The wealthiest family by region before AGOT

[Corvo the Crow]

2 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

Cat notes how prosperous the Green fork is  There would be more now; the summer had been long and peaceful. North of here the kingsroad ran along the Green Fork of the Trident, through fertile valleys and green woodlands, past thriving towns and stout holdfasts and the castles of the river lords.

Just the quote I was referring to about towns. Again, Riverlands have several notable towns and not all have been ravaged by war; Lannisters never went as far as Seagard and Fairmarket, for example. Frey lands were also not affected that much by the war but they didn't have any notable town to begin with, at least not that we've been told of in the entirety of the saga, the spin-off novellas, the World book and even the maps in any of these or Lands of Ice and Fire.

 

2 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

not actually correct, while there are 6 lords declarant that army is not raised from just 6 Houses.  

"Bronze Yohn mistrusts me." Petyr pushed a log aside."He means to come in force. Symond Templeton will join him, do not doubt it. And Lady Waynwood too, I fear."

 "And Lord Belmore, Young Lord Hunter, Horton Redfort. They will bring Strong Sam Stone, the Tolletts, the Shetts, the Coldwaters, some Corbrays."

honestly, I am genuinely surprised you of all people did not know this. That 20k came from 9 Houses and an unknown amount of Corbrays, not just 6. 

Did't Lyn come on his own? After all he is the heir trying to undermine his brother so he'll have a small escort at most. As for Shetts, Coldwaters and Tolletts , they are all Royce bannermen so I didn't add them to the count on purpose. Templetons, Hunters, Redforts, Waynwoods and Belmores would all have their own vassals, it's just that they wouldn't be powerful enogh on their own to be worth mentioning and in fact we have just the example of it with Hardyngs, despite being Waynwood vassals, not being in that list.

 

Good point on TWOIAF quote, I have missed that.

 

Oh and on Lannisters, Tywin had 3000 men and 500 knights at the start of Reyne-Tarbeck Rebellion and he was prepared for it. This number would also include men from Lannisport as it is less than a mile away.

[BlackLightning]

2 hours ago, Dorian Martell's son said:

The mountain clans mostly. They have a great love for the Ned hence why they march with Stannis on his mission to free the north from the Iron Born and Rescue Arya Poole. 

Exactly. This is the ultimate plot of the story as foreshadowed in the prologue of Game. 

This has been a running theme over all 5 books 

I get that.

But no, I'm not just talking about the mountain clans. Some of these soldiers - outside of the ones belonging to the Karstarks and the Boltons - seem to be coming from the western parts of the North: the Barrowlands, the Rills, Torrhen's Square and the Stony Shore.

Because the North has always been portrayed as if it has both low population in general terms and low population density.

It doesn't make sense to me. The North should be completely bereft of any soldiers - in other words, men in their prime - who aren't sworn to the Boltons, the Karstarks, the Manderlys, the houses of the Neck (i.e. Reed) and Stannis. Every other soldier should be boys, old men and the women who willing to pick up a sword and shield.

2 hours ago, Dorian Martell's son said:

Exactly. This is the ultimate plot of the story as foreshadowed in the prologue of Game. 

This has been a running theme over all 5 books 

I think you're misunderstanding me. When I say the Others and their zombies should overrun the North, I mean overrun. As in Walking Dead "we don't know what the hell is happening, we're practically helpless, just trying - and mostly failing - to survive" overrun. No grand epic battles. No daring action-hero missions. None of it.

No matter how it goes, Stannis' campaign, the War of the Five Kings and whatever the hell it is that the Weeper is planning will have bled the North completely dry.

All potential for Northern resistance should die when the Night's Watch and the Wall falls. Castles will be manned by skeleton crews if at all. And said skeleton crews will be powerless to defend said castles from both zombies and magical ice demon elves. Like they might as well leave the castle gates open and unlocked.

White Harbor's status as a world-class port city will come in handy but it'll end up imploding before long. Think Hardhome from the TV show but 3x worse because there will be 3x as many people.

Winterfell is the only hope of the North (given Mance's obsession with the place and how everyone seems to harp on how important it is for a Stark to rule in Winterfell) and that's still temporary, best case scenario.

But considering the likelihood that Littlefinger, our very own agent of chaos (who also happens to have financially ruined the realm), will be there...temporary won't be good enough because he'll find a way to fck it all up just because Brandon Stark and then his doofy little brother got the girl.

Like I don't see any big fights with the Others happening until they get past the Neck or across the sea into Braavos.

We probably should get back on topic LOL 

[Free Northman Reborn]

3 hours ago, Jabar of House Titan said:

I get that.

But no, I'm not just talking about the mountain clans. Some of these soldiers - outside of the ones belonging to the Karstarks and the Boltons - seem to be coming from the western parts of the North: the Barrowlands, the Rills, Torrhen's Square and the Stony Shore.

Because the North has always been portrayed as if it has both low population in general terms and low population density.

It doesn't make sense to me. The North should be completely bereft of any soldiers - in other words, men in their prime - who aren't sworn to the Boltons, the Karstarks, the Manderlys, the houses of the Neck (i.e. Reed) and Stannis. Every other soldier should be boys, old men and the women who willing to pick up a sword and shield.

I think you're misunderstanding me. When I say the Others and their zombies should overrun the North, I mean overrun. As in Walking Dead "we don't know what the hell is happening, we're practically helpless, just trying - and mostly failing - to survive" overrun. No grand epic battles. No daring action-hero missions. None of it.

No matter how it goes, Stannis' campaign, the War of the Five Kings and whatever the hell it is that the Weeper is planning will have bled the North completely dry.

All potential for Northern resistance should die when the Night's Watch and the Wall falls. Castles will be manned by skeleton crews if at all. And said skeleton crews will be powerless to defend said castles from both zombies and magical ice demon elves. Like they might as well leave the castle gates open and unlocked.

White Harbor's status as a world-class port city will come in handy but it'll end up imploding before long. Think Hardhome from the TV show but 3x worse because there will be 3x as many people.

Winterfell is the only hope of the North (given Mance's obsession with the place and how everyone seems to harp on how important it is for a Stark to rule in Winterfell) and that's still temporary, best case scenario.

But considering the likelihood that Littlefinger, our very own agent of chaos (who also happens to have financially ruined the realm), will be there...temporary won't be good enough because he'll find a way to fck it all up just because Brandon Stark and then his doofy little brother got the girl.

Like I don't see any big fights with the Others happening until they get past the Neck or across the sea into Braavos.

We probably should get back on topic LOL 

You are misinformed. The North has a population of millions. 20,000 dead men represent significantly less than 1% of that total.

There are plenty of men left in the North.

[Bernie Mac]

7 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Just the quote I was referring to about towns. Again, Riverlands have several notable towns and not all have been ravaged by war; Lannisters never went as far as Seagard and Fairmarket, for example. Frey lands were also not affected that much by the war but they didn't have any notable town to begin with, at least not that we've been told of in the entirety of the saga, the spin-off novellas, the World book and even the maps in any of these or Lands of Ice and Fire.

Fair enough, but a town or town in the Frey land don't have to be notable to make a decent amount of turnover on top of the huge arable and fertile lands they rule as well as the bride. I imagine they are the wealthiest in the riverlands for a multitude of reasons.

7 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

 

Did't Lyn come on his own? After all he is the heir trying to undermine his brother so he'll have a small escort at most. As for Shetts, Coldwaters and Tolletts , they are all Royce bannermen so I didn't add them to the count on purpose.

But the Coldwaters and Tolletts are actually Lords (capital L), with clearly defined castles and lands and vassals of their own. Both are mentioned a couple of times in the history of the Vale.  They are significant, just their Lord, Royce, is more so. After Hightower he is probably the next most powerful vassal in Westeros. 

What I like about Royce is that this is a Lord, in contrast to Hightower who just rules a big blob of land, whose territories are scatted everywhere in the vale much like most lords did in the medieval era. 

7 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

 

Templetons, Hunters, Redforts, Waynwoods and Belmores would all have their own vassals, it's just that they wouldn't be powerful enogh on their own to be worth mentioning and in fact we have just the example of it with Hardyngs, despite being Waynwood vassals, not being in that list.

The Hardyng's have never been mentioned as actually being Lords, or for that matter Waynwood vassals. They may be a House of landed knights, they may even be the Waynwood's version of the Cassell's. 

 

[Dorian Martell's son]

9 hours ago, Jabar of House Titan said:

I get that.

But no, I'm not just talking about the mountain clans. Some of these soldiers - outside of the ones belonging to the Karstarks and the Boltons - seem to be coming from the western parts of the North: the Barrowlands, the Rills, Torrhen's Square and the Stony Shore.

Because the North has always been portrayed as if it has both low population in general terms and low population density.

It doesn't make sense to me. The North should be completely bereft of any soldiers - in other words, men in their prime - who aren't sworn to the Boltons, the Karstarks, the Manderlys, the houses of the Neck (i.e. Reed) and Stannis. Every other soldier should be boys, old men and the women who willing to pick up a sword and shield.

Most of the troops are not men in their prime. The men of the clans did not head south with Robb so they are fresh but the troops on both sides of the umbers are either green boys or old men and that is why the bolton forces, with the frey help are still only a few thousand men. All of stannis' troops are maybe 4000. The population is very low. 

 

9 hours ago, Jabar of House Titan said:

I think you're misunderstanding me. When I say the Others and their zombies should overrun the North, I mean overrun. As in Walking Dead "we don't know what the hell is happening, we're practically helpless, just trying - and mostly failing - to survive" overrun. No grand epic battles. No daring action-hero missions. None of it.

No matter how it goes, Stannis' campaign, the War of the Five Kings and whatever the hell it is that the Weeper is planning will have bled the North completely dry.

All potential for Northern resistance should die when the Night's Watch and the Wall falls. Castles will be manned by skeleton crews if at all. And said skeleton crews will be powerless to defend said castles from both zombies and magical ice demon elves. Like they might as well leave the castle gates open and unlocked.

White Harbor's status as a world-class port city will come in handy but it'll end up imploding before long. Think Hardhome from the TV show but 3x worse because there will be 3x as many people.

Winterfell is the only hope of the North (given Mance's obsession with the place and how everyone seems to harp on how important it is for a Stark to rule in Winterfell) and that's still temporary, best case scenario.

But considering the likelihood that Littlefinger, our very own agent of chaos (who also happens to have financially ruined the realm), will be there...temporary won't be good enough because he'll find a way to fck it all up just because Brandon Stark and then his doofy little brother got the girl.

Like I don't see any big fights with the Others happening until they get past the Neck or across the sea into Braavos.

We probably should get back on topic LOL 

 AS of now, the only thing holding back the bolded text is the wall, and that will fall at the end of the next book if that book is ever published 

[Moiraine Sedai]

On 6/5/2018 at 1:38 PM, Dead headofMaelysKinslayer said:

Before AGOT?

Yeah.  Richer after the RW.

[Bernie Mac]

47 minutes ago, Dorian Martell's son said:

The men of the clans did not head south with Robb  

They actually did. 

"There's northmen in the tents." She knew them by their beards, by their faces, by their cloaks of bearskin and sealskin, by their half-heard toasts and the songs they sang; Karstarks and Umbers and men of the mountain clans. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Two-thirds of my strength was on the north side when the Lannisters attacked those still waiting to cross. Norrey, Locke, and Burley men chiefly, with Ser Wylis Manderly and his White Harbor knights as rear guard.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And mine are long and sharp, my lord, as long and sharp as yours. The crossbows took Donnel Locke, Owen Norrey, and half a dozen more. 

 

The mountain clans sent their soldiers with Robb. Now it could be that they kept the vast majority of their warriors at home, but that would not explain why those warriors did not join Rodrik in trying to retake Winterfell or send support to the Wall. I think the most plausible answer is the host we are seeing in ADWD is due to it finally being winter, there is now no more harvest to bring in, their farmers are not needed and we have been repeatedly told how in normal winters the Men of the mountain clan may sacrifice themselves knowing there are too many mouths and we are seeing this in action. It would also explain why so the fleeing Ironborn were able to kill so many of them. 3,000 against 100 should not result in that many casualties unless the 3,000 was largely untrained and poorly equipped in war. 

 

[Corvo the Crow]

3 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

But the Coldwaters and Tolletts are actually Lords (capital L), with clearly defined castles and lands and vassals of their own. Both are mentioned a couple of times in the history of the Vale.  They are significant, just their Lord, Royce, is more so. After Hightower he is probably the next most powerful vassal in Westeros. 

True but my reasoning is if Royce has called his banners their men would be among that 20000 so no need to count them seperately.

 

3 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

What I like about Royce is that this is a Lord, in contrast to Hightower who just rules a big blob of land, whose territories are scatted everywhere in the vale much like most lords did in the medieval era. 

I like that as well and it's probably a remnant from the Andal invasions during which every first men house swore fealty to Royces.

Royces are also not the only ones, apparently; Darrys seem to have lands on Redfork near the Westerland border since Raymun went with Piper and Vance for the 3 towns mountain raided.

[Dorian Martell's son]

6 minutes ago, Bernie Mac said:

They actually did. 

"There's northmen in the tents." She knew them by their beards, by their faces, by their cloaks of bearskin and sealskin, by their half-heard toasts and the songs they sang; Karstarks and Umbers and men of the mountain clans. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Two-thirds of my strength was on the north side when the Lannisters attacked those still waiting to cross. Norrey, Locke, and Burley men chiefly, with Ser Wylis Manderly and his White Harbor knights as rear guard.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And mine are long and sharp, my lord, as long and sharp as yours. The crossbows took Donnel Locke, Owen Norrey, and half a dozen more. 

 

The mountain clans sent their soldiers with Robb. Now it could be that they kept the vast majority of their warriors at home, but that would not explain why those warriors did not join Rodrik in trying to retake Winterfell or send support to the Wall. I think the most plausible answer is the host we are seeing in ADWD is due to it finally being winter, there is now no more harvest to bring in, their farmers are not needed and we have been repeatedly told how in normal winters the Men of the mountain clan may sacrifice themselves knowing there are too many mouths and we are seeing this in action. It would also explain why so the fleeing Ironborn were able to kill so many of them. 3,000 against 100 should not result in that many casualties unless the 3,000 was largely untrained and poorly equipped in war. 

this makes sense. the warriors that fought the IB were very tough. they weren't old or green  

[Free Northman Reborn]

Here we go again.

Even by Ran’s rather low estimates the North has something like 4 million inhabitants. 

That means 2 million men, of which maybe a third will be of fighting age. So 600,000 men between 15 and 50.

No matter how you cut it from there, losing 20,000 will not come close to affecting the number of fighting age men left available.

 

[Ran]

My estimate is not low.  In fact, according to actual, professional demographer Lyman Stone, it may be a little high since his "best fit" estimate of the population of the Seven Kingdoms is about 5.5 million lower than my own (though mine was always a rough estimate). The North is probably closer to 3.5 million in his view, based on that particular figure.

That said, while many men of fighting age continue to exist, a very large proportion of the _professional_ fighting men (aka the nobility) and leadership are off the board, the logistical situation has become a nightmare due to the season, and order has largely broken down. All of these things speak against any substantial new concentrated military forces being levied in the North within the span of time the remaining books in ASoIaF will cover. (By concentrated, I mean that of course if some village gets attacked, the people will likely try their best to defend themselves. But that's not men on the march.)

[Corvo the Crow]

39 minutes ago, Ran said:

 

That said, while many men of fighting age continue to exist, a very large proportion of the _professional_ fighting men (aka the nobility) and leadership are off the board, the logistical situation has become a nightmare due to the season, and order has largely broken down. All of these things speak against any substantial new concentrated military forces being levied in the North within the span of time the remaining books in ASoIaF will cover. (By concentrated, I mean that of course if some village gets attacked, the people will likely try their best to defend themselves. But that's not men on the march.)

Edited 7 minutes ago by Ran

This helps answer many questions. I Believe North has the highest population after Reach perhaps even higher than that, but not only the population is spread far and wide so there are logistical challenges, but North is also not as rich as most other kingdoms so if they want to equip and train their men  to be on par with the southern kingdoms, they'll end up with a smaller percentage of fighters for same amount of people. And they are equipping their men with the same equipment if not with better ones; Stout men wear brigandines which are both more expensive than chainmail and worn over it while Frey men only wear mail.

This would also explain how mountain clansmen have so many men with Stannis while sending a much smaller amount with Robb; they are the poorest in the North excepting Crannogmen so they were able to properly equip an even smaller amount of men.

Also while we are at it, I am curious if mr. George has any idea how many men each house had with Robb in Winterfell. I am especially curious on clansmen numbers and how many Robb had himself.

[Bernie Mac]

5 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

 

Even by Ran’s rather low estimates the North has something like 4 million inhabitants. 

How is Ran's estimates low? 

• the North has one city, the smallest city in Westeros with a population of around 100k
• after the Crownlands we have spent the most time in the North, we are only aware of one actual town
• there is another settlement that only becomes a town in winter and is inhabited by people as far away as the mountain clans
• the western coast is thinly peopled even by the north's barren standards
• Robert, travelling on the main road in the north, complains about the lack of human life in the north
• Robb going North meant that that the Winterfell lands lacked adult defenders; and your brother took the rest, along with all the likely lads for leagues around.
• the Umbers, Karstarks and Hornwoods all complained about the lack of men, the Umbers and Karstarks in particular were short of not just soldiers but farmers

 

What evidence do you have to suggest that Ran's numbers are low? 

5 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

That means 2 million men, of which maybe a third will be of fighting age. So 600,000 men between 15 and 50.

I don't think anyone is really arguing that the North is lacking in these age ranges, but that these men will not be properly trained or equipped and possibly the North does not have the resources to even organize and feed these men to go to war. 

 

5 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

No matter how you cut it from there, losing 20,000 will not come close to affecting the number of fighting age men left available.

Sure it will. It had a huge impact on the Wintefell lands, shown by just how inexperienced and poor they were when they were beaten at Winterfell. 

The same is true of any region, with the 35k army out of the westerlands the green boys under Stafford were easily beaten. Of course there will be an effect when you replace your experienced and properly equipped soldiers with farmers and teenagers. 

[The hairy bear]

To be honest, I've always found that Ran's estimates for the population of the North are a little too high  .

IIRC, one of the methods that were used was to apply to each of the kingdoms the average population per square area of a similar region in medieval real history. Another method was to use Gibbon's estimation that any given state could field at maximum one hundredth of its population. But I don't think any of those calculations are taking into account the unusual seasonal pattern of Westeros.

The North can be at a similar latitude than Scandinavia, but I'm sure the Scandinavian population in the Middle Ages would have been much lower if every twenty years you'd have a couple of four-year winters. I figure that this should be completely devastating to the population numbers, specially among the oldest.

I also imagine that the North's population has a life expectation for the no-nobles much shorter than in the other kingdoms, or in medieval Europe. A lucky Northern commoner may survive one long Winter, but is very unlikely to survive two.

When the series start, they are about to begin the tenth year of summer, so we don't get to see the effects of a long winter. But we know that just thirty years ago there was a decade (272-282) with seven years of winter! (the "cruel" three year winter of Tyrion's birth, the two years before the False Spring, and the two years after).

The fact that there is any commoner in the North older than 30 seems miraculous to me.

13 hours ago, Ran said:

according to actual, professional demographer Lyman Stone, it may be a little high since his "best fit" estimate of the population of the Seven Kingdoms is about 5.5 million lower than my own (though mine was always a rough estimate).

Wow. That sounds interesting. Is this study, or at least the conclusions, available anywhere?

[Ran]

16 minutes ago, The hairy bear said:

To be honest, I've always found that Ran's estimates for the population of the North are a little too high  .

IIRC, one of the methods that were used was to apply to each of the kingdoms the average population per square area of a similar region in medieval real history. Another method was to use Gibbon's estimation that any given state could field at maximum one hundredth of its population. But I don't think any of those calculations are taking into account the unusual seasonal pattern of Westeros.

True, but I feel that this is something that is fairly impossible to really account for because, realistically, a long winter would shatter populations. Not just the North, but everywhere. It'd be like having the Black Plague sweeping through every decade. So to some degree the fact that there's a real artifice here that isn't quite reflected in the text has to be hand-waved.

 

Quote

 

Wow. That sounds interesting. Is this study, or at least the conclusions, available anywhere?

https://medium.com/migration-issues/westeros-is-poorly-designed-3b01cf5cdcaf

 

He takes us all to task for our 40 million figure, and then scientifically comes up with a figure less than 20% under it. Heh. Admittedly, if you read the thing, he even casts doubts on the 34.5 figure because he doesn't feel there's enough urbanization, but I feel like the fact that he's not well-versed in the books and he just looked at maps and such misses the evidence that there's a lot more towns out there than we know of but they just haven't been named. And he doesn't really wrestle with the fact that the North is so sparsely populated while being such a large proportion of the Seven Kingdoms.

 

ETA: Just realized that his estimate is also based on a 3.45m area, rather than the 3.6ish I used, so if we agreed on that he'd actually be within 10% of me. So much for science...

[The hairy bear]

Thanks Ran, that was certainly a great read.

I do agree with your assessment that he puts too much weight into the urbanization ratio, without considering that the maps are not supposed to be complete. That said, I completely agree with the idea that the Westeros that George designed (single language, little cultural diversity, stable centralized government, long dynasties,...) would have been better served if all the distances had been halved.

[Free Northman Reborn]

On 6/9/2018 at 2:08 AM, Switzeran said:

True, but I feel that this is something that is fairly impossible to really account for because, realistically, a long winter would shatter populations. Not just the North, but everywhere. It'd be like having the Black Plague sweeping through every decade. So to some degree the fact that there's a real artifice here that isn't quite reflected in the text has to be hand-waved.

 

https://medium.com/migration-issues/westeros-is-poorly-designed-3b01cf5cdcaf

 

He takes us all to task for our 40 million figure, and then scientifically comes up with a figure less than 20% under it. Heh. Admittedly, if you read the thing, he even casts doubts on the 34.5 figure because he doesn't feel there's enough urbanization, but I feel like the fact that he's not well-versed in the books and he just looked at maps and such misses the evidence that there's a lot more towns out there than we know of but they just haven't been named. And he doesn't really wrestle with the fact that the North is so sparsely populated while being such a large proportion of the Seven Kingdoms.

 

ETA: Just realized that his estimate is also based on a 3.45m area, rather than the 3.6ish I used, so if we agreed on that he'd actually be within 10% of me. So much for science...

 

So my first response to this was going to be to apply the famous economist joke to “professional demographers”, as in if you ask 9 demographers a question you will get 10 different answers.

Then I actually clicked on the link provided and realized that this is an article I read months ago, and which I immediately dismissed out of hand due to the author’s incredibly limited and in fact flawed understanding of Westeros.

The reality of any model is of course that it is fundamentally influenced by its assumptions, and his assumptions are based on severe limitations of understanding of the setting, resulting in him placing too much emphasis on some aspects of Westeros which we have all dismissed as obviously unrealistic (such as the often discussed lack of linguistic diversity), and assuming others as facts which we know are not true - such as him stating that he only found 135 named settlements on the map of Westeros and deriving from that an assumed number for the potential towns and large villages on the continent. This while we know that only a fraction of all settlements are actually named and the map is not intended to be in any way comprehensive.

Then he proceeds to list everything that he doesn’t agree with, and tries to dismiss it as non-factual out of hand, including:

·         The armies are too large, so their numbers are dismissed out of hand.

 

 

·       Cities are too large, so their numbers too are dismissed out of hand.

 

 

·      The land area is too large - He assumes the long disproven South America size comparison, and proceeds to build a bunch of strawman arguments based on that.

 

 

·       He feels dynasty lengths are too long - We know he should just accept it, as it is part of the magical setting.

 

 

·       Linguistic diversity is too low - Again, we know he should just accept it, because Martin did not want to design a bunch of different languages.

         The urbanisation rate is too low – it should be at least 5%. Well, go with 5% then. 2 million urbanites will give you the 40 million population Westeros is likely to have, at a 5% urbanization rate.

         He has a problem with the population density being too low, well, if there is anything we can try to use to at least partially account for the immense impact of the Seasons, it can be the low population density. The density is low, sure, but if you give the North, Dorne and the Stormlands only 6 and 9 and 12 per square mile respectively, that leaves the central half of Westeros with an average density much closer to 20 per square mile, which is quite reasonable.

 

 

         And, as mentioned in my introduction above, he assumes the 135 marked settlements on the map of Westeros is even close to comprehensive list of all settlements, when this is absolutely not the case. In any case, his assumptions drive his model, and his assumptions are flawed, or place emphasis on some facts which we know can be handwaved away – primarily the lack of linguistic diversity and the small number of seemingly overly large cities, which many of us have long ago commented on and dismissed as a quirk of the author.

40 million people give or take 5 million or so, still remains a very good fit for Westeros. But also, even if it is only 30 million, that is not the issue here. Because then the entire Westeros decreases proportionally. It doesn’t just hit the North while leaving the rest untouched.

The North is not Scandinavia. The Wall is not on the arctic circle. Winterfell is located more or less where Germany is in Europe. The Umber and Karstark lands may equate to southern Scandinavia, with the Lands Beyond the Wall being Scandinavia proper.

So many people really struggle to grasp that fact. Because of "magical snowfalls in summer"

[Bernie Mac]

1 hour ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

The North is not Scandinavia. The Wall is not on the arctic circle. Winterfell is located more or less where Germany is in Europe. The Umber and Karstark lands may equate to southern Scandinavia, with the Lands Beyond the Wall being Scandinavia proper.

 

Winterfell is at the same latitude as Ibben, I really don't think you can claim it is where Germany is on the map, certainly not Munchen. Nothing in the North, even South of Winterfell, has been described anything like the Bavarian countryside. At a push you could probably say Denmark, but even then people sunbathe at the beach at Copenhagen and the North, even in summer, does not have that feel. Perhaps White Harbor, but Winterfell not so much. 

[Free Northman Reborn]

25 minutes ago, Bernie Mac said:

Winterfell is at the same latitude as Ibben, I really don't think you can claim it is where Germany is on the map, certainly not Munchen. Nothing in the North, even South of Winterfell, has been described anything like the Bavarian countryside. At a push you could probably say Denmark, but even then people sunbathe at the beach at Copenhagen and the North, even in summer, does not have that feel. Perhaps White Harbor, but Winterfell not so much. 

The Arctic circle is either 600 miles North of the Wall, where the Haunted Forest ends, or about 300 miles North of the Wall according to Werthead's map, which while I don't completely agree with it, is a fairly decent overall estimation of the position of various locations. From there you can work your way down to Winterfell's latitude, 600 miles further South.

We also know how far the Lands Beyond the Wall extend before you get to the Land of Always Winter, which again reinforces the position of the Wall as well South of the Arctic circle. (Besides  the obvious fact that you never get 24 hours of daylight at the Wall, even in Summer, hence it cannot be in the Arctic circle).

It's pretty incontrovertible that Winterfell is not in our Scandinavian latitudes

Edit

Link

https://atlasoficeandfireblog.wordpress.com/2016/02/28/so-how-big-is-the-world-anyway/

 

 

[Ran]

3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

The North is not Scandinavia. The Wall is not on the arctic circle. Winterfell is located more or less where Germany is in Europe. The Umber and Karstark lands may equate to southern Scandinavia, with the Lands Beyond the Wall being Scandinavia proper.

The North is very thinly populated and if you want to find a medieval society showing such a thin population in an area known for being colder than other regions in the continent, with substantial forests and wastelands, Scandinavia is where you have to look to get a sense.

I recall your efforts to calculate the latitude. But I can't help but note that the treeline is variable in our world (it goes as far north as 72 degrees north in Siberia), and if you are happy to say "magic" to dismiss the fact that summer snows are not uncommon in the North, then I would point out that there's magic in the fact that there are trees in the setting that can survive years of winter, so they are obviously much hardier than those of our own world and so could very well extend much further north than they do in our world. 

The thing we have absolute evidence for is that the North is empty. Robert describes it as vastly emptier than any place he's ever been, and he's a man who marched forces from the stormlands to the Reach and the on to riverlands through that big blobby area in between, and lived for awhile in the Vale, and has made visits to the westerlands while invading the Iron Islands -- by which, I'm saying, he's a guy who has seen most of the Seven Kingdoms, and the North stands out for its emptiness. They travel the kingsroad for a couple of weeks with little evidence of seeing much of anything, then go on a nice ride into the barrowlands and it's just endless miles of nothing (well, besides barrows). There's a great big huge swamp making up the southern bound of the place, too. The second largest known population center, Barrowton, is surrounded by ... vast empty nothing, again. The Gift, more pretty damned empty nothing. The Stony Shore, pretty damned empty. 

All of this goes to say that it's pretty damned empty. _How_ empty is a a matter of conjecture, but I'm comfortable with the fact that multiple different approaches for calculating the population of Westeros, including one which tried to estimate the populations of different regions as well, largely agree with one another. You can't accept that 30 or 35 or 40 million isn't a bad guess based on these efforts, and then argue with the fact that the North simply has a lower population density than other regions.