[SPOILERS] Military matters and population development (including cities)

[Lord Varys]

Oh, the question was not so much about the Swann thing as such but the implications Tyrion's dismissal of Munkun have for Munkun's overall credibility. If it was Syrax then Eustace, Mushroom, and Orwyle all should have known that, being at KL at the time the attempt happened. Even Orwyle would have had ample opportunity to hear talk about the charred corpse of Ser Byron lying around in the yard of the Red Keep after he got out of his cell. And Eustace would have never suggested Sunfyre if he had been around at KL while somebody tried to slay the dragon of the queen. He was Rhaenyra's septon, after all, just as he was Aegon II's septon before Rhaenyra and after.

More importantly, Gyldayn's dismissal of Munkun as a source for the Vhagar version based on the fact that Orwyle tends to get things wrong isn't convincing in light of Munkun drawing on multiple sources including interviews with eyewitnesses since Swann's squire could have been one of those eyewitnesses, as could have been people at court who were not Orwyle. Munkun generally follows Orwyle on the inner workings of court, but an attempt on the queen's dragon chained in the yard of the Red Keep is not a matter of 'the inner workings' of the court. It was done out in the open with half the people living in the castle being able to hear the man's dying screams, smell his charred meat, see his burned corpse. The inner workings of court are council sessions behind closed doors, plans and plots made in private, etc.

And to think about it - it is very odd that both Munkun and Eustace think Swann tried to slay a Green dragon. This in and of itself makes Tyrion's rationale that Storm's End standing with Aegon II meaning that (the second son of) House Swann also leaned towards/stood with the Greens not exactly a good argument. Lord Ormund Hightower standing with Aegon II doesn't men the Beesburys and Costaynes stood with Aegon II, too, right?

The fact that Swann is confirmed to have witnessed the confrontation between Aemond and Lucerys at Storm's End also increases the likelihood that he had more issues with Aemond/Vhagar than Syrax or Sunfyre. The man saw the great beast Vhagar in the flesh and he saw how Aemond behaved. That is more we do know about his connections with Syrax and Sunfyre.

And if the attempt took place somewhere in the wild - which would have been the case if Byron and his squire actually were able to track down Vhagar in the Riverlands - then it also makes sense that Eustace confused Vhagar with Sunfyre late in life because both dragons were far away from court at that time - unlike Syrax.

There is no solution to this conundrum but I'd say the chances that Tyrion is right on this one - and Syrax was the dragon in question - have been lowered somewhat. If only for the fact that Gyldayn's own argument - that Munkun greatly drew on Orwyle for certain events - cannot really be said to apply to as public an event as Swann's attempt on Syrax in the yard of the Red Keep would inevitably have been.

We cannot, for convenience's sake, pretend Munkun had no access to eyewitnesses from the Red Keep who may have seen or heard talk about Swann's attempt. Especially not since he started to serve as Grand Maester immediately after the end of the Dance, meaning that he himself may have heard talk about that particular episode. It would have been the second most interesting KL dragon anecdote during the Dance after the events related to the Storming of the Dragonpit.

[direpupy]

35 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

There is no solution to this conundrum but I'd say the chances that Tyrion is right on this one - and Syrax was the dragon in question - have been lowered somewhat. If only for the fact that Gyldayn's own argument - that Munkun greatly drew on Orwyle for certain events - cannot really be said to apply to as public an event as Swann's attempt on Syrax in the yard of the Red Keep would inevitably have been.

I get your point and i can't say i disagree, i would like to point out do, that Syrax is they only one that has two confirmed sources Mushroom and the squire, but that does not mean there where none apart from Orwyle on they other side of the debate.

I am starting to think that the conversation between Tyrion and Haldon is supposed to be an example of a scholarly debate that has no real answer both sides have good points but neither can prove that they are right. Haldon is trying to test Tyrion on his knowledge and finds out Tyrion favors a different side in this particular debate then he does, it does the job do, Tyrion proves that he is a man who is knowledgeable on scholarly subjects.

[Corvo the Crow]

Do we have a list of the lords in the great southron host? Like which of the defeated lords were a part of it and which managed to get away? Of those that joined, which joined with what? I mean Beesbury and Rowan only had knights at start, right? Did some others only have foot/horse as well?

 

Also a seperate question, what do we have on mercenary numbers throughout history?

 

On the previous page I have argued Tywin must have thousands of them judging by Tyrion’s 800 and under what conditions he gathered them and unwin peake having 500 in his 1500 but I woould like to see more numbers supporting or opposing.

[Free Northman Reborn]

Oldtown seems to have about 350k people. Let’s say the surrounding Hightower lands stretch for 200 miles by 200 miles beyond Oldtown, with a (very high for Westeros) density of 30 people per square mile.

That’s another 1.2m  people. Giving them around 1.5m people in total. That equates to a military capability of around 15k men, at a 1% ratio.

Add mercenaries and the ability to squeeze out maybe more than the usual 1% due to the wealth and fertility of the region and you may be looking at closer to 20k.

But 30k is unreasonable.

[Ran]

Yeah, 30,000 seems very high to me.

[direpupy]

Looking at the map of the Reach and aproximating the positions of the varieus houses i don't think that the Hightower lands inclusif of the lands of there vassals make up a third of the Reach total lands as is being suggested in this tread, at most i come to a fifth of the reach perhaps if you stretch it a little more, and in that case you are probably talking 20k for the Hightowers and there vassal houses combined.

[Lord Varys]

Even if it weren't a third, Lord Ormund didn't just raise 5,000 men but countless thousands more, all with Oldtown and whatever knights petty lords were directly sworn to Oldtown as a basis. In total he may have had 8,000-10,000 men, assuming countless thousands were not just, you know, 2,000.

And Lord Lyonel is, as is laid out in detail later on, far from spent. He could raise new armies thanks to Oldtown. Chances that he could count on the black Beesburys and Costaynes in any such enterprise are not that high, so the strength of House Hightower at the end of the Dance rests with House Hightower alone. And Gyldayn explicitly mentions the remaining potential of Oldtown the city as a reservoir for more men. That's just a fact we have to accept.

That could mean that the entire power of House Hightower (Oldtown, petty lords, landed knights around Oldtown) may be in the territory of 15,000-20,000 men. And then I think it wouldn't be far-fetched if the principal bannermen of House Hightower could raise another 10,000, especially since we have no idea how many towns there are in the Hightower lands.

Even more so if the population of the Reach continued to grow even after the Dance. The the numbers of KL continued to grow is confirmed, I think, since KL wasn't yet the most populous city of Westeros by the time of the Dance, if I remember correctly. That's a more recent development.

Similar numbers would have to be assumed for King's Landing as a reservoir of men as well, and Lannisport and Gulltown and White Harbor, too.

I mean, if one of the main city were besieged one could easily have tens or hundreds of thousands of men under arms. That wouldn't make them all great fighting men, of course, but the potential to make some of those men part of a new army to attack a retreating enemy is always there.

[direpupy]

26 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Even if it weren't a third, Lord Ormund didn't just raise 5,000 men but countless thousands more, all with Oldtown and whatever knights petty lords were directly sworn to Oldtown as a basis. In total he may have had 8,000-10,000 men, assuming countless thousands were not just, you know, 2,000.

That the Hightowers can raise 10k men from oldtown and there own lands is a given, nobody is disputing that.

26 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

And Lord Lyonel is, as is laid out in detail later on, far from spent. He could raise new armies thanks to Oldtown. Chances that he could count on the black Beesburys and Costaynes in any such enterprise are not that high, so the strength of House Hightower at the end of the Dance rests with House Hightower alone.

Beesbury and constayne are just two of the five principal bannerman of house Hightower now the house mullendore is also a black house so that makes three, but that stil leaves two who could have contributed to the Hightower host. And two of the Black houses beesbury and Constayne where defeated during the battle of the Honeywine and thus may have been forced into changing sides, i do not have F&B at hand right now but from recollection i seem to remember them not being mentioned after this battle at all.

So i i think its shortsited to assume that any new forces raised by Lord Lyonel would not include atleast some men from his sworn bannermen.

26 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

 And Gyldayn explicitly mentions the remaining potential of Oldtown the city as a reservoir for more men. That's just a fact we have to accept.

A city is always a resevoir for men, even when we get the 10k number from pate in the prologue of AFfC he follows it up with the comment that the Hightowers can raise even more if they sweep the cobblestones. That does not mean any new army will consist solley out of Oldtown men.

And as you mention yourself in the quote below men sweeped up in a city are not really going to make great fighting men, so when we are talking about a house there strength in warriors, these men with barley any training and certainly lacking proper equipment are not really something you should count.

A good example of this is the comments on they extra men recruited into the Gold Cloakes before the Battle of the Blackwater who's prowes as warriors is doubted, and from how they performed rightly so.

26 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

I mean, if one of the main city were besieged one could easily have tens or hundreds of thousands of men under arms. That wouldn't make them all great fighting men, of course, but the potential to make some of those men part of a new army to attack a retreating enemy is always there.

In real fighting men 20k is probably there maximum with maybe another 5k in men sweeped from the cobblestones and levied from village peasants to shore up the numbers.

[Corvo the Crow]

Thera are men available to raise, true, but they are not on par with the actual fighting men we mostly see. I insist on my belief that Westeros relies on professional soldiers and when it’s not the case, we are told of it like Tyrion being in a flank full of arrow fodder or Freys sending peasants with sharpened sticks or Stafford raising men from Lannisport.

These men are there but are preferred not to be used. I think the greatest evidence of it is Tywin has wagons filled with armor and weapons, but he doesn’t hand it out to the kind of men in Tyrion’s flank. He equipped the clansmen because they are fighters with the skills to use those whereas the unarmored farmhands with scythes and rusty swords do not.

[Corvinus85]

22 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Thera are men available to raise, true, but they are not on par with the actual fighting men we mostly see. I insist on my belief that Westeros relies on professional soldiers and when it’s not the case, we are told of it like Tyrion being in a flank full of arrow fodder or Freys sending peasants with sharpened sticks or Stafford raising men from Lannisport.

These men are there but are preferred not to be used. I think the greatest evidence of it is Tywin has wagons filled with armor and weapons, but he doesn’t hand it out to the kind of men in Tyrion’s flank. He equipped the clansmen because they are fighters with the skills to use those whereas the unarmored farmhands with scythes and rusty swords do not.

I don't know where this belief comes from, but it's not an accurate assessment of what we've seen in the books. 

Semi-professional at best. What GRRM calls men-at-arms are really levied infantry, like spearmen, pikemen, etc. Some lords are more willing and capable to ensure the people of his lands are trained and ready for war. Tywin is one. Other lords, less so. Westeros still relies mainly on knights as the elite of their forces, and each house has a small core of household troops, the sworn swords as GRRM calls them. This is mentioned many times, for example when Jorah compares the Westerosi to the Dothraki. 

The only true professional soldiers we see in Westeros are the Gold Cloaks, and presumably the watchmen of Lannisport and Oldtown. But the Gold Cloaks are not considered that great when it comes to actual warfare, though I think based on what we've seen happen prior and during the Dance, I'd say the present day GC have declined in martial quality.

[Lord Varys]

14 minutes ago, direpupy said:

Beesbury and constayne are just two of the five principal bannerman of house Hightower now the house mullendore is also a black house so that makes three, but that stil leaves two who could have contributed to the Hightower host. And two of the Black houses beesbury and Constayne where defeated during the battle of the Honeywine and thus may have been forced into changing sides, i do not have F&B at hand right now but from recollection i seem to remember them not being mentioned after this battle at all.

I thought of that, but considering the situation Lord Lyonel found himself in at the end of the Dance he could not really count on the allegiance of any of his bannermen there - two had taken up arms against House Hightower, three had been Blacks, and the other two stayed out of the war entirely. A new king had been crowned, one House Tyrell of Highgarden had acknowledged, so Lord Lyonel would have to convince his lords bannermen not only to rebel against Aegon III but also against the Tyrells.

Considering that we know that Garmund being a page at Highgarden may have been part of the - or the real - reason as to why Lord Lyonel bent the knee to Aegon III chances are not that high that he could have forced his lords bannermen to sent many men to him.

But I never said he could not have expected any men from them - however, him being able to force them to send him support would greatly rest on his own military potential. He must still be pretty strong to be able to persuade/force those men to support his cause.

14 minutes ago, direpupy said:

A city is always a resevoir for men, even when we get the 10k number from pate in the prologue of AFfC he follows it up with the comment that the Hightowers can raise even more if they sweep the cobblestones. That does not mean any new army will consist solley out of Oldtown men.

At this point we also have no reason to believe the bannermen of House Hightower have contributed in any way to the men Lord Leyton has assembled. The castles and lands of the bannermen of House Hightower are all very near to the coastlines. They are as threatened by the Ironborn as is Oldtown itself, making it very unlikely that those lords will actually send (m)any men to the defense of Oldtown.

14 minutes ago, direpupy said:

And as you mention yourself in the quote below men sweeped up in a city are not really going to make great fighting men, so when we are talking about a house there strength in warriors, these men with barley any training and certainly lacking proper equipment are not really something you should count.

This was my point all along in this thread, going back to my suggestion that we should perhaps not think that the numbers of knights, archers, and men-at-arms given equal the strength of an entire army.

But if we are not going along with that idea then quality is irrelevant when we talk about about the mere size of an army. And that's what we doing here.

14 minutes ago, direpupy said:

In real fighting men 20k is probably there maximum with maybe another 5k in men sweeped from the cobblestones and levied from village peasants to shore up the numbers.

I'm not sure you or anyone has the basis to make such an assessment since we have no way whatsoever to make good guesses on the number of good fighting men Oldtown has to offer. We don't know how many knights or lords live there, no idea how large its City Watch is in times of peace, no idea how many sellswords and freeriders are in permanent service there, no idea how many sworn swords are in service there, no idea how many household knights do serve the various branches of House Hightower, how many warriors are in permanent service to the rich merchants and traders that must live in Oldtown, etc.

House Lannister is not exactly popular in KL thanks to Tywin's sack. It is hardly surprising that the Kingslanders didn't exactly do their best to help the twisted little monkey demon to defend the city against Stannis or Renly.

I'd assume that the Oldtowners act differently when their city and its ruling house are threatened.

[Corvo the Crow]

1 hour ago, Corvinus said:

I don't know where this belief comes from, but it's not an accurate assessment of what we've seen in the books. 

Semi-professional at best. What GRRM calls men-at-arms are really levied infantry, like spearmen, pikemen, etc. Some lords are more willing and capable to ensure the people of his lands are trained and ready for war. Tywin is one. Other lords, less so. Westeros still relies mainly on knights as the elite of their forces, and each house has a small core of household troops, the sworn swords as GRRM calls them. This is mentioned many times, for example when Jorah compares the Westerosi to the Dothraki. 

The only true professional soldiers we see in Westeros are the Gold Cloaks, and presumably the watchmen of Lannisport and Oldtown. But the Gold Cloaks are not considered that great when it comes to actual warfare, though I think based on what we've seen happen prior and during the Dance, I'd say the present day GC have declined in martial quality.

Yet evidence contradicting what you say is in the very post you have replied to. Where do these ill fitted lannisport guys come from if not Lannisport a mile from Casterly Rock? And do you think all the professional soldiers ahorse and lords hand out mail and spear to just any peasant to form their foot?

Goodman Willit is in disagreement with you

Quote

Willit, a grizzled man-at-arms in the service of Ser Harys Swyft, who'd pulled his master from beneath his dying horse and defended him against a dozen attackers; and a downy-cheeked squire named Josmyn Peckledon, who had killed two knights, wounded a third, and captured two more, though he could not have been more than fourteen. Willit was borne in on a litter, so grievous were his wounds.

lastly, for Goodman Willit, a spear with a silver-banded haft, a hauberk of new-forged ringmail, and a full helm with visor. Further, the goodman's sons shall be taken into the service of House Lannister at Casterly Rock, the elder as a squire and the younger as a page, with the chance to advance to knighthood if they serve loyally and well.

He defended his master’s life against a dozen attackers and was grievously injured in doing so and what does he get? New forged-ringmail and a fullhelm with visor. While we are at it, why not start handing out destriers and plate to the peasants as well?

You don’t drag around useless mouths for months on end just so they can break at the first charge and cause a rout, you only take them to fill in the ranks or when absolutely necessary.

 

There was a thread from some other poster some years back, it was a post with extensive research that reached the same conclusion, Westerosi armies, for the most part, are professionals and not just any peasant who can grab a pitchfork at hand and put a foot before the other.

[Corvinus85]

1 minute ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Yet evidence contradicting what you say is in the very post you have replied to. Where do these ill fitted lannisport guys come from if not Lannisport a mile from Casterly Rock? And do you think all the professional soldiers ahorse and lords hand out mail and spear to just any peasant to form their foot?

Goodman Willit is in disagreement with you

He defended his master’s life against a dozen attackers and was grievously injured in doing so and what does he get? New forged-ringmail and a fullhelm with visor. While we are at it, why not start handing out destriers and plate to the peasants as well?

You don’t drag around useless mouths for months on end just so they can break at the first charge and cause a rout, you only take them to fill in the ranks or when absolutely necessary.

 

 

This is not evidence of a professional soldier, but a sworn man per the feudal system. Willit is sworn to Ser Harys to fight for him. In return, he is rewarded with certain things, usually land, and on this occasion better armor and weapon. I'm not sure what your point is with this.

The feudal system of the Middle Ages wasn't simply raise all the peasants and other common folk, and order them to fight and die. They were trained men, who often were required to bring their own equipment, but a wealthy lord would also equip his troops, too. They had military training, but were not part of a standing army. A standing army implies its member be soldiers 24/7, while these people had other day jobs.

Take, for example, what Jaime thinks of Steelshanks Walton. This was a guy who was one of Roose's main officers at the time, but he was someone who had answered his liege's oath. Per Jaime's thoughts, at the end of the war Walton would return home, farm his land, and raise a family. If he was a professional soldier, at the end of the war, he would still be a soldier.

[Corvo the Crow]

22 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

This is not evidence of a professional soldier, but a sworn man per the feudal system. Willit is sworn to Ser Harys to fight for him. In return, he is rewarded with certain things, usually land, and on this occasion better armor and weapon. I'm not sure what your point is with this.

The feudal system of the Middle Ages wasn't simply raise all the peasants and other common folk, and order them to fight and die. They were trained men, who often were required to bring their own equipment, but a wealthy lord would also equip his troops, too. They had military training, but were not part of a standing army. A standing army implies its member be soldiers 24/7, while these people had other day jobs.

Take, for example, what Jaime thinks of Steelshanks Walton. This was a guy who was one of Roose's main officers at the time, but he was someone who had answered his liege's oath. Per Jaime's thoughts, at the end of the war Walton would return home, farm his land, and raise a family. If he was a professional soldier, at the end of the war, he would still be a soldier.

Well I assumed you mean peasants drafted from their lands and pointed off to march like some others.

In any case here’s e-Ro’s thread

 

[Lord Varys]

I get the vibe that men-at-arms as used by Gyldayn in FaB more often than not refer to professional warriors who are permanently in service to this or that lord (e.g. the number of men for Dragonstone's garrison). In that sense I'd assume the majority of the men-at-arms fighting in the Dance were such men permanently in the service of lords and landed knight. Keep in mind that depending on the actual number of lords and landed knight in a given region those numbers actually do multiply to no small degree.

But it also seems that for any larger campaign there also drafted new men, some of them veterans from earlier campaigns, some completely new men. How the ratio between those men varies from army to army. Sometimes - like with Rhaegar's army or part of Borros Baratheon's Kingsroad host - we get a pretty good description of that kind of thing, in other cases we don't get that. What we do learn, though, is that the higher the ratio of those non-professional men in an army is the larger is the chance that the army will lose a battle. This is why the professionalism of the Golden Company is very relevant if we speculate about the future of Aegon's campaign.

I guess the transition between a professional man-at-arms and 'rabble' is pretty fluid, but I'd say that man-at-arms still implies that you have experience with a couple of weapons and that you have some equipment aside from just your clothes.

Overall my personal guess is that most armies only a rather small percentage of actual professional warriors. For the Dance, I think, we can see that most of the Riverlanders fighting for Rhaenyra were such professionals - knights, professional archers, experienced men-at-arms on foot, etc. That's how those people triumphed over all their enemies. They did not exactly have the advantage in numbers, but they actually knew how to win battles.

Sworn swords are definitely marked as swordsmen, meaning they are likely either knights or men with a decent amount of knightly training (i.e. squires). They are not just guys who fight wars, do guard duty, etc. in their spare time.

The main reason why I think the overall ratio of professional warriors has to be pretty low is simply that we get no indication that there is much training at arms been done among the commoners. Only noblemen, knights, and at best squires do fight in tourneys. Lords do have a vital interest in training their own guardsmen and men-at-arms in their castles, but we don't know how this affects martial life in the countryside. Do villagers also train at arms in some fashion? Are there contests at archery, say? Perhaps. But I doubt the average villager learns how to form a shield wall and the like without pressure/guidance from lords or knights. Not to mention that only rich/spare people could afford to train at arms, anyway.

The places where there is likely a pretty strong martial culture especially in the past would be the Dornish Marches and the Red Mountains, considering that there was constant fighting in those regions before and even after the Targaryen Conquest. The percentage of professionals warriors of any type should be considerable higher there than anywhere else. It would be similar although identical, I'd think, in the Vale regions closest to the mountains

What new glimpses we got of the Reach in FaB - especially in relation to both Bitterbridge and Tumbleton - makes the place look less like a place full of villages and peasants and fields, but rather a pretty urban environment in certain regions. That implies that there could be a considerable number of professional warriors in those places, not just in the City Watches of the large cities.

But as I said already somewhere above it is quite clear that Westeros is not a society where mercenaries/sellswords play a large role. There are no large bands of mercenaries constantly switching sides, fighting for the highest bidder, nor do the commanders of such groups play any role in the political environment. This would be the case if the average warrior actually were fighting for coin and not out of a feudal responsibility/duty.

[Corvinus85]

21 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

I get the vibe that men-at-arms as used by Gyldayn in FaB more often than not refer to professional warriors who are permanently in service to this or that lord (e.g. the number of men for Dragonstone's garrison). In that sense I'd assume the majority of the men-at-arms fighting in the Dance were such men permanently in the service of lords and landed knight. Keep in mind that depending on the actual number of lords and landed knight in a given region those numbers actually do multiply to no small degree.

Interesting, I get the opposite vibe, mainly because of the numbers often given to men-at-arms. It's clear that man-at-arms is an infantry man from Gyldan's writing, well equipped and with military training. I suppose the term is general enough to encompass both the household troops (not knights) of a lord, and the semi-professional levies that can be raised. If GRRM had used the term correctly, it would have encompassed knights, too, but mainly referred to all well trained cavalry forces, so mercenaries, lancers, and knights. Which is why, going back to the numbers given, where men-at-arms seem to outnumber even archers by at least 3 to 1, can only mean common infantry soldiers.

[direpupy]

3 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Considering that we know that Garmund being a page at Highgarden may have been part of the - or the real - reason as to why Lord Lyonel bent the knee to Aegon III chances are not that high that he could have forced his lords bannermen to sent many men to him.

But I never said he could not have expected any men from them - however, him being able to force them to send him support would greatly rest on his own military potential. He must still be pretty strong to be able to persuade/force those men to support his cause.

I never said Lyonel did not have any strength of his own left only that i do not think that any army he raises would be purely Oldtown/Hightower men, so i agree that he would have significant strength left. 

3 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

At this point we also have no reason to believe the bannermen of House Hightower have contributed in any way to the men Lord Leyton has assembled. The castles and lands of the bannermen of House Hightower are all very near to the coastlines. They are as threatened by the Ironborn as is Oldtown itself, making it very unlikely that those lords will actually send (m)any men to the defense of Oldtown.

Leytons 10k or more if he sweeps the cobble stones was meant as an example of a city always being a reservoir of men, while the remark that followed it about a new army not necessarily consisting only out of Oldtown men was in regards to Lord Lyonel raising a new army. Sorry if that was unclear nobody disputes that the 10k are all Hightower men.

But small nitpick two of the five bannerman of house Hightower are not near the coast.

3 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

I'm not sure you or anyone has the basis to make such an assessment since we have no way whatsoever to make good guesses on the number of good fighting men Oldtown has to offer. We don't know how many knights or lords live there, no idea how large its City Watch is in times of peace, no idea how many sellswords and freeriders are in permanent service there, no idea how many sworn swords are in service there, no idea how many household knights do serve the various branches of House Hightower, how many warriors are in permanent service to the rich merchants and traders that must live in Oldtown, etc.

Its a guess i am in no way trying to suggest i know more then anyone else, its just my best guess based on the presented evidence in this tread and others and what i have read in the books. Just like you are guessing that the Hightowers can raise 30k based on the way you read the evidence.

[Lord Varys]

Just now, Corvinus said:

Interesting, I get the opposite vibe, mainly because of the numbers often given to men-at-arms. It's clear that man-at-arms is an infantry man from Gyldan's writing, well equipped and with military training. I suppose the term is general enough to encompass both the household troops (not knights) of a lord, and the semi-professional levies that can be raised. If GRRM had used the term correctly, it would have encompassed knights, too, but mainly referred to all well trained cavalry forces, so mercenaries, lancers, and knights. Which is why, going back to the numbers given, where men-at-arms seem to outnumber even archers by at least 3 to 1, can only mean common infantry soldiers.

Keep in mind that the lowest level of nobility - i.e. just some guys with no lordly or knightly title owning a tract of land and having some peasants to work it - could very well be those semi-professional levies that can be raised. Men with equipment and a feudal obligation to answer their lord's call would be, for the most part, people with certain privileges and resources.

But it is also quite clear that is a great gap between knights and squires on the one hand - who are part of the ruling class, basically - and other types of warriors. We don't have small percentage of the overall population making up the entire warrior class - we have a small fraction of the warrior class make up the lords and knights and a much larger part of them being lesser warriors in their employ/retinue.

But sure, the average levy drafted should not exactly be Eustace Osgrey's ridiculous men - but that kind of rabble must be there, too, considering new troops are often said to have to be trained for battle. If the majority of the men fighting in war were prepared for war there would be little to no need to train them for war.

The only men prepared for war would be knights, squires - who basically play at war their entire lives - and men who trained at arms and then continued to serve in a soldierly profession throughout their lives. And most of those men seem to be men in service or lords or knights.

After all, Westeros doesn't have that many wars anymore. A semi-professional not-knight/squire warrior would have little opportunity to continue to hone his skills after he ended up participating in one of the rare campaigns that happened to take place during his lifetime...

[Corvo the Crow]

One thing; when we are told the great southron host is over 20000 strong(note this,  not near 30000 but over 20000) how many battles it had seen so far? We can  do some backwards calculation; Fish feed with 2000 dead was the bloodiest battle we were told so no battle came near that in the dead count and we know that Hightowers started with 5000 men plus mercenaries and rabble on top of that. Not only can we get the strengths, or at least combined strengths, of some lords in Dance, but also what was Oldown men’s proportion. 

So say, if it was just one battle, these men collected would make perhaps around 25000 and men from Oldtown would be more than a fifth of it, perhaps as many as a third.

 

TLDR for the rest of the post; Hightowers without their principal bannermen make a third of Reach’s strength.

One other thing, though it doesn’t mean much, it is a thing to think on, as Varys pointed out, Oldtown’s principal bannermen act on their own so when Hightower’s stayed back in field of fire, vassals probably didn’t. In fof Lannister to Gardener strength is 2/3 whereas when Lannisters brought 300 retainers, Tyrells brought 500; 3/5. So perhaps that %10 difference is representing Hightowers(Oldtown)

So perhaps Oldtown alone, without the outlying vassals, make a tenth of the power of Reach. 

Obviously we don’t know if Lannister’s 22000 was say % 80 of their and Gardener’s 33000 is just %50 but, as said, it’s something to think on.

One final note, Renly’s 80000+10000 wasn’t the full power of the Reach(and whatever men from SL) his host was growing Strong as he marched on and we know the Reach can raisr at leasy another 30000 in a month. I have always assumed the 10000 with mace is mostly if not entirely Hightower(Oldtown) (foot)men given the absence of their, the most powerful bannermen’s, banner during Cat’s visit but after BW getting rewarded all the same.

As most everyone assumes Reach is 100000 strong, I think the numbers I have given are fitting too well to be just considered coincidence.

Note, however, I mean it’s strength besides the garrison left in the city as they surely left some during Dance as well.

 

[Free Northman Reborn]

I am quite perplexed how this thread has evolved to this point. Every house’s strength is a reference to what they can raise through all the vassals sworn to them. There is no reason to make the Hightowers an exception to this rule.

When the Hightowers are said to be able to raise 3 times any other Reach lord’s strength, that is a reference to what they can raise through all their vassals. Don’t know why anyone would dispute that.