bluetiger]

3 minutes ago, cgrav said:

There's one you left out, and it goes right to the "heart" of Bran's role in the story: the Branstokkr.

In the olde Norse tradition, ash trees were grown in the middle of noble courts, sort of shrines to Yggdrasil. Those trees were called branstokkr, and they are the real world counterpart to GRRM's heart trees.

I assumed that in Old Norse 'bran' means something similar as in Old English, as the words gave similar roots. I fell victim to my own methods, and confidence in my Norse Mythology knowledge There is still so much I don't know... thanks for noticing this as I didn't even know about that custom.

[Bluetiger]

There is 'brand' as well: 

To quote Wiktionary:

Quote

From Middle English brand, from Old Englishbrand ‎(“fire; flame; burning; torch; sword”), from Proto-Germanic *brandaz ‎(“flame; flaming; fire-brand; torch; sword”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰrenu- ‎(“to bubble forth; brew; spew forth; burn”). Cognate with Scots brand, West Frisian brân ‎(“fire”), Dutch brand, German Brand, Swedish brand ‎(“blaze, fire”), Icelandic brandur, French brand (< Germanic)

 

[Bluetiger]

15 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

And let me guess -- they get burnt in a life-saving, cleansing ritual, right?

I found this

Quote

Volsungasaga – probably the most important saga of the Fornaldar Sagas, or epic poems. Fornaldar Sagas means “sagas of old times” and the word saga is from the Icelandic “what is said” or “what is told”. The citation refers to an episode in which the God Odin comes in disguise to a wedding feast and thrusts a sword into the branstokkr (a tree which forms part of the structure of the timber hall), claiming that the warrior who can remove it will never fail while he wields it in battle.

And from Wikipedia: Branstokkr

Spoiler tag for lenght.

 In Norse mythology, Barnstokkr (Old Norse, literally "child-trunk") is a tree that stands in the center of King Völsung's hall. Barnstokkr is attested in chapters 2 and 3 of the Völsunga saga, written in the 13th century from earlier tradition, partially based on events from the 5th century and the 6th century, where, during a banquet, a one-eyed stranger appears and thrusts a sword into the tree which only Sigmund is able to pull free. Scholarly theories have been put forth about the implications of Barnstokkr and its relation to other trees in Germanic paganism.

Barnstokkr is introduced in chapter 2 ofVölsunga saga where King Völsung is described as having "had an excellent palace built in this fashion: a huge tree stood with its trunk in the hall and its branches, with fair blossoms, stretched out through the roof. They called the tree Barnstokk[r]".

In chapter 3, King Völsung is holding a marriage feast for his daughter Signy and King Siggeir at King Völsung's hall. At the hall, large fires are kindled in long hearths running the length of the hall, while in the middle of the hall stands the great tree Barnstokkr. That evening, while those attending the feast are sitting by the flaming hearths, they are visited by a one-eyed, very tall man whom they do not recognize. The stranger is wearing a hooded, mottled cape, linen breeches tied around his legs, and is barefooted. Sword in hand, the man walks towards Barnstokkr and his hood hangs low over his head, gray with age. The man brandishes the sword and thrusts it into the trunk of the tree, and the blade sinks to its hilt. Words of welcome fail the crowd.

The tall stranger says that he who draws the sword from the trunk shall receive it as a gift, and he who is able to pull free the sword shall never carry a better sword than it. The old man leaves the hall, and nobody knows who he was, or where he went. Everyone stands, trying their hand at pulling free the sword from the trunk of Barnstokkr. The noblest attempt to pull free the sword first followed by those ranked after them. Sigmund, son of King Völsung, takes his turn, and—as if the sword had lay loose for him—he draws it from the trunk. The saga then continues.

Hilda Ellis Davidson draws links to the sword placed in Barnstokkr to marriage oaths performed with a sword in pre-Christian Germanic societies, noting a potential connection between the carrying of the sword by a young man before the bride at a wedding as a phallic symbol, indicating an association with fertility. Davidson cites records of wedding ceremonies and games in rural districts in Sweden involving trees or "stocks" as late as the 17th century, and cites a custom in Norway "surviving into recent times" for "the bridegroom to plunge his sword into the roof beam, to test the 'luck' of the marriage by the depth of the scar he made".

Davidson points out a potential connection between the descriptor apaldr (Old Norse "apple tree") and the birth of King Völsung, which is described earlier in the Völsunga saga as having occurred after Völsung's father Rerir sits atop a burial mound and prays for a son, after which the goddess Frigghas an apple sent to Rerir. Rerir shares the apple with his wife, resulting in his wife's long pregnancy. Davidson states that this mound is presumably the family burial mound, and proposes a link between the tree, fruit, mound, and the birth of a child.

Davidson opines that Siggeir's anger at his inability to gain the sword that Odin has plunged into Barnstokkr at first sight appears excessive, and states that there may be an underlying reason for Siggeir's passionate desire for the sword. Davidson notes that the gift of the sword was made at a wedding feast, and states that Barnstokkr likely represents the 'guardian tree', "such as those that used to stand beside many a house in Sweden and Denmark, and which was associated with the 'luck' of the family", and that the 'guardian tree' also had a connection with the birth of children. Davidson cites Jan de Vries in that the name barnstokkr "used in this story was the name given to the trunk of such a tree because it used to be invoked and even clasped by the women of the family at the time of childbirth."

Providing examples of historical structures built around trees, or with 'guardian trees' around or in the structure in Germanic areas, Davidson states that the "'luck' of a family must largely depend on the successful bearing and rearing of sons, and there is a general belief that when a guardian tree is destroyed, the family will die out." In connection with this, Davidson theorizes that at the bridal feast, it should have been Siggeir, the bridegroom, who drew the sword from the tree, "and that its possession would symbolize the 'luck' which would come to him with his bride, and the successful continuation of his own line in the sons to be born of the marriage". The sword having been refused to him, Davidson theorizes that this may well have been intended as a deadly insult, and that this lends a tragic air to the scene in the hall.

Jesse Byock (1990) states that the nameBarnstokkr may not conceivably be the original name of the tree, and instead that it is possible that it may have originally beenbran(d)stokkr, the first part of the compound potentially having been brandr, (meaningbrand or firebrand), a word sometimes synonymous with "hearth", and pointing to a potential connection to the fire burning within the hall. Byock notes that the tree is called aneik (Old Norse "oak"), which has an unclear meaning as the Icelanders often employed the word as a general word for "tree", and the tree is also referred to as apaldr, which is also a general term used to refer to trees. Byock theorizes that the latter reference to an apple tree may imply a further symbolic meaning pointing to the apple tree of the goddessIðunn, and that the Barnstokkr may be further identified with the world tree Yggdrasil.

Andy Orchard (1997) states that the role and placement of Barnstokkr as a "mighty tree, supporting and sprouting through the roof of Völsung's hall" has clear parallels in Norse mythology with the world tree Yggdrasil, particularly in relation to Yggdrasil's position to the hall of Valhalla. Orchard further points out parallels between Sigurd's ability to solely remove the sword from the trunk and King Arthur's drawing of the sword Excalibur.

In Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungenopera cycle, the tree appears as Barnstock, when the hero Siegmund, with a great tug, pulls from it a sword that he names Nothung. The tree however is in the house of Hunding, who takes the place of Siggeir as husband ofSieglinde and enemy of Siegmund.Barnstokkr has been theorized as English author and philologist J. R. R. Tolkien's immediate source for a scene in his 1954 work The Lord of the Rings depicting the fictional character of Frodo Baggins and his acceptance of the weapon Sting after it has been thrust "deep into a wooden beam".Some of the structures described in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings have been described as "recalling" the position and placement of Barnstokkr in Völsunga saga, which Tolkien was well familiar with.

 

[ravenous reader]

On 12/27/2016 at 5:22 AM, Black Crow said:

"You know nothing, Jon Snow. This wall is made o' blood"

Its a thing of evil, to which the only possible riposte must be Janet Clouston:

"Blood built it.

"Blood stopped the building of it.

"Blood will bring it down."

The same blood that built it -- i.e. of Brandon the Builder descended by way of the Bloody Blade -- will bring it down.  I call it 'catching the karmic boomerang you can't refuse'!

[cgrav]

31 minutes ago, Blue Tiger said:

I assumed that in Old Norse 'bran' means something similar as in Old English, as the words gave similar roots. I fell victim to my own methods, and confidence in my Norse Mythology knowledge There is still so much I don't know... thanks for noticing this as I didn't even know about that custom.

The tricky thing is that it's interchangeable with barnstokkr, which may be more common, but it's not unusual in language for consonants to switch sides of the vowel.

Also of note is that Odin also breaks Sigurd's sword during battle, hence why it must later be forged anew.

In terms of Ice and Fire symbolism, I think it's very telling that Bran occupies the role of Odin, who is the source of the magical sword. Corroborating LmL, the story of Sigurd and Sigmund establishes Bran as the wielder of of the Lightbringer comet, who both sends it and destroys it.

[cgrav]

To reach back to the Garth/Weir thing - did anyone else notice that Davos's jailer at White Harbor is named Garth? 

Probably already pointed out, but I've yet to read back all the pages that accrued over my vacation.

[Bluetiger]

1 minute ago, cgrav said:

The tricky thing is that it's interchangeable with barnstokkr, which may be more common, but it's not unusual in language for consonants to switch sides of the vowel.

Also of note is that Odin also breaks Sigurd's sword during battle, hence why it must later be forged anew.

In terms of Ice and Fire symbolism, I think it's very telling that Bran occupies the role of Odin, who is the source of the magical sword. Corroborating LmL, the story of Sigurd and Sigfried establishes Bran as the wielder of of the Lightbringer comet, who both sends it and destroys it.

I've noticed that Bran is anagram of barn while researching meanings of 'bran' , but I didn't consider it to be important.

But now I wonder if burning brans = burning Bran.

Quote

"You take her!" she yelled. "You get her out! You do it!" The fire beat at her back with hot red wings as she fled the burning barn. It felt blessedly cool outside, but men were dying all around her. She saw Koss throw down his blade to yield, and she saw them kill him where he stood. Smoke was everywhere. There was no sign of Yoren, but the axe was where Gendry had left it, by the woodpile outside the haven. As she wrenched it free, a mailed hand grabbed her arm. Spinning, Arya drove the head of the axe hard between his legs. She never saw his face, only the dark blood seeping between the links of his hauberk. Going back into that barn was the hardest thing she ever did. Smoke was pouring out the open door like a writhing black snake, and she could hear the screams of the poor animals inside, donkeys and horses and men. She chewed her lip, and darted through the doors, crouched low where the smoke wasn't quite so thick.

 

Quote

Someone's there. Arya chewed her lip. All the other places they'd come upon had been empty and desolate. Farms, villages, castles, septs, barns, it made no matter. If it could burn, the Lannisters had burned it; if it could die, they'd killed it. They had even set the woods ablaze where they could, though the leaves were still green and wet from recent rains, and the fires had not spread. "They would have burned the lake if they could have," Gendry had said, and Arya knew he was right. On the night of their escape, the flames of the burning town had shimmered so brightly on the water that it had seemed that the lake was afire.

Quote

Even in the burning barn, with walls of flame towering all around and him in chains, he had not seemed so distraught as he did now. "A girl . . . she makes a jest."

I think I understand why Ned thinks that Bran might become a High Septon in GOT - it's a reference to Pope Gregory VII - the one famous because of Emperor Henry IV's Walk to Canossa. His real name was Hildebrand = battle + sword. So it seems GRRM knows this history and at least is familar with brand = sword.

Btw, Varamyr's mentor Haggon might be based on Hagen from German legends

 

[ravenous reader]

10 hours ago, Blue Tiger said:

Do you think that apart from being The Wicker Man, The Fisher King and Bran the Blessed, Bran might be the Corn King as well?

Yes, all of the above.  I think Bran is the main character, the main hero and GRRM's most secret alter ego -- his 'inner child'. He's also the first and will probably be the last, or penultimate, POV.  

This is 'Bran':

Quote

One of the more dominant themes in Game of Thrones is family. It's what gives the characters purpose, but it also ruins them. What was your own sense of family and home like? 
I was born in 1948, and raised in Bayonne, New Jersey, which is a peninsula just south of Jersey City. By bus, it was 45 minutes to the heart of Manhattan, but Bayonne really was a world in and of itself. New York was very close, but we didn't go there very often. From the age of four I lived down on First Street, in the public-housing projects, facing the waters of Kill Van Kull, with Staten Island on the other side.

My father was a Martin, but he was of Italian and German descent. My mother was a Brady – Irish. I heard a lot from my mother about the heritage of the Bradys, who had been a pretty important family at certain points in Bayonne history. I knew at a very early age that we were poor. But I also knew that my family hadn't always been poor. To get to my school, I had to walk past the house where my mother had been born, this house that had been our house once. I've looked back on that, of course, and in some of my stories there's this sense of a lost golden age, where there were wonders and marvels undreamed of. Somehow what my mother told me set all that stuff into my imagination.

Was your relationship with your parents close? 
My father was a distant figure. I don't think that he ever understood me, and I don't know that I ever understood him. We didn't use the term then, but you could probably say he was a functioning alcoholic. I saw him every day, but we hardly talked. The only thing that we really bonded over was sports.

Did you get out of Bayonne much before college? 
We never had a car. My father always said that drinking and driving was very bad, and he was not going to give up drinking [laughs]. My world was a very small world. For many years I stared out of our living-room window at the lights of Staten Island. To me, those lights of Staten Island were like Shangri-La, and Singapore, and Shanghai, or whatever. I read books, and I dreamed of Mars, and the planets in those books, and of the Hyborian Age of Robert E. Howard's Conan books, and later of Middle-earth – all these colorful places. I would dream of those places just as I dreamed of Staten Island, and Shanghai.

From GRRM Rolling Stone interview.

Quote

I've never noticed it before:

From Wikipedia: Bran

Quote

Bran, also known as miller's bran, is the hard outer layers of cereal grain. It consists of the combined aleurone andpericarp.

So, in a way ,Theon sacrifices 'Bran' -miller's son. The miller's boys lived near the Acorn Water. And fReek mentions that their mother gave hay to Ser Rodrik's horses. Later Theon has them burned, just like the Wickerman would be set ablaze.

That metaphor is even more complex, since I suspect Theon is the biological father of the boys he murdered, making Theon -- ironically he who claims he 'does not sow' -- the 'miller' so to speak of his own 'seed.'  In return for having crushed and burnt his own seed, Theon loses his further reproductive potential (castration/penectomy) in a bitter reprisal of fate (and GRRM's wrath!)

GRRM is not condoning murder and definitely not kinslaying.  Although I believe Bran will meet his death in burning -- in an echo of that of the 'miller's boys' -- it's important to note the difference between making a sacrifice of someone else (murder, unwilling victim) and a sacrifice for someone else (self-sacrifice, willing hero).  Bran's ultimate test and act will be the latter.

Quote

Bran is both raven and corn.

Nice!  Just as he is both captive and captor of the weirwoods.

Quote

Quote

Bran is present in and may be in any cereal grain, including rice, corn (maize), wheat, oats,barley, rye and millet. Bran is not the same aschaff, coarser scaly material surrounding the grain but not forming part of the grain itself

This is worrying, since we already know that Bran is firewood:

Quote

The high oil content of bran makes it subject to rancidification, one of the reasons that it is often separated from the grain before storage or further processing. Bran is often heat-treated to increase its longevity.

Some quotes:

Quote

Bran did his best, although he did not think he ever really fooled her. Since his father would not forbid it, she turned to others. Old Nan told him a story about a bad little boy who climbed too high and was struck down by lightning, and how afterward the crows came to peck out his eyes. Bran was not impressed. There were crows' nests atop the broken tower, where no one ever went but him, and sometimes he filled his pockets with corn before he climbed up there and the crows ate it right out of his hand. None of them had ever shown the slightest bit of interest in pecking out his eyes

When Bran falls from the tower, the golden kernels of corn falling with him represent the sacrifice of his seed and reproductive potential.  In Bran's case, he gives his seed to the weirwood ('marrying' the tree) as it gives its seed to him via the weirwood bole.  Traditionally, shamen (greenseer equivalent) would often be castratees or intersex and infertile somehow, the sacrifice of sexuality thought to be necessary to facilitate the gateway to the higher mysteries.

Quote

Quote

He looked at the words, but they didn't matter. Nothing mattered. Bran was going to live. "My brother is going to live," he told Mormont. The Lord Commander shook his head, gathered up a fistful of corn, and whistled. The raven flew to his shoulder, crying, "Live! Live!"

Bran wants to feed corn to the crows. He's a willing sacrifice.

'Live' read backwards (something GRRM is fond of playing around with...recall 'oh oh oh...ho ho ho') is 'evil.'

@Black Crow has suggested there is something nefarious attendant with Bran's abduction by the crows/trees/singers/Bloodraven.

Quote

Quote

"I don't care whose stories they are," Bran told her, "I hate them." He didn't want stories and he didn't want Old Nan. He wanted his mother and father. He wanted to go running with Summer loping beside him. He wanted to climb the broken tower and feed corn to the crows. He wanted to ride his pony again with his brothers. He wanted it to be the way it had been before.

@ravenous reader, apart from actually meaning 'azul/marine tiger' , Bluetiger means Celestial Tiger, as 'Niebieski'=blue, but it also means celestial, as in 'ciało niebieskie' = 'celestial body'.

It all comes from 'niebo' = sky, heaven. Niebo comes from protoslavic nebo, and that word comes from proto-indoeuropean  *nébhos = cloud.

As in 'nebula' -- how fitting!  I love etymology .

Quote

There are many reasons why I chose this nickname, but I think this interpretation really fits Mythical Astronomy (although I've started using it way back in 2011).

Edit: Wikitionary claims that in West Frisian brân means fire.

Indeed -- as in a 'fire brand', being 'branded,' etc.

Quote

Apart from garth = fishing weird, garth is also:

1. A grassy quadrangle surrounded by cloisters

2. A close; a yard; a croft; a garden.

3 A clearing in the woods; as such, part of many placenames in northern England

4. (paganism) A group or a household dedicated to the pagan faith Heathenry.

5. (paganism) A location or sacred space, in ritual and poetry in modern Heathenry.

It seems that graveyard's original name was gravegarth.

In Welsh 'arth' means bear.

Edited 8 hours ago by Blue Tiger

A fenced-off garden represents the taming or harvesting of nature -- basically, 'stealing the fire of the gods'...I actually have a poem along those lines; it's quite difficult, but I'll post it with notes on the 'poetry thread,' if you like.

[Bluetiger]

34 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

I actually have a poem along those lines; it's quite difficult, but I'll post it with notes on the 'poetry thread,' if you like.

Sounds interesting. 

Btw, another brandon etymology:

Quote

EtymologyEdit

From Middle French brandon, from Old Frenchbrandon, from Frankish *brant, *brand ‎(“burnt log; brand; cinder”) + -on.

PronunciationEdit

• IPA^(key): /bʁɑ̃.dɔ̃/

NounEdit

brandon m ‎(plural brandons)

1. firebrand; torch made of twisted straw [mid-12th c.]
2. loose, burning material from a fire
3. (figuratively) firebrand (someone or something that is a source of trouble)

   un brandon de discorde‎

   a bone of contention or a seed of discord

4. straw at the end of a staff placed at the corner of a field to indicate the juridicalseizure of a crop

 

 

 

[cgrav]

The wiki on Barnstokkr contains the unifying concept of Fire and tree:

Quote

Jesse Byock (1990) states that the name Barnstokkr may not conceivably be the original name of the tree, and instead that it is possible that it may have originally been bran(d)stokkr, the first part of the compound potentially having been brandr, (meaning brand or firebrand), a word sometimes synonymous with "hearth", and pointing to a potential connection to the fire burning within the hall.

Even though heart and hearth (to my surprise) do not share a root, GRRM unites them for his own purposes, which is to set blood and fire in the same place linguistically. 

[ravenous reader]

5 hours ago, LmL said:

Oh wow, I feel stupid that I did not connect "Bran" with grain and corn. That's awesome. You'll notice that I even did call attention to the Miller's children being children of someone who makes grain, who grinds corn, because Theon thinks to himself that if he had called them Ram's heads, people would have seen horns.

But I missed the Bran thing, haha.

I told you, we're each other's 'blind-spots'!  I'm caught up in a whirlwind of weirwoods; and you're mesmerized by those meteors...

Quote

This is exactly why I have so little patience for the "a spade is just a spade" people when analyzing A Song of Ice and Fire. The name Bran refers to ravens, it refers to a burning brand, and it refers to bran as in corn grain. That's just fucking sweet man.

@Tijgy also pointed out it can refer to a 'hill' as in 'fell.'

Quote

And I think you're right, grant himself is the sacrifice. He's definitely in line with the same king of winter symbolism that Jon is, but of course there could be a twist. In particular, I have sort of begun noticing signs that the resurrection process might be inverted for these two. Meaning, John might end up raised by ice at first, then cleansed by fire. Brand, however, he might burn - his physical boys flash that is - only to end up inside of a frozen giant, Hodor.

Interesting.  Apropos that quote we discussed on the other (black sword vs. white sword) thread, I was thinking that the 'etching' of Jon's shadow in the ice is interesting, since in armory or other etching techniques, the acid 'burns' the path into the metal, creating the design.  So, if the moonlight etches Jon's shadow (i.e. sword) into the wall, that means there's something figuratively 'burning' depressed and encased within the Wall of ice.  It's an 'ice dragon' of course -- because the lowest level akin to a tomb of the ice cells, in which they store all the dead bodies, prisoners as well as the food, including all those foods pickled in vinegar (i.e. acid), is compared to the gullet of an ice dragon.  Jon keeps saying 'the Wall is mine' -- never a truer word was spoken!

I'm still partial to 'Deep Impact Drogon' -- so Bran would have to endure the burning first as part of skinchanging Drogon and 'walking' the burning 'Bifrost' bridge, in order to get to the ice comet, which would then represent the union of fire (Bran-Drogon) with ice (the comet before it penetrates the atmosphere).

Quote

@ravenous reader, I've been thinking about that scene on the hill when Bran and company are fighting to get into Bloodraven's cave. When bran skin changes into Hodor, the tears in Hodor's eyes freeze, giving him eyes of ice.

That's a great catch!

Quote

Then, right before Bran loses consciousness, he sees a burning wight standing in front of a tree, as I mentioned in part 3. The burning wight is giving us the Burning Tree motif, but right behind him, the tree is dressed in a frozen shroud - which it promptly burries Bran in. So another words, what we have is a burning tree, right before bran is buried in an icy shroud.

 Very nice.  So, the chronological sequence is death by fire, then ice, in this instance for Bran.  It also ties in with the Robert Frost poem -- the death twice over (once by fire, then by ice) -- as discussed by @Walda on the poetry thread.

Quote

That combined with Hodor's ice eyes could be a clue about bran inhabiting that ice giant we've been sort of talking about. Also, skinchanging an ice giant could be foreshadowing of skinchanging or "riding" the comet.

Definitely.  It's Odin's psychopomp horse galloping between worlds as you indicated --  in Bran's case representing either the comet or Drogon, and all facilitated by the weirwood which was seeded by the comet, the seed of which now returns (the 'lion star child') to face its own seed (the weirwood as spaceship) returning to it in the opposite direction (admittedly, reading that over it really does sound 'crack-pot'!)  Bran is basically venturing out to where no 'other' will dare, hunting down the hrakkar in the Dothraki 'sea'  (isn't that what the Dothraki believe, that the ultimate sea to which they all return is located in the sky; that's why they do everything that matters 'under the stars').

Quote

It's also worth noticing Bran's many connections with lightning, since lightning is directly connected to the Burning Tree idea and the fire of the Gods. We have the story you mentioned here with the bad little boy who was struck by lightning at the top of the tower - that is of course where bran fell from, symbolizing the moon's fall from the heavens which struck as a lightning strike, the Storm God's Thunderbolt. Then at Queen's Crown when bran inhabits Hodor, we have lightning again. When Sam comes out of the well, Bran skinchanges Hodor again, and even recalls the lightning strike at Queen's Crown at that moment. That makes a ton of sense, since I'm claiming that the fire of the Gods in part represents the weirwood connection. Bran is the one enjoying this fire of the Gods, so it is natural he would be associated with lightning - particularly with being struck by lightning. When he falls, he is the burning brand.

Yes -- and not to forget he has the Tully looks, so he's 'kissed by fire'!  @Pain killer Jane also suggested that the Tullys via Lothston connection have Targaryen blood, making Bran a dragon person too.  

Recently I was reading @Evolett's weaver essays, when I came across a delightful coinage of hers, namely the idea of a magical gene, encompassing all magic, tree and dragon alike, ice and fire, etc. -- 'the silver gene'.  I love that notion!  That's how I understand the weaving of the silver seaweed!  The 'silver' is the lightning, the magic.

If you're interested, I wrote about Bran as sword here, prompted by something @Lost Melnibonean said about lightning providing a pathway between worlds for the supernatural to establish immanence in the Celtic mythology of the Sidhe.  @Tijgy and I also discussed Bran being forged and cleansed in the Winterfell godswood like Ice here on Evita's 'Bran's growing powers' re-read thread.

A while ago I had this conversation with @TyrionTLannister when he contacted me in order to explore the idea of various characters as swords, which I'll reproduce here:

Quote

When analysing the symbolism, consider that GRRM imagines human beings on the archetypal 'hero's journey' passing through similar developmental stages in their arcs analogous to the successive steps a sword passes through in its forging.  Forging including firing, smelting, hammering, beating into shape.  Quenching including plunging the sword into water, rapid cooling.  Tempering including heating to reduce excess hardness.  Annealing including heating and slow cooling in order to strengthen the metal, decrease internal stress.  In general, a sword sequentially undergoes multiple mini 'deaths' and rebirths in its transformation, just like a person's spiritual journey.

Applied to Bran, for example, one might argue he has symbolically passed through several of these stages of alternate heating, cooling, and beating!  First, the fall from the tower at Jaime's hand to the earth was like being caught between the hammer and the anvil respectively, making Bran an unworked piece of sheet metal.  Obviously, the crippling which deformed or reformed his body was like a piece of metal taking a beating!  Because he fell from the lightening-struck tower, at the hands of two fire-associated creatures Jaime and Cersei, together with Nan's parable about the naughty boy who climbed too high and was struck by lightning (whereafter crows pecked out his eyes), we can liken the fall itself to a kind of radical heat treatment by fire!  Lightning is also magically transformative (as Lost Melnibonean made clear in his reference to Celtic lore and the Sidhe).  Notably, the first time Bran succeeds in skinchanging Hodor lightning is present in the tower to catalyse the process.  And never forget, although he's northern, Bran like his mother is a southern 'fire' creature of sorts being 'kissed by fire' with his flaming red hair!  

Following his fall, Bran sunk into a coma, which I've previously argued on the 'nennymoan thread' (that's my favorite post; I can give you a link if you're interested) is akin to drowning (a bit like Patchface having drowned and been miraculously resuscitated) -- so you can think of that as a water treatment like quenching following the fire treatment to the 'sword.'  Following his emergence from the coma, Bran receives another fire treatment at the hands of his wolf Summer whose eyes are compared to a fiery furnace and whose body seems to permanently radiate heat.  In this equation, the direwolf serves both as forge and smith in Bran's transformation!  At Winterfell, the two main locales that are important in the 'forging' process are the crypts and the godswood.  Seams has previously identified the womb/tomb wordplay in 'Tobho Mott' (hot tomb) hinting at the forge-like aspect of the crypts.  Also, while Bran and his companions are down in the crypt they note that the air temperature is noticeably warmer than that at ground level.  Of course, Winterfell is built on a major tectonic fault system, as evidenced by the 'hot springs,' so the foundation the deeper one goes is one of fire!  

While they're hiding out in the crypts, at the same time Winterfell is being sacked and burnt, transforming the whole castle into one massive forge of which the crypts and the heart tree are its heart, Bran significantly develops his third-eye powers.  Regarding the godswood, similarly Theon notes that the temperature there is higher than that in the rest of Winterfell, so that the ground remains unfrozen.  Traditionally, that is the place where Ned used to cleanse his sword Ice in the cold black pool following a beheading, and as I pointed out in my conversation with Tijgy, Bran is also sent to overnight in the godswood in order to 'cleanse' himself, directly aligning him with the sword! (cleansing is a water treatment analog)  Thereafter, Bran and his friends make for Bloodraven's cavern, which represents another step on the forging journey.  It too is described as surprisingly warm and toasty (like a forge, or 'summer under the sea') compared to ground level, so that's another forge, which in addition to the fire element contains the black underground river ('sunless sea') representing the water treatment.

  Quote

Are there more instances where Bran symbolizes a sword?

 With reference to Bran as a greenseer, it's important that he's configured like the sword in the prologue as a tree struck by lightning and that a magic wand is a kind of wooden staff which can channel fire, so according to this reasoning the whole weirwood network can be thought of collectively as a sword!  Like a king the greenseer sits his throne and orchestrates his influence via the trees, particularly the leaves which are frequently described as 'bloodstained hands' which is a pun on Hands (of the king) who can be thought of as swordhands of the king.

Given that Bran is in the heart tree, particularly that in the Winterfell godswood, and that he has tasted the blood of the human sacrifices made to the tree, It's tempting to compare the weirwood blood ritual to the blood magic used in the production of Valyrian steel.  Perhaps the weirwood's power is similarly augmented, making Bran-in-the-tree a Valyrian steel sword.  Remember Oathkeeper is described as drinking the red dye added by Mott (compared to blood...'waves of night and blood on some steely shore'...which also reminds us that Ned's blood was given to the same sword) or evocatively as 'drinking the sun.'  Similarly, Bran drinks the blood via the roots of the tree, so perhaps he is a sword, except I tend to think Bran represents the sun, so the metaphor is not a perfect parallel. On that point, it might be significant that Gared's head was placed on an ironwood stump for the beheading by Ice, so when his blood is spilled like summerwine spraying on the snow perhaps the tree's roots lap it up? (By the way, you should check out LmL's stuff on 'dark swords' (Valyrian steel) vs. 'light swords' (Dawn, the pale swords of the Others).  He's had some lively discussions with Lord Martin around that topic, and he follows his classifications more strictly than I tend to do, which might appeal to you).

It's useful to consider GRRM's caution regarding a double-edged sword or 'sword without a hilt' with no safe way to grasp it, by which he's indicating the dual nature of power or magic, potentially healing and harming at once.  I've argued that by losing his legs (a state of powerlessness on the one hand) he symbolically lost his hilt while simultaneously acquiring a pathway to unlimited power.  As a very advanced greenseer, Bran is teetering on this edge, complete with the temptations attending power/magic.  We as readers are sensing this paradoxical dynamic, which is the reason we're speculating on the good vs. evil conflict!

I'm not sure of other instances of Bran as sword.  I will keep my eye open!  Let me know if you think of anything further.

  Quote

 If Bran is a sword, then who will wield him? 

 

As a greenseer, Bran is the wielder not the wielded.  I even think he's capable of wielding the ultimate black sword, the ultimate Valyrian steel sword, Drogon; or alternatively he could also wield the instrument of the wights (the Other overseer is bound to be a greenseer).

As a kind of god, perhaps he's 'three-in-one', being the one to pass the sentence and swing the sword, the sword itself and the sacrifice.  If he sacrifices himself, this is equivalent to Efnisien destroying the cauldron from within. This would represent the ultimate in facing what needs to be done without looking away.

 

Quote

@LmL said:

Ok, that's pretty on the nose... The weirwood trees are essentially the graves of the original horned people who went inside them.

I've been thinking about the weirwood trees as traps recently... And I've been wondering if they aren't perhaps traps for dragons. It's kind of related to the idea of the moon meteors seeding the weirwood trees - but think about it more like the weirwood trees trapping or containing the effects of the moon meteors. That might correlate to the idea of trapping Dragon people. These would of course be people from the great Empire of the Dawn, the first dragon people to come to Westeros. The fact that the most prominent greenseer in the story is a dragon blooded person who got trapped in the weirwood tree... well it makes you wonder.

Yeah that's good.  I think of the dragonseed traditionally located in all the myths at the bottom of the roots/well of the tree as the seed literally and figuratively.  What's interesting is that this 'seed' both feeds and gnaws at the roots, providing the duality of healing/harming influence we keep seeing reiterated.

Plant traps for dragons makes me think of  'Venus flytraps' and 'snapdragons'...the latter, although not technically carnivorous like the former, named for the fancied resemblance of antirrhinum flowers to a dragon's mouth. As the name of a Christmas game of plucking raisins from burning brandy and eating them alight, from 1704.

[LmL]

3 hours ago, cgrav said:

To reach back to the Garth/Weir thing - did anyone else notice that Davos's jailer at White Harbor is named Garth? 

Probably already pointed out, but I've yet to read back all the pages that accrued over my vacation.

I did, and I need to go back a read that scene again, I remember there is a ton of great symbolism there. The black stone fortress known as the Wolf's Den is the black heart inside a city which otherwise parallels the ice moon - white marble and all the rest. There is lighting, talk of human sacrifice top weirwoods, other good stuff. It's been a few months since I looked at it though, thanks for the reminder.

[LmL]

4 hours ago, Lord Fauntleroy said:

Just breaking my silent reading/  listening to beg for this please

It will happen, for sure. Some characters seem to sort of come out in drips and drabs, sometimes a character gets a dedicated episode.. it just depends on the train of thought I am following. I need to finish my greenseer stuff with Odin and Yggdrasil and then I should be in good position to do a Bran episode. I also am now set up to do a Mance Raydar episode / section. So far the most Bran stuff I have done is in the Tyrion Targaryen episode. 

 

3 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

LOL. @evita mgfs gave us multiple 'Bran-centric episodes' countless moons ago -- if anyone would bother to read her brilliant and pioneering thoughts!

I love @evita mgfs; I don't see her around the boards as much as I used to but we are good buddies. I've even skipped with her and seen her amazing collection of memorabilia  Please do link to any of her posts which you find relevant, the fact that it has her name on it will demand my attention, at least.

3 hours ago, cgrav said:

There's one you left out, and it goes right to the "heart" of Bran's role in the story: the Branstokkr.

In the olde Norse tradition, ash trees were grown in the middle of noble courts, sort of shrines to Yggdrasil. Those trees were called branstokkr, and they are the real world counterpart to GRRM's heart trees.

In one Norse myth, Odin sticks a magical sword in a branstokk, which can only be removed by Sigmund. Later, Sigmund's son Sigurd re-forges that sword to slay the dragon Fafnir. You can guess how many forging attempts were required. 

Yes, that's another good connection,. We were talking about that sword upthread, but not in connection to Bran's name. I really have a ton of things to say about the idea of tree swords but they mostly relate to the Others. @Blue Tiger did a good job laying out the myth of Odin planting the sword in the tree upthread as well, and yes, we talked about the conspicuous three forging attempts. Clearly the reforging of the broken hero's sword is realized in Tolkien as well, and it may be happening here too, because there is a ton of important broken sword symbolism, as I have talked about many times. 

[LmL]

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

I told you, we're each other's 'blind-spots'!  I'm caught up in a whirlwind of weirwoods; and you're mesmerized by those meteors...

Yes... teamwork. Good ole teamwork, nothing like that. I always feel privileged to discuss with "the preeminent minds of the board" such as yourself, ha ha. I know you liked that.  

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

@Tijgy also pointed out it can refer to a 'hill' as in 'fell.'

Yes, and this just connects Bran to Winterfell in an even more intrinsic way.

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

Interesting.  Apropos that quote we discussed on the other (black sword vs. white sword) thread, I was thinking that the 'etching' of Jon's shadow in the ice is interesting, since in armory or other etching techniques, the acid 'burns' the path into the metal, creating the design.  So, if the moonlight etches Jon's shadow (i.e. sword) into the wall, that means there's something figuratively 'burning' depressed and encased within the Wall of ice.  It's an 'ice dragon' of course -- because the lowest level akin to a tomb of the ice cells, in which they store all the dead bodies, prisoners as well as the food, including all those foods pickled in vinegar (i.e. acid), is compared to the gullet of an ice dragon.  Jon keeps saying 'the Wall is mine' -- never a truer word was spoken!

Yes, there are so anythings which put the black dragon inside the ice. Makes me wonder if Drogon won't be wighted before Bran "rides" or pilots him, becoming an ice dragon in truth. Black ice dragon! Black ice armor! Woo!

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

I'm still partial to 'Deep Impact Drogon' -- so Bran would have to endure the burning first as part of skinchanging Drogon and 'walking' the burning 'Bifrost' bridge, in order to get to the ice comet, which would then represent the union of fire (Bran-Drogon) with ice (the comet before it penetrates the atmosphere).

I love this theory so much even though it seems a bit far fetched. I absolutely agree with your general analysis of Bran's flinging destiny - it has to do with reaching up to the stars. I am not sure who exactly that will happen, but I love your line of thinking about this. This idea is also strongly present in Dany's symbolism - touching the moon and touching the comet. Being the stallion who mounts the world. So it really makes me wonder - are Bran and Dany going to effect some kind of teamwork?

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

That's a great catch!

Another time, Hodor has one eye frozen shut, making him an icy greenseer, right? I think there might be something to this, the notion of skinchanging ice giants or whatever. I mean, that is what the black meters that goes into the ice does - remember that's exactly how I described it? The black meteor skinchanging the ice moon? Remember that the dark stone of the Giant's Lance also represents this same thing. The ice giant mountain is, underneath, black stone. 

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

 Very nice.  So, the chronological sequence is death by fire, then ice, in this instance for Bran.  It also ties in with the Robert Frost poem -- the death twice over (once by fire, then by ice) -- as discussed by @Walda on the poetry thread.

Definitely.  It's Odin's psychopomp horse galloping between worlds as you indicated --  in Bran's case representing either the comet or Drogon, and all facilitated by the weirwood which was seeded by the comet, the seed of which now returns (the 'lion star child') to face its own seed (the weirwood as spaceship) returning to it in the opposite direction (admittedly, reading that over it really does sound 'crack-pot'!)  Bran is basically venturing out to where no 'other' will dare, hunting down the hrakkar in the Dothraki 'sea'  (isn't that what the Dothraki believe, that the ultimate sea to which they all return is located in the sky; that's why they do everything that matters 'under the stars').

nods head...

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

Yes -- and not to forget he has the Tully looks, so he's 'kissed by fire'!  @Pain killer Jane also suggested that the Tullys via Lothston connection have Targaryen blood, making Bran a dragon person too.  

That's a bit obscure, but his kissed by fire hair works on its own anyway. He has other clear moon symbolism to be found, which I discussed in my Tyrion episode. 

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

Recently I was reading @Evolett's weaver essays, when I came across a delightful coinage of hers, namely the idea of a magical gene, encompassing all magic, tree and dragon alike, ice and fire, etc. -- 'the silver gene'.  I love that notion!  That's how I understand the weaving of the silver seaweed!  The 'silver' is the lightning, the magic.

Yes, that's a deep theory for sure. I'm a bit skeptical on the eugenic aspect of it but a lot of her conclusions seem to line up with mine, and there is a ton of fabulous stuff in those essays - I recommend them often despite my reluctance to genetic theories. Silver is a multi-faceted symbol which I don't claim to have on lockdown, either. As evidenced by you leading me around by the nose on the nennymoan / silver seaweed thing. I think it was when you called it "see-weed" as in cannabis that I finally saw the light. I'll probably always be a Nennymoaner but I can see the sea / see thing with clarity, for a certainty. 

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

If you're interested, I wrote about Bran as sword here, prompted by something @Lost Melnibonean said about lightning providing a pathway between worlds for the supernatural to establish immanence in the Celtic mythology of the Sidhe.  @Tijgy and I also discussed Bran being forged and cleansed in the Winterfell godswood like Ice here on Evita's 'Bran's growing powers' re-read thread.

A while ago I had this conversation with @TyrionTLannister when he contacted me in order to explore the idea of various characters as swords, which I'll reproduce here:

Thanks for sharing, that all lines up with my thinking quite well. The lightning is the same as a meteor in regards to representing a connection between heavens and earth - meteors were often called thunder stones in antiquity. The connection between lighting and broken trees and broken swords is a rich one which we have discussed some, but I have a collection of notes on the topic as well. The wooden lightning bolt switchback stair on the Wall is a good one. The one that gets set on fire and triggers an avalanche, and then grows back. 

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

Yeah that's good.  I think of the dragonseed traditionally located in all the myths at the bottom of the roots/well of the tree as the seed literally and figuratively.  What's interesting is that this 'seed' both feeds and gnaws at the roots, providing the duality of healing/harming influence we keep seeing reiterated.

@The Grey Dayne has some thoughts about weirwoods and fungus networks, and how that could relate to meteors, but I don't want to steal his thunder (sorry couldn't resist). 

1 hour ago, ravenous reader said:

Plant traps for dragons makes me think of  'Venus flytraps' and 'snapdragons'...the latter, although not technically carnivorous like the former, named for the fancied resemblance of antirrhinum flowers to a dragon's mouth. As the name of a Christmas game of plucking raisins from burning brandy and eating them alight, from 1704.

The trees are Garth traps first and foremost, so what I am suggesting (and have before) is that the horned people were connected to or related to dragon people.

[sweetsunray]

At all the aspiring writers... Would it surprise you that I have a similar period in mind as @LmL, not Atlantis though, but the period after first migrations and first empires are being built heading towards the cultural bronze age collapse. These are the times of the first grand scale societies, creation of states and the issues that follow from it, but as it's the emergence of it, it's also a time of different ways of tackling that large scale organisation. Some societies conquer, others seek refuge by being pushed away by the conquering migration and use a less aggressive mix-it-up approach in the new lands they arrives. And both these societies develop two different forms of inheritance - a matrilineal one and a patrilineal one. Both are patriarchical, in that the chieftains and rulers are men, but in one society the sons inherit (by their wives), while in the other the nephews inherit (the sons of the chieftain's sister). And there are pockets of fringe professional groups that are matriarchical in the latter society. It heavily impacts the differing views on women in these societies, (the stability of) marriage (and thus alliances) and out-of-wedlock children. And they are heading for an intercultural clash with characters from one world ending up in the other and using that other's society's norms to their advantage, when one of the aggressive vassal regions of the patrilineal empire end up raiding and enslaving the king's heirs (son and daughter of his only sister) as well as killing some crucial heirs and sisters. The king and other rulers have to solve their heir issue (and the main characters here are the "new heir" generation), while the enslaved kids need to find a way to get back or improve their lives, and what happens if their owners discover their value in the society they were stolen from. It gives me the opportunity to write a differing set of male and female characters in different social contexts.

But like LML the idea is that the back story of most fantasy worlds is the world story, rather than that world's history, a mash up of early viking, proto-Celtic, Mesopotania, Egypt, Hittite, early African, pre-Classic Greek and Cretan societies.

And if you wish to develop an actual "world" for maps and stuff, I can all recommend you Fractal Terrains, a software program that allows you to go through randomly created planets where you can manipulate settings, mimic asteroid impacts, raise continents, sink continents, mimic erosion effects of an ice age, etc... check distances, temperatures, climate, type of vegetation growing there.