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Dothraki belief in how long ago Man was created


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Dothraki belief in how long ago Man was created :: websites seem to say 1000 years ago, and say that it clashes with Westerosi records that go much further back.

I now have the book "A Game of Thrones" and I have read through it. A chapter in it set among the Dothraki says that they believe that the first man, riding the first horse, came out of the lake "a thousand thousand years ago". Is the repetition merely emphatic?  Or does it mean a thousand thousands, i.e. a million?

 

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Dothraki as a people could not challenge Valyrian empire. For instance if they tried to raid Essaria as long as dragonlords were still around that colony of the empire would have called help and those raiders would have had a date with dragon(s). So I assume that ancestors of Dothraki became what they are now only couple hundred years ago. Or I assume that they are rather new people compared to other peoples in Essos.

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I'd rather not trust Dothraki math. They aren't exactly a bookish people. Their history is probably just oral tradition and when they say thousand they just mean really many, like more than two dozen. Westerosi records aren't very reliable either when it comes to the Age of Heroes and stuff like that. 

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I would think the intent was for it to mean a million, for which the Dothraki likely have no word, but also that it isn't meant to be taken literally. It is a big number chosen because it is unfathomable.

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Unusual is the people who truly know their origin.  The Dothraki didn't start out as Dothraki.  They came from east through the mountain passes and occupied the power vacuum after the fall of the Great Valyrian Empire.  So they are a people from the far east.

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 5/3/2019 at 10:57 PM, Anthony Appleyard said:

Dothraki belief in how long ago Man was created :: websites seem to say 1000 years ago, and say that it clashes with Westerosi records that go much further back.

I now have the book "A Game of Thrones" and I have read through it. A chapter in it set among the Dothraki says that they believe that the first man, riding the first horse, came out of the lake "a thousand thousand years ago". Is the repetition merely emphatic?  Or does it mean a thousand thousands, i.e. a million?

 

He would have to be soon followed out of the lake by the first woman riding the first mare, for mankind and horsekind to multiply and continue.

 

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On 5/4/2019 at 3:27 AM, Anthony Appleyard said:

A chapter in it set among the Dothraki says that they believe that the first man, riding the first horse, came out of the lake "a thousand thousand years ago". Is the repetition merely emphatic?  Or does it mean a thousand thousands, i.e. a million?

I think we should take this to mean that Dothraki believe men came to be thousands of years ago, rather than as an exact number. Figure of speech so to speak. In this world, people remember their recent history, but not ancient history. Westerosi records of ancient history are not exactly accurate either. Dothraki also has a unique way of speaking, so I suppose that plays a role too. In any case, different people in Planetos has different ways of expressing the same thing. 

Also, I don't think the Dothraki believe men were created by anything. They just rode out of the lake. 

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