Houses really held power for thousands of years?

[dmfn]

I was talking to my wife who's Chinese about TWOIAF, the histories and stuff, and she brought up a pretty point (I think).

In Chinese history there were innumerable cases where a few bad apples in a row ruined a dynasty. Even the great Han only made it 200 years, fell into civil war for a few years, and then carried on for 200 more.

Whereas in Westeros, houses like the Hightowers, Starks and Lannisters have seemingly held nearly absolute authority in their domain for millennia on end. 

 

Of course many First Men kingdoms were subdued by the Andals, but even those much younger Andal kings, like Aryn, have been in their positions for thousands of years, too.

Finally, we get to the conquest of Aegon I Targaryen, and most of the big players were already well established, and had been (more or less) the same for a long time. Of course, the Hoares, Gardeners, and whoever else were eliminated, and a few houses like the Tullys and Tyrells were promoted, but even since then, 300 years is a pretty long time to go without a single incapable ruler, who causes his line to be extinguished, to wind up in charge of a castle. 

Now, in the current story are many once powerful houses on the verge of extinction.

Tytos nearly lost it for House Lannister, but they managed to hang on till this stage of uncertainty. Jon Aryn's sole heir may not make it. Eddard Stark caused his house to be laid low. Robert, Renly and Stannis may end the Baratheon line. Edmure is merely a puppet Tully. House Frey's days might be numbered. If the Starks do survive, that probsbly means the Boltons will not. Houses Martell, Greyjoy, and Tyrell basically have it all on the table.

It just seems 'odd' let's say, that everything was one way till ASOIAF's storyline began, and then started falling apart. 

Is this what happened before the Long Night? Am I crazy, or looking at the numbers wrong? Or that's just the way it is? Shouldn't there be ruined castles everywhere?

[honorable men]

Addressing Dying Houses:

Have you ever looked at the family trees and ever wonder what happened to XYZ son/daughter of ABC/JKL? I think they went on to marry someone low with a great job and had kids and lived in upperclass lifestyles as with their decedents. 

You see, We don't know how many times these Houses were on the verge on the extinction until someone manages to trace a family lineage. 

I'm pretty sure we have 5th to 10th generations of these great houses that are roaming around the docks or courts or cities because their great great great grandpa was passed over. 

Only way to really terminate a house, is to ruin/take their castle, kill their people, take the land and give it to another lord. 

Without Castles, Incomes, Land & Armies your house is pretty much dead. Even if there are direct line of survivors. Its hard to find another house thats willing to risk their own house to fight a house that completely wiped one out just so you can go "home".

Its a military minded society they live.

Only rarely do we see these extinct houses coming back and taking what is rightfully theirs. 

 

Hoares for example had their castle burned down and given away. A very distant relative tried to lay claim and died for it. Will another distant relative try again? probably not.

And pretty much every house in the Reach is claiming House Garderner's rightful decedent. 

 

And Yes there are GreyStarks surviving now, probably working the fields and whispering to each other about the myth of the ancestry. 

 

All depending on how much the author wants to reveal anyways... 

[Hugorfonics]

I assume this is what happend in China too. By the end of the Han the houses Cao, Liu and Sun (Liu is Han and Sun as in Sun Tzus art of war) were the defacto rulers, 50 years later the Sima clan reduced them all to rubble. When houses reach high they fall hard. Once they lose the mandate of heaven it must become someone elses turn

The thing is China has been accustomed to being the middle kingdom where as Westeros is comfortable being seven. Ruling fractured kingdoms allows cooperation with your neighbors. In modern Westeros, as Stannis says, kings only have subjects and enemies; therefore more prone to being killed off

 

[argonak]

23 hours ago, dmfn said:

I was talking to my wife who's Chinese about TWOIAF, the histories and stuff, and she brought up a pretty point (I think).

In Chinese history there were innumerable cases where a few bad apples in a row ruined a dynasty. Even the great Han only made it 200 years, fell into civil war for a few years, and then carried on for 200 more.

Whereas in Westeros, houses like the Hightowers, Starks and Lannisters have seemingly held nearly absolute authority in their domain for millennia on end. 

 

Of course many First Men kingdoms were subdued by the Andals, but even those much younger Andal kings, like Aryn, have been in their positions for thousands of years, too.

Finally, we get to the conquest of Aegon I Targaryen, and most of the big players were already well established, and had been (more or less) the same for a long time. Of course, the Hoares, Gardeners, and whoever else were eliminated, and a few houses like the Tullys and Tyrells were promoted, but even since then, 300 years is a pretty long time to go without a single incapable ruler, who causes his line to be extinguished, to wind up in charge of a castle. 

Now, in the current story are many once powerful houses on the verge of extinction.

Tytos nearly lost it for House Lannister, but they managed to hang on till this stage of uncertainty. Jon Aryn's sole heir may not make it. Eddard Stark caused his house to be laid low. Robert, Renly and Stannis may end the Baratheon line. Edmure is merely a puppet Tully. House Frey's days might be numbered. If the Starks do survive, that probsbly means the Boltons will not. Houses Martell, Greyjoy, and Tyrell basically have it all on the table.

It just seems 'odd' let's say, that everything was one way till ASOIAF's storyline began, and then started falling apart. 

Is this what happened before the Long Night? Am I crazy, or looking at the numbers wrong? Or that's just the way it is? Shouldn't there be ruined castles everywhere?

Its quite unrelealistic.  Look at any major throne or royal house in our own history and you'll be hard pressed to find a family name which can keep it together more than a few generations, at least until the legal systems and national governments got solid enough that some random adventurer couldn't just come steal your duchy because he had more soldiers.

 

But then, ASOIAF is fantasy.  However more importantly, ASOIAF is also filled with unreliable narrators.  I'm reading the first westeros history book right now, and even the maester "writing it" constantly mentions how so much of what is reported as fact is completely unsupported stories, and that even the maester's records don't go back very far.  That so much of what they have as written history is just someone writing down singers songs. 

Its like we're watching a show about greece and their history books are all things like Homer's Oddesey.  Has the Night's Watch really lasted thousands of years?  There's no way to know.  Westeros is hit regularly with near extinction event winters, not to mention zombie invasions.  Now the Targaryen times are well documented.  And probably a couple hundred years before that.  But past that?  Good luck, its all legends passed on through storytellers who had no reason to not embellish truth or outright create fiction. 

A big part of what you're seeing now is just a reflection of survivor bias, as you're seeing the same thing happen to houses you're shown that's happened to hundreds of other houses you never heard of.  

The other big part is that Game of Thrones occurs towards the end of a major collapse of international authority in Westeros.  Its been building since the Targaryen's dragons went extinct, because those were the only thing that really unified Westeros.  Without that, there's at least 8 disparate cultures, two religions, and who knows how many ethniticies divinding the place up into a much larger number of natural national entities.  As soon as the dragons went extinct, the clock was ticking on the Targaryen's unified kingdom.

[dmfn]

@argonak

I hesitated to use the word 'unrealistic' but was thinking the same thing. I was really hoping the was some 'reason' for writing it that way. 

I've certainly considered the inaccurate history angle, but like you said, the last few hundred years under the Dragons has been fairly well documented. I'd even venture to say that most of the demography the maesters recorded is probably correct regarding which houses were where, doing what. That gives us an honest thousand, at the least.

I've also wondered about the ecological part of the story. Would Tywin Lannister (or any warlord) really burn fields in a world where winter could last for years? Without prophetic levels of preparation for winter stores, vast numbers of people- like huge chunks of the population- would be starving every winter. In real world history lots of people starved during 3-4 month winters as recently as the 20th century!

So how could one House or another reign for hundreds, even thousands of years? even through famine, winter, or incompetent leadership?

The best excuse I can come up with are their castles. The houses who have done the best, ruled the longest, had the most influence etc. are those houses with badass castles.

Obviously every castle is made for defense, but some of the major houses' castles tend to have special features that make them so... (can i say it again) badass.

Winterfell has hotsprings. Storm's End has rounded walls (so tightly fit together wind can't phase it...), and a historical/maybe magical builder. The Hightower's fused black base and height on an island make it unique. The Eyrie is really a few castles/gates atop a spire of a mountain. Casterly Rock is built as much into the rock as out of, and is a pretty darn big rock. Riverrun can be surrounded by water on three sides. Harrenhall was just too massive to siege or storm. 

But we've already heard the starvation tatic nearly worked at Storm's End, so that will always be a factor. 

I'm don't know about every other castle... the hows and whys

[argonak]

2 hours ago, dmfn said:

@argonak

I hesitated to use the word 'unrealistic' but was thinking the same thing. I was really hoping the was some 'reason' for writing it that way. 

I've certainly considered the inaccurate history angle, but like you said, the last few hundred years under the Dragons has been fairly well documented. I'd even venture to say that most of the demography the maesters recorded is probably correct regarding which houses were where, doing what. That gives us an honest thousand, at the least.

I've also wondered about the ecological part of the story. Would Tywin Lannister (or any warlord) really burn fields in a world where winter could last for years? Without prophetic levels of preparation for winter stores, vast numbers of people- like huge chunks of the population- would be starving every winter. In real world history lots of people starved during 3-4 month winters as recently as the 20th century!

So how could one House or another reign for hundreds, even thousands of years? even through famine, winter, or incompetent leadership?

The best excuse I can come up with are their castles. The houses who have done the best, ruled the longest, had the most influence etc. are those houses with badass castles.

Obviously every castle is made for defense, but some of the major houses' castles tend to have special features that make them so... (can i say it again) badass.

Winterfell has hotsprings. Storm's End has rounded walls (so tightly fit together wind can't phase it...), and a historical/maybe magical builder. The Hightower's fused black base and height on an island make it unique. The Eyrie is really a few castles/gates atop a spire of a mountain. Casterly Rock is built as much into the rock as out of, and is a pretty darn big rock. Riverrun can be surrounded by water on three sides. Harrenhall was just too massive to siege or storm. 

But we've already heard the starvation tatic nearly worked at Storm's End, so that will always be a factor. 

I'm don't know about every other castle... the hows and whys

 

The winter is definetly reported to impact different regions more than others.  The winters seem to be like little miniature "little ice ages" from our own history.  So for the northern regions that means they get snowed in and its nasty.  So the northerners should absolutely be building stores for winter on a humongous level.  The southerners more seem to just get poor growing seasons.  This will lead to shortages and famine, but they wouldn't neccessarily need to stockpile like the north does.  Maybe thats why Storm's End was possible to be sieged like that.  

But yeah, I've always wondered about the food storage thing.  I kind of had to assume it was being taken care of "off screen," even though that ought to be one of the primary functions of Lords given the situation they're in.

[Jaak]

On 8/14/2018 at 6:49 PM, dmfn said:

I was talking to my wife who's Chinese about TWOIAF, the histories and stuff, and she brought up a pretty point (I think).

In Chinese history there were innumerable cases where a few bad apples in a row ruined a dynasty. Even the great Han only made it 200 years, fell into civil war for a few years, and then carried on for 200 more.

Whereas in Westeros, houses like the Hightowers, Starks and Lannisters have seemingly held nearly absolute authority in their domain for millennia on end. 

 

Of course many First Men kingdoms were subdued by the Andals, but even those much younger Andal kings, like Aryn, have been in their positions for thousands of years, too.

Finally, we get to the conquest of Aegon I Targaryen, and most of the big players were already well established, and had been (more or less) the same for a long time. Of course, the Hoares, Gardeners, and whoever else were eliminated, and a few houses like the Tullys and Tyrells were promoted, but even since then, 300 years is a pretty long time to go without a single incapable ruler, who causes his line to be extinguished, to wind up in charge of a castle. 

Now, in the current story are many once powerful houses on the verge of extinction.

Tytos nearly lost it for House Lannister, but they managed to hang on till this stage of uncertainty. Jon Aryn's sole heir may not make it. Eddard Stark caused his house to be laid low. Robert, Renly and Stannis may end the Baratheon line. Edmure is merely a puppet Tully. House Frey's days might be numbered. If the Starks do survive, that probsbly means the Boltons will not. Houses Martell, Greyjoy, and Tyrell basically have it all on the table.

It just seems 'odd' let's say, that everything was one way till ASOIAF's storyline began, and then started falling apart. 

Is this what happened before the Long Night? Am I crazy, or looking at the numbers wrong? Or that's just the way it is? Shouldn't there be ruined castles everywhere?

Look at the same Chinese history.

Yes, there were these two all-China Han dynasties.

And then Shu (220-265) was Han, too.

And then there was the Han dynasty of Xiongnu, from 304 to 319 when they gave up and renamed it Zhao.

Hou Jing was a Han Dynasty, too.

While the longest lasting dynasty in China, that of Zhou, lasted 800 years, so did House of Capet in France. And the Japanese imperial family has been reigning for 2000 years.

There are a few ruined castles in Westeros, like Oldstones. But only a few. A castle is a site that was good for a castle, and some standing walls. Most of time, conquerors and usurpers reuse the site.

And this is an explanation why some names last for millennia. Bad rulers happen, but when they die or are outright overthrown, their successors bear the same name. Sometimes the power is seized by a distant cousin - sometimes an unrelated usurper seizes power, adopts the name of his predecessor and tries to maintain more or less transparent pretence that he was a distant cousin, too.

Did not quite happen in China. After Han dynasty, of Wu, Shu and Wei, Shu Han ended up losing. And the Xiongnu Han gave up trying to pretend and renamed themselves Zhao.

Did not happen everywhere in Westeros either. In Riverlands, Justman and Teague did not achieve the legitimacy to last.

But Starks, Arryns, Lannisters, Durrandons and Gardeners did achieve that kind of name brand.

How many usurpers do you think have renamed themselves Stark?

[dmfn]

@Jaak

those are good points. we at least know about Bael the Bard. Plus any cadet branch of Stark could make that claim on Winterfell. 

and Casterly Rock was built by Casterlys, and taken by Lann the Clever.

Maybe there's been more turnovers than we think.

 

[Starkz]

On 8/14/2018 at 11:49 AM, dmfn said:

I was talking to my wife who's Chinese about TWOIAF, the histories and stuff, and she brought up a pretty point (I think).

In Chinese history there were innumerable cases where a few bad apples in a row ruined a dynasty. Even the great Han only made it 200 years, fell into civil war for a few years, and then carried on for 200 more.

Whereas in Westeros, houses like the Hightowers, Starks and Lannisters have seemingly held nearly absolute authority in their domain for millennia on end. 

 

Of course many First Men kingdoms were subdued by the Andals, but even those much younger Andal kings, like Aryn, have been in their positions for thousands of years, too.

Finally, we get to the conquest of Aegon I Targaryen, and most of the big players were already well established, and had been (more or less) the same for a long time. Of course, the Hoares, Gardeners, and whoever else were eliminated, and a few houses like the Tullys and Tyrells were promoted, but even since then, 300 years is a pretty long time to go without a single incapable ruler, who causes his line to be extinguished, to wind up in charge of a castle. 

Now, in the current story are many once powerful houses on the verge of extinction.

Tytos nearly lost it for House Lannister, but they managed to hang on till this stage of uncertainty. Jon Aryn's sole heir may not make it. Eddard Stark caused his house to be laid low. Robert, Renly and Stannis may end the Baratheon line. Edmure is merely a puppet Tully. House Frey's days might be numbered. If the Starks do survive, that probsbly means the Boltons will not. Houses Martell, Greyjoy, and Tyrell basically have it all on the table.

It just seems 'odd' let's say, that everything was one way till ASOIAF's storyline began, and then started falling apart. 

Is this what happened before the Long Night? Am I crazy, or looking at the numbers wrong? Or that's just the way it is? Shouldn't there be ruined castles everywhere?

The Targs left a huge power vacuum after they were overthrown and Robert was a terrible King and couldn’t fill it. Chaos ensues and now all of Westeros including the great houses are suffering.

[Rufus Snow]

On 8/16/2018 at 10:13 AM, dmfn said:

we at least know about Bael the Bard. Plus any cadet branch of Stark could make that claim on Winterfell. 

and Casterly Rock was built by Casterlys, and taken by Lann the Clever.

Maybe there's been more turnovers than we think.

Once Bael the Bard caught my attention, I also started noticing other times (usually just mentioned in passing, so I didn't take any notes, alas...) where a family name was maintained despite the bloodline jinking through a female descent. Usual Westerosi tradition passes the name down the male line, yet on more than one occasion in history a House has been 'maintained' through a female who marries, yet the family keeps her maiden name rather than take her husband's. In a 'male-preference' world loss of male heirs would normally result in loss of family name - so we have to assume that some of these families which have 'reigned for thousands of years' actually have such jinks in their bloodline, effectively hiding all those expected catastrophes.

House Nymeros-Martell has its own answer to the 'jinking' problem...

@argonak mentions survivor bias, and I think this is also significant, as we know of many families which have gone extinct - but we don't know how many have been totally forgotten.

Then, of course, history is written by the victors. If Jeyne Poole can become a Stark in the full gaze of the North, who's to say how many times the name may have been passed to someone not born with it, in order to legitimize a claim?

[Giant Ice Spider]

The English royal family goes back nearly 1000 years (though under several names). The Danish royal family goes back over a thousand years (again, under several names). The Tongan royal family has maintained an unbroken line for 43 generations.

These are exceptions. The longest I can find for a noble or royal house to survive with its original name is 500 years (Spencers & Howards).

Also, bear in mind many houses, such as the Tudors and Stuarts, did not die out because of war. Both died out after an heirless female died of old age. How this has not happened in Westeros (Rosbys notwithstanding) is rather beyond me.

My conclusion is that all the Westerosi history is much more recent than people suggest. But that's just me.

 

[Lion of the West]

I actually think that one of the things that has held these Houses together is the power of magic in the world. When the magic started to be drained, the Houses started to be under the risk of realistic odds for survival.

Although I'm not sure if I agree that we shoud compare Hightower or Royce with a ruling dynasty. Being the ruler is after all under alot of more pressure and fire than the middlemen are. Thus in my country for example we have noble families living on, on the male side to my knowledge, from at least the mid 13th century and still going today. Many have fallen by the wayside, but there are those who are still going strong even in this day and age. The best, I think, is our current royal House which seems to have been ruling for a bit over 200 years by now.

[Maia]

3 hours ago, Giant Ice Spider said:

The English royal family goes back nearly 1000 years (though under several names). The Danish royal family goes back over a thousand years (again, under several names). The Tongan royal family has maintained an unbroken line for 43 generations.

These are exceptions.

Capets are still around and still "rule" as the Spanish royal family. Bourbons are actually Capets, in the male line even, they just at some point took a different name from one of their land titles, IIRC, to distinguish themselves from the then-ruling French royal dynasty. So, 1000 years is more than doable iRL. Habsburgs are still around too, that's also about a millenium of documented genealogy under their belts. And as you point out, in Westeros succession passing through a female heir retains the House name, so dynasties 2-3 times as old are entirely plausible. 

 

3 hours ago, Giant Ice Spider said:

Also, bear in mind many houses, such as the Tudors and Stuarts, did not die out because of war. Both died out after an heirless female died of old age. How this has not happened in Westeros (Rosbys notwithstanding) is rather beyond me.

Not sure what you are talking about? By Westerosi standards these dynasties didn't end, weren't in fact separate dynasties but continuations of the same one and Queen Liz would have had the same surname as William the Conqueror.

3 hours ago, Giant Ice Spider said:

My conclusion is that all the Westerosi history is much more recent than people suggest. But that's just me.

I do somewhat agree with this - IMHO the Long Night happened 2-3 millenia ago, rather than however long Westerosi claim.

Also, it is important to take into account that Westerosi have an understanding of aseptics and antiseptics about on the level of the late 19th - early 20th century, which drastically lowers certain kinds of mortality. And yet, it is plausible enough that a culture that developed somewhat differently would have achieved this knowledge much earlier than we did.

[Jaehaerys Tyrell]

As some have pointed out, many bloodlines in our world have ruled for a thousand years. In most places a dynasty owns multiple castles and changes name when passing through a female line, but in Westeros, where it is common for a family to possess a single castle and for female-line heirs to adopt the surname of the traditional ruling family, I find it quite plausible that hundreds of houses could exist for thousands of years. 

A good example could be the Scottish nobility, where female-line heirs adopt the surname of their clan. 

[Corvo the Crow]

Since some people have talked about genealogies and unbroken lines I just wanted to point out something;

If you are a woman, you have an unbroken line of females under your belt with the same DNA bar some mutations, mtDNA that is almost exclusively passed on through the mother to her children. 

If you are a man you have an unbroken line of DNA in the form of genes in the chromosome Y.

Any other genetic material you have, you likely won't have an unbroken line of DNA past a few generations even for a single gene(at least the ones that set us apart from each other).

So if Lord Stark of Winterfell dies with no male heirs of his body or any of his recent ancestors, we may consider the Starks are dead but chances are, there's another, however distant, "Stark" male cousine descended from a succession of males in an unbroken line. He just doesn't carry the name Stark. He may, say, be a Karstark or some othe cader maybe a descendant of a bastard or a descendant of some other Stark who took his wife's name. He may even be a descendant of some male relative of Brandon the Builder's with a family name of his own or none at all!

Over time, Genes may get lost to us forever simply through not being passed on to the children due to the fickle nature of meiosis, however many you make, but mtDNA and Chromosome Y survive unless a mother has no daughters at all or  a father has no sons.

So @Maia has pointed out something great!

 

Also small bonus: Daynes are likely the Family that was independent the longest. Dorkstar says they go back ten thousand years and  Nymeria came only a thousand years or so ago to forge Dorne into one it's over nine thousand(!) years of independent rule.

[Jaak]

2 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

@MaiaAlso small bonus: Daynes are likely the Family that was independent the longest. Dorkstar says they go back ten thousand years and  Nymeria came only a thousand years or so ago to forge Dorne into one it's over nine thousand(!) years of independent rule.

Of the extant ones, that is.

Gardeners expressly started with Garth Greenhand, who came with the first migration of First Men across Broken Arm. And that makes 12 000 years.

What is sorely lacking in World of Ice and Fire is systematic review of events of Long Night by region. That is something which happened everywhere in Westeros simultaneously, so it would be a logical question to ask - what were your ancestors doing at Long Night? Their names and tales? Or was your House founded long afterwards?

The events of Long Night is something that should have been memorable for each House.