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Heresy 196 and a look at the Wall


Black Crow

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1 hour ago, Brad Stark said:

Or men were there sooner.   Except Moat Catlin,  we don't have any large structure potentially built by the Children.   It wouldn't be out of character for the Children waving a magic wand and making The Wall appear if they had that power, but carrying blocks and building by hand is out of character.  And why would they want the Wall except to defend against men?

Really don't see Moat Caillin being built by the Children, as I said in the last thread all that the association does is underline that the place goes back well before 1189

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1 hour ago, Black Crow said:

Really don't see Moat Caillin being built by the Children, as I said in the last thread all that the association does is underline that the place goes back well before 1189

I didn't mean to suggest it was.  I just meant to suggest the Children don't build much of anything.  We have the story about calling down the hammer of waters from the Children's tower, so I mentioned it as a possible counterexample. 

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10 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

I didn't mean to suggest it was.  I just meant to suggest the Children don't build much of anything.  We have the story about calling down the hammer of waters from the Children's tower, so I mentioned it as a possible counterexample. 

I think its fair to say that we don't have any indications that the tree-huggers build anything outside of nature, but that's not to stop them standing on top of the highest thing for a very great many miles around B)

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My point is I am convinced The Wall involved both Children and men working together.   Men could not work the magic involved without the Children and Children would not build anything like that on their own.  

This almost certainly implies a group of men fighting with the Children against another group of men.  This calls into question the timelines,  as men weren't that far north in great numbers before the pact.

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I also want to mention a slight problem with the Night's King's story.  He was 13th Lord Commander, so if the Watch was formed in response to The Long Night and the Others,  he and his men would be very familiar with the threat of Others.  Maybe they never saw a female Other,  but still would not be open to anything looking like either a wight or Other.  Craster own mother was shot at approaching the Wall.  The story implies unfamiliarity with The Others,   as if The Wall and Watch were already there and she was the first Other. 

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3 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

I also want to mention a slight problem with the Night's King's story.  He was 13th Lord Commander, so if the Watch was formed in response to The Long Night and the Others,  he and his men would be very familiar with the threat of Others.  Maybe they never saw a female Other,  but still would not be open to anything looking like either a wight or Other.  Craster own mother was shot at approaching the Wall.  The story implies unfamiliarity with The Others,   as if The Wall and Watch were already there and she was the first Other. 

Other-ness is a relative term and the source of much confusion early on in the story as to what defines the other.  That would be anyone who is not 'us', doesn't hold the same beliefs, customs or allegiances.  Melisandre defines the Great Other as the soul of ice contesting with the heart of fire.  The men of the watch define the others as the wildlings.  I think the early watchmen did know the about the others as white walkers since they either received or traded for obsidian with the CotF and it seems likely to me that that the wildlings have their own oral tradition concerning the Others as well; some of which we hear in Old Nan's tales.  It's Dalla who tells Jon that the horned lord warned that sorcery was a sword without a hilt vis-a-vis Joramun's horn and curiously it's also something that Marwyn tells Sam.  (Not to mention again the Wall is also a shaped like a sword without a hilt.)

I think this is where we get into the Andalization of the Night's Watch; it's true history suppressed and replaced.

To go back to Black Crow's comment on the children's tower as the tallest natural point in the land, what could that be?  Certainly a mountain peak.  Just the name Joramun's Horn calls to mind the Matterhorn, sometimes referred to as the Mountain of Mountains.  

https://www.alpinejournal.org.uk/Contents/Contents_2006_files/AJ 2006 189-190 Peck Matterhorn.pdf  

Or is the Wall itself Joramun's Horn; the tallest peak horizontal across the land?

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A Dance with Dragons - Jon IV

As they did their count, Jon peeled the glove off his left hand and touched the nearest haunch of venison. He could feel his fingers sticking, and when he pulled them back he lost a bit of skin. His fingertips were numb. What did you expect? There's a mountain of ice above your head, more tons than even Bowen Marsh could count. Even so, the room felt colder than it should.
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A Dance with Dragons - Jon VI

Jon frowned in disbelief. "That's … queer."
"You think so?" She knelt and scratched Ghost behind his ear. "Your Wall is a queer place, but there is power here, if you will use it. Power in you, and in this beast. You resist it, and that is your mistake. Embrace it. Use it."

 

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13 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

Classic heresy?

I don't remember the details of it myself; but it could be argued that the Wall also serves to protect what remains of the greenseers and their weirwoods beyond the God's Eye.  While the efforts to get Bran beyond the Wall are somewhat suspicious; I do think he is in danger of his life if he remained at Winterfell or hidden elsewhere.  Ramsey Bolton et al the biggest threat and this seems to be born out by Coldhands who wants the world to think him dead so so nobody comes looking for him. 

The idea that the Wall is a sword  across the landscape calls to mind the Kings if Winter in the crypts, with their swords lain across their knees; the sign that you are not welcome; denied guest rights and in peril of your life as we see with Robb when Tyrion visits.  

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3 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

The story implies unfamiliarity with The Others,   as if The Wall and Watch were already there...

While I don't believe it to be the most likely scenario, I do think it's possible that the Watch and the Nightfort were already around by the time of the LN, and that the battle against the Night's King and the Long Night were one and the same.

If the Black Gate and Nightfort had actually been established during the Pact in order to divide the lands of the CotF from the lands of men, with the WW functioning as guardians of the Haunted Forest, then we might interpret the Night's King as a rogue agent who necessitated a human-CotF alliance, with the Watch as we currently know it being established in the aftermath of his downfall.

Again, I don't believe it's the most plausible chronology, but it is something I've considered in light of the show's adaptation choices.

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4 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

I also want to mention a slight problem with the Night's King's story.  He was 13th Lord Commander, so if the Watch was formed in response to The Long Night and the Others,  he and his men would be very familiar with the threat of Others.  Maybe they never saw a female Other,  but still would not be open to anything looking like either a wight or Other.  Craster own mother was shot at approaching the Wall.  The story implies unfamiliarity with The Others,   as if The Wall and Watch were already there and she was the first Other. 

Like most of Old Nan's stories there are ambiguities which may be significant, or which may simply reflect a looseness in GRRM's writing.

The number 13 may be significant, or GRRM may simply like it. 13 heroes set out to find the Children of the Forest of which only one last hero survived to meet them. Was the 13th Lord Commander the 13th man to hold that office, or was he the 13th and last hero?

The white lady is at best ambiguous. At first sight she sounds as if she might be a white walker, but that would be a total contradiction of the theory that on seeing her the horn would have been blown thrice. No-one else from Will up the Tree on downwards has any difficulty in recognising walkers. Furthermore there's an internal contradiction in the story in that having set her up as his queen and ruled for 13 years [that number again] its discovered that they have been sacrificing to the Others, or to run it past again: It was discovered that having married an Other and ruled for 13 years, Lord and Lady Macbeth had been sacrificing to the... Others.

 

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40 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

The number 13 may be significant, or GRRM may simply like it. 13 heroes set out to find the Children of the Forest of which only one last hero survived to meet them. Was the 13th Lord Commander the 13th man to hold that office, or was he the 13th and last hero?

We find the number for 2 others occasions, and beyond the Wall. 

- First time with Chett's plot : in fact, it is not 13, but 14, and Chett think and explain that 14 is a good number to succeed their plot. Chett and his "co-ploters" want quit the Watch, but they don't want to be hunted, so they plot to kill the LC and some of his lieutenants and riders who could hunt them (+ Sam just as a revenge for Chett). The purpose is = escaping a hunt. 

- Second time : the survivors from the FIst's battle who are coming back to Castle Black are at the end 13 : 12 + Sam. Litteraly, these 13 have escaped a wild hunt. 

 

5 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

I also want to mention a slight problem with the Night's King's story.  He was 13th Lord Commander, so if the Watch was formed in response to The Long Night and the Others,  he and his men would be very familiar with the threat of Others.  Maybe they never saw a female Other,  but still would not be open to anything looking like either a wight or Other.  Craster own mother was shot at approaching the Wall.  The story implies unfamiliarity with The Others,   as if The Wall and Watch were already there and she was the first Other. 

And perhaps all the story is simply false because there is a taboo on the real story. 

Leaf, in ADWD, says once that ravens and crows could speak in the past. We have in the saga the Varys' mute little birds, and the Euron's Crow-Eyed mutes also, with his ship "the Silence". I think that's a lot of "birds" who can no more speak. And if they speak - as LF or Sansa - they don't tell the truth. 

For me, those are clues that the real story of the Wall, the Watch, "beyond the Wall", the Others, aso was just hidden, and nobody could tell it, except the greenseers and the weirwoods, of course. But if the greenseers keep the secret...

 

3 hours ago, LynnS said:

The idea that the Wall is a sword  across the landscape calls to mind the Kings if Winter in the crypts, with their swords lain across their knees; the sign that you are not welcome; denied guest rights and in peril of your life as we see with Robb when Tyrion visits.  

And they have left their hand/fist beyond the Wall ^^

4 hours ago, LynnS said:

Or is the Wall itself Joramun's Horn; the tallest peak vertical across the land?

Or, as we theorize that Lightbringer is in fact a metaphor for a real character (Jon Snow), why Joramun's horn couldn't be also a real character ? 

 

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2 hours ago, GloubieBoulga said:

Or, as we theorize that Lightbringer is in fact a metaphor for a real character (Jon Snow), why Joramun's horn couldn't be also a real character ? 

 

I think Joramun is real character and king beyond the wall who joined with the Stark IN Winterfell to defeat the Night's King.  We are seeing this replay with Jon as king beyond the wall; the one who unites the clans, replacing Mance in that capacity, and Bran as the Stark IN Winterfell via the heart tree. Further I think that the Mormonts by way of the female line are descendents of Joramun.   I think he is the 'horned lord' whether that refers to the horned moon, the antlered god and/or the one who possesses the actual horn or winter (Sam's broken horn); I think he is thrice named horned lord.       

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One thing I have always wondered. If the Children helped build the Wall to guard against the Others, then why by the Old Gods are they on the wrong side of it?

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3 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

One thing I have always wondered. If the Children helped build the Wall to guard against the Others, then why by the Old Gods are they on the wrong side of it?

We're told that they fled north to escape the Andal persecution and perhaps so that people would think they were dead and nobody would come looking for them. . 

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38 minutes ago, LynnS said:

We're told that they fled north to escape the Andal persecution and perhaps so that people would think they were dead and nobody would come looking for them. . 

So they fear humanity more than the Others? Hmmmm.

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1 hour ago, LynnS said:

We're told that they fled north to escape the Andal persecution and perhaps so that people would think they were dead and nobody would come looking for them. . 

Something else to think about here [and its not a new point] is that the Andals, as we know, never conquered the North, yet the Three-fingered Tree-huggers and the other Old Races found no sanctuary there either but had to keep on going beyond the Wall

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2 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

So they fear humanity more than the Others? Hmmmm.

I'm not sure about the origin of the white walkers or their purpose or what is trapped beyond the curtain of light.  Consider Syrio Forel's words to Arya:

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A Game of Thrones - Arya II

 

"—needle," Arya finished for him, fiercely.

"Just so. Now we will begin the dance. Remember, child, this is not the iron dance of Westeros we are learning, the knight's dance, hacking and hammering, no. This is the bravo's dance, the water dance, swift and sudden. All men are made of water, do you know this? When you pierce them, the water leaks out and they die." He took a step backward, raised his own wooden blade. "Now you will try to strike me."

Seems to me that this is exactly what happens when Sam kills the White Walker, known in these parts as Ser Puddles.  Melisandre refers to the Great Other as the soul of ice and we know that she takes some bit of Stannis' soul when she makes a shadowStannis.  The white shadows seems to be souls fully converted to ice or removed from their flesh and made into ice.    Not only that, Craster's wives refer to them as the brothers.  So far we haven't heard any tales of the wildlings specifically being molested by the WW's.  Although men of the watch have been disappearing and Coldhands, once a man of the watch, is most concerned about the white shadows rather than the wights.   When Leaf tells Bran that 'they' killed him long ago; I think it's possible that 'they' are the WW's.  Why would the men of the watch be targeted?

In Waymar's encounter with the WW's, he is mocked by his opponent.  Waymar is also an Andal by blood.  I found this interesting bit in the World Book:

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The World of Ice and Fire - The Iron Islands: The Black Blood

Archmaester Hake tells us that the kings of House Hoare were, "black of hair, black of eye, and black of heart." Their foes claimed their blood was black as well, darkened by the "Andal taint," for many of the early Hoare kings took maidens of that ilk to wife. True ironborn had salt water in their veins, the priests of the Drowned God proclaimed; the black-blooded Hoares were false kings, ungodly usurpers who must be cast down.

This calls to mind the notion that the Watch has been tainted with the overthrow of the Night's King and replacement by the Andals. When you join the watch your blood is black.  Craster bears a heavy curse:

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A Clash of Kings - Jon III

 

"Good. Craster's Keep is just ahead. If the gods are good, he'll let us sleep by his fire."

Sam looked dubious. "Dolorous Edd says Craster's a terrible savage. He marries his daughters and obeys no laws but those he makes himself. And Dywen told Grenn he's got black blood in his veins. His mother was a wildling woman who lay with a ranger, so he's a bas . . ." Suddenly he realized what he was about to say.

Is Dywen's father and Andal?  What about Craster?

Quote

A Storm of Swords - Jon III

 

"Craster weds his daughters," Jon pointed out.

She punched him again. "Craster's more your kind than ours. His father was a crow who stole a woman out of Whitetree village, but after he had her he flew back t' his Wall. She went t' Castle Black once t' show the crow his son, but the brothers blew their horns and run her off. Craster's blood is black, and he bears a heavy curse." She ran her fingers lightly across his stomach. "I feared you'd do the same once. Fly back to the Wall. You never knew what t' do after you stole me."

Does this curse have anything to do with Sherrit's curse?

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A Storm of Swords - Bran IV

 

Jojen gazed up at him with his dark green eyes. "There's nothing here to hurt us, Your Grace."

Bran wasn't so certain. The Nightfort had figured in some of Old Nan's scariest stories. It was here that Night's King had reigned, before his name was wiped from the memory of man. This was where the Rat Cook had served the Andal king his prince-and-bacon pie, where the seventy-nine sentinels stood their watch, where brave young Danny Flint had been raped and murdered. This was the castle where King Sherrit had called down his curse on the Andals of old,

I think the curse is called down because the Andals interfered with the Watch's true purpose or alliance with the wildliings and the Cotf. I think the Watch was meant to protect the old gods and that their 'sacrifices' have something to do with providing greenseers.  When that purpose was subverted or tainted; the white shadows become the alternate watch with the men of the Watch as the enemy.

Craster's son's are conscripted for that purpose, a curse called down on the Andal blood; but I think the newborn babes are taken by the wildlings of Whitetree to raise before conversion to white shadows.

I think it's significant that the oath of the watch was changed to say that a man of the watch would have no family and bear no children.  I don't think the original watch had any such restriction and this served a purpose of some kind.  When you say the new words of the watch; your blood is tainted, whatever obligation the watch had in producing children removed.  Craster now serves that purpose and the Andals of old pay with their own 'blood' and their own children.  They must now serve to protect the old gods in place of the watch.

End of tinfoil....

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On 3/1/2017 at 8:57 AM, LynnS said:

Or the magic is applied to an existing structure at it's base perhaps to the foundation ice whatever height that may have been.  But yes, it's not an effective barrier if you take hundreds of years to build it.  Why bother building it at all;  if the spell  is the only defensive requirement?  Where is the workforce to build such a thing?  

 

 
Spells are woven into it and locked beneath the ice perhaps fixing ice to stone.  Great lore raised it:  accumulated knowledge or beliefs held by a group about a subject, especially when passed from generation to generation by oral tradition. Archaic knowledge. We're also given to understand that this particular lock has a key embodied in the horn of winter.  :
 

       

 

The physicality of the Wall was meant to keep the people who were aligned with or who were also practicing ice magic contained. If they did happen to escape south of the Wall they would be unable to work magic there, and they would be killed on sight by the "shield", namely the Starks of Winterfell.

 

On 3/1/2017 at 11:57 PM, Lord Wraith said:

Apparently this is the case which would make a great deal more sense.

So when the Watch was strong they kept making the wall high, or so it is said.

 

One thing I have always mystified me that the Watch has existed for thousands of years (or so it is said). We know that when Aegon landed (300 years ago) there were 10,000 men on the wall. What has happened since the rise of the Targaryens in Westeros to drop the numbers of the Night's Watch from 10,000 to under 1,000?

 

I too have deep suspicions regarding the Targaryens. Like you say the Watch used to be 10,000 strong until Aegon the Conqueror arrived. And in 300 years the Watch has dwindled to less than a thousand. I also have my suspicions regarding Bloodraven. He was the Lord Commander on the Wall and yet he left of his own accord to seek out the Children. Why? Here are some facts: the Watch has diminished, the Starks and their heirs are removed from Winterfell. The white walkers have returned and an army of the dead assembled. Perhaps the Wall will come down next and the Others will have free access to march down upon the realms of man. Seems like a deliberate plan to me.

 

On 3/2/2017 at 6:18 AM, GloubieBoulga said:

<snip> As we are with the Wall, I would like to note some parallelisms with other walls. I think to the walls in Essos, with Daenerys. All that follows is speculative (but based on the text, of course) : 

- The walls of the city in Red Waste : 

These white walls enclose a white empty city, a "city of bones" or a city of dead, a tomb. Curiously, the khalasar can find good food and water here and Daenerys is tempted by staying in this sweet tomb. Staying little time give forces, but staying to long could just give death. 

- The walls of Qarth : 

I always wonder about these 3 walls and I suspect they are telling a particular story. I have no answer yet, but we can note some elements : the animals could be a transposition of "blazes" of Westeros (not exactly blazes but representativ animals, I mean) : snakes for Dorne, kites for Vale (and perhaps also the stag of Baratheon, because in french a kite is a bird of prey but also a "cerf-volant" - cerf = stag - and in french royal mythology, linked to the wild hunt, the stag wears very often wings), fishes for Riverlands, red wolves for the North (and also the Lannister, I suspect, Stark and Lannister both are linked to predators and the red is a Lannister's color), and elephants instead mammouths for beyond the Wall. 

The middle wall wear the colors of Winterfell, "grey granite", and is associated with very violents war's scenes ("clash of swords", it remains nothing ?^^). The slaughters scenes themselves recalls some westerosis wars : "arrows in flught" => I think to BR killing Daemon Blackfyre and his sons; "babes being butchered" => babies Aegon and Rhaenys with Gregor and Amory Lorch; "heroes at battle" => Rhaegar and Robert at the Trident (this isn't an exhaustive example ^^); pyres of the dead => pyre of Rhaegar. For me, the idea is that the first reason of Winterfell was a war, and same reason for the Wall. And a war between humans, not a war against CotF, or Giants, nor the legendary Long Night.

But curiously, the black color of the 3rd wall representing men and women making love could be a Long Night too : a bit disturbing, no ? Ok, let's speculate there is also a love story at the origins of the Wall and Winterfell. 

In one word, where the white walls of Vaes Tolorro could represent the Wall as a tomb, the 3 walls of Qarth could be a metaphor for the story of the Wall (and Winterfell, because the 2 are linked). 

 

- Let's have a look to Astapor's walls : 

this time, all the city is a wall, in the text : the "red brick" is really all over. 

Daenerys expresses several times that Astapor's bicks are made with blood, and effectively, the Unsullied are the result of many horrible sacrifices. In the same chapter, Dany evokes with Jorah Mormont the sack of Kingslanding, and in Daenerys 4th chapter (ASOS), Astapor will be sacked too. Further, Astapor's story continues in great violence, with a Butcher king and a Whore queen (with perhaps the wordplay worm/whore), and finally the destruction by fire and sickness. 

<snip>

 

 

I think what Dany see in the walls of Qarth are symbolic of the history of Westeros with each wall representing an age. The outer wall is how Westeros was before man arrived with the land full of a variety of exotic animals and plenty. The second wall represents the wars that came with the arrival of the First Men, Andals, and Rhoynar, and the killing of the Children. The black wall represents the depravity of man at the expense of all the wonder that was there in the beginning. 

Astapor's blood-red bricks laid by slaves is a parallel to the Wall. The red dust contains blood and its blowing in the wind. We might conclude that the reason why magic has returned is because the Wall is slowly disintegrating. It's literally blowing away. The "blood" magic that is contained in the Wall is swirling in the cold winds and exiting through the underground tunnels. It's found an exit at Winterfell where it's manifested as a blizzard.

 

On 3/2/2017 at 6:54 AM, LynnS said:

@RavenousReader  I think 3rd eye observations are important and it does make a connection to the Wall.  I'd add Bran's visions of various locations on Planetos, the Wall, Braavos, Vaes Dothrak, Asshai focus in on places of power and sorcery.  So Jon's observation of the glacier like the Wall is telling us something about the Wall.  Indeed it is a river of ice with all the connotations relating to time or perhaps even things that are frozen in time.

I'm inclined to abandon the idea that magic was applied to an existing ice sheet in favor of fixing glaciers instead but whatever the situation, I think the CotF used the natural resources available to them growing glaciers along a predetermined line of defense.  You could consider the curtain of light from Bran's vision;  a wall without the ice .  It is a ward that Bran can see with the 3rd eye with something similar woven into the Wall with ice growing along it's course.   This is the great lore that Melsandre refers to - the woven light.  I think Dany sees something similar in the HoB&W when she describes the woven carpet she travels along the great hall.  A magic carpet in other words. LOL 

If the Wall can be likened to a living thing; then it's heart is a heart tree but I'm torn as to whether this is the weirwood at the Black Gate or the weirwood at Whitetree.  This is the only weirwood tree that we have seen so far with a mouth to receive offerings bloody or otherwise and the Black Gate itself is a mouth that opens to consume whomever passes.  

 

My stumbling block with the glacier idea is that I don't expect glaciers to end abruptly on the back side. The shape of the Wall is a wall. A glacier should taper off on one end...shouldn't it?

 

22 hours ago, Black Crow said:

Like most of Old Nan's stories there are ambiguities which may be significant, or which may simply reflect a looseness in GRRM's writing.

The number 13 may be significant, or GRRM may simply like it. 13 heroes set out to find the Children of the Forest of which only one last hero survived to meet them. Was the 13th Lord Commander the 13th man to hold that office, or was he the 13th and last hero?

The white lady is at best ambiguous. At first sight she sounds as if she might be a white walker, but that would be a total contradiction of the theory that on seeing her the horn would have been blown thrice. No-one else from Will up the Tree on downwards has any difficulty in recognising walkers. Furthermore there's an internal contradiction in the story in that having set her up as his queen and ruled for 13 years [that number again] its discovered that they have been sacrificing to the Others, or to run it past again: It was discovered that having married an Other and ruled for 13 years, Lord and Lady Macbeth had been sacrificing to the... Others.

 

 

I saw the movie The Great Wall the other night, which is based upon a Chinese mythological story about how their Great Wall was built to guard against the Tao Tai, which are based upon the real mythological taotie. The Great Wall is manned by The Nameless Order (No one!) The Tao Tai creatures were released from the mountains by a meteor that landed. When it landed the people saw a green glow where the meteor hit, either seeding or releasing the Tao Tai. Every 60 years the Tao Tai attack and feed on humans. They have a Queen who needs to be fed by her followers. Two men, played by Matt Damon and Pedro Pascal, are attacked by a scout Tao Tai and Matt Damon is able to kill one and bring it's hand/claw to the Lord Commander. (Har! where have we read that before!) In any case, I wonder if the Tao Tai mythology was created based on the Otherization of the various invaders that the Great Wall was said to have been built to guard against? It also should be pointed out that not only was the Great Wall a defensive barrier, it was also used to help defeat and expand borders! Who's to say that the Wall wasn't actually built to expand the realms of men by pushing the Children north?

 

11 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

One thing I have always wondered. If the Children helped build the Wall to guard against the Others, then why by the Old Gods are they on the wrong side of it?

 

6 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

So they fear humanity more than the Others? Hmmmm.

 

I think you are seeing some of the same things I am seeing, that the Targaryens seem connected to the decline of the Watch.

 

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On 2017-03-02 at 7:18 AM, GloubieBoulga said:

I have no more time to comment, but I wonder if there isn't here a foreshadowing for the "beast taking wings" "in a smoking tower", or also the doom of the Wall who liberate all its water and... huh

 

I'm not sure about the beast taking wing from a smoking tower or what that represents but I do think that the Wall is a reservoir of magic as well as a dam or weir and that power can be used as Melisandre tells Jon. 

To back to the previous idea that Jon is AA; the crypts of Winterfell are called to mind; the line of succession represented by the kings of winter in their tombs and the statues of Brandon Sr. and Lyanna:

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They were almost at the end now, and Bran felt a sadness creeping over him. "And there's my grandfather, Lord Rickard, who was beheaded by Mad King Aerys. His daughter Lyanna and his son Brandon are in the tombs beside him. Not me, another Brandon, my father's brother. They're not supposed to have statues, that's only for the lords and the kings, but my father loved them so much he had them done."  GoT Bran VII

I'm not really buying Ned's explanation to Bran about the statues because what precedes it is a lie.  His grandfather wasn't beheaded by Aerys. I think what we are seeing with the inclusion of Bran Sr. and Lyanna's statues is the line of succession if they had lived.  In Lyanna's case, she is a stand-in for Jon; the one whose true name can't be spoken.  This also implies that Jon is older than Rob and that's Jon's father would have taken precedence in the line of succession over Ned and his progeny.  As Ned says there are some secrets that are too dangerous to tell even to the ones you love.   I'd go further and say that Jon is a great bastard someone with royal blood.

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A Game of Thrones - Jon VIII

When Jon had been Bran's age, he had dreamed of doing great deeds, as boys always did. The details of his feats changed with every dreaming, but quite often he imagined saving his father's life. Afterward Lord Eddard would declare that Jon had proved himself a true Stark, and place Ice in his hand. Even then he had known it was only a child's folly; no bastard could ever hope to wield a father's sword. Even the memory shamed him. What kind of man stole his own brother's birthright? I have no right to this, he thought, no more than to Ice. He twitched his burned fingers, feeling a throb of pain deep under the skin. "My lord, you honor me, but—"

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A Storm of Swords - Jon II

He flexed the burned fingers of his sword hand. Longclaw was slung to his saddle, the carved stone wolf's-head pommel and soft leather grip of the great bastard sword within easy reach.

     

 

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29 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

I saw the movie The Great Wall the other night, which is based upon a Chinese mythological story about how their Great Wall was built to guard against the Tao Tai, which are based upon the real mythological taotie. The Great Wall is manned by The Nameless Order (No one!) The Tao Tai creatures were released from the mountains by a meteor that landed. When it landed the people saw a green glow where the meteor hit, either seeding or releasing the Tao Tai. Every 60 years the Tao Tai attack and feed on humans. They have a Queen who needs to be fed by her followers. Two men, played by Matt Damon and Pedro Pascal, are attacked by a scout Tao Tai and Matt Damon is able to kill one and bring it's hand/claw to the Lord Commander. (Har! where have we read that before!) In any case, I wonder if the Tao Tai mythology was created based on the Otherization of the various invaders that the Great Wall was said to have been built to guard against? It also should be pointed out that not only was the Great Wall a defensive barrier, it was also used to help defeat and expand borders! Who's to say that the Wall wasn't actually built to expand the realms of men by pushing the Children north?

I have to say that the scriptwriters appear to have been rather heavily influenced by the writings of a Mr Martin of our acquaintanceship rather than the other way around

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