Re-read: Wildings are the Others

[Tucu]

20 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

I agree that the rustle of leaves, the icy rush of the stream, and the wind all could be interpreted as the True Tongue, but I currently don't believe the Children of the Forest are part of this new awakening of white walkers and wights. The Children helped defeat the Others and warded their magic into the Wall. I understand that many readers suspect Bran is behind the return of the Others, but I think it's due to the removal of the wards that has allowed magic to return. Somehow this warding has been removed, magic was released, and I suspect Euron had something to do with that, because Damphair has a bad memory of a squeaky, iron hinge opening. IMO Euron is Bloodraven's (and now Bran's) opposing force, and that is why we see parallels. There could be another greenseer under Whitetree allied with the wildlings, but since Bloodraven sits underground and Euron walks the earth, I for one don't really expect another greenseer underground other than Bran. Euron is the crow's eye seeing all from high above, and the gods of water and wind are behind his power - and since water and wind are his gods, perhaps these noises are coming from powers connected to him?

I have a different hypothesis about the Others: the weirwoods/CoTF messed up the seasons and triggered the Long Night; the plan backfired as the resource wars of First Men also hit them. They created the WW and raised wights to survive; after years of struggle they wanted peace and establish an alliance with the Last Hero. The Last Hero and his people got peace and access to the CoTF caves until the end of the Long Night; the CoTF got a Wall made of blood sacrifices to replace the lands lost after the Pact of the Isles of Faces was broken. The legend of the evil Others was created to hide the actions of the weirwoods/CoTF and to reduce the number of men wanting to live north of the Wall.

Back in the present, someone or something reactivated the forces behind the Long Night and the alliance of weirwoods/CoTF and some group of First Men is needed once more to ensure survival.

[Melifeather]

46 minutes ago, Tucu said:

I have a different hypothesis about the Others: the weirwoods/CoTF messed up the seasons and triggered the Long Night; the plan backfired as the resource wars of First Men also hit them. They created the WW and raised wights to survive; after years of struggle they wanted peace and establish an alliance with the Last Hero. The Last Hero and his people got peace and access to the CoTF caves until the end of the Long Night; the CoTF got a Wall made of blood sacrifices to replace the lands lost after the Pact of the Isles of Faces was broken. The legend of the evil Others was created to hide the actions of the weirwoods/CoTF and to reduce the number of men wanting to live north of the Wall.

Back in the present, someone or something reactivated the forces behind the Long Night and the alliance of weirwoods/CoTF and some group of First Men is needed once more to ensure survival.

Well if Maester Luwin told it true the Pact held through the Long Night and didn't end until after the Andals came:

  “The Pact began four thousand years of friendship between men and children. In time, the First Men even put aside the gods they had brought with them, and took up the worship of the secret gods of the wood. The signing of the Pact ended the Dawn Age, and began the Age of Heroes.”

  Bran’s fist curled around the shiny black arrowhead. “But the children of the forest are all gone now, you said.”

  “Here, they are,” said Osha, as she bit off the end of the last bandage with her teeth. “North of the Wall, things are different. That’s where the children went, and the giants, and the other old races.”

  Maester Luwin sighed. “Woman, by rights you ought to be dead or in chains. The Starks have treated you more gently than you deserve. It is unkind to repay them for their kindness by filling the boys’ heads with folly.”

  “Tell me where they went,” Bran said. “I want to know.”

  “Me too,” Rickon echoed.

  “Oh, very well,” Luwin muttered. “So long as the kingdoms of the First Men held sway, the Pact endured, all through the Age of Heroes and the Long Night and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, yet finally there came a time, many centuries later, when other peoples crossed the narrow sea. 

  “The Andals were the first, a race of tall, fair-haired warriors who came with steel and fire and the seven-pointed star of the new gods painted on their chests. The wars lasted hundreds of years, but in the end the six southron kingdoms all fell before them. Only here, where the King in the North threw back every army that tried to cross the Neck, did the rule of the First Men endure. The Andals burnt out the weirwood groves, hacked down the faces, slaughtered the children where they found them, and everywhere proclaimed the triumph of the Seven over the old gods. So the children fled north—”

 

Maester Luwin didn't get to finish, because this is where a raven brought news of Ned's death, but I noticed Luwin didn't say the Children fled north of the Wall - just "north", so it is plausible that they only moved north of the Neck after the Andals came, and didn't move beyond the Wall until Harren the Black built Harrenhal. I am going to insert my belief that the Pact was officially broken when the north didn't protect them from Harren, and the Children had to resort to fire magic by summoning the Targaryens.

 

[Tucu]

24 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

Well if Maester Luwin told it true the Pact held through the Long Night and didn't end until after the Andals came:

  “The Pact began four thousand years of friendship between men and children. In time, the First Men even put aside the gods they had brought with them, and took up the worship of the secret gods of the wood. The signing of the Pact ended the Dawn Age, and began the Age of Heroes.”

  Bran’s fist curled around the shiny black arrowhead. “But the children of the forest are all gone now, you said.”

  “Here, they are,” said Osha, as she bit off the end of the last bandage with her teeth. “North of the Wall, things are different. That’s where the children went, and the giants, and the other old races.”

  Maester Luwin sighed. “Woman, by rights you ought to be dead or in chains. The Starks have treated you more gently than you deserve. It is unkind to repay them for their kindness by filling the boys’ heads with folly.”

  “Tell me where they went,” Bran said. “I want to know.”

  “Me too,” Rickon echoed.

  “Oh, very well,” Luwin muttered. “So long as the kingdoms of the First Men held sway, the Pact endured, all through the Age of Heroes and the Long Night and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, yet finally there came a time, many centuries later, when other peoples crossed the narrow sea. 

  “The Andals were the first, a race of tall, fair-haired warriors who came with steel and fire and the seven-pointed star of the new gods painted on their chests. The wars lasted hundreds of years, but in the end the six southron kingdoms all fell before them. Only here, where the King in the North threw back every army that tried to cross the Neck, did the rule of the First Men endure. The Andals burnt out the weirwood groves, hacked down the faces, slaughtered the children where they found them, and everywhere proclaimed the triumph of the Seven over the old gods. So the children fled north—”

 

Maester Luwin didn't get to finish, because this is where a raven brought news of Ned's death, but I noticed Luwin didn't say the Children fled north of the Wall - just "north", so it is plausible that they only moved north of the Neck after the Andals came, and didn't move beyond the Wall until Harren the Black built Harrenhal. I am going to insert my belief that the Pact was officially broken when the north didn't protect them from Harren, and the Children had to resort to fire magic by summoning the Targaryens.

 

The Pact lasting for thousands of years always sounded weird to me. We know of only one battle between the Andals and the CoTF: the one in High Heart. It is also difficult to explain the absense of CoTF in the North given that was free from Andal invasions. I take that as another one of the lies of the ancients.

[Melifeather]

22 hours ago, Tucu said:

The Pact lasting for thousands of years always sounded weird to me. We know of only one battle between the Andals and the CoTF: the one in High Heart. It is also difficult to explain the absense of CoTF in the North given that was free from Andal invasions. I take that as another one of the lies of the ancients.

This is why I believe the Children remained in the Riverlands  north of the Neck until Harren the Black cut down “forests of weirwoods” to build Harrenhal, and why I suspect the Pact was considered broke right before the dragons came. If there were still forests of weirwoods until Harren cut them down, then the Children still had places to live.

 

Edited: I should revise my statement that I believe the Children remained in the Riverlands until Harren the Black drove them out, and then they fled north of the Neck.

[kissdbyfire]

21 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

This is why I believe the Children remained in the Riverlands north of the Neck

Do you mean in the Riverlands south of the Neck? 

[Melifeather]

40 minutes ago, kissdbyfire said:

Do you mean in the Riverlands south of the Neck? 

Yes, you are right. How sloppy of me. I was imagining the Trident as being the dividing line running parallel within the Neck, but after reviewing the map it more or less runs at an angle through and below the Neck. I should revise my statement that I believe the Children remained in the Riverlands until Harren the Black drove them out, and then they fled north of the Neck.

I was actually doing additional work on the theory of this OP today, and part of what I was working on includes my belief that the Starks may have taken Winterfell by conquest from another tribe of First Men closer to the time when the Andals migrated to Westeros and brought iron. The theory is based on the symbolic nature of the King in the North's crown, which consists of a bronze circlet surrounded by nine iron swords which hints that the iron defeated and wards the bronze. If true it could explain why the Children didn't settle happily in the north protected by Starks, but rather found their refuge north of the Wall.

[Melifeather]

Adding an observation regarding blowing the Horn of Winter.

Recall the story of the 13th Lord Commander who became the Nights King. The King Beyond the Wall joined forces with the Lord of Winterfell to defeat him. Right now Ramsay Snow-Bolton is the Lord of Winterfell. Technically he is Jon's brother, because they share the same bastard last name: Snow. Mance is the King Beyond the Wall, and he's currently at Winterfell. This situation is a near direct man to man parallel, except the Pink Letter claims the King Beyond the Wall is hanging in a cage. Is that how it really went down thousands of years ago? Did the wildlings cooperate with the Lord of Winterfell, because he had their King in a cage? It's interesting to wonder about.

The King Beyond the Wall thousands of years ago was named Joramun, and he supposedly blew the Horn of Winter, waking giants from the earth. What or who were these giants? My personal opinion is that he woke the dead, but did he wake the dead north of the Wall, or were they the dead down in the crypts of Winterfell? Did Joramun's horn blowing help the Lord of Winterfell defeat the Nights King by drawing him to Winterfell, thus causing the rest of the Watch to rise against him? Was he a victim of a mutiny like Jon Snow? 

The current free folk believe Joramun's horn can blow the Wall down. Why would they think that if history says it woke giants? Maybe because blowing the Wall down doesn't mean the physical Wall would crumble, but rather that the Lord Commander would fall from power.

So, back to Mance and Ramsay. How would the Horn of Winter come into play this time around against Jon? Jon was the Lord Commander and he was stabbed - maybe to death. Did the horn get blown after all?

[kissdbyfire]

But Ramsay isn’t the Lord of Winterfell. Not really. His wedding to fArya is a farce, and even the Old Gods know. 

All around them lights glimmered through the mists, a hundred candles pale as shrouded stars. Theon stepped back, and Ramsay and his bride joined hands and knelt before the heart tree, bowing their heads in token of submission. The weirwood’s carved red eyes stared down at them, its great red mouth open as if to laugh. In the branches overhead a raven quorked.

[Guest]

I find the idea that the Wildings are the Others fascinating. If they are, then Jon has already broken the primary reason for the Wall, the Black Brotherhood, and everything about the traditional North by bringing them through the Wall - invited! If this is true, the Wall has already fallen. BUT that is also why I have a problem with it, if the Wildings are the Others, then why do they all act as if they are not the Others - and the Others are the Wights (and friends) created, directly and indirectly, by the CoTF?

Interesting, very interesting - but so many questions.

[Melifeather]

On 4/2/2019 at 4:41 AM, Guest said:

I find the idea that the Wildings are the Others fascinating. If they are, then Jon has already broken the primary reason for the Wall, the Black Brotherhood, and everything about the traditional North by bringing them through the Wall - invited! If this is true, the Wall has already fallen. BUT that is also why I have a problem with it, if the Wildings are the Others, then why do they all act as if they are not the Others - and the Others are the Wights (and friends) created, directly and indirectly, by the CoTF?

Interesting, very interesting - but so many questions.

Welcome! I had missed your reply, because you posted as a guest. You should complete a profile and join the many interesting discussions on this forum!

Mance Raydar became the King Beyond the Wall, because he presented the various tribes and clans with his big idea: how to get through the Wall by manufacturing a threat. If the wildlings can convince the Watch that they are not the Others, then they might be able to convince them to allow them through the Wall.

Over the last 8000 years the Watch has forgotten who the enemy is and nobody discusses why the wildlings are there in the first place. They trade with the wildlings and the men of the Watch occasionally take wildling lovers and sometimes accept their bastard sons and raise them to become members of the Watch themselves. This is how Mance came to be man of the Watch. He was raised on the Wall. 

I agree the Wall is already "breached" and I suspect we'll see white walkers and wights south of the Wall very soon and maybe even inside Winterfell, but I also think the Wall is disintegrating and blowing away, and that is why there's such a terrible blizzard.

[Melifeather]

I'm going to drop a theory inside this theory and make a prediction:

Since I think Jon Snow will become the Nights King reborn and that I suspect the Children are trying to undo history to right a past wrong, I think one of the major things that needs to occur is to return Winterfell to it's original family - and it ain't the Starks, but it ain't the Boltons either. It's some wildling family and I have a feeling that it might be the Thenns.

Alys Karstark seems to be a stand-in for both Arya and the Starks. Recall that the Karstarks are a cadet branch of House Stark and descendants  of Karlon Stark. Alys's marriage to the Magnar of Thenn seems to be an inverted repeat of the historical marriage between the Lord Commander and the "Other". The Lord Commander was a bastard brother to the Lord of Winerfell and he married a wildling woman known historically as the "Corpse Queen". Reversing that event could entail that the female would be a "Stark" from south of the Wall and "sister" to the Nights King. The groom would be a male wildling descended from the original family of Winterfell who I posit were the Thenns.

I wonder if there actually weren't any white walkers during the Long Night? The Thenns and the other families that supported them were "otherized" in order to justify what the Starks did to them. Then the stories grew in the telling and they became the monsters. 

When Mance met Dalla she must have told him that white walkers could actually be manufactured with magic. Why not bring to life the caricatures and become like the creatures in the tales in order to breach the Wall?

[Bael's Bastard]

White Walkers, identical to those said to have come during the Long Night, clearly exist today. So any theory that suggests there were no WW during the LN, or that the LN is just propaganda about enemies that were just regular men, doesn't hold up. It might be an interesting theory if the books hadn't acquainted us with actual WWs and wights.

[Melifeather]

On 7/14/2019 at 11:33 PM, Bael's Bastard said:

White Walkers, identical to those said to have come during the Long Night, clearly exist today. So any theory that suggests there were no WW during the LN, or that the LN is just propaganda about enemies that were just regular men, doesn't hold up. It might be an interesting theory if the books hadn't acquainted us with actual WWs and wights.

I was just spitballing, because clearly magic was being practiced and the Wall was built to contain that magic. The reason why white walkers and dragons have reappeared is because magic is seeping from the Wall. The wards woven into the structure are ancient and threadbare.

[Melifeather]

Copying in some relevant posts from Heresy:

The story about the wildlings not kneeling has to do with them deciding not to follow the son, because he was not like his father. If history is undoing itself, then this time the wildlings will follow the son, because he is like his father - even though he knelt. Kneeling to Stannis would also be the opposite of what happened historically with the son.

Quote

Sigorn was the first to kneel before the king. The new Magnar of Thenn was a younger, shorter version of his father—lean, balding, clad in bronze greaves and a leather shirt sewn with bronze scales. 

Alys believes Karhold will yield to her and Sigorn's 200 Thenns. 

Sigorn may have signaled his intent: 

Quote

ADWD - Jon V

"You want more food?" asked Jon. "The food's for fighters. Help us hold the Wall, and you'll eat as well as any crow." Or as poorly, when the food runs short.

A silence fell. The wildlings exchanged wary looks. "Eat," the raven muttered. "Corn, corn."

"Fight for you?" This voice was thickly accented. Sigorn, the young Magnar of Thenn, spoke the Common Tongue haltingly at best. "Not fight for you. Kill you better. Kill all you."

The raven flapped its wings. "Kill, kill."

Sigorn's father, the old Magnar, had been crushed beneath the falling stair during his attack on Castle Black. I would feel the same if someone asked me to make common cause with the Lannisters, Jon told himself. "Your father tried to kill us all," he reminded Sigorn. "The Magnar was a brave man, yet he failed. And if he had succeeded … who would hold the Wall?" He turned away from the Thenns. "Winterfell's walls were strong as well, but Winterfell stands in ruins today, burned and broken. A wall is only as good as the men defending it."

An old man with a turnip cradled against his chest said, "You kill us, you starve us, now you want t' make us slaves."

A chunky red-faced man shouted assent. "I'd sooner go naked than wear one o' them black rags on my back."

JNR had some observations that I quite agree with in this post.

Alys Karstark is symbolically Jon Snow's sister. The Karstarks are Starks founded by a younger brother, Karlon Stark. Jon's real sister, Arya, has become "no one" which is symbolically "dead". The combination of the two represent the Other that married the Nights King. To support the idea that Alys Karstark is the Corpse Queen reborn, I found this:

Quote

 

ADWD - Jon X

Jon turned to Alys Karstark. "My lady. Are you ready?"

"Yes. Oh, yes."

"You're not scared?"

The girl smiled in a way that reminded Jon so much of his little sister that it almost broke his heart. "Let him be scared of me." The snowflakes were melting on her cheeks, but her hair was wrapped in a swirl of lace that Satin had found somewhere, and the snow had begun to collect there, giving her a frosty crown. Her cheeks were flushed and red, and her eyes sparkled.

"Winter's lady." Jon squeezed her hand.