Unowned lands and keeps

[Lord Varys]

2 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Tyrion handing out land and lordship as promise for help making good on his claim.

Clear enough I'd say.

Hey, I can offer you a lordship and gold, too. Tyrion is selling lies to a guy who has no idea how Westeros works. Words are wind.

Not to mention that his entire enterprise is dependent on Daenerys - or another ally of Tyrion's - sitting the Iron Throne. Without that he is never going to take and keep Casterly Rock, and if he has connections to the monarch - or serves Hand - he certainly can get hand lordships to people.

Even the Nestor Royce example doesn't include a lordship as such. Littlefinger gives him a castle, not a lordship. Lordships are only granted by the king.

[dsjj251]

On 7/7/2018 at 9:48 AM, Lord Varys said:

Hey, I can offer you a lordship and gold, too. Tyrion is selling lies to a guy who has no idea how Westeros works. Words are wind.

Not to mention that his entire enterprise is dependent on Daenerys - or another ally of Tyrion's - sitting the Iron Throne. Without that he is never going to take and keep Casterly Rock, and if he has connections to the monarch - or serves Hand - he certainly can get hand lordships to people.

Even the Nestor Royce example doesn't include a lordship as such. Littlefinger gives him a castle, not a lordship. Lordships are only granted by the king.

We dont actually know if Little Finger grants him a "lordship" , as Keeper, he already had the title of Lord. 

This is one of those questions where no one actually has a concrete answer, all of the examples given are vague(Nestor Royce) or are the result of war and treason(Brightwater Keep/Harrenhal).

 

The only thing we can safely say based on rebellions is that the crown and great lords can take away lands without asking for consent from the other(Harrenhal, Castamere, Tarbeck).

 

We dont actually have an example of being told who can grant lordship and who cant. If a knight can make a knight, it seems logical that a lord can make a lord.

 

Stannis and Davos seems to be the best example of this, but then again, that is vague as well. 

[Universal Sword Donor]

On 7/7/2018 at 5:58 AM, Lord Varys said:

Why did Mace Tyrell need King Joffrey to grant Brightwater to Garlan if he could have done that himself? Why do only kings promise lordships as rewards? Why do we only see kings raising men to lordships? Why do we see only kings attaint lords?

Probably because that land isn't his to grant? Now land in his demesne, I don't really see why he couldn't.

The gift/new gift obviously is NW land, hence FNR's comment on Ned needing consent. I fail how to see a lord of Harrenhal couldn't install a new lord at the abandoned holdfast near God's Eye Town (assuming it's theirs to give). Land owed directly to the crown or having reverted to it would obviously be under the wary eye of the throne.

[Lord Varys]

2 minutes ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

Probably because that land isn't his to grant? Now land in his demesne, I don't really see why he couldn't.

The entire Reach *belongs* to House Tyrell in the sense that they are the lords paramount and liege lords of the Mander. Aegon the Conqueror granted them all the lands and incomes, etc. previously owned by House Gardener.

In that sense, surely all the Lords of the Reach live in 'the demesne' of House Tyrell, no? where is the difference in the relationship between House Rowan, say, and some petty lord directly sworn to House Tyrell living in the neighborhood of Highgarden?

I mean, both the Rowans and such a petty house owes House Tyrell fealty, right?

Yet, Mace Tyrell can neither atteint Lord Alester Florent himself, nor grant his lands to his son, Garlan, He needs the Iron Throne for that. Despite the fact that Alester Florent betrayed his liege lord, Mace Tyrell.

2 minutes ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

The gift/new gift obviously is NW land, hence FNR's comment on Ned needing consent. I fail how to see a lord of Harrenhal couldn't install a new lord at the abandoned holdfast near God's Eye Town (assuming it's theirs to give). Land owed directly to the crown or having reverted to it would obviously be under the wary eye of the throne.

The fact is that no lord ever offers to make somebody else a lord, despite the fact that many a lord might have reason or motivation to do so. I mean, Littlefinger could make all his goons lords both in the Vale and the Riverlands if he as lord could make lords. Roose could grant the Freys and other loyal men lordships in the North without going through King Tommen. And so on.

This never happens. The only authorities who offer and are seen men who presume to be kings - Joffrey, Cersei (acting as Queen Regent in the name of her children), Stannis.

[McGuv19]

On 8/19/2017 at 9:01 AM, TMIFairy said:

A man could make a point that eliminating a Lordly House and creating a new Lordly House are two different things

IIRC the Reyne and Tarbeck lands were annexed and added to Lannister Lands, hence no activation of the "create new Lordly House"  procedure.

Thinking about it, the Crown having a say over the creation of new Landed Knightly/Masterly Houses would be micro-management not possible in a "quasi Medieval" environment.

Here I could imagine the Starks possibly having something to say about Lord Manderly creating landed Knight House no.103. But I really do not see the Crown as stooping that low.

Back to Reyne and Tarbeck lands - technically/legally Tyiwn handing them out to Landed Knights would again be under the Crown's radar?

As Master/Knight does not have the right to "pits and gallows" I can imagine that having too many Master/Knightly Houses could become an administrative burden. Especially for "he who passes the sentence swings the sword micromanagment freaks" - think of Ned riding out to behead NW deserters ... at a certain point he would spend all his time on the road meting out capital punishment sentences.

 

Tywin does actually end up giving Rolph Spicer the ruins of Castamere

[Lion of the West]

1 hour ago, McGuv19 said:

Tywin does actually end up giving Rolph Spicer the ruins of Castamere

Welcome, necromancer! What brings you to Westeros?

The thing with Tywin is that, if I recall, he is acting as Hand of the King so his actions there wouldn't really tell us much of what he can do when he is "only" Lord Paramount.

[hnv]

15 hours ago, McGuv19 said:

Tywin does actually end up giving Rolph Spicer the ruins of Castamere

Well the question is under what capacity he does so, The King's Hand or the Lord Paramount. I suspect he did so on behalf of the Crown. 

There are actually quite a few interesting constitutional questions here that as a lawyer I find interesting. My assumption is that the creation of titles like lord\warden is wholly in the hands of the Crown as the Fount of Honour\fons honoroum (similar to the British Crown with Letters of Patent). while Knighthood or Landed Knighthood possible for Paramount lords and maybe even lesser lords. On the other hand When Ned tells Bran that he will hold an holdfast in the future it seems that the Stark lord can decide on making him lord bran of holdfast X without the Crown's consent. But maybe he's giving it as family property and not creating a new house. 

Now Property is never truly vacant as there is always someone who can claim remote link. But politically it could happen, or the property could stand empty until the right prescribes. In that case I assume the Crown is the residual heir of all property, maybe the Crown is the heir in Trust (similar to statutes of the magne carte). In the real world this actually increased the power of the British Crown and Germanic emperors quite a lot, and if it were the case I would assume the small council would have a custodian to the Crown's property as an office holder (or maybe a chief adviser to the master of coins)

 

I wanted to write the legal aspects of the Westrosi system for a while but can't find the spare time

[Piero Orson]

I use this topic to ask a question too, but this time about Essos unowned lands. If we use this map from the Atlas of Ice and Fire, even if it's fan work the creator brings consistency to it, we can see that a lof of lands are...not claimed. Are they petty andals and rhoynars settlements in the western part of the continent ? Are each free city territory much larger and touching other territories ?
 

[Loose Bolt]

I assume that major problem in western Essos are Dothraki raids. Or any settlement would either be very well hidden and lucky to stay hidden or strong enough that those possible raiders stop long enough that people living in those places had time to give mandatory "gift". After all it seems to me that most khalasars are running protection business and most of free cities are their "customers".

[Piero Orson]

We know that Omber kindgoms survive by paying tribute to the dothraki (And it's pretty much everything we know about them.) Probably the western essos settlement who are under one of the free cities leadership survive because of the gift offered by the cities. If Volon therys is considered a town in western Essos, that let us imagine how many smaller settlement exist in each free city territory.

[hnv]

On 5/25/2019 at 12:01 AM, Piero Orson said:

I use this topic to ask a question too, but this time about Essos unowned lands. If we use this map from the Atlas of Ice and Fire, even if it's fan work the creator brings consistency to it, we can see that a lof of lands are...not claimed. Are they petty andals and rhoynars settlements in the western part of the continent ? Are each free city territory much larger and touching other territories ?
 

The bigger question is how they feed everyone in Essos? There's seems to be minimal agriculture on Essos, hardly any crofts, yet the cities flourish with trade. 

[Jaak]

On 5/26/2019 at 10:36 AM, hnv said:

The bigger question is how they feed everyone in Essos? There's seems to be minimal agriculture on Essos, hardly any crofts, yet the cities flourish with trade. 

Tyrion does hear of tillers and toilers in Flatlands of Pentos.