R+L=J v.163

[Lord Varys]

1 hour ago, velo-knight said:

"The father first, then the son, so both die kings" - Jon I ADWD.

That is Jon's weirdo paranoia about Melisandre burning Mance. But she never burnt Mance.

1 hour ago, velo-knight said:

Obviously, in this scenario, Brandon was never Lord of Winterfell in any significant way, but that doesn't mean he couldn't get a statue. Doesn't it seem odd that Lyarra is left without a statue?

No, because women usually don't get statues. And we have no idea whether Ned was close to his mother. She clearly was dead long before Rickard and Brandon died, and there was most likely no reason for him to care much about her tomb at that point. But then - Lyarra Stark is so non-existent in the story that George should better just continue to pretend that Rickard produced all the children his own. The man never thinks of his mother throughout AGoT nor does anybody ever bring her up. Not even her grandchildren when they are hiding in the crypts.

1 hour ago, velo-knight said:

And if this is Ned's way of doing that?

Could be. But why should be assume that he was the first Stark to honor an elder brother who should have been lord or king this way? Surely similar things happened often enough during Stark history.

1 hour ago, velo-knight said:

And post-rebellion Ned Stark cares about that, why, exactly?

Because he also considered Aerys II the King on the Iron Throne until the man died?

[velo-knight]

50 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

That is Jon's weirdo paranoia about Melisandre burning Mance. But she never burnt Mance.

Some more context: "The father first and then the son, so both die kings. The words had been murmured by one of the queen's men as Maester Aemon had cleaned his wounds. Jon had tried to dismiss them as his fever talking. Aemon had demurred." This is how actual inhabitants of this world view succession - either that of one of the Queen's Men (a legalistic bunch if ever there was one), or Jon Snow, the educated Bastard of Winterfell.

50 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Could be. But why should be assume that he was the first Stark to honor an elder brother who should have been lord or king this way? Surely similar things happened often enough during Stark history.

 Yet it's remarked upon here specifically. I can accept that it's present to tell us something about Ned Stark the person - he's a family man - but that doesn't categorically rule out other interpretations.

50 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Because he also considered Aerys II the King on the Iron Throne until the man died?

Which is why he promptly delivered himself up for execution. I doubt he'd take Aerys feelings or decrees into consideration here, considering that his faction won. I don't think this is the kind of thing that we can litigate in a black-and-white way: yes, Ned thought Aerys was the king and deserved some respect (certainly not betrayal), but also fought to depose him. I think it's a tad legalistic to say that Ned (or anyone else) believes that Rickard and Brandon died as commoners.

[Ygrain]

9 hours ago, velo-knight said:

Thanks for pointing that out. I was going to mention Mance's black-and-red as a great example, before I remembered that people have earnestly argued that Mance is Rhaegar, with that symbolism likely being a key component.

Both Mance and Jaime are Rhaegar. It is known.

9 hours ago, velo-knight said:

Isn't the armor that the Night's Watch uses black as well?

I haven't done the search but I don't recall anyone wearing armour as in, full plate, only chain mail.

9 hours ago, velo-knight said:

Bloodlines are important and have in-world power in ASoIaF, but I'd hate to think only a patrilineal descendant of the Daynes could be the new savior. That's just very uninspiring to me.

Oh, I am fully with Arya here: woman is important, too!

9 hours ago, velo-knight said:

I'd be delighted if Dawn turned out to be relatively unimportant - the original Lightbringer, perhaps, but not significant to this story. I feel that's unlikely, however.

Well, yes, that wold be a nice trope-breaker, but I think we are going to visit Starfall soon, so the chances are indeed rather low :-)

[Black Crow]

44 minutes ago, Ygrain said:

 

I haven't done the search but I don't recall anyone wearing armour as in, full plate, only chain mail.

 

There's a reference to Ser Jaremy Ryker having some plate armour, which Thoren Smallwood inherits, but from the context its pretty clear that this was exceptional and that everyone else is wearing black ringmail and leather.

[Ygrain]

52 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

There's a reference to Ser Jaremy Ryker having some plate armour, which Thoren Smallwood inherits, but from the context its pretty clear that this was exceptional and that everyone else is wearing black ringmail and leather.

Thank you. In other words, a black armour is not a NW thing.

 

A question: is it mentioned anywhere why the Pact of Ice and Fire was never fulfilled?

[IceFire125]

6 hours ago, Ygrain said:

question: is it mentioned anywhere why the Pact of Ice and Fire was never fulfilled?

It's like GRRM left out only for a certain prince to dig it up and fulfilled it at a later time.  I hope he covers this in the overall narrative before the final book ends.

My questions in related to this are, why did Jace called it a Pact of Ice and Fire? What background education did Jace had to have the authority to name it as such? Was he a reader of lore and prophecy as well, that off on a whim, he'd called the pact that way? Did he have prior information or orders from Daemon, Rhaenyra, or others that knew the significance to name it as such?

Because remember, there were dragons flying about, a lot of them.  So it isn't something that relates to dragons or the birthing of dragons.

And in the novella, GRRM never really indicated that the royal family are even worried about the potential threat of the Others.  I don't know, I feel GRRM had that in for the purpose of the main series and how it relates to how it will guide Rhaegar's thoughts and actions ultimately.

 

[The Twinslayer]

On ‎12‎/‎21‎/‎2016 at 7:46 PM, Kingmonkey said:

Arguably even earlier -- the white pup is our first hint that something's up about Jon. However it's the repetition of the theme that is the real clue. Each time we hear something vague about Jon's parentage, we hear nothing much. However when we realise that we keep hearing vague things about Jon's parentage, we start wondering what the author is trying to tell us. So fair enough, the process had already started when we're given the Ashara story -- but it had barely started. When it comes to it, we got the Ashara in chapter 6, book 1. That's about 1% of the way into the story. 

I think these are all solved if you assume that it was Ned, not Brandon, who had been tasting the Dornishman's sister. 

 

 

This indicates that Benjen was the Stark In Winterfell at the end of the war, as he had to wait for Ned's return before leaving for the wall. It clearly doesn't give us any information about when he became the Stark in Winterfell.

I do think that Ned and Ashara were lovers.  I also suspect that Ned intended to (or even did) marry Ashara, whether on his own initiative or because Rickard wanted an alliance with House Dayne.  Brandon arranging for them to dance at the tournament sounds a lot like a step toward an arranged marriage.  It is also interesting that Ned let Howland Reed sleep in his tent -- perhaps because Ned was elsewhere that night.

That, I think, is why Ned is so bitter about having to marry Catelyn and rule the North in Brandon's place.  It isn't the life he wanted. 

On ‎12‎/‎21‎/‎2016 at 8:29 PM, Kingmonkey said:

The sequence of events here is something we get contradictory information on, for some reason. Ned believes that Rickard was forced to watch while Brandon was strangled, while Jaime thinks that Brandon was forced to watch Rickard burned alive, and strangled himself on his bonds while trying to rescue his father from the flames.

As Jaime was the eyewitness, his account is probably more reliable. In which case the two died within moments of each other, and it's unlikely anyone could be sure which one died first.

I agree that Jaime is more reliable that Cat in terms of what actually happened.  But as you say, Ned believes that Brandon died before Rickard -- meaning that the statue of Brandon in the crypts has nothing to do with Brandon being Lord of Winterfell.     

[Lord Varys]

16 hours ago, velo-knight said:

Some more context: "The father first and then the son, so both die kings. The words had been murmured by one of the queen's men as Maester Aemon had cleaned his wounds. Jon had tried to dismiss them as his fever talking. Aemon had demurred." This is how actual inhabitants of this world view succession - either that of one of the Queen's Men (a legalistic bunch if ever there was one), or Jon Snow, the educated Bastard of Winterfell.

They were talking in context of potential sacrifices, though. From a legalistic viewpoint a coronation or proclamation is necessary to make a king. Else Bran, Aegon, etc. would all be kings simply by default because they are surrounded by loyalists. Yet Connington and the Golden Company and the Reeds don't see the princes in their care as kings.

16 hours ago, velo-knight said:

 Yet it's remarked upon here specifically. I can accept that it's present to tell us something about Ned Stark the person - he's a family man - but that doesn't categorically rule out other interpretations.

Sure, but we also have the Lyanna exception. There simply are no statues of female Starks in the crypts. If Ned made an exception for her it makes sense to assume he also made an exception for Brandon. Especially since he still thinks that Brandon was the one who should have been Lord of Winterfell not he.

16 hours ago, velo-knight said:

Which is why he promptly delivered himself up for execution. I doubt he'd take Aerys feelings or decrees into consideration here, considering that his faction won. I don't think this is the kind of thing that we can litigate in a black-and-white way: yes, Ned thought Aerys was the king and deserved some respect (certainly not betrayal), but also fought to depose him. I think it's a tad legalistic to say that Ned (or anyone else) believes that Rickard and Brandon died as commoners.

The Starks seem to be very formal people in general. Cregan Stark avenged the death of the king he came to depose, Eddard Stark tried to do the same when he marched into the Red Keep. That doesn't fit well with the idea that he saw himself as a ruling Lord of Winterfell during the Rebellion despite the fact that he acted and lead his army in that capacity. And one expects that one of the first legal acts of King Robert after his coronation would have been to formally restore the proper titles and holdings to Ned, Jon, and Hoster since Aerys II most likely took them from them. In addition one also expects that Robert formally attainted, dispossessed, and disowned King Viserys III and the Queen Dowager Rhaella.

[Sly Wren]

On December 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Ygrain said:

The colours don't always correspond, e.g. we have Jaime wearing black and red at the feast at Winterfell, or Renly's green armour. However, we are talking a dream here, which means potential symbolism, allusions and what not. AA's red sword and black armour, regardless of material, instantly reminds of another guy wearing black armour who thought himseld PTWP/AA. - Not saying that this must be a connection, but it's like a puzzle piece which constantly changes shape - you don't know if it will eventually fit or not, but cannot discard it just yet.

I agree re: the colors and the importance of it being a dream.

But per your convo with @velo-knight and @Black Crow re whether or not the Night's Watch is exclusive to black armor and mail--obviously they aren't. But that's arguably not the key point in the dream.

Jon doesn't think he was "wearing black plate armor made of ice." He thinks "he was armored in black ice." No mention of plate or mail or rings or bones or bronze or leather or wicker or all of the other things people are armored in throughout Jon's POVs. He's "armored in black ice."

And Jon's used and recognized the the phrase "armored in" since his first Game POV: 

"Let me give you some counsel, bastard," Lannister said. "Never forget what you are, for surely the world will not. Make it your strength. Then it can never be your weakness. Armor yourself in it and it will never be used to hurt you." Game, Jon I

Jon takes that idea to heart re: armoring himself pretty soon: : 

If he must be alone, he would make solitude his armor. Castle Black had no godswood, only a small sept and a drunken septon, but Jon could not find it in him to pray to any gods, old or new. If they were real, he thought, they were as cruel and implacable as winter. Game, Jon III

And he uses the phrase "armored in" to reference things other than "armor" in other contexts, too--here's just one example

The trees stood beneath him, warriors armored in bark and leaf, deployed in their silent ranks awaiting the command to storm the hill. Black, they seemed . . . it was only when his torchlight brushed against them that Jon glimpsed a flash of green. Clash, Jon IV

And in Dance, the novel where he has that dream of himself on the Wall, he talks about people being "armored" in all kinds of materials. And actually uses the phrase "armored in ice" to mean "covered in ice."

Half a mile from the grove, long red shafts of autumn sunlight were slanting down between the branches of the leafless trees, staining the snowdrifts pink. The riders crossed a frozen stream, between two jagged rocks armored in ice, then followed a twisting game trail to the northeast. Dance, Jon VII

Then, in the chapter where Jon dreams of himself on the Wall, not only does he use the phrase for himself: 

Jon was armored in black ice, but his blade burned red in his fist. As the dead men reached the top of the Wall he sent them down to die again. Dance, Jon XII

But also, once awake, Jon uses it to describe other materials for armor: Jon notes the wildlings are all rather randomly armored. And some “had armored themselves in bones, like Rattleshirt.” Dance, Jon XII

So, the point: seems like the phrase "armored in" doesn't mean "plate armor" in Jon's lexicon. It can mean armored in all sorts of things.

The key, therefore, is the black ice. Which, as shown upthread, is tied to the Wall at night. Rhaegar's plate armor is black and specific to him. But Jon's use of "armored in" is not at all specific to plate armor. And the "black ice" is more specific to the Wall than it could ever be to plate armor, regardless of the armor's color.

If anything, I think the "black ice" and its tie to the Wall may be tied to Jon's convo with Sam re: fighting the Others and their armor and weapons earlier in Dance. Perhaps being "armored in black ice" is showing Jon part of some way he can defeat this threat.  Might just be "embrace the Wall and the Watch's original purpose." Might be he needs icy armor like the Others.

ETA: Or, as I noted in the next post to @Voice, this might be a reference to Jon's "armoring" himself in his bastardy. Here, Jon's armoring himself in the Watch and the Wall.

But given all of the context, it seems far less likely that this is any reference to Rhaegar's black plate. It might be--can't rule it out. But that fits far less well in the context we've been given for Jon than "armored in black ice" does.

On December 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Ygrain said:

I think you are considerably limiting your perspective with this noob-and-therefore-unimportant assumption. If a Westerosi house showed such prophetic abilities, you would think they are greendreamers and related to the First Men, and most likely imbued with some magical heritage. The Daynes, IIRC, are also related to the First Men, but look like Targs. Coincidence?

Very fair--my focus on the "ancient Westerosi will fix this" is more a hunch than a proof. I do think the Targs have shown themselves clueless and unengaged on the concept of the Others. And Alysanne messes with the Wall and the Watch. And that weird version of the Stranger in Aegon's Dragonstone sept makes me think the Targs feared skin changers. But until we get more info, a parvenue might somehow ending up being helpful.

As for the Daynes, they are called "First Men" but predate the Starks. And, far as I can tell, nothing in the novels says all of the First Men came from the same ethnic group--seems like this might be a ties to @LmL's theory re: the Geo-Dawnians.

But I believe Martin's said flat out that the Stony Dornish aren't Valyrian--though I'd have to look that up to be sure. So, they'd potentially be from an older group the Valyrians might have splintered off from, too, or something.

[Sly Wren]

On December 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Ygrain said:

Voice is hardly the only one taking this line of thought. Dawn is such a unique weapon that we are definitely going to learn its backstory, and where there is backstory, there is relevance.

Amen.

23 hours ago, Voice said:

Star fall... Stark fall... 

One Stark in particular...

"Some say he was a Bolton," Old Nan would always end. "Some say a Magnar out of Skagos, some say Umber, Flint, or Norrey. Some would have you think he was a Woodfoot, from them who ruled Bear Island before the ironmen came. He never was. He was a Stark, the brother of the man who brought him down." She always pinched Bran on the nose then, he would never forget it. "He was a Stark of Winterfell, and who can say? Mayhaps his name was Brandon. Mayhaps he slept in this very bed in this very room."  

The "Stark" fell when Winter-fell. When the SotM claimed Ice, Dawn brought end to the Long Night. 

Only Jon Snow, being a son of both Starfall and Winterfell, a scion of Dayne+Stark, can provide the katharmos for the miasma... a Heart(tree) in conflict with itself... shaped like a weirwood Ghost. 

I'm wondering now if this is tied to the "armored in black ice" withe red burning blade. You know that I think Dawn could very well burn red. That would be the Daynes.

But "armored in black ice"--a member of the Night's Watch embracing the role, armoring himself in it, as Tyrion tells Jon to armor himself if his bastardy. That would be the potential opposite of the Night's King, no? Instead of going mad with power, embracing his role as protector, not conquerer. Armored in the Wall instead of in sorcery for power.

Maybe.

ETA: Just remembered this:

           Lonely and lovely and lethal, Jon Snow reflected, and I might have had her. Her, and Winterfell, and my lord father's name. Instead he had chosen a black cloak and a wall of ice. Instead he had chosen honor. A bastard's sort of honor. Dance, Jon III.

Jon's thinking of Val and taking her. Taking her and Winterfell and the name of Stark. Instead, chooses honor. He's thus the apparent opposite of the Night's King: choosing duty and the Wall over a beautiful woman and dominance.

Throughout the first three novels, Jon repeatedly thinks about whether or not a bastard can have honor. Here, he's chosen that he can. So, armoring himself in bastardy and honor is armoring himself in the Wall? The ultimate in "Snowgate?" And the opposite of the fallen Night's King.

On December 22, 2016 at 9:40 AM, Ygrain said:

o me, it is like suggesting that Jon may not be only AA's champion but of the old gods, as well, hence the white and red. And since this is old gods' doing, I don't think they would feel the need to sugegst anything about Rhaegar.

I could see that. And Jon makes the tie to the weirwood with Ghost's eyes.

Quote

I do wonder why Shaggy is black, though, as it sets Rickon apart from his siblings, and it is probably not a good thing. We can already see that he, being so young, has little sense of Stark identity, and gods know what is going on in Skagos.

Amen--I keep having fears that someone might have to put him and Shaggy down. Which is not a happy thought in any way. 

Still--all the Starks are grey--like the twilight and their sigil and the "middling world" of the crypts they live on. Seems like there's a chance the white coat is tied to Jon's black cloak.

After all, apparently the KG were originally inspired by the Night's Watch.

[LmL]

In regards to "black ice," I view it as a symbol which refers to a couple of things - namely, dragon glass and Valyrian steel. Ned's "Ice" is black (a grey so dark it looks black, like Jon's eyes) - Black Ice. Obsidian is frozen fire - it's black, it's frozen, and it looks a bit like ice itself.  And of course, it is very likely that both dragonglass and V steel kill Others, which is the whole point of Jon's dream of wielding a burning red sword.  

Jon himself is likened to Dragonglass many times - his hunger for Winterfell is described as being like a dragon glass blade in his gut; Stannis says that just as Jon found the dragon glass at the fist, Stannis has found Jon and means to use him as Jon used the dragon glass, and of course when John was he elected Lord Commander, the token that represented him was the arrowhead. He won in a flood of arrowheads, very similar to the flood of arrowheads which poured out of the horn which he found at the fist, actually. Jon is a sword in the darkness - he's a black sword in the darkness, burning red. Jon himself is a black ice sword, burning red. A man called Snow white dresses all in black - black snow, black ice, same thing.  And of course Ned's black Ice is now painted in Targaryen colors, red and black, darkness and blood. Same colors as Jon playing AA in his dream - Black Ice and red fire instead of red blood. of course turning blood to fire is kind of an AA thing to do, lol. 

Jon sees the meltwater in the cracks of the Wall at sunset, "as the last light faded," and they turn from rivers of black ice to streaks of red fire as the sun catches them. The crack in the wall is where we saw the blue rose that represents one side of Jon's heritage, and here we see the other side of Jon's heritage. Black ice and red fire - we're talking about Valyrian steel here, and obsidian, one or both catching on fire. Just as it was in Jon's dream, where he was wielding longclaw, a Valyrian steel sword, which was burning red.

So yes, the key is Black Ice - the black eye seems to refer to Valyrian steel, I'm on other things. So I would say it's definitely an analog to Rhaegar's night-black armor, in some sense. I would also agree that it is meant to be tied to the Wall - the wall is the ice armor of Westeros, and it's kind of like a suit of armor which one is inhabiting. We've seen symbols of John in the eyes of the wall twice now - the blue rose and the black eyes turning to red fire - and I feel like that one scene where Stannis lays his lightbringer sword along the Wall on the map as a general clue that the wall is one of the symbolic manifestations of lightbringer. The watch itself is a sword in the darkness, and I would say the Wall is part of that. 

Also, at this point, I'd be willing to make a small wager that there is a black stone foundation under that big old ice wall. 

[LmL]

21 hours ago, velo-knight said:

"The father first, then the son, so both die kings" - Jon I ADWD. Obviously, in this scenario, Brandon was never Lord of Winterfell in any significant way, but that doesn't mean he couldn't get a statue. Doesn't it seem odd that Lyarra is left without a statue?

And if this is Ned's way of doing that?

And post-rebellion Ned Stark cares about that, why, exactly?

Maybe, and I'm prepared to accept that. The ambiguity over Brandon vs. Rickard is a better argument in my mind.

Aaah, I understand now. Yeah, I doubt Brandon gets a statue in that case.

Thanks for pointing that out. I was going to mention Mance's black-and-red as a great example, before I remembered that people have earnestly argued that Mance is Rhaegar, with that symbolism likely being a key component.

Isn't the armor that the Night's Watch uses black as well?

Bloodlines are important and have in-world power in ASoIaF, but I'd hate to think only a patrilineal descendant of the Daynes could be the new savior. That's just very uninspiring to me.

I'd be delighted if Dawn turned out to be relatively unimportant - the original Lightbringer, perhaps, but not significant to this story. I feel that's unlikely, however.

I've actually suggested this very thing as a possibility - it could be that Dawn was important the first time around, but now it's no more than a museum piece. I do think it's more likely that Dawn will come out to play, but at the same time, I also think it's possible that it won't. Whether it does or does not come out, I have always thought that Ned's sword is the most important sword in the story. It's the one we've seen the most, it's the one we saw first, and it's the one we are emotionallying attached to. If I had to place a bet on which sword Jon will have in his hands at the pivotal moment, I would place my bets on Oathkeeper.

In similar fashion, it may be that house Dayne is really just a recipe to make a last hero - one part Dragon-blooded person, one part westerosi greenseer. Here I am referring to my theory that House Dayne descendants from the original race of dragon Lords, The Great Empire of the Dawn, who would be the mutual ancestor of Valyria and House Dayne if the theory is correct. I have a feeling the last hero had some of this Great Empire dragon bloodline, and also some Westerosi greenseer blood, with House Dayne potentially descending from him. Jon is a recreation of this "recipie," so even though he isn't a Dayne, he might be made of the same ingredients. 

I just wrote a new series about skinchanger zombies, green men, the Last Hero, and Jon's resurrection, and one of the main premises was that in order to journey into the cold dead hands and confront the others, one really has to be Undead. I believe that skinchangers make the best zombies, because their animals can act as temporary soul jars, preserving the soul ( or even merging it with their animal's) until it can be put back into the resurrected body. I believe that that is how coldhands was made, and that is clearly what Jon is about to become - a resurrected, undead skin changer. The point for our conversation here is that Jon's skinchanger heritage is very important in the process of creating the ultimate weapon against the Others, and I think that also makes the most sense in terms of the importance of his Targaryen lineage. I have never thought that the point was going to be for Jon to make a claim on the throne, but rather some more magical purpose which is important for fighting the Others. I'm not sure if his dragon blood will be used for riding dragons- probably the most likely case - or perhaps allowing him to wield fire magic in some way.  

The custom of handing down Dawn to a worthy Dayne is just that - a custom. Dawn is wielded like a normal sword, so far as we are told - the user is not required to have a certain magic, again, so far as we know. But we DO know that greenseer bloodlines and dragon bloodlines ARE magical, and that they do sometimes permit access to powerful magics will will most likely be needed to confront the Others. Thus, the bloodline issues which are important re: Jon are the magical ones, not the official patrilineal Westerosi inheritance customs or whatever. Furthermore, if Dawn does have a long-forgotten magical purpose (which I think is the most likely case, IF indeed it is to come out and play), then it would make the most sense that it is one of the magical bloodlines which is needed for the wielder. I have speculated that maybe Dawn is a huge milkglass candle, and that Dany would 'wield' it (building on the swords of pale fire idea in Dany's dream of her gemstone-eyed ancestors). Or if Dawn is original Ice, another theory I find eminently plausible, then the key bloodline ouwld the one called Stark, having to do with either the greenseer gene in their blood, or whatever potential icy heritage the Starks might have from the Night's King. 

Any way you slice it, whichever theory you like best, the key will be magical bloodlines, not issues of inheritance. That's my 2 cents anyway. 

[velo-knight]

2 hours ago, LmL said:

Also, at this point, I'd be willing to make a small wager that there is a black stone foundation under that big old ice wall. 

Oily, or fused?

[LmL]

1 hour ago, velo-knight said:

Oily, or fused?

Oh man, could be either. Oily stone is more creepy and magical but fused stone would indicate dragonlords up here building, which I think is likely or at least possible. If there's oily stone in the frozen north, I favor a meteorite in the heart of Winter, for various symbolic reasons. This could be what animates the others with their weird cold version of starfire.

[velo-knight]

31 minutes ago, LmL said:

Oh man, could be either. Oily stone is more creepy and magical but fused stone would indicate dragonlords up here building, which I think is likely or at least possible. If there's oily stone in the frozen north, I favor a meteorite in the heart of Winter, for various symbolic reasons. This could be what animates the others with their weird cold version of starfire.

Yeah, the oily black stone seems to be kind of...evil. The idea that the wall is, literally, evil to the core is interesting, but I have a hard time buying it. That said, if it was more ambiguous - if oily black stone was actually associated with Ice / Earth magic and Bran the Builder the way fused stone is associated with dragons, and balance was what was really needed, (something Jon might provide, rather uniquely) that would be interesting. We know from Bran already that the Starks were not always very nice people...

[ravenous reader]

5 hours ago, LmL said:

In regards to "black ice," I view it as a symbol which refers to a couple of things - namely, dragon glass and Valyrian steel. Ned's "Ice" is black (a grey so dark it looks black, like Jon's eyes) - Black Ice. Obsidian is frozen fire - it's black, it's frozen, and it looks a bit like ice itself.  And of course, it is very likely that both dragonglass and V steel kill Others, which is the whole point of Jon's dream of wielding a burning red sword.  

Jon himself is likened to Dragonglass many times - his hunger for Winterfell is described as being like a dragon glass blade in his gut; Stannis says that just as Jon found the dragon glass at the fist, Stannis has found Jon and means to use him as Jon used the dragon glass, and of course when John was he elected Lord Commander, the token that represented him was the arrowhead. He won in a flood of arrowheads, very similar to the flood of arrowheads which poured out of the horn which he found at the fist, actually. Jon is a sword in the darkness - he's a black sword in the darkness, burning red. Jon himself is a black ice sword, burning red. A man called Snow white dresses all in black - black snow, black ice, same thing.  And of course Ned's black Ice is now painted in Targaryen colors, red and black, darkness and blood. Same colors as Jon playing AA in his dream - Black Ice and red fire instead of red blood. of course turning blood to fire is kind of an AA thing to do, lol. 

Jon sees the meltwater in the cracks of the Wall at sunset, "as the last light faded," and they turn from rivers of black ice to streaks of red fire as the sun catches them. The crack in the wall is where we saw the blue rose that represents one side of Jon's heritage, and here we see the other side of Jon's heritage. Black ice and red fire - we're talking about Valyrian steel here, and obsidian, one or both catching on fire. Just as it was in Jon's dream, where he was wielding longclaw, a Valyrian steel sword, which was burning red.

So yes, the key is Black Ice - the black eye seems to refer to Valyrian steel, I'm on other things. So I would say it's definitely an analog to Rhaegar's night-black armor, in some sense. I would also agree that it is meant to be tied to the Wall - the wall is the ice armor of Westeros, and it's kind of like a suit of armor which one is inhabiting. We've seen symbols of John in the eyes of the wall twice now - the blue rose and the black eyes turning to red fire - and I feel like that one scene where Stannis lays his lightbringer sword along the Wall on the map as a general clue that the wall is one of the symbolic manifestations of lightbringer. The watch itself is a sword in the darkness, and I would say the Wall is part of that. 

Also, at this point, I'd be willing to make a small wager that there is a black stone foundation under that big old ice wall. 

Black ice suffused with red fire?  Or black metallic core surrounded by white ice emanating moonlight glow?

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A Dance with Dragons - Jon VI

"Every man who walks the earth casts a shadow on the world. Some are thin and weak, others long and dark. You should look behind you, Lord Snow. The moon has kissed you and etched your shadow upon the ice twenty feet tall."

As something like an additional appendage which is attached to one, and therefore that one carries around with one everywhere one goes, a 'shadow' is basically a sword -- like the Kingsguard shadows of the royals, or Ghost shadowing Jon (he's also directly compared to a sword when Jon stations him as guard to sleep between him and Ygritte), or the shadows of the Others in their shifting tree-camouflage 'like-moonlight-on-water' armor, etc.  In the quote I've provided below, Melisandre and Jon even go on to discuss wielding the sword without a hilt, almost immediately following the remarks on Jon's shadow, thereby linking the two concepts. 

Just like shadows, some swords are more effective weapons than others, as Melisandre points out...'long and dark' vs. 'thin and weak.'  Jon's shadow -- therefore emblematic of the sword he's ultimately destined to both literally carry and figuratively embody -- is gigantic 'twenty feet tall' and dark -- though it's been 'etched by/in moonlight, (rather than sunlight as you've suggested above),  which I've interpreted as a pale luminous glow surrounding the outline of the sword with a dark inner core.  Therefore, it's not technically all 'black ice' but a combination of a black core surrounded by white ice.  Fittingly, a shadow cannot be grasped -- the more one tries, the more it flees and eludes one -- just like 'a sword without a hilt' or magic.

Etching is a process whereby a design is traced into a waxy protective substance overlaying metal, whereafter acid is applied to the parts that have been gouged into the wax by the artist, thereby exposing and eating at the metal beneath.  Thereafter, the 'wax' is removed and ink is applied to the exposed, graven parts, and the excess removed.  Only the impressions take up the ink; the previously wax-protected areas, raised relative to the trace, are not affected.  

Applying the analogy to Jon, we can see that the sword is likely to be possessed of an inky black metallic core surrounded by a sheath of white ice.  The way the shadow is etched into rather than projected onto the Wall means that the sword is encased in the icy armor surrounding it.  Moreover, as he's been kissed by moonlight and not sunlight, I expect him to be a pale blue not red sword!  

The point is Jon won't have identical armor to Rhaegar, since Rhaegar's color symbolism has been transmuted by Jon's mother Lyanna's 'blue rose' symbolism -- the black dragon core surrounded by the icy blue sheath.

Am I seeing too many impregnated ice moons for my own good?! 

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Jon glanced over his shoulder. The shadow was there, just as she had said, etched in moonlight against the Wall. A girl in grey on a dying horse, he thought. Coming here, to you. Arya. He turned back to the red priestess. Jon could feel her warmth. She has power. The thought came unbidden, seizing him with iron teeth, but this was not a woman he cared to be indebted to, not even for his little sister. "Dalla told me something once. Val's sister, Mance Rayder's wife. She said that sorcery was a sword without a hilt. There is no safe way to grasp it."

"A wise woman." Melisandre rose, her red robes stirring in the wind. "A sword without a hilt is still a sword, though, and a sword is a fine thing to have when foes are all about. Hear me now, Jon Snow. Nine crows flew into the white wood to find your foes for you. Three of them are dead. They have not died yet, but their death is out there waiting for them, and they ride to meet it. You sent them forth to be your eyes in the darkness, but they will be eyeless when they return to you. I have seen their pale dead faces in my flames. Empty sockets, weeping blood." She pushed her red hair back, and her red eyes shone. "You do not believe me. You will. The cost of that belief will be three lives. A small price to pay for wisdom, some might say … but not one you had to pay. Remember that when you behold the blind and ravaged faces of your dead. And come that day, take my hand." The mist rose from her pale flesh, and for a moment it seemed as if pale, sorcerous flames were playing about her fingers. "Take my hand," she said again, "and let me save your sister."

Melisandre almost seems to be a sword too, though pale with 'pale sorcerous flames playing about her fingers'.  Although, contradicting the 'pale' effect would be her red robes stirring in the wind like red flames.

1 hour ago, LmL said:

Oh man, could be either. Oily stone is more creepy and magical but fused stone would indicate dragonlords up here building, which I think is likely or at least possible. If there's oily stone in the frozen north, I favor a meteorite in the heart of Winter, for various symbolic reasons. This could be what animates the others with their weird cold version of starfire.

P.S. I'd guess it's fused, since Castle Black is described like the Hightower and the astrological observation tower in Bran's dream as 'windowless'...

I agree with you about the black stone foundation.  The Wall is strong.  The stone is strong.  The seed is strong.  And there's a weirwood embedded into the Wall ('black gate')-- which at Winterfell has been compared to both a stone and a seed -- so I'm willing to bet the meteor as I've said before 'seeded' the weirwood.

 In the Yggdrasil and Merlin myths, the dragon is chained to the tree in a cave at the bottom of the tree (see dragon), and sometimes at the bottom of a well (sea dragon).  There is a well at the Nightfort, isn't there -- the tomb-womb birth canal passage which 'birthed' Sam coming from the 'other side'?  Maybe that's the reason it's called the 'black' gate, due to its black stone/seed foundation.

6 hours ago, Sly Wren said:

The key, therefore, is the black ice. Which, as shown upthread, is tied to the Wall at night. Rhaegar's plate armor is black and specific to him. But Jon's use of "armored in" is not at all specific to plate armor. And the "black ice" is more specific to the Wall than it could ever be to plate armor, regardless of the armor's color.

If anything, I think the "black ice" and its tie to the Wall may be tied to Jon's convo with Sam re: fighting the Others and their armor and weapons earlier in Dance. Perhaps being "armored in black ice" is showing Jon part of some way he can defeat this threat.  Might just be "embrace the Wall and the Watch's original purpose." Might be he needs icy armor like the Others.

ETA: Or, as I noted in the next post to @Voice, this might be a reference to Jon's "armoring" himself in his bastardy. Here, Jon's armoring himself in the Watch and the Wall.

The 'black ice' reminds me of the six Others whom we meet in the prologue who like the Night's Watchmen are termed 'watchers' and whose armor includes reflections of black, white and grey-green ice:

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A Game of Thrones - Prologue

A shadow emerged from the dark of the wood. It stood in front of Royce. Tall, it was, and gaunt and hard as old bones, with flesh pale as milk. Its armor seemed to change color as it moved; here it was white as new-fallen snow, there black as shadow, everywhere dappled with the deep grey-green of the trees. The patterns ran like moonlight on water with every step it took.

...

They emerged silently from the shadows, twins to the first. Three of them … four … five … 

So, with the first, that makes a total of six Others, who mirror the six Children of the Forest whom Bran meets in the cave, and considering their corresponding number makes one suspect a possible relation.  In any case, their names conjure up the same black, white and grey-green color scheme :

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A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

The moon was fat and full. Stars wheeled across a black sky. Rain fell and froze, and tree limbs snapped from the weight of the ice. Bran and Meera made up names for those who sang the song of earth: Ash and Leaf and Scales, Black Knife and Snowylocks and Coals. Their true names were too long for human tongues, said Leaf. Only she could speak the Common Tongue, so what the others thought of their new names Bran never learned.

Ash -- grey

Leaf -- green

Scales -- green? black? white?

Black knife -- sounds very like obsidian or 'black ice' to me

Snowylocks -- white or silver

Coals -- black

@cgrav has something interesting to say about the Wall as a gigantic sedentary Other, implying rather counterintuitively therefore that the Wall shares the same kind of magic as the Others, that is then used to repel the Others:

On 12/14/2016 at 10:03 PM, cgrav said:

Regardless of what/who turns out to have made the first weirwood, I think the Black Gate is an under-discussed mystery, and based on the present discussion, I think it could be tied into the Others. The Wall is almost just a gigantic, highly sedentary Other. The Others are sentient creatures made of magical ice who have bones resembling weirwood... the Wall is made of magical ice and has a sentient weirwood growing right below it, maybe into it? And the Wall is anthropomorphized constantly, as if it had a will of its own. The Others are noted as being like shadows, and the Wall's shadow is mentioned frequently. Our knowledge that the Wall keeps out the Others leads us to believe that it's an oppositional magic, rather than an overpowering form of the same kind.

Perhaps it's like magnets, where like poles repel and unlike poles attract.  The wall, due to its size just happens to have a larger magnetic field than the Others, making it an overpowering rather than oppositional form of magic.

Just as another dragon is sometimes required in order to defeat a dragon -- e.g. Dance of the Dragons; perhaps another 'Other' is sometimes required in order to defeat an Other.

[Sly Wren]

6 hours ago, LmL said:

In regards to "black ice," I view it as a symbol which refers to a couple of things - namely, dragon glass and Valyrian steel. Ned's "Ice" is black (a grey so dark it looks black, like Jon's eyes) - Black Ice. Obsidian is frozen fire - it's black, it's frozen, and it looks a bit like ice itself.  And of course, it is very likely that both dragonglass and V steel kill Others, which is the whole point of Jon's dream of wielding a burning red sword.  

Maybe--but I'm doubting this for a few reasons.

1: Jon sees himself  "armored in black ice BUT his blade burned red in his fist." That "but" suggests it's an odd juxtaposition: the ice he's armored in clashing with his burning blade. Which makes me think that black ice is black ice--either armor like the Others' armor, or a symbol of his embracing his role as a Night's Watch brother.

2: Jon knows what dragonglass looks like--he found that cache, after all. When describing it in the cache, he doesn't mistake that dragonglass for ice. Not even in the dark. He even notes the orange light playing on it.

A length of frayed rope bound the bundle together. Jon unsheathed his dagger and cut it, groped for the edges of the cloth, and pulled. The bundle turned, and its contents spilled out onto the ground, glittering dark and bright. He saw a dozen knives, leaf-shaped spearheads, numerous arrowheads. Jon picked up a dagger blade, featherlight and shiny black, hiltless. Torchlight ran along its edge, a thin orange line that spoke of razor sharpness. Dragonglass. What the maesters call obsidian.  Clash, Jon IV.

But in his dream, no such notation. Instead, earlier in the novel, he's seeing the Wall as black ice.

And you know my take on the burning blade--Jon's never seen Dawn. But he has seen dragonglass.

We won't know until we get more. But given the context we've seen in how Jon uses this language and how this scene is set up in the rest of the novel, seems like that's black ice. And thus no more tied to Rhaegar's black armor than the black ringmail of the Watch. Arguably less tied, seeing as Jon's on that Wall. 

5 hours ago, LmL said:

The custom of handing down Dawn to a worthy Dayne is just that - a custom. Dawn is wielded like a normal sword, so far as we are told - the user is not required to have a certain magic, again, so far as we know. But we DO know that greenseer bloodlines and dragon bloodlines ARE magical, and that they do sometimes permit access to powerful magics will will most likely be needed to confront the Others. Thus, the bloodline issues which are important re: Jon are the magical ones, not the official patrilineal Westerosi inheritance customs or whatever. Furthermore, if Dawn does have a long-forgotten magical purpose (which I think is the most likely case, IF indeed it is to come out and play), then it would make the most sense that it is one of the magical bloodlines which is needed for the wielder.

Fair points. I'm inclined to think the complete uniqueness of Dawn and the complete uniqueness of how it is passed suggest a magical nature. Not unlike "there must always be a Stark in Winterfell" seems like it's just a custom. But without a Stark in Winterfell, Winterfell's getting really cold and a storm seems to be centered around it.

And I agree re: magical bloodlines: but "worthiness" is also crucial.

23 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

The 'black ice' reminds me of the six Others whom we meet in the prologue who like the Night's Watchmen are termed 'watchers' and whose armor includes reflections of black, white and grey-green ice:

And, just as Jon's blade burns red, the Others' blades shimmer blue and their eyes "burn" blue: 

The Other slid forward on silent feet. In its hand was a longsword like none that Will had ever seen. No human metal had gone into the forging of that blade. It was alive with moonlight, translucent, a shard of crystal so thin that it seemed almost to vanish when seen edge-on. There was a faint blue shimmer to the thing, a ghost-light that played around its edges, and somehow Will knew it was sharper than any razor. Game, Prologue.

The Other even examines Waymar's blade before attacking him--like he's looking to see if Waymar (from a house of First Men) has a sword that can stop him. Only after examining Waymar's blade do the Others attack him.

One way or another, the idea that the black ice armoring Jon is tied to the Others' armor some way makes a lot more sense than some other (bad pun) arguments about any tie to Rhaegar. Brings me back to wondering if Rhaegar was trying to copy some ancient text re: black armor. . . . 

27 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

So, with the first, that makes a total of six Others, who mirror the six Children of the Forest whom Bran meets in the cave, and considering their corresponding number makes one suspect a possible relation.  In any case, their names conjure up the same black, white and grey-green color scheme :

Very interesting-- @Black Crow would have some very specific interpretations of your points.

29 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

Perhaps it's like magnets, where like poles repel and unlike poles attract.  The wall, due to its size just happens to have a larger magnetic field than the Others, making it an overpowering rather than oppositional form of magic.

Just as another dragon is sometimes required in order to defeat a dragon -- e.g. Dance of the Dragons; perhaps another 'Other' is sometimes required in order to defeat an Other.

Or a relative--if the theories on Craster's being somehow "Stark" related hold, let alone Nan's story about the Night's King being a Stark put down by his own brother--I could see Jon the bastard Stark needing to be the one to put down the rising Others--the ultimate in inconvenient relatives at Christmas.

And just as Dawn is somewhat like the Others' swords, Jon's being armored like the Others might give him what he needs to stay against them. Somehow.

[LmL]

2 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

Black ice suffused with red fire?  Or black metallic core surrounded by white ice emanating moonlight glow?

Rivers of black ice turning to streaks of red fire, and a dude with black ice armor and a black sword burning red. So yes, black ice and red fire. 

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As something like an additional appendage which is attached to one, and therefore that one carries around with one everywhere one goes, a 'shadow' is basically a sword -- like the Kingsguard shadows of the royals, or Ghost shadowing Jon (he's also directly compared to a sword when Jon stations him as guard to sleep between him and Ygritte), or the shadows of the Others in their shifting tree-camouflage 'like-moonlight-on-water' armor, etc.  In the quote I've provided below, Melisandre and Jon even go on to discuss wielding the sword without a hilt, almost immediately following the remarks on Jon's shadow, thereby linking the two concepts. 

Lightbringer is very much a shadowsword - think of when Stannis's shadow murders Renly. It's called a "shadowsword" twice, and then also "the shadow of a sword that wasn't there." Another line has Theon thinking about how although Ned always treated him kindly, the long dark shadow of his greatsword lay between them. The following are all prime symbols of the Lightbringer meteors: smoke-dark v steel swords, winged shadow black dragons, and the black shadowbaby assassins. And I like how you've described the shadow here is a sword. And if so... Jon needs a sword black as shadow, it would seem.  Of course he also has Ghost, who is a white shadow, and he has a sword with a white wolf pommel... but it's a black sword... which is why Sly Wren and I can go back forth all day debating what color sword Jon is destined to hold, with neither of us being certain. But in this scene you have brought up, to the extent Jon's shadow represents his sword or the sword without a hilt, it's a black sword, but etched in ice. That sounds like black ice again. And of course, Jon dreams of and wishes for a nearly black sword called Ice on several occasions. 

As for the nitty gritty of this scene you have put forward, what I am seeing are symbols of Jon going inside the ice, Jon as the black meteor impregnating the ice. He shadow is projected on to the Wall, coming at the Wall if you will, and etching implies being engraved into the Wall. Jon of course is foreshadowed to go into those ice cells when he dies, and he thinks the ice tunnel under the wall is like a tomb - I would tend to view this is more of that line of symbolism... Jon going into the ice. Being encased in ice. Armored in ice. 

And think about it - if the moon kisses him, then he's also kissing the moon. A black sword, kissing the moon, creating black shadows in the ice... I think you get the idea here. 

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Just like shadows, some swords are more effective weapons than others, as Melisandre points out...'long and dark' vs. 'thin and weak.'  Jon's shadow -- therefore emblematic of the sword he's ultimately destined to both literally carry and figuratively embody -- is gigantic 'twenty feet tall' and dark -- though it's been 'etched by/in moonlight, (rather than sunlight as you've suggested above),  which I've interpreted as a pale luminous glow surrounding the outline of the sword with a dark inner core.  Therefore, it's not technically all 'black ice' but a combination of a black core surrounded by white ice.  Fittingly, a shadow cannot be grasped -- the more one tries, the more it flees and eludes one -- just like 'a sword without a hilt' or magic.

Not sure about that... there is no pale glow in this scene around the shadow. It's a shadow projected on the Wall by moonlight. Ice touched by shadow.. you can make of it what you want but a black core wrapped in white ice will still look black unless the ice is very thick. 

I would say the moonlight and the ice are medium into which Jon is etched. The entire Wall is lit up by pale moonlight, except for where his shadow is etched into it. I hint we are saying the same thing - Jon is a black thing, a shadow or a sword or a shadowsword - encased in ice. 

Mels's quote actually has hidden meaning, I think: "Ice, I see, and daggers in the dark.  Blood frozen red and hard."

Ice she sees - Ned's sword Ice, which is a sword in the darkness, and it's now frozen blood too, being a sword called ice which is now half "waves of blood." Ice is a dagger in the dark - and indeed, a dagger OF darkness - which is also like frozen blood. Now, Sly Wren, don't come along and think I am saying Mel is actually seeing a sword in her vision. I am talking symbolism here. And RR, check out the wordplay - "Ice, I see" -  or maybe "Ice, icy". Ha ha. Icy daggers in the dark. 

Once again I will assert that Ned's sword and Jon are parallel symbols. Black ice, blood and fire (Oathkeeper's pommel flames gold, after drinking the sun's fire (Tywin's forge)). 

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Etching is a process whereby a design is traced into a waxy protective substance overlaying metal, whereafter acid is applied to the parts that have been gouged into the wax by the artist, thereby exposing and eating at the metal beneath.  Thereafter, the 'wax' is removed and ink is applied to the exposed, graven parts, and the excess removed.  Only the impressions take up the ink; the previously wax-protected areas, raised relative to the trace, are not affected.  

Applying the analogy to Jon, we can see that the sword is likely to be possessed of an inky black metallic core surrounded by a sheath of white ice.  The way the shadow is etched into rather than projected onto the Wall means that the sword is encased in the icy armor surrounding it.  Moreover, as he's been kissed by moonlight and not sunlight, I expect him to be a pale blue not red sword!  

Except he dreams of the red sword (a Valyrian steel sword burning red), and the black ice is both times placed in proximity to red fire. Although the pale blue rose in the ice rep[resents Jon's heritage through Lyanna (or however you want to say it), Jon never has the color blue in his symbolism apart from that. My interpretation is much more straightforward - Jon is a sword in the darkness, as are all the black brothers - and if they themselves are swords, they are black swords. Just as the KG are called the white swords. Not coincidentally, the NW fight with black knives, made of dragonglass.  The NW are black swords wielding black knives, and they fight the Others with fire. Just as Jon uses black ice and red fire to fight the Others. 

The only bluish swords we have seen were in the hands of the Others, I don't expect Jon to have one of those.

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The point is Jon won't have identical armor to Rhaegar, since Rhaegar's color symbolism has been transmuted by Jon's mother Lyanna's 'blue rose' symbolism -- the black dragon core surrounded by the icy blue sheath.

Armored in black ice, that's where I get the idea of Jon as AA reborn in an icy sheath. But again, Jon never has any blue to him, apart from the rose in the Wall signifying Lyanna's heritage flowering at the Wall. What I keep seeing with Jon is that Lyanna's contribution was not the blue, but the ice. Targs are black and red, fire and blood the blackness of things burnt by fire. But Jon... his black and red symbolism has been frozen. Black ice and red fire. And like I said, Jon himself is compared to dragonglass on three occasions, most prominently by Stannis who creates a direct analogy between the dragonglass Jon wields and Stannis wielding Jon like a weapon. So... if Jon is a sword, he's black sword, like I said, and I would be very surprised to see any blue fire around him. That would indicate him joining the side of the Others. 

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Am I seeing too many impregnated ice moons for my own good?! 

The fact that George seems to be doing the yin yang thing of the black dot in the white half and vise versa, it makes for a lot of paradoxes, like frozen fire or a burning cold. Lord knows I am very cautious with this stuff and forming tight conclusions about the moons. I think we have been making progress though lately, exploring the fiery heart of ice. 

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Melisandre almost seems to be a sword too, though pale with 'pale sorcerous flames playing about her fingers'.  Although, contradicting the 'pale' effect would be her red robes stirring in the wind like red flames.

Mel is like a weirwood tree, honestly.  There is a lot of red and white pairings, and some of them seem to suggest weirwoods, and some fire, and some both.  That's probably too much of a side branch to RLJ though. 

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P.S. I'd guess it's fused, since Castle Black is described like the Hightower and the astrological observation tower in Bran's dream as 'windowless'...

Fused would indicate dragon people helping to build the Wall, which as I said makes a certain amount of sense. The two places I think we could find oily black stone where we haven't seen it before at the Isle of Faces and the Heart of Winter, wherever that is. 

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I agree with you about the black stone foundation.  The Wall is strong.  The stone is strong.  The seed is strong.  And there's a weirwood embedded into the Wall ('black gate')-- which at Winterfell has been compared to both a stone and a seed -- so I'm willing to bet the meteor as I've said before 'seeded' the weirwood.

I feel like that one time where "on moonless nights, the Wall looked as black as stone" (paraphrase) is a hint about black stone being a part of the Wall - one that came from a moonless night, or a night where we lost a moon. The black stone castles along the Wall basically imply this idea of black stone buried in ice, so an underlying black stone Wall would just carry that imagery forward a bit. We'll have to see. 

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 In the Yggdrasil and Merlin myths, the dragon is chained to the tree in a cave at the bottom of the tree (see dragon), and sometimes at the bottom of a well (sea dragon).  There is a well at the Nightfort, isn't there -- the tomb-womb birth canal passage which 'birthed' Sam coming from the 'other side'?  Maybe that's the reason it's called the 'black' gate, due to its black stone/seed foundation.

The simplest answer is that it's the black gate because it let's black brothers through... but I also think Martin is making a point of inverting things, a white weirwood gate called the black gate, a man called Snow who wears black head to heel, that sort of thing. 

By the way you have to admit Jon being a man in black who is called snow is a pretty nice point in favor of seeing the black mortify as applying directly to Jon. 

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The 'black ice' reminds me of the six Others whom we meet in the prologue who like the Night's Watchmen are termed 'watchers' and whose armor includes reflections of black, white and grey-green ice:

So, with the first, that makes a total of six Others, who mirror the six Children of the Forest whom Bran meets in the cave, and considering their corresponding number makes one suspect a possible relation.  In any case, their names conjure up the same black, white and grey-green color scheme :

Ash -- grey

Leaf -- green

Scales -- green? black? white?

Black knife -- sounds very like obsidian or 'black ice' to me

Snowylocks -- white or silver

Coals -- black

@cgrav has something interesting to say about the Wall as a gigantic sedentary Other, implying rather counterintuitively therefore that the Wall shares the same kind of magic as the Others, that is then used to repel the Others:

Yeah, and once again it is weird that Dany's dragons have those three colors we see on the Others... white, green, and black. That's why I loath color symbolism... it's just so subjective. But yeah, you could take the black shadow component of the Others as a hint about black stone being a part of their makeup... perhaps not literally embedded in each other, but a meteor bringing fire to the heart of winter. But overall, the color white is given preeminence - white walkers, white shadows, etc. 

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Perhaps it's like magnets, where like poles repel and unlike poles attract.  The wall, due to its size just happens to have a larger magnetic field than the Others, making it an overpowering rather than oppositional form of magic.

Again it's worth noting that the Wall boosts magic of a fire sorceress, which seems odd at first. It's a hinge of the world which apparently affects all magic. There are multiple things going on here - it's a hinge of the world which amplifies magic in its proximity, but it also has specific spells laid into it.  Those spells would be directed at specific purposes, so they would probably function differently than whatever regional magical effect the Wall has. It's really hard say exactly how the Wall works, magically. I wonder rid perhaps bringing Craster's son through the Wall might allow the Others to pass.... who knows. 

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Just as another dragon is sometimes required in order to defeat a dragon -- e.g. Dance of the Dragons; perhaps another 'Other' is sometimes required in order to defeat an Other.

Well, if Jon is a black ice symbol, that's essentially pitting frozen fire vs. burning ice.  They are very much inverted parallels. Dragonglass and valyrian steel are both frozen fire, because they were molten things which were cooled and hardened to make black weapons will kill Others.  The Others are ice that burns, ice that has a burning quality to it, as if ice could be set on fire with cold fire, or as if the Others swallowed fire and turned it cold. So it is ice vs fire, but much more. Frozen fire vs. burnin ice. 

 

1 hour ago, Sly Wren said:

Maybe--but I'm doubting this for a few reasons.

1: Jon sees himself  "armored in black ice BUT his blade burned red in his fist." That "but" suggests it's an odd juxtaposition: the ice he's armored in clashing with his burning blade. Which makes me think that black ice is black ice--either armor like the Others' armor, or a symbol of his embracing his role as a Night's Watch brother.

It's definitely an ice / fire juxtaposition - one could argue that is essentially what Jon is - but I do not see how that leads to conclude that black ice must mean this or that. I mean it's pretty simple - Jon is a sword, and he can only be a black sword, as he wears black all the time and is the lord of castle black. If he's armored in black ice, that means he's a black ice sword, from a certain perspective. And again, he lusts after a (nearly) black sword called Ice. A Valyrian steel sword... just like the Valerian steel sword which burned red in his fist in that dream. 

And then you have the other scene with Jon and black ice, where the black ice literally turns to streaks of red fire. You can't decouple black ice and red fire, imo. 

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2: Jon knows what dragonglass looks like--he found that cache, after all. When describing it in the cache, he doesn't mistake that dragonglass for ice. Not even in the dark. He even notes the orange light playing on it.

Come on, now you are being silly. Of course I am not suggesting Jon or anyone mistakes dragonglass for ice. That doesn't make sense. I said that black ice is a symbol which I believe refers to both Valyrian steel and dragonglass, for all the reasons I laid out. 

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A length of frayed rope bound the bundle together. Jon unsheathed his dagger and cut it, groped for the edges of the cloth, and pulled. The bundle turned, and its contents spilled out onto the ground, glittering dark and bright. He saw a dozen knives, leaf-shaped spearheads, numerous arrowheads. Jon picked up a dagger blade, featherlight and shiny black, hiltless. Torchlight ran along its edge, a thin orange line that spoke of razor sharpness. Dragonglass. What the maesters call obsidian.  Clash, Jon IV.

But in his dream, no such notation. Instead, earlier in the novel, he's seeing the Wall as black ice.

What quote are you referring to? The only "black ice" mention with the Wall I am aware of refers to the streaks of meltwater running in the cracks of the ice - those are the "rivers of black ice" which turn to streaks of red fire. I would further correlate this to Ned's sword again, black Ice, which has "waves" of night and blood.  

To be clear, I am not even suggesting Jon will have any kind of magical armor at all. I mean, he would look great in Euron's Valyrian steel plate, but that's neither here nor there. I tend to look at the armor as slightly more symbolic - I like you notion of embracing the cold of the Watch and using it as a weapon or as armor, and like I said, the Wall is kind of like Westeros's ice armor. I think the main things it implies is Jon being frozen, while at the same time having a component of fire to his nature... and of course I hint the black ice implies Jon as a dragonglass dagger - again, symbolically - meaning that Jon is the ultimate weapon against the others, as dragonglass is, and as Valyrian steel probably is. 

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And you know my take on the burning blade--Jon's never seen Dawn. But he has seen dragonglass.

We won't know until we get more. But given the context we've seen in how Jon uses this language and how this scene is set up in the rest of the novel, seems like that's black ice. And thus no more tied to Rhaegar's black armor than the black ringmail of the Watch. Arguably less tied, seeing as Jon's on that Wall. 

I just look at it as an appropriate echo of rhaegar's armor, really - it's black ice because Jon is a frozen dragon. But given that many links exist between black ice and Valyrian steel (imo), there is an additional tie to Rhaegar's black steel armor. And you have to admit, Euron's armor would look good on Jon...

[Ygrain]

A little note: if the ice Wall is built on an original structure of black stone, cannot this foundation be obsidian? Obsidian blade dispells the Others' magic, the Wall stops their magic entirely. Seems like the same thing to me, only magnified.

 

13 hours ago, Sly Wren said:

Jon doesn't think he was "wearing black plate armor made of ice." He thinks "he was armored in black ice." No mention of plate or mail or rings or bones or bronze or leather or wicker or all of the other things people are armored in throughout Jon's POVs. He's "armored in black ice."

You're still going too literally. The point is that an ice armour, or whatever way you put it, resembles a full plate, not chain mail etc. Plates, or layers, if you will, of smooth hard material.

 

[velo-knight]

5 hours ago, Ygrain said:

A little note: if the ice Wall is built on an original structure of black stone, cannot this foundation be obsidian? Obsidian blade dispells the Others' magic, the Wall stops their magic entirely. Seems like the same thing to me, only magnified.

Brilliant! I wonder if any other black stone buildings are actually obsidian. It definitely seems like a good candidate for the Wall.

5 hours ago, Ygrain said:

 

You're still going too literally. The point is that an ice armour, or whatever way you put it, resembles a full plate, not chain mail etc. Plates, or layers, if you will, of smooth hard material.

 

This. To be honest, sometimes I think we go too many layers deep in trying to puzzle out how the books will end and what the bigger meaning is, and that's what a lot of the Dayne fascination seems to be built on to me.