The Sleeping Lion

[Pukisbaisals]

Just wanted to share some ideas about House Grandison.

Sigil of this house is a black sleeping lion. Words: "Rouse me not". Noblemen usually pick up meaningful symbols to represent their house, ones they can be proud of.  Why sleeping was so meaningful to founders of house Grandison?

First thought sigil inspires - Grandisons are dreaming lion dreams, that is, they are skinchangers.

Harlan Grandison (member of KG before Jaime joined it) durng his sleep - in a frame of skinchanger hypothesis, it could be read as failure to return to human body after warged animal died.

Hugh Grandison (current lord of Grandview) was one of Arianne's suitors:

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At the welcoming feast, he had gone to sleep between the fish course and the meat. Drey called that apt, since his sigil was a sleeping lion.

I found it quite strange. Fish is usually served at the beginning of the feast. At this point elderly suitor couldn't be tired or overeaten yet. An he was described as more robust than Rosby. What was the reason of him falling asleep during the feast Prince of Dorne raised in his honor?

Another cat of the same coat, though very different size is One--eared black tomcat from the Red Keep, who is generally believed warged by Rhaenys or/and someone else.

 

Black sleeping lion can also be associated with "Lion of the night".

 

Hugh's hair color was also particularly mentioned :

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Grandison was called the Greybeard, but by the time she'd met him his beard had gone snow white

Damon Lannister was called Grey Lion likely because of color of his hair and regardless to the fact he had golden lion as his sigil. So white bearded Grandison is also sort of White Lion. White lions were mentioned in the books only twice - Hrakkar, who was hunted by Drogo and white lion from Dany's vision:

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A white lion ran through grass taller than a man

 

[LindsayLohan]

That's some dramatic over-thinking.  GRRM needs to publish Winds before we all lose what's left of our minds.

Here's a theory:  The sleeping lion and words "Rouse Me Not" are a fun way of saying "Don't start no shit, won't be no shit."  Y'know... exactly as the words and banner imply.

[Lord of Raventree Hall]

17 hours ago, Pukisbaisals said:

Another cat of the same coat, though very different size is One--eared black tomcat from the Red Keep, who is generally believed warged by Rhaenys or/and someone else.

 

Who is generally believed by who? Fringe corners of the fandom? No one I talk to about ASOIAF thinks this is true, including on this forum. That cat is just Rhaenys' cat. Not everyone is a secret warg. 

[Paxter Redwyne]

This is what happens when author delays publishing his next book by four years.

[Seams]

22 hours ago, Pukisbaisals said:

Just wanted to share some ideas about House Grandison.

Sigil of this house is a black sleeping lion. Words: "Rouse me not". Noblemen usually pick up meaningful symbols to represent their house, ones they can be proud of.  Why sleeping was so meaningful to founders of house Grandison?

I'm sorry you've drawn not one but two of the unoriginal "Where is Winds?" comments, mistakenly believed to be clever by a handful of people who don't come to the forum to share ideas.

You have spotted an interesting detail and raised a good question.

To me, the Grandison words and sigil are clearly a reference to Viserys, who was secretly betrothed to Arianne. He was not the sleeping lion, but the sleeping dragon, and he constantly warned Daenerys not to wake the dragon. (An anagram of "Hugh Grandison" could be "dragon hushing".)

It's been awhile since I've read the Arianne chapters so I'm not fresh on the details. It seems GRRM wants us to compare the sleeping lion to the sleeping dragon, for some reason. I may be completely lost in my little anagram obsession lately, but I noticed that "Rouse me not" can be rearranged to spell "morose tune." Potentially relevant HBO reference:

Spoiler

I always wondered why The Rains of Castamere was performed in such a morose way in the show, even though it's supposed to be a tribute to the power of Tywin Lannister. Maybe GRRM told them that the song was supposed to be morose? If so, the Grandison words could tie into that song and provide a hint that Tywin was the sleeping lion who awakened to impose discipline and wreak destruction on the Reynes and Tarbecks.

The fact that Grandison was at a feast is probably also significant. We have seen important deaths and betrayals and dreams involving feasts. I know that GRRM has used tourneys to foreshadow the power struggle for the Iron Throne. Betrothals also seem significant in combining sigils and special qualities unique to certain houses (watch out for anyone married to a Royce or Fossoway).

Maybe he uses the failed betrothal here, as well as the feast, to show us how the Martells have tried different things to navigate their way into the center of power in Westeros. We know that they offered betrothals between Elia and Oberyn for Jaime and Cersei, but were rejected. On the other hand, this fake betrothal attempt may have been payback for that rejection by the Lannisters: we are told that Doran already had a betrothal in mind for Arianne and was pretending to seek suitors in order to cover the secret engagement to Viserys. The failure to wake the sleeping lion with a betrothal for Arianne may underscore Doran's secret long game of surreptitiously working to outsmart the Lannisters without their knowing it.

[LindsayLohan]

41 minutes ago, Seams said:

To me, the Grandison words and sigil are clearly a reference to Viserys, who was secretly betrothed to Arianne. He was not the sleeping lion, but the sleeping dragon, and he constantly warned Daenerys not to wake the dragon. (An anagram of "Hugh Grandison" could be "dragon hushing".)

 

https://i.gifer.com/Wdyc.gif

[Damon_Tor]

 

[HoodedCrow]

Sometimes an author makes associations to plant a seed that may show up somewhere else, as has been pointed out about Viserys and the sleeping dragon.

It is possible that the sleeping lion could be Jaime, and he will end up with a black cloak, and white deeds. He is certainly a contrast with his white cloak and black deeds.

Nice Christopher Walker bit!

[Seams]

Nimble Dick tells Brienne a story about his legendary ancestor, Clarence Crabb, known as Crackbones:

"Crackbones fought a dragon too, but he didn't need no magic sword. He just tied its neck in a knot, so every time it breathed fire it roasted its own arse." (AFfC, Brienne IV)

Here's a little more context for Lord Grandison:

Beesbury died a few years later. That gave her some small comfort in her present pass; she could not be forced to marry him if he was dead. And the Lord of the Crossing had wed again, so she was safe from him as well. Elden Estermont is still alive and unwed, though. Lord Rosby and Lord Grandison as well. Grandison was called the Greybeard, but by the time she'd met him his beard had gone snow white. At the welcoming feast, he had gone to sleep between the fish course and the meat. Drey called that apt, since his sigil was a sleeping lion. Garin challenged her to see if she could tie a knot in his beard without waking him, but Arianne refrained. Grandison had seemed a pleasant fellow, less querulous than Estermont and more robust than Rosby. She would never marry him, however. Not even if Hotah stands behind me with his axe. (AFfC, The Princess in the Tower)

I think the knot-tying detail is another parallel to the dragon, with Dick Crabb's anecdote as confirmation.

Nimble Dick is a story-teller, like Old Nan, and a singer. So we know that GRRM wants us to pay attention to his stories and find hints about things to come. Since Dick says that everyone on Crackclaw Point is a good dragon man, I suspect that Clarence is a symbolic Targaryen. The story about him tying a dragon's neck in a knot might refer to some Targ-on-Targ conflict such at the Dance of the Dragons or the Blackfyre rebellions. By contrast, Arianne declines to tie Grandison's beard in a knot and she finds him likable.

Something tells me that the Grandison story might foreshadow a future meeting between Arianne and fAegon / Young Griff. Will she decide that the time is right to wake the dragon? "Tying the knot" is an idiom for getting married. Will Arianne want to tie the knot with fAegon?

I don't know why GRRM would choose to make Grandison's sigil a sleeping lion, though, if all of the details and hidden meanings point to dragons.

[Pukisbaisals]

On 6/18/2018 at 4:08 PM, Seams said:

To me, the Grandison words and sigil are clearly a reference to Viserys, who was secretly betrothed to Arianne. He was not the sleeping lion, but the sleeping dragon, and he constantly warned Daenerys not to wake the dragon.

Targaryens can be also referred as dreamers- some of them have prophetic dreams - Daeron the Drunken, Daenys the Dreamer, Daemon II Blackfyre.

20 hours ago, HoodedCrow said:

It is possible that the sleeping lion could be Jaime, and he will end up with a black cloak, and white deeds. He is certainly a contrast with his white cloak and black deeds

Jaime is also literal dreamer. His transformation started after his cave dream.

 

As for Grandisons themselves, I wonder if they are cadet branch of some other house. Grandison can be understood as Grand Son - a son who had achieved some greatness, fame. Or son of someone who was referred as "the Great ". Or maybe even just grandson, descendant of some famous grandfather.

Lion associates with Lannisters, Reynes or Osgreys, sleeping - with skinchanging or prophetic dreams.

[Damon_Tor]

20 hours ago, HoodedCrow said:

Sometimes an author makes associations to plant a seed that may show up somewhere else, as has been pointed out about Viserys and the sleeping dragon.

And sometimes he fills in gaps by making little jokes to himself, like that one house populated by muppets.

Maybe "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" was on the radio while filling out his list of ~1000 Weserosi Nobles and their Sigils.

[HoodedCrow]

Definitely, Martin is a jokester. New question for him” were you listening to the lion sleeps tonight, when”...

It does seem to me that Jaime does have some big deeds ahead in the book and he did dream and is going through transformational changes. He has been kind of tied in a knot in some ways, and if he wakes, he could be the sleeper hero.

I look to him for something major and maybe doing something preposterous from current info like marrying Sansa, Arianne, Brienne, or Dany, saving the day at Winterfell or something perverse and unexpected like becoming a king of beasts. If Dany really wanted to demonstrate alliance with her enemies to save the kingdom, what better way than to pardon her dads killer. She is going to have to be as flexible as a willow to unite that kingdom.