Heresy 217 Dreams and Dust

[Melifeather]

22 minutes ago, Tucu said:

From F&B we get that Morning hatched in the Vale while Rhaena was under the protection of Jeyne Arryn. It looks like this dragon went through a normal hatching. The ritual (or prophetic event) seems to be only about hatching eggs that turned to stone.

The Targaryens were very secretive about how the eggs could be hatched, but when Aegon II heard that Morning "hatched" he desperately tried to hatch dragon eggs - which sounds like something deliberate needs to be done. Unless a living dragon is capable of hatching eggs? But you'd think when there were living dragons that they in turn would have had multiple egg hatchings.

[Melifeather]

2 minutes ago, Janneyc1 said:

My issue with this is that the Dragonseeds wouldn't die as kings. They were bastards, they don't get inheritance rights. That said, needing two sacrifices to awaken a dragon could make more sense. 

 

The relation to the First Men and their own sacrifices could make sense. We suspect that there were dragons in Westeros long before the Valyrians got there, so the First men may have some knowledge of how to hatch dragons. I hope we get a look inside the barrows in the next book, there should be some juicy stuff in there. 

What I am wondering is if the elderly First Men were sacrificed to create white walkers rather than dragons.

[Janneyc1]

Just now, Feather Crystal said:

What I am wondering is if the elderly First Men were sacrificed to create white walkers rather than dragons.

They may have been. Or sacrificed to help hold their old enchantments. Look at Winterfell and Storm's End. they are both First Men construction and both have a magical identity that goes with them. Perhaps the old men and bastards of the first night were sacrificed to keep that power going. 

[Tucu]

55 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

The Targaryens were very secretive about how the eggs could be hatched, but when Aegon II heard that Morning "hatched" he desperately tried to hatch dragon eggs - which sounds like something deliberate needs to be done. Unless a living dragon is capable of hatching eggs? But you'd think when there were living dragons that they in turn would have had multiple egg hatchings.

The process of hatching a dragon from normal eggs seems to be a mystery for the Targs too. After the Doom they started with 5 dragons and only two are known to have hatched between the Doom and the Conquest. After that the number seems to have risen quickly; 6 hatched during Aegon I's reign and by the Dance of Dragons they had 19 additional living Dragons (plus Vhagar that was born before the conquest)

[Brad Stark]

We have a number of wild dragons, such as sheepstealer and cannibal.  It seems more likely they hatched on their own rather than through an elaborate ritual. 

[Melifeather]

13 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

We have a number of wild dragons, such as sheepstealer and cannibal.  It seems more likely they hatched on their own rather than through an elaborate ritual. 

They hatched on Dragonstone which was built with fire and sorcery. The Valyrians knew how to liquify stone. Sheepstealer and Cannibal weren't discovered as eggs and given to Targaryens to bond with, but perhaps one of the living dragons cultivated them until they hatched? I don't think the eggs will hatch if left alone.

[Brad Stark]

14 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

They hatched on Dragonstone which was built with fire and sorcery. The Valyrians knew how to liquify stone. Sheepstealer and Cannibal weren't discovered as eggs and given to Targaryens to bond with, but perhaps one of the living dragons cultivated them until they hatched? I don't think the eggs will hatch if left alone.

Yes, there may have been some care or heat or magic from Dragonstone required, but it is unlikely anyone - King, dragonseed or commoner, was ritually sacrificed to hatch the eggs. 

[Janneyc1]

1 hour ago, Brad Stark said:

Yes, there may have been some care or heat or magic from Dragonstone required, but it is unlikely anyone - King, dragonseed or commoner, was ritually sacrificed to hatch the eggs. 

Perhaps the trick is to get a fire hot enough to expedite the hatching process. Dany's sacrifices could have just been a transition of energy from the living to the unborn dragons. Dragonstone, being volcanic, probably has temperatures that can facilitate the hatching process. My guess is that the Targs hatching while on Dragonstone was done deep in the earth and it took them awhile to dig deep enough to get there. 

[Black Crow]

22 hours ago, Tucu said:

The process of hatching a dragon from normal eggs seems to be a mystery for the Targs too. After the Doom they started with 5 dragons and only two are known to have hatched between the Doom and the Conquest. After that the number seems to have risen quickly; 6 hatched during Aegon I's reign and by the Dance of Dragons they had 19 additional living Dragons (plus Vhagar that was born before the conquest)

There's a basic problem here in that dragons are supposedly very long-lived. In the ordinary way of nature the birth rate and death rate or animals are fairly evenly balanced. Perhaps what went wrong was that the Targaryens tried to force the birth/hatching rate to compensate for the loss of dragons [and magic?] in the Doom.

[Janneyc1]

48 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

There's a basic problem here in that dragons are supposedly very long-lived. In the ordinary way of nature the birth rate and death rate or animals are fairly evenly balanced. Perhaps what went wrong was that the Targaryens tried to force the birth/hatching rate to compensate for the loss of dragons [and magic?] in the Doom.

Another thought along these lines is that dragons are magical. We know that magic waxes and wanes on this planet, so changes in hatching rates are to be expected, as well as longevity in life. I could see the lifespan of dragons being affected by how magic is affected. 

[Brad Stark]

3 hours ago, Black Crow said:

There's a basic problem here in that dragons are supposedly very long-lived. In the ordinary way of nature the birth rate and death rate or animals are fairly evenly balanced. Perhaps what went wrong was that the Targaryens tried to force the birth/hatching rate to compensate for the loss of dragons [and magic?] in the Doom.

They seemed to control the birthrate, every new dragon belonged to a newborn Targ and most Targs got an egg in their crib.  There are exceptions, such as the wild dragons I mentioned, but too few to believe these were natural animals with a natural birth rate.

 

[Brad Stark]

2 hours ago, Janneyc1 said:

Another thought along these lines is that dragons are magical. We know that magic waxes and wanes on this planet, so changes in hatching rates are to be expected, as well as longevity in life. I could see the lifespan of dragons being affected by how magic is affected. 

We know magic waxes and wanes, and most recently it waxes along with the return of the dragons.  But we don't know if the increase in magic brings more dragons, or the existence of the dragons increases magic.  My guess would be the 2nd.

[Black Crow]

The old story of the chicken and the egg of course but there's a further complication in the appearance of the comet, considered as significant by some, including Old Nan who explicitly linked it with dragons

[Brad Stark]

We had a comet during Summerhal, which makes sense if the dragons actually hatched.  But then we had a comet when Aegon was conceived, with no obvious link to anything. 

We don't know if it is the same comet, and I've seen several comets in my own lifetime which didn't bring dragons or magic, and I have to assume Westerous has those too, but GRRM including them in his story makes little sense. 

 

[Tucu]

I came across these quotes from Dunk about his shield with the falling star

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She had made a better job of it than he could ever have hoped for. Even by lantern light, the sunset colors were rich and bright, the tree tall and strong and noble. The falling star was a bright slash of paint across the oaken sky. Yet now that Dunk held it in his hands, it seemed all wrong. The star was falling, what sort of sigil was that? Would he fall just as fast? And sunset heralds night. "I should have stayed with the chalice," he said miserably. "It had wings, at least, to fly away, and Ser Arlan said the cup was full of faith and fellowship and good things to drink. This shield is all painted up like death."

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Egg was asleep by the time Dunk reached the roof. He lay on his back with his hands behind his head and stared up at the sky. The stars were everywhere, thousands and thousands of them. It reminded him of a night at Ashford Meadow, before the tourney started. He had seen a falling star that night. Falling stars were supposed to bring you luck, so he'd told Tanselle to paint it on his shield, but Ashford had been anything but lucky for him. Before the tourney ended, he had almost lost a hand and a foot, and three good men had lost their lives. I gained a squire, though. Egg was with me when I rode away from Ashford. That was the only good thing to come of all that happened.

His shield depicts a falling star at the evening (so an evening star falling) and he associates it with a herald of night (darkness) and with death? Brienne, daughter of the EvenStar later uses this sigil on her shield.

Duncan get his metaphorical "dragon Egg" close to the time he sees the falling star. This Egg "hatches" at Whitewalls during the Second Blackfyre Rebellion. BR says:

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There have always been Targaryens who dreamed of things to come, since long before the Conquest, so we should not be surprised if from time to time a Blackfyre displays the gift as well. Daemon dreamed that a dragon would be born at Whitewalls, and it was. The fool just got the color wrong

Finally Egg and Duncan die at Summerhal when another comet was in the sky.

[Melifeather]

1 hour ago, Tucu said:

I came across these quotes from Dunk about his shield with the falling star

His shield depicts a falling star at the evening (so an evening star falling) and he associates it with a herald of night (darkness) and with death? Brienne, daughter of the EvenStar later uses this sigil on her shield.

Duncan get his metaphorical "dragon Egg" close to the time he sees the falling star. This Egg "hatches" at Whitewalls during the Second Blackfyre Rebellion. BR says:

Finally Egg and Duncan die at Summerhal when another comet was in the sky.

I think these are perfect examples of how prophecies and symbolism can be expressed, and not typically how you'd expect.

[JNR]

I think the odds are good the comet from when Aegon was conceived is the same as the one in the books because:

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a comet had been seen above King's Landing on the night Aegon was conceived, and Rhaegar was certain the bleeding star had to be a comet

This tells me the source material Aemon has in mind specifies a bleeding star. 

If Rhaegar identified the comet he saw with a bleeding star, then what Rhaegar saw wasn't just a comet, but in fact a red comet.  Like the one in ACOK:

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The long red tail of Mormont's Torch burned as bright as the moon.

Quite a distinctive and memorable appearance.

Since comets are cyclical, and Aegon was conceived about a year before the Rebellion began, we can see this comet (assuming it's the same one) has a short cycle, much shorter than Halley's in our world, and thus pops up from time to time.  I doubt it has any real connection to anything.

It will still, however, naturally be interpreted by all kinds of people in all kinds of ways that seem relevant to their circumstances (as we see above, where the Watch interprets the comet as "Mormont's Torch").  In this respect, GRRM's comet is identical to the comet from Tad Williams' Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn series, which GRRM has repeatedly cited as an influence.

[Tucu]

1 hour ago, Feather Crystal said:

I think these are perfect examples of how prophecies and symbolism can be expressed, and not typically how you'd expect.

Yes, in the case of Daemon it is particulary interesting that trusting the interpretation of one prophecy (Duncan becoming a KG) led him to expose too much information maybe changing the fate of the second prophecy; the dragon hatching maybe switching from Daemon to Aegon.

[Brad Stark]

A comet and a shooting star are very different.  Comets typically last for months and appear to be stationary and shooting stars move quickly and last a fraction of a second.  

We have the Star of Bethlehem story which could have been either, but only because the story contains elements that are clearly different from both. 

I doubt we have a comet like Haley's with a regular period. We had comet sightings in 259, 281 and 300.   If we had comet sightings every 20 years, people would know, predict and expect them.  

This comet is unusual, we've observed hundreds of comets, but few bright enough to notice.  I doubt a comet with such as short period could be that bright without disintegrating quickly. 

The red color is also at odds with how comets are dark grey objects that reflect the sun's light.  A red comet would either need to emit its own light or be made of a bright red material that evaporates near the sun.  GRRM may simply not cared if the science holds up. 

[Brad Stark]

Regardless of how much GRRM cared about the science of comets, he almost certainly knew they were historically thought of as bad omens and associated with death and disaster by different cultures in history.