Did the First Men bring horses over?

[Free Northman Reborn]

6 hours ago, Prof. Cecily said:

I'm not so sure of that. Maester Luwin seemed to think otherwise.

A Game of Thrones - Bran VII

Ah yes. Thanks for finding the quote I was thinking about. Consider however that Luwin has no first hand knowledge of the skinchanging abilities of the Children. I have difficulty believing that mages who can wear the skin of any beast that walks, crawls or flies would fear a domesticated animal such as a horse.

[Prof. Cecily]

No worries!

[Helikzhan]

20 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Well sure, anything could have happened 12000 years ago. My point is that when you said the Dothraki look just like northerners with a tan, that is wrong. It would be like saying Spanish people look like tan Chinese people, which they don't.

You're operating under the assumption of two things.

1. Starks / First Men descendants don't have a version of the fold - judging by depictions of Eddard Stark I'd say this is inaccurate.

2. Dothraki are mongols by comparison. Almond eye shapes are better described as a subdivision of Pan-Asian than mongol which is too broad a comparison.  

I'll admit saying that Northerners and Dothraki only had a tan between them was a hamfisted observation. There are probably differences beyond skin color but not many.  

 

12,000 years is easily more than enough time for genetic variation and genetic favoritism to change a people.  

[Free Northman Reborn]

42 minutes ago, Helikzhan said:

You're operating under the assumption of two things.

1. Starks / First Men descendants don't have a version of the fold - judging by depictions of Eddard Stark I'd say this is inaccurate.

2. Dothraki are mongols by comparison. Almond eye shapes are better described as a subdivision of Pan-Asian than mongol which is too broad a comparison.  

I'll admit saying that Northerners and Dothraki only had a tan between them was a hamfisted observation. There are probably differences beyond skin color but not many.  

 

12,000 years is easily more than enough time for genetic variation and genetic favoritism to change a people.  

The issues with this theory are legion. And the danger is that by listing them all, the proponent of the theory can hone in on those that are open to at least some level of debate, however small, and by opening those issues up to even a sliver of doubt, however unlikely, create the impression that the theory as a whole holds water. Which it doesn't.

To start with, this discussion has taken a weird turn whereby the need seems to have been created to disprove the idea that the First Men and Dothraki share a common origin. Instead, the burden of proof for such an unlikely claim should be on the person who is trying to convince others that there is indeed such a common link. Picking rather general commonalities such as a relatively large physique, relatively dark hair and the domestication of horses is not sufficient, for these are characteristics found in a multitude of cultures across Essos and the world.

There is no hint of a common origin for these peoples. What is overlooked is that ancient Essos was a vast continent, filled with a multitude of tribes and peoples spread over millions of square miles. The First Men could have originated from any of these founding tribes. Besides, the Dothraki don't even originate from the Dothraki Sea. They originally came from east of the Bone Mountains, around the lands where the Joghos Nai reside today. And this Dothraki migration to the grasslands of central Essos only occurred thousands of years after the First Men had left Essos and colonized Westeros.

So no, the Dothraki and First Men do not share a common origin, unless you perhaps go back to the time when the first humans emerged from Sothoryos, if we assume a similar evolutionary path as our species is believed to have taken on our own planet Earth.

[Helikzhan]

5 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

There is no hint of a common origin for these peoples. What is overlooked is that ancient Essos was a vast continent, filled with a multitude of tribes and peoples spread over millions of square miles. The First Men could have originated from any of these founding tribes. Besides, the Dothraki don't even originate from the Dothraki Sea. They originally came from east of the Bone Mountains, around the lands where the Joghos Nai reside today. And this Dothraki migration to the grasslands of central Essos only occurred thousands of years after the First Men had left Essos and colonized Westeros.

 

I'll focus here as this is what you're really getting at. 

 

The green sea is the green sea. Irrespective of what corner they spawned in they took ownership of the green sea and continued a legacy going back to the time of the FM. As time goes on people take on the shape of whatever region they own. The Eurasian (hint in the title) steppes are a perfect example of this. All Pan-Asian groups bear a strikingly similar appearance because even though they reside in different corners they had to cross those regions and intermingle at times. That would shape them similar. It's almost like an assembly line. The parts may have come in as square pegs of plastic but they leave the belt the same way the circle pegs of plastic do. 

Nothing on earth suggests that people trekked across the Sahara and wound up strikingly different within the same group. For example the Aryan race connects many subdivisions of Caucasians in many areas of the world. It's not like some odd breed of Mongol crossed the Caucus mountains and bore a strikingly different appearance to all others in that journey. Aryans for that reason are all very similar. Different skin colors, slightly different facial features but largely the same animal. Africans look almost nothing like Caucasians because they're far removed from the natural selection window Eurasians endured. 

Thus it's readily evident that climate shapes all people. Their skin, their eyes, their hair and all sorts of other physical differences arise from this shaping. Where we are different on planet earth is in our most extreme destinations. The Celts to the far north, the Asians to the far east, the Africans to the far south and the Caucasians to the far west. Thus it's far easier to say people became different at the end of their journey but were more alike at the start. I would say those in central Essos were / are very similar. They likely endured some differences in the Bone Mountains but they've held the green sea a good time, too. 

 

And finally, almond shaped eyes are not owned wholly by Mongols. There are snow white Caucasian people with almond shaped eyes. Again I urge you to take depictions of Eddard Stark seriously. 

[Helikzhan]

Maybe I should explain something I think might be missing here about genetic variation and natural selection.

It's said that the eye fold to make almond shaped eyes can occur in both Mongols and Europeans. This means the DNA can randomly produce one or the other. There is a bias to create one over the other but it's not a guarantee. Like anything else in your genetic makeup it can be different in some way from your kin. This is genetic variation. If something is possible from the combination of DNA then it can happen.

Natural Selection is a process where conditions of nature favor one genetic variation over another. Such as the case where circular eyes were favored in a dark climate. Not so much that nature favored but that nature ceased to punish the circular eye. So those with circular eyes would live long enough to breed and proliferate. Almond shaped eyes would still be around but would become the less dominant outcome. Africans probably have tons of genetic variations occur but the African climate does not tolerate them for long.

So in the case of the FM they came over looking like the Dothraki look today or pretty damn close. 12,000 years later they look the part of the territory they've owned. Some of their more common features have changed but it's the same people.

One last case to make is to take a look at Haley Bennett. Very Caucasian but with almond eyes.