Jump to content

Heresy 225 and the Snowflakes of Doom


Black Crow

Recommended Posts

9 hours ago, JNR said:

Before you can figure out what the facts mean, you have to establish what the facts are.

So the most important initial step is to establish the actual facts vs. the mere possibilities vs. the evident bullshit.

This involves reading the canon almost as if you were a skeptical journalist trying to figure out whether your sources are lying or truthful... and if truthful, whether and how much they're correct.

I would point to this passage as a good for-instance of the GRRM's mind works, in constructing his puzzles:

So, applying this kind of thinking to a common passage:

The major point here is that it's almost all Ned's unimpeachable personal memory -- he has no way to know we can read his mind, so he can't be lying.  And this is also really important stuff, so odds are high he remembers it correctly.

The exception is of course the boldfaced clause, which the phrase "it was said" notifies us is only a rumor.  That rumor is of very little value unless confirmed somehow.  If we accept that rumor as a fact, and build theories that require that idea, our theories are in trouble -- just as we would be in trouble if we published stories as a journalist without first vetting our sources.

So... this situation leaves us pondering many interesting questions about that rumor... while also having established to a near-certainty that all the rest is probably accurate.   It's useful progress.

Now when we apply this thinking to the Northern myths, which we know are ancient and in some cases, weren't written down for thousands of years... we can see for sure that distortion must have crept in and must have become amplified across all those generations and all that geography.  We can trust none of them, as sources, and many are probably way off.  Which is why I agreed with you earlier in saying

Yet they almost certainly have value and meaning of some sort; we just have to be wary of thinking they are easy nuts to crack.  They're likely to turn out as tricksy to understand as GRRM himself, because as he reminded us, the myths are as distant in time from his characters as Noah would logically be from us.

OK, I see what you mean.  I agree, everything isn't a fact.  Robert believes that Lyanna was raped hundreds of times.  Making this statement doesn't make it a fact, only that he believes she was raped.  However, saying she was raped 'hundreds of times' is a flag that he is exaggerating and obsessed.  So how can we know that she was raped even once?  We are never told why he thinks she was raped except that Rhaegar kidnapped her.  In his mind, he doesn't believe Lyanna would go willingly or that Rhaegar loved her or that she loved him.  So the only possible answer in his mind is that she was kidnapped and raped.  But we hear nothing about her being kidnapped either, except for the songs the singers sing.  The singers of this story are the tabloid press of the day where facts don't matter.  They sell the romance story.  We don't know where she died and the only witness still alive has been kept off the page.  So has anything we've been told accurate?

When George said that all the clues existed in the books to answer that question; it was taken as a challenge by readers and fans.  We have the most elaborate explanations surrounding Jon's parentage because we lack actual facts.   I think the answer will be much more straight forward and far simpler when we do know the facts.  We will be able to look at the text and the clues will be revealed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Martin also presents the reader with the notion of foreshadowing.  This is also open to wide interpretation, so how do we know that something is being foreshadowed.  I came across this passage the other day:

Quote

A Feast for Crows - Brienne IV

"Ser Gallawho of What?" He snorted. "Never heard o' him. Why was he so bloody perfect?"

"Ser Galladon was a champion of such valor that the Maiden herself lost her heart to him. She gave him an enchanted sword as a token of her love. The Just Maid, it was called. No common sword could check her, nor any shield withstand her kiss. Ser Galladon bore the Just Maid proudly, but only thrice did he unsheathe her. He would not use the Maid against a mortal man, for she was so potent as to make any fight unfair."

Crabb thought that was hilarious. "The Perfect Knight? The Perfect Fool, he sounds like. What's the point o' having some magic sword if you don't bloody well use it?"

"Honor," she said. "The point is honor."

That only made him laugh the louder. "Ser Clarence Crabb would have wiped his hairy arse with your Perfect Knight, m'lady. If they'd ever have met, there'd be one more bloody head sitting on the shelf at the Whispers, you ask me. 'I should have used the magic sword,' it'd be saying to all the other heads. 'I should have used the bloody sword.'"

Brienne could not help but smile. "Perhaps," she allowed, "but Ser Galladon was no fool. Against a foe eight feet tall mounted on an aurochs, he might well have unsheathed the Just Maid. He used her once to slay a dragon, they say."

If anyone is a just maid or perfect knight, it's Brienne and she models herself after the stories she was told about Ser Galladon.

Quote

A Feast for Crows - Brienne I

But she had another longsword hidden in her bedroll. She sat on the bed and took it out. Gold glimmered yellow in the candlelight and rubies smoldered red. When she slid Oathkeeper from the ornate scabbard, Brienne's breath caught in her throat. Black and red the ripples ran, deep within the steel. Valyrian steel, spell-forged. It was a sword fit for a hero. When she was small, her nurse had filled her ears with tales of valor, regaling her with the noble exploits of Ser Galladon of Morne, Florian the Fool, Prince Aemon the Dragonknight, and other champions. Each man bore a famous sword, and surely Oathkeeper belonged in their company, even if she herself did not. "You'll be defending Ned Stark's daughter with Ned Stark's own steel," Jaime had promised.

She doesn't count herself in the company of heroes.  However, I think foreshadowing along with prophecies are likely to be true for those characters who are unaware of the prophecies and give them little thought.  While others like Stannis, Melisandre and Euron are the manx cats attempting to make the prophecy come true for themselves.

So this fits with my notion that Brienne will be the Perfect Knight to claim the dawn sword and it will be given to her by the Seven as represented by the High Sparrow.  She will be the Just Maid who slays a dragon.     

Link to comment
Share on other sites

55 minutes ago, LynnS said:

OK, I see what you mean.  I agree, everything isn't a fact.  Robert believes that Lyanna was raped hundreds of times.  Making this statement doesn't make it a fact, only that he believes she was raped.  However, saying she was raped 'hundreds of times' is a flag that he is exaggerating and obsessed.  So how can we know that she was raped even once?  We are never told why he thinks she was raped except that Rhaegar kidnapped her.  In his mind, he doesn't believe Lyanna would go willingly or that Rhaegar loved her or that she loved him.  So the only possible answer in his mind is that she was kidnapped and raped.  But we hear nothing about her being kidnapped either, except for the songs the singers sing.  The singers of this story are the tabloid press of the day where facts don't matter.  They sell the romance story.  We don't know where she died and the only witness still alive has been kept off the page.  So has anything we've been told accurate?

When George said that all the clues existed in the books to answer that question; it was taken as a challenge by readers and fans.  We have the most elaborate explanations surrounding Jon's parentage because we lack actual facts.   I think the answer will be much more straight forward and far simpler when we do know the facts.  We will be able to look at the text and the clues will be revealed.

I am firmly in the J=R+L crowd, so this won't make sense to people opposed.   But I don't think Robert actually believes this himself.  I don't think knows with certainly what happened, but he is afraid of what could be true.   Robert wants to think of himself above all else as a hero and also being desirable to women.   Lyanna wanting to go with Rheagar completely undermines both of these, Robert accepting that means giving up on everything he believes himself to be.  So he is fanatically trying to convince himself by talking to Ned and anyone else who would listen. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 minutes ago, Brad Stark said:

I am firmly in the J=R+L crowd, so this won't make sense to people opposed.   But I don't think Robert actually believes this himself.  I don't think knows with certainly what happened, but he is afraid of what could be true.   Robert wants to think of himself above all else as a hero and also being desirable to women.   Lyanna wanting to go with Rheagar completely undermines both of these, Robert accepting that means giving up on everything he believes himself to be.  So he is fanatically trying to convince himself by talking to Ned and anyone else who would listen. 

I don't mind that you are firmly in the RLJ camp.  The fact is Robert was highly desirable to women and he was treated like a hero.  We don't have Lyanna's thoughts about Rhaegar and vice-versa; so we don't know that she wanted to go with him.  Ned would know, but he is dead.  We have people who witnessed the crowning of Lyanna; but we only have their assumptions about what this meant.  Ser Barristan can only see it as an expression of romantic love; since that is how he feels about Ashara.

But Ned says that Lyanna was crowned the queen of beauty, not the queen of love and beauty.  That's an interesting omission.  I can only assume that he thought the gesture had nothing to do with love.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 8/3/2019 at 3:21 PM, LynnS said:

I think of Othor and Jafr as equivalent to Mel's shadow assassins.  She can only control the shadow for a short period of time while the WWs can control them at will, so long as their bodies remain intact.  The only threat is fire.  The killing cold takes their victim's lives. While Mel is restricted to taking only as much as Stannis can bear.  She also uses Edric Storm's blood for her fires and presses Stannis to let her take is entire life force and snuff out his life for her use.      

 

On 8/4/2019 at 2:39 PM, LynnS said:

Specifically she creates a shadow by taking something from Stannis.  She make take his seed but she also takes some of his life force.  She contributes a part of herself in the form of the shadow.  But either way her shadow babies are similar to Othor and Jafr.  They have to be taken across the Wall and Mel has to have Davos take her into Storms End.  Then she releases the shadow assassin.  The Wights are free to move once they are taken beyond the Wall. 

At Dragonstone, she uses leaches with Edric's blood because she deems Stannis too weak to continue using his blood. 

However, I'm talking about he similarities between the shadows themselves.  Mel's shadows are smoke and dissipate once their purpose is served.  The advantage that the WW have over Mel may be that they trap their shadows in the corpses of the living that they kill.  The evidence of their connection to the WW is their blue eyes.  So they can puppet them around so long as the corpse serves as a host for the shadows they create.  But like Mel, their shadows have to be taken across the magical barrier.  

I think it is interesting to compare the black shadow Melisandre birthed once she was inside Storms End to Othor and Jafer after they were carried through the Wall. The black shadow knew where to go and who to target, because he was carrying out Stannis's will, but who's will were Othor and Jafer carrying out? It couldn't have been their own. We haven't been given any reasons for Othor and Jafer to want Jeor or Jon dead, but that is who they attacked. The Wall should block control or skinchangers, so they weren't animated that way unless the controllers were also on the south side of the Wall. I also think this means the wights themselves are not shadows. They are physical bodies that are animated somehow, whereas the black shadows are more akin to energy and fluid like smoke. The white walkers are closer to being white shadows - also akin to energy or a gas that has been frozen.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Feather Crystal said:

We haven't been given any reasons for Othor and Jafer to want Jeor or Jon dead, but that is who they attacked.

I have to assume that Mel or Stannis had some kind of control over Stannis-shadow once past the barrier.  But who knows.  Maybe it is made up of Stannis' malice and purpose and once released, require no direction.  Or it could be Stannis directing it since he is connected to it. 

I still think of Mel and fire made flesh and the WWs as ice made flesh.  But not completely.  They both have mortal bodies.  So I think something is controlling Othor and Jafr as well.  Perhaps someone who knows the layout of Castle Black and where Mormont can be found.  Is it an attempt to replace Mormont or bring the Night Watch north of the Wall?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, LynnS said:

But Ned says that Lyanna was crowned the queen of beauty, not the queen of love and beauty.  That's an interesting omission.  I can only assume that he thought the gesture had nothing to do with love.

What do you suppose Ned did think?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, JNR said:

What do you suppose Ned did think?

 "All the smiles died."  That's what we are told.  It seems to be more than a breach of etiquette.   What was Rhaegar's purpose in being there?  Aerys was suspicious of the politics and his son's ambitions.  Hoster Tully was absent from the Tourney, Tywin is pissed off about losing his heir and also absent.   The tourney is a mummer's show, with an undertow of tension, disguising it's true purpose. 

In other words, I just don't know.  lol

Although, I do have some odd thouhts about Rhaegar.  First, I think the Ghost of High Heart and the woods witch of the PWIP prophecy are the same person. I say this because she tells Arya that she gorged on death at Summerhall.  Rhaegar has an obsession with that prophecy, first thinking that he is the promised prince and then his son.  

We are not told much about what the woods with said in it's entirety.  Only this:

Quote

 

A Dance with Dragons - Daenerys IV

"Why did they wed if they did not love each other?"

"Your grandsire commanded it. A woods witch had told him that the prince was promised would be born of their line."

"A woods witch?" Dany was astonished.

 

Later, we learn that Rhaegar believed it was Aegon because a comet was seen on the day of his birth.

I'm guessing that Rhaegar met the GoHH at Summerhall on his solo visits and traded songs for dreams with her, to learn more about the prophecy.  Her dreams are somewhat cryptic, so if Rhaegar looked twice at Lyanna,

perhaps it had nothing to do with love or beauty, but something he recognized from something the GoHH said:

"I saw a wolf-maid with roses in her hair..." or something like that.

When Kevan Lannister says that Rhaegar would never have 'looked twice' at Lyanna if Cersei had been at the tournament; he is comparing their beauty on one hand, and saying she was an impediment to Tywin's ambitions on the other hand.

But the notion that someone looks twice or does a double take implies that you recognize something, maybe even a sense of deja vu.

Of course this is pure fantasy on my part,

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The wights, the Others, the shadows and maybe even dragons may be similar to the Warg bond.  Isn't there a quote from the book or ssm about magic involving movement of the soul?

An Other is a very strong warg without a body making and controlling a crude human form from ice.

A wight is a dead body being warged, and similar to what we've seen with ravens, 1 person can control a lot of them at the same time. 

A shadow is similar to a wight in only part of your conciousness goes into it, but you lose that part forever.   It is similar to an Other as it has no physical body. 

A dragon is permanent control of a body made from a wyvern and a fire wyrm.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 hours ago, LynnS said:

"All the smiles died."  That's what we are told.

True.  And since Lyanna is a subset of all, presumably her smile died too.

7 hours ago, LynnS said:

First, I think the Ghost of High Heart and the woods witch of the PWIP prophecy are the same person. I say this because she tells Arya that she gorged on death at Summerhall. 

Sure.  I think there's a stronger case to make than that, through Jenny of Oldstones:

Quote

"A woods witch?" Dany was astonished.

"She came to court with Jenny of Oldstones. A stunted thing, grotesque to look upon. A dwarf, most people said, though dear to Lady Jenny, who always claimed that she was one of the children of the forest."

So this person appears to be a dwarf with unusual abilities ("woods witch") who was alive about forty years earlier and who was very close to Jenny of Oldstones.

Now let's look at the Ghost of High Heart. 

In her, we have a dwarf with unusual prophetic powers who lives in the woods, was unquestionably alive forty years earlier, and after all those decades, is still so completely obsessed with Jenny of Oldstones that she refers to her as "my Jenny" and requires passing singers to sing about her:

Quote

And so Lem woke Tom Sevenstrings beneath his furs, and brought him yawning to the fireside with his woodharp in hand. "The same song as before?" he asked.

"Oh, aye. My Jenny's song. Is there another?"

And so he sang, and the dwarf woman closed her eyes and rocked slowly back and forth, murmuring the words and crying.

So yes, the Ghost is beyond any reasonable doubt the woods witch.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

The wights, the Others, the shadows and maybe even dragons may be similar to the Warg bond.  Isn't there a quote from the book or ssm about magic involving movement of the soul?

An Other is a very strong warg without a body making and controlling a crude human form from ice.

A wight is a dead body being warged, and similar to what we've seen with ravens, 1 person can control a lot of them at the same time. 

A shadow is similar to a wight in only part of your conciousness goes into it, but you lose that part forever.   It is similar to an Other as it has no physical body. 

A dragon is permanent control of a body made from a wyvern and a fire wyrm.

I prefer this explanation except that the Wall breaks any skinchanger connections.  So I can't see Othor and Jafr being controlled that way.  The only comparison is Mel and Stannis-shadow.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 8/6/2019 at 6:41 AM, LynnS said:

But we hear nothing about her being kidnapped either, except for the songs the singers sing.  The singers of this story are the tabloid press of the day where facts don't matter.  They sell the romance story.  We don't know where she died and the only witness still alive has been kept off the page.  So is anything we've been told accurate?

On that particular mystery?  Yes, I think so.  There's

On 8/5/2019 at 9:35 PM, JNR said:

Ned's unimpeachable personal memory -- he has no way to know we can read his mind, so he can't be lying.  And this is also really important stuff, so odds are high he remembers it correctly.

So the important thing is to distinguish the memories from the non-memories.

For instance, if one is analyzing the TOJ dream, it should be obvious to one that the dream is not a memory... although it contains memories on two specific points:

Quote

In the dream his friends rode with him, as they had in life.

Quote

They were seven, facing three. In the dream as it had been in life.

GRRM goes out of his way to make it obvious the dream is not a memory with remarks like this:

Quote

In the dream they were only shadows, grey wraiths on horses made of mist.

Quote

 A storm of rose petals blew across a blood-streaked sky, as blue as the eyes of death.

All the same, most readers still stubbornly persist in interpreting the dream as if it were Ned's memory.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I can't forebear to turn again to the infamous 1993 synopsis

Arya will be more forgiving ... until she realizes, with terror, that she has fallen in love with Jon, who is not only her half-brother but a man of the Night's Watch, sworn to celibacy. Their passion will continue to torment Jon and Arya throughout the trilogy, until the secret of Jon's true parentage is finally revealed in the last book.

Things have moved on since 1993, and the passion hasn't happened, but as Jon has grown up there's an interesting lack of curiousity about his mother. He's curious, but not to the exclusion of everything else, and except in that domestic context GRRM doesn't suggest that the revelation is going to be a game-changer in the sword from the stone/return of the king sense proclaimed by so many of the believers.

Rather, I feel that its more likely to be an explanation of something that happened in the past; how it came about that his mother Lyanna Stark really came to vanish, what was really going on at Harrenhal, and what went wrong and that we'll find Lyanna was a casualty of war rather than the face that launched a thousand ships. Rhaegar's gesture with the flowers was political rather than romantic and I think that what's being overlooked in all of this speculation is that there is an overlooked and absolutely crucial witness we haven't yet heard from - and it isn't Howland Reed.

Right at the beginning young Arya hides in a metaphorical apple-barrel and overhears a conversation about a war and a plot long advanced. What does Varys know about Harrenhal and the deals stitched up there?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

55 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

Right at the beginning young Arya hides in a metaphorical apple-barrel and overhears a conversation about a war and a plot long advanced. What does Varys know about Harrenhal and the deals stitched up there?

Pycelle is another who may know more than we are told:

Quote

A Clash of Kings - Tyrion VI

"How long have you been spying for my sister?" Tyrion asked.

Pycelle's breathing was rapid and shallow. "All I did, I did for House Lannister." A sheen of sweat covered the broad dome of the old man's brow, and wisps of white hair clung to his wrinkled skin. "Always . . . for years . . . your lord father, ask him, I was ever his true servant . . . 'twas I who bid Aerys open his gates . . ."

That took Tyrion by surprise. He had been no more than an ugly boy at Casterly Rock when the city fell. "So the Sack of King's Landing was your work as well?"

"For the realm! Once Rhaegar died, the war was done. Aerys was mad, Viserys too young, Prince Aegon a babe at the breast, but the realm needed a king . . . I prayed it should be your good father, but Robert was too strong, and Lord Stark moved too swiftly . . ."

"How many have you betrayed, I wonder? Aerys, Eddard Stark, me . . . King Robert as well? Lord Arryn, Prince Rhaegar? Where does it begin, Pycelle?" He knew where it ended.

The apple-barrel conversation is also interesting.  We assume that the bastard and the book refer to Gendry.  Arya assumes they are talking about Jon.  Only seven of Robert's bastards have been identified although Varys knows of eight.  Ned says that it was Sansa's naive statement about blonde-haired babies that turned on the light bulb.  But he is distracted and only half listens to Arya.

Quote

A Clash of Kings - Tyrion III

"If it had been, would you admit it?"

"No. But why should I betray a secret I have kept so long? It is one thing to deceive a king, and quite another to hide from the cricket in the rushes and the little bird in the chimney. Besides, the bastards were there for all to see."

"Robert's bastards? What of them?"

"He fathered eight, to the best of my knowing," Varys said as he wrestled with the saddle. "Their mothers were copper and honey, chestnut and butter, yet the babes were all black as ravens . . . and as ill-omened, it would seem. So when Joffrey, Myrcella, and Tommen slid out between your sister's thighs, each as golden as the sun, the truth was not hard to glimpse."

Varys says nothing about eye color.  I've had the notion that nine of Robert's bastards take after their mothers and that's why they are not there for all to see.  Jon has dark brown hair which may have been much darker as a newborn.

As far as Lyanna having a touch of the wolf blood; meaning she could be hot tempered or impulsive; she may have thrown caution to the wind where Robert is concerned.  

Either way, if Lyanna was standing in Tywin's way, should Robert prevail; he would get rid of her or make her a liability to Robert.  It was Cersei he wanted on the throne.   Soiling Lyanna's reputation, pitting Robert against Rhaegar would be right up his alley.

What of the note that Brandon recieves telling him of Lyanna's disappearance? kidnapping?  Where did that come from?  Pycelle? Why does Brandon then go to Kingslanding and call out Rhaegar?   It was a trap, and Hostler Tully knew it when he called Brandon a gallant fool.  What was Pycelle whispering in Aerys' ear to make him think that the Starks were threatening Rhaegar?

All these events were designed to start a war and it stinks of Tywin Lannister. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, LynnS said:

Pycelle is another who may know more than we are told:

The apple-barrel conversation is also interesting.  We assume that the bastard and the book refer to Gendry.  Arya assumes they are talking about Jon.  Only seven of Robert's bastards have been identified although Varys knows of eight.  Ned says that it was Sansa's naive statement about blonde-haired babies that turned on the light bulb.  But he is distracted and only half listens to Arya.

Varys says nothing about eye color.  I've had the notion that nine of Robert's bastards take after their mothers and that's why they are not there for all to see.  Jon has dark brown hair which may have been much darker as a newborn.

As far as Lyanna having a touch of the wolf blood; meaning she could be hot tempered or impulsive; she may have thrown caution to the wind where Robert is concerned.  

Either way, if Lyanna was standing in Tywin's way, should Robert prevail; he would get rid of her or make her a liability to Robert.  It was Cersei he wanted on the throne.   Soiling Lyanna's reputation, pitting Robert against Rhaegar would be right up his alley.

What of the note that Brandon recieves telling him of Lyanna's disappearance? kidnapping?  Where did that come from?  Pycelle? Why does Brandon then go to Kingslanding and call out Rhaegar?   It was a trap, and Hoster Tully knew it when he called Brandon a gallant fool.  What was Pycelle whispering in Aerys' ear to make him think that the Starks were threatening Rhaegar?

All these events were designed to start a war and it stinks of Tywin Lannister. 

It would be ironic of course if R+L=J was true but R stood for Robert rather than Rhaegar.

While I'm not sure I'm ready to go down that particular rabbit hole I am nevertheless reminded of the constant dichotomy of black and white in this story and that while the saintly Targaryens are while/silver of hair, Jon Snow patently is not. 

[I can recall a suggestion made in another place of how splendid it would be - or words to that effect - if having been slain at Castle Black, Jon would not only be brought back to life by Our Mel, but would awaken with his hair turned silver white!]

As to Pycelle, Varys, Tywin Lannister and the Blessed St, John of Arryn, we obviously still don't know at this stage what was really going on, or how many factions there actually were in the pit of vipers commonly known as Harrenhal, but I think that what we do know only goes to emphasise what I said earlier; that Lyanna was a casualty of war, not the cause of it.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's 2am and I can't sleep due to hunger, so I would love to ask a question. Is it possible the song Last of the Giants aren't about giants like Wun Wun? When Ygritte and other Free Folk sing the song, she wheeps and Jon says there are giants beyond the Wall and asks why she is crying. What if giants of that song refers to giants like Titan of Braavos instead? Human men so tall and powerful that were seen as giants. And like giants in the song they will be connected to mountains - Gregor the Mountain, Andrik a mountain rose from the sea etc. Neither giants are said to smile. Maybe Argoth Stone Skin was a man of great size as well, maybe even Dunk? 

+ I remember Winterfell's name being discussed in one of the Heresy threads, in Turkish Winterfell is translated as Kışyarı, which means Winter Cliff, is there a significance to that I wonder? 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Black Crow said:

I can recall a suggestion made in another place of how splendid it would be - or words to that effect - if having been slain at Castle Black, Jon would not only be brought back to life by Our Mel, but would awaken with his hair turned silver white!

That was one of the more hilarious ideas I've seen on this site. 

I remember it well -- the word used at the time to describe it was catabasis and the hair shift was the culmination of a theory that while Jon was in a coma, Bloodraven would take him on a mental tour of his Targ ancestry, explaining hard truths... and all this would somehow generate the de facto dye job to his hair. 

Never specified in that thread at the time was whether the silver-gold hair transformation would only apply to his head, or possibly also manifest in his arm hair, leg hair, crotch hair, underarm hair, nostril hair, etc. 

The same author, I bet you'll recall, considered it suggestive that Jon wears black as a Night's Watchman, just like Rhaegar's armor was black.  (I didn't have the heart to break the hard news to her that all Night's Watchmen, for thousands of years, have done the same.)

2 hours ago, Jova Snow said:

What if giants of that song refers to giants like Titan of Braavos instead?

Not much support in canon, but I seem to recall the World book discusses ancient giants in Lorath who built mazes out of carved stone and left huge bones behind. 

Since Westerosi giants show no sign of building anything out of stone more complicated than a burial mound, I doubt they had anything to do with such mazes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 8/4/2019 at 2:16 PM, St Daga said:

It's not quite the same, what Mel does with Stannis and Edric. She uses Stannis' seed to grow shadow's in her womb. She uses Edric's blood to have Stannis curse Robb, Balon and Joffrey. We don't know how she would have used Edric's life if she could have given him to the flames, but it still seems different than what she does with Stannis. I think the seed and womb is what make this different, and different from Jafer and Othor wights. 

Do we ever see Stannis without the sword he calls Lightbringer, after it is cleaned up from its dunk in the flames on Dragonstone. If Stannis wears the sword constantly, how does that differ from Mance wearing a bracelet. We don't know if Rattleshirt had a ruby. The man is burned and he isn't wearing much and no such jewel stands out. "Mance Rayder wore only a thin tunic that left his limbs naked to the cold."

Mance's bracelet might be part of a glamour, but then why do the bones matter?  So perhaps the ruby is only to control him and has nothing to do with the glamour? Although I certainly think the sword is probably glamoured, also. Perhaps that ruby in Lightbringer's hilt serves more than one purpose? :dunno:

Just because Mel felt like she was burning when Rattleshirt did, I don't think it meant she actually was. She would have survived that burning, regardless of Jon's archer's actions, or she would not have staged such an act. I don't think she will do anything to risk her own life (whatever that really entails) until she feels like her job is finished.

Back to Rattleshirt for a moment. It seems like Mance has to wear the bone armor to make the glamour stronger. Mel alludes to a bag of fingerbones in regards to glamour's, too. Davos is missing his fingerbones, so does this mean Mel plans to make a glamour of Davos at some time, for some purpose? It seems likely, but why?

 

It’s interesting that Melisandre felt the flames that licked Rattleshirt. Skinchangers feel the pain of their hosts, so perhaps glamours work similar to skinchanging?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

It’s interesting that Melisandre felt the flames that licked Rattleshirt. Skinchangers feel the pain of their hosts, so perhaps glamours work similar to skinchanging?

This is what Mel says about glamor:

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Melisandre I

Jon Snow turned to Melisandre. "What sorcery is this?"

"Call it what you will. Glamor, seeming, illusion. R'hllor is Lord of Light, Jon Snow, and it is given to his servants to weave with it, as others weave with thread."

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Melisandre I

Melisandre paid the naked steel no mind. If the wildling had meant her harm, she would have seen it in her flames. Danger to her own person was the first thing she had learned to see, back when she was still half a child, a slave girl bound for life to the great red temple. It was still the first thing she looked for whenever she gazed into a fire. "It is their eyes that should concern you, not their knives," she warned him.

"The glamor, aye." In the black iron fetter about his wrist, the ruby seemed to pulse. He tapped it with the edge of his blade. The steel made a faint click against the stone. "I feel it when I sleep. Warm against my skin, even through the iron. Soft as a woman's kiss. Your kiss. But sometimes in my dreams it starts to burn, and your lips turn into teeth. Every day I think how easy it would be to pry it out, and every day I don't. Must I wear the bloody bones as well?"

"The spell is made of shadow and suggestion. Men see what they expect to see. The bones are part of that." Was I wrong to spare this one? "If the glamor fails, they will kill you."

So it seems that it is mostly illusion and suggestion.   Specifically she says it is made of shadow although she also says that it the ability to weave light.  What sort of shadow, I'm not sure.  And it's a bit of mummer's show:
Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Melisandre I

The sound echoed queerly from the corners of the room and twisted like a worm inside their ears. The wildling heard one word, the crow another. Neither was the word that left her lips. The ruby on the wildling's wrist darkened, and the wisps of light and shadow around him writhed and faded.

The bones remained—the rattling ribs, the claws and teeth along his arms and shoulders, the great yellowed collarbone across his shoulders. The broken giant's skull remained a broken giant's skull, yellowed and cracked, grinning its stained and savage grin.

But the widow's peak dissolved. The brown mustache, the knobby chin, the sallow yellowed flesh and small dark eyes, all melted. Grey fingers crept through long brown hair. Laugh lines appeared at the corners of his mouth. All at once he was bigger than before, broader in the chest and shoulders, long-legged and lean, his face clean-shaved and windburnt.

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Melisandre I

"The bones help," said Melisandre. "The bones remember. The strongest glamors are built of such things. A dead man's boots, a hank of hair, a bag of fingerbones. With whispered words and prayer, a man's shadow can be drawn forth from such and draped about another like a cloak. The wearer's essence does not change, only his seeming."

It's interesting that she doesn't want Mance making too many appearances.  The glamor is not fool-proof.

Contrast that with what the kindly man tells Arya:
 

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - The Ugly Little Girl

"Bring me the face," said the kindly man. The waif made no answer, but she could hear her slippers whispering over the stone floor. To the girl he said, "Drink this," and pressed a cup into her hand. She drank it down at once. It was very tart, like biting into a lemon. A thousand years ago, she had known a girl who loved lemon cakes. No, that was not me, that was only Arya.

"Mummers change their faces with artifice," the kindly man was saying, "and sorcerers use glamors, weaving light and shadow and desire to make illusions that trick the eye. These arts you shall learn, but what we do here goes deeper. Wise men can see through artifice, and glamors dissolve before sharp eyes, but the face you are about to don will be as true and solid as that face you were born with. Keep your eyes closed." She felt his fingers brushing back her hair. "Stay still. This will feel queer. You may be dizzy, but you must not move."

Then came a tug and a soft rustling as the new face was pulled down over the old. The leather scraped across her brow, dry and stiff, but as her blood soaked into it, it softened and turned supple. Her cheeks grew warm, flushed. She could feel her heart fluttering beneath her breast, and for one long moment she could not catch her breath. Hands closed around her throat, hard as stone, choking her. Her own hands shot up to claw at the arms of her attacker, but there was no one there. A terrible sense of fear filled her, and she heard a noise, a hideous crunching noise, accompanied by blinding pain. A face floated in front of her, fat, bearded, brutal, his mouth twisted with rage. She heard the priest say, "Breathe, child. Breathe out the fear. Shake off the shadows. He is dead. She is dead. Her pain is gone. Breathe."

 

In this case, the ugly little girl's face contain memories or shadows and Arya experiences whole gamut of sensory memories.

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - The Ugly Little Girl

"To you," said the priest. "It does not look the same."

"To other eyes, your nose and jaw are broken," said the waif. "One side of your face is caved in where your cheekbone shattered, and half your teeth are missing."

She probed around inside her mouth with her tongue, but found no holes or broken teeth. Sorcery, she thought. I have a new face. An ugly, broken face.

"You may have bad dreams for a time," warned the kindly man. "Her father beat her so often and so brutally that she was never truly free of pain or fear until she came to us."

This last statement is reminiscent of what the kindly man tells Arya about the first FM.  He gave the first 'gift' to someone who was suffering and begging for death.  The gift was given and the first face was taken and 'her pain was gone'. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

It’s interesting that Melisandre felt the flames that licked Rattleshirt. Skinchangers feel the pain of their hosts, so perhaps glamours work similar to skinchanging?

She did feel the sensation of it. Very like Varamyr feel's the sensation of Orell's eagle on fire, or Bran feeling Summer's pain. So, I agree, that the glamour does work like skinchanging, or at least there are similarities.  

On 8/4/2019 at 1:56 PM, LynnS said:

The power she was channeling almost got away from her.  I'd say it was building up out of control:

Quote
Quote

 

A Dance with Dragons - Melisandre I

"The bones help," said Melisandre. "The bones remember. The strongest glamors are built of such things. A dead man's boots, a hank of hair, a bag of fingerbones. With whispered words and prayer, a man's shadow can be drawn forth from such and draped about another like a cloak. The wearer's essence does not change, only his seeming."

 

She made it sound a simple thing, and easy. They need never know how difficult it had been, or how much it had cost her. That was a lesson Melisandre had learned long before Asshai; the more effortless the sorcery appears, the more men fear the sorcerer. When the flames had licked at Rattleshirt, the ruby at her throat had grown so hot that she had feared her own flesh might start to smoke and blacken. Thankfully Lord Snow had delivered her from that agony with his arrows. Whilst Stannis had seethed at the defiance, she had shuddered with relief.

 

 

On 8/4/2019 at 10:01 PM, JNR said:

I agree.  She is definitely not invulnerable -- as you pointed out, her ruby was scorching her chest when Rattleshirt burned.

However, she also evidently protected herself from Cressen's poison in the ACOK prologue.  So she can still, seemingly at least, shield herself with magic in ways others cannot.

As for the idea of Mel actually burning or combusting  or being scorched from the heat that she feels when Rattleshirt burns, I disagree with.

We don't have her perspective during Cressen's poisoning, but it might be possible that she felt wretched while the poison worked on her body, just as she felt heat from Rattleshirt's burning, but she really wasn't physically effected by either. Mentally and emotionally, yes, and that gave her the sensation of great pain, but physically she was safe. I think the thing she was in danger of with Rattleshirt's burning was letting the glamour fade before she was ready. If the glamour was broken the moment those arrow's killed Rattleshirt, then the man in the cage should have obviously looked like Rattleshirt again. But no one acts like this happened. It is possible that most people where looking away from the spectacle or he was physically burned to badly for those details to be seen, I guess. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...