GRRM: One reason why there aren't many Starks around are because of the Skagosi rebellions

[Frey Kings]

Is it because the Starks are really good at dying? Or they can't win in the North without complete genocide(see history)? Or is because One guy was upset his daddy left him and decided to burn the entire fleet down  a thousand years ago and since then, nobody has bothered building a ship or two to land on the island???

Or does the Skagosi really have a mixture of Ibbenese and Unicorn and COTF and Giant's blood in them to repel the stinky Starks off their land?

 

I salute the Skagosi for every Stark they've killed and going to kill (looking at you Rickon, no riding a unicorn into battle in the upcoming battles)

 

Congrats Skagosi on continuing to Fight the POWER!

 

 

[Lion of the West]

The problem with this is that I can accept that a powerful House like the Boltons can trim down the number of Starks from time to time. But the idea that a far off and not very rich little island would be responsible for killing any large number of Starks does not make sense. And I only recall a single Lord Stark getting killed no that island.

[Bernie Mac]

2 minutes ago, LionoftheWest said:

The problem with this is that I can accept that a powerful House like the Boltons can trim down the number of Starks from time to time. But the idea that a far off and not very rich little island would be responsible for killing any large number of Starks does not make sense. And I only recall a single Lord Stark getting killed no that island.

that is not the entire quote

It's also true that there are many more Lannisters. It also has to be taken into consideration that the North has had frequent revolts and other such problems, that there have been rebel lords in the past, that they've dealt with the Kings-beyond-the-Wall, and the revolt of Skagos, and everything else that's occured in the last hundred years. All of these things are a reason for why there aren't so many Starks in the present as there were in the past.

 

It should also be pointed out that there are other Starks around in the North

There are probably some descendants of offshoot branches from the family tree floating around the north, most likely in White Harbor and Barrowton.

If we look at the family tree we see that Artos had two sons, who both could still be alive, who both had children of their own. Now for some reason Rickard's line has became distant from the other branches (Ned growing up in the Vale should have on decent terms with Jocelyn's three daughters yet Cat and Robb barely know them.

 

 

[Frey Kings]

3 minutes ago, Bernie Mac said:

.....Now for some reason Rickard's line has became distant from the other branches (Ned growing up in the Vale should have on decent terms with Jocelyn's three daughters yet Cat and Robb barely know them.

 

 

I think the extra siblings do go marrying off into smaller lords or merchants or etc. They don't count. Since they married out of royalty. Besides the Blackwoods and the Royces. I think the Starks sent 1 or 2 daughters to random houses outside the North since Aegon's Conquest.

Like for example, the current Lord Corbray, Lyn's older brother married a wealthy merchent's daughter from Gulltown for $$$. Even if it bought shame to the house. So I assume many of these extra daughters and brothers and siblings do go off and get married. Its just they marry out of Succession eventually. I bet there are farmers that are tending the farms and spreading lore that their great-great-great x10 grand father was a Stark.

 

I think there's at least 5 Targaryens that ran off and did their own thing. Like the brothel keeper in Volantis or Lys. Not including that one time the entire line married for love.

 

[Frey Kings]

So in conclusion, the Starks don't need a wedding every now and then. They are perfectly fine killing themselves off because of XY & most importantly... Z

[honeyed chicken]

1 hour ago, Frey Kings said:

Is it because the Starks are really good at dying?

 

I think you've left off a major reason for the paucity of Starks - the NW.

The Starks and the North together have done the lion share of the work to hold the Wall. That means more Stark men taking the vows & fathering no children.

I would also agree with those who put the Boltons down for a large share of Stark deaths.

The Karstarks are largely a side branch of the House Stark. Lots of distant relations there.

[Bernie Mac]

30 minutes ago, honeyed chicken said:

I think you've left off a major reason for the paucity of Starks - the NW.

The Starks and the North together have done the lion share of the work to hold the Wall. That means more Stark men taking the vows & fathering no children.

While this is logical it is not actually true in regards to the time frame the author is talking about. In the last century the only other candidate, other than Benjen, to have not fathered any children and joined the Watch is Errold. There has been an awfully lot of early deaths of Starks in the last century. 

We have the family tree from Cregan Stark and we know how most died or if they had issue.

30 minutes ago, honeyed chicken said:

I would also agree with those who put the Boltons down for a large share of Stark deaths.

it has been centuries since they have fought, the Boltons had little to do with how many Starks there were at the start of series.

[BlackLightning]

I think GRRM has said that this was a mistake on his part.

Wasn't Ned's mother, Lyarra Stark, the only child of a lesser branch of Starks.

And I know life in the North is ugly and hard - especially during winter. The Karstarks are an offshoot branch of the Starks that become powerful in their own right. The Greystarks were an offshoot branch of the Starks that turned on their own family and got wiped out as a result.

Maybe that's why there's not many of them?

[Universal Sword Donor]

9 hours ago, LionoftheWest said:

The problem with this is that I can accept that a powerful House like the Boltons can trim down the number of Starks from time to time. But the idea that a far off and not very rich little island would be responsible for killing any large number of Starks does not make sense. And I only recall a single Lord Stark getting killed no that island.

You can't imagine a remote location where an outnumbered, but better armed and trained force suffered at the hands of a more numerous foe?

Without even getting out of the north, I can name two.

[Lion of the West]

8 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

You can't imagine a remote location where an outnumbered, but better armed and trained force suffered at the hands of a more numerous foe?

Without even getting out of the north, I can name two.

I can imagine it, but I can't imagine them alone keeping the Stark family tree pruned.

[Universal Sword Donor]

11 hours ago, LionoftheWest said:

I can imagine it, but I can't imagine them alone keeping the Stark family tree pruned.

Why? It certainly contributed but plenty of Starks marrying and not having children is more of the issue. There were, what, 3 stark lords who died fighting the IB/Skagosi/Wildlings and 3 who died fighting (or burning) in the south. Even if we exclude ned and robb for obvious reasons, man that's a rough patch given that 4-5 lords of a house is probably around average for what one would expect in a century of rule. 

[Ralphis Baratheon]

Winter is hash, some Stark children may have died when they were very young. Also some Stark second and third sons with no inheritance with the wild "wolf's blood" could have went to Essos to seek fame and adventure as sellswords. I'd imagine a Stark would get a pretty prime position in the The Company of the Rose.

[Bowen Marsh]

On 8/29/2018 at 8:44 AM, Frey Kings said:

Is it because the Starks are really good at dying? Or they can't win in the North without complete genocide(see history)? Or is because One guy was upset his daddy left him and decided to burn the entire fleet down  a thousand years ago and since then, nobody has bothered building a ship or two to land on the island???

Or does the Skagosi really have a mixture of Ibbenese and Unicorn and COTF and Giant's blood in them to repel the stinky Starks off their land?

 

I salute the Skagosi for every Stark they've killed and going to kill (looking at you Rickon, no riding a unicorn into battle in the upcoming battles)

 

Congrats Skagosi on continuing to Fight the POWER!

 

The Skagosi probably stewed a few Winterfell wolves  with onions and neeps in their long history.  The best explanation, in my opinion, is the high rate of mortality and the chances they were feeding their children to the trees.  As in blood sacrifice.