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Regarding Planetos


Igziabeher

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I've seen plenty of maps of Westeros and it's surrounding regions, but have never seen it in a globe form yet.  So I have wondered a lot about it's layout.  

 

Where exactly do we think the equator is located?  Somewhere near Dorne or South of Westeros completely?  If so that leaves pretty much all of the Southern Hemisphere outside of a small stretch of Southyros completely unmapped.

Also, what do we think the size of Planetos' globe is exactly?  Similar to Earth or smaller?  I've always seen at as a smaller planet compared to ours.

Also if the land of Always Winter is around the North Pole than can't it be possible that it connects to the lands North of Asshai on the opposite hemisphere?

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I'm not sure if northern Sothoryos is even in the southern hemisphere -- it does not feel a stand-in for southern Africa specifically, but rather sub-Saharan Africa in general. And Jaenara Baelaerys spent some years traversing south of Sothoryos, so the equator is probably not even on the current maps of Ice & Fire.

Planetos is almost definitely bigger than Earth. Everything is on a massive scale -- Westeros, the political equivalent to Europe and Great Britain, is the size of South America. Sothoryos goes on and on, apparently. And we still don't have a complete map of Essos, and only a small indication of what Ulthos might be. 

Lands north of Asshai? How would that really be possible, unless the planet is donut-shaped? Though the Shivering Sea is likely south of the Lands of Always Winter, too.

The only indication is that you might be able to circumnavigate it (sorta). Elissa Farman's ship was allegedly found in Asshai after she sailed west from the Sunset Sea, but we cannot rely on that. And we don't know how long she lived, if she really did make it. Did it take her 5 years to make the voyage? 10, 20, 30, 40? Did she encounter a new continent or two (she dreams of a landscape that seems vaguely like an America analogue)? We can't really know.

I imagine Planetos is maybe a couple times bigger than earth, but due to density and whatnot there is the same gravity (or a wizard did it!)

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Werhead has mapped it out pretty well. Don’t have the link handy now.

In short: The equator is roughly around the latitude of the Summer Isles if I recall. 

The Arctic circle around the Northern edge of the Haunted Forest - Werthead thinks about 300 miles North of the Wall, I think about 500-600 miles North of the Wall.

George has said the planet is slightly larger than Earth. I recall Werthead arrived at an estimate of about 8% larger, but I can’t recall what he based that particular number on. Between 5-10% larger than Earth feels about right, though, given that the distances between climatic zones are fairly similar to Earth.

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3 hours ago, Vaith said:

 

Lands north of Asshai? How would that really be possible, unless the planet is donut-shaped? Though the Shivering Sea is likely south of the Lands of Always Winter, too.

 

Most maps I've seen of Essoc cut off right around Asshai.  So I imagined if they had Azor Ahai stories as far out as there, there must be some strip of land further East that extends North towards the Arctic Circle area.  Unless the stories are all just word of mouth from Westoros which is possible as well.  It just seems like the long night story has a large influence over there that there has to be some direct effect.

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I imagine that it's south of Dorne along where the Valyrian peninsula ends and where Walano (the northernmost Summer island) is. It would fit in with the Summer island's analogy for Africa since the Summer islands seem to have similar environments to the Congo rainforest which the Earth's equator passes through.

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On 2/6/2019 at 6:37 PM, Igziabeher said:

I've seen plenty of maps of Westeros and it's surrounding regions, but have never seen it in a globe form yet.  So I have wondered a lot about it's layout.  

 

Where exactly do we think the equator is located?  Somewhere near Dorne or South of Westeros completely?  If so that leaves pretty much all of the Southern Hemisphere outside of a small stretch of Southyros completely unmapped.

Also, what do we think the size of Planetos' globe is exactly?  Similar to Earth or smaller?  I've always seen at as a smaller planet compared to ours.

Also if the land of Always Winter is around the North Pole than can't it be possible that it connects to the lands North of Asshai on the opposite hemisphere?

Martin wants to keep his secrets.   We won't get the globe.  On Planetos there is no telling if the planet is tilted on its axis.  A tilt can screw around with the weather.

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1 hour ago, Igziabeher said:

so historically, where would Westeros more or less be comparable to our history?  the 13th to 15th century roughly?  Slightly before the time of Columbus & Magellan?

Roughly so, or at least that seems to be the intent. However, there are a few vast technological disparities, way ahead in certain areas and way behind in others.

Ex...land military technology, like the sophisticated full plate armor and zome of their medical knowledge, like the fact that nobles practice a form of contraception and or abortion in Moon/Tansey Tea, seem way advanced when compared with for example Naval technology(this is particularl seems woefully behind), The galleys and Longships we see are more comparable to classical period ships than medieval ones, and there is not one mention of a compass or astrolabe in all of ASOIAF or its supporting material, it is mentioned that ships sail primarily within sight of land.

There is also a nod to real world lost technology, I believe wildfire to be at least inspired by "Greek Fire" and the the Valyrain fused stone to be an allusion to concrete, little know fact, it was invented by the Romans and rediscovered in modern times, the formula for it lost during the Dark Ages.

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The seasons are totally different than anything on Earth. About the equador; if we believe Jaenara Belaerys who was a Targaryan explorerer flew 3 years down Sothoryos and back. So she called it a land without end. If she came in cold weather would she not have mentioned it as the end. if this is true maybe Planetos is more oval than round, i dont know a lot about science, but studied for some years and the weather pattern make think that.

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20 hours ago, Seaserpent said:

The seasons are totally different than anything on Earth. About the equador; if we believe Jaenara Belaerys who was a Targaryan explorerer flew 3 years down Sothoryos and back. So she called it a land without end. If she came in cold weather would she not have mentioned it as the end. if this is true maybe Planetos is more oval than round, i dont know a lot about science, but studied for some years and the weather pattern make think that.

You mean Valyrian. She was a Balaerys.

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Could Jaenara Belaerys and her dragon spend that 3 years inside of some kind of space and time anomaly instead of really flying south? After all we know that seasons of Westeros are weird by "magical reasons" and so it is possible that those reasons would cause space and time anomalies somewhere. If I am correct she spend those 3 years just flying circles until she somehow found her way out of that anomaly. So it is possible that her experience won't actually tell anything how large Sothyros actually is :(

 

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4 hours ago, Loose Bolt said:

Could Jaenara Belaerys and her dragon spend that 3 years inside of some kind of space and time anomaly instead of really flying south? After all we know that seasons of Westeros are weird by "magical reasons" and so it is possible that those reasons would cause space and time anomalies somewhere. If I am correct she spend those 3 years just flying circles until she somehow found her way out of that anomaly. So it is possible that her experience won't actually tell anything how large Sothyros actually is :(

 

She concluded it was at least as large as essos, that means that a possibly equador has to be much more south than summer islands, if we compare it with earths climate. I think it tells us that known world is at least twice as large and that she didnt find any southpole.

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2 hours ago, Seaserpent said:

She concluded it was at least as large as essos, that means that a possibly equador has to be much more south than summer islands, if we compare it with earths climate. I think it tells us that known world is at least twice as large and that she didnt find any southpole.

3 years is over 1000 days (naturally assuming that year of Planetos is as long as ours) and also assuming that a dragon would fly about 100 miles per day then she and her dragon flied at least 100.000 miles.

So I can see 3 options. Either

A) Sothyros is really over 50.000 miles long and Planetos is some kind of Super Earth.

B ) There are some kind of space and time anomaly included.

C) She just lied.

Each would have their own problems included.

A) Would mean that Planetos should have really massive gravity. Naturally assuming that natural laws of real our world work in that world.

B) and C) would mean that we would still know nothing about "real" Sothyros.

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We learn how far a dragon can fly per day in FaB. When Jaehaerys and Alysanne race to Oldtown they stop only two times, first in Bitterbridge, then in Highgarden. This means that a reasonably young dragon can at least fly the distance between KL and Bitterbridge, the distance between Bitterbridge and Highgarden, and the distance between Highgarden and Oldtown in a single day without much difficulty, possibly somewhat more (they wanted to be fast, but they did not fly a day and a night which certainly would have also be technically possible, one guesses).

Using that as guideline one can guess how much land Jaenara Belaerys may have covered in a single day - but we have no reason to assume she flew straight down south, or that she could fly as far as she wanted without sure knowledge she would find a safe refuge. The fact that she spent three years in Sothoryos does not even remotely mean she explored the lands there thoroughly.

Nor does Yandel telling us this story mean it is true. This is little more than hearsay by a tertiary source.

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On 2/14/2019 at 8:13 PM, Lord Varys said:

We learn how far a dragon can fly per day in FaB. When Jaehaerys and Alysanne race to Oldtown they stop only two times, first in Bitterbridge, then in Highgarden. This means that a reasonably young dragon can at least fly the distance between KL and Bitterbridge, the distance between Bitterbridge and Highgarden, and the distance between Highgarden and Oldtown in a single day without much difficulty, possibly somewhat more (they wanted to be fast, but they did not fly a day and a night which certainly would have also be technically possible, one guesses).

Using that as guideline one can guess how much land Jaenara Belaerys may have covered in a single day - but we have no reason to assume she flew straight down south, or that she could fly as far as she wanted without sure knowledge she would find a safe refuge. The fact that she spent three years in Sothoryos does not even remotely mean she explored the lands there thoroughly.

Nor does Yandel telling us this story mean it is true. This is little more than hearsay by a tertiary source.

Everything we know is second or third hand. I dont think she only flew south, but she is an explorerer and she say it has at least the size lenght width of essos, but offcourse we dont know. In this topic people seem to know where the equador lays and that is just one big guess, that is what i am saying with this example. Not even mentioning the strange climate planetos has. We know one thing for sure and that is that the tiny continent of Westeros has almost all climate zones.

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  • 1 month later...
On 2/8/2019 at 2:53 AM, Free Northman Reborn said:

Werhead has mapped it out pretty well. Don’t have the link handy now.

In short: The equator is roughly around the latitude of the Summer Isles if I recall. 

The Arctic circle around the Northern edge of the Haunted Forest - Werthead thinks about 300 miles North of the Wall, I think about 500-600 miles North of the Wall.

George has said the planet is slightly larger than Earth. I recall Werthead arrived at an estimate of about 8% larger, but I can’t recall what he based that particular number on. Between 5-10% larger than Earth feels about right, though, given that the distances between climatic zones are fairly similar to Earth.

Werthead is brilliant.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 2/14/2019 at 12:25 PM, Loose Bolt said:

3 years is over 1000 days (naturally assuming that year of Planetos is as long as ours) and also assuming that a dragon would fly about 100 miles per day then she and her dragon flied at least 100.000 miles.

She was only *gone* 3 years, right? So that’s 1.5 years south(ish) and 1.5 years back home north(ish). It’s right before bedtime, so I’m not gonna do the math - but the given size of Sothorys would be roughly half of your calculations then, yes? About 500 days out, 500 days back for a rough total of just over 3 years away from Valyria. 

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