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The Meaning of Horses


Seams

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I know there have been threads about horses over the years, but I haven't seen a good analysis of a horse's symbolic relationship to its rider. Another important layer of meaning seems to come from the person who gave the horse - the horse source? - and the person who accepted it. 

The wheels started turning again on this topic when I thought of Dunk selling a horse named Sweetfoot, riding a horse named Thunder and dreaming about burying a horse named Chestnut. He turns down a horse named Flame or Amends. Each name and type of horse seems to have deeper meaning:

  • Sweet is part of the major theme of "bittersweet" outcomes that GRRM has told us will sum up the series. 
  • Foot is an ongoing motif about losing hands and arms and - more rarely - feet. Dunk is told that Prince Aerion "Brightflame" Targaryen will cut off one of his hands and one of his feet until Dunk is victorious in the Trial of Seven. He later wonders whether it would have been worth giving up a foot to prevent the death of Prince Baelor. 
  • Chestnut is part of a major tree motif in The Sworn Sword and the books in general. Tree trunks are used to build a dam and Wat's Wood suffers from drought and then burns as the story progresses. In Dunk's dream, the burial of Chestnut dredges up thoughts of people who have already died and (in Dunk's mind) shows the likely deaths of bannermen and of Dunk's squire, Egg. Dornishmen chastise Dunk for wasting water by crying over the dead horse.
  • Thunder may represent the Storm King. He is a warhorse "inherited" by Dunk from Ser Arlan of Pennytree. Dunk says that a knight cannot be a knight without a warhorse. When Dunk is training Ser Osgrey's bannermen, Thunder runs at the shield wall the men have formed, causing the wall to break open as the men shy away from the galloping animal. I suspect that the symbolism of Thunder breaching The Wall may foreshadow later developments in ASOIAF.
  • Maester is a donkey on which Egg rides in The Sworn Sword, apparently a gift from Aemon Targaryen (Egg's brother and the future Maester Aemon at the Night's Watch). Egg finishes the story on a new horse (name not yet revealed) that was apparently a gift from Rohanne Webber. I suspect it is significant that Maester carries the casks of wine that Dunk and Egg have obtained for House Osgrey - is it a blood transfusion? Dunk notes that Maester probably wants to get the heavy things off his back, however.
  • Dunk turned down a gift horse offered by Lady Rohanne, a "blood bay with a bright eye and a long, fiery mane" that may be symbolic of Lady Rohanne herself. Rohanne says she calls the horse Flame, but Dunk can rename her; suggesting the name "Amends" as a symbol of Lady Rohanne's apology to Dunk. Dunk says the horse is "too good" for him.

What does it mean that Egg accepts a horse from Rohanne and Dunk declines the offer? We see Lady Dustin give away horses in ASOIAF - two colts go to the Walders who come under the protection of Ramsay Bolton at Winterfell. With her Ryswell pedigree and sigil, Lady Dustin seems to have a special affinity for horses. She tells of the horse her husband rode when he accompanied Ned to the Tower of Joy and she expresses her resentment that Ned brought the horse back to her but did not return her husband's remains. 

I suspect we are supposed to compare the death of Chestnut (or Dunk's dream version of the death) and the death of Lyanna Stark at the Tower of Joy. Both incidents occur in the Prince's Pass in the red sands of Dorne, if I recall correctly. In one case, the horse is returned (along with the Dane family sword); in the other case, the dead horse is left for sand dogs to scavenge the carcass. Is Ned's gesture of returning Lord Dustin's horse similar to Dunk rejecting the gift horse offered by Lady Rohanne? 

Lady Dustin also tells us that Brandon Stark (the uncle) and Lyanna Stark were like centaurs because they spend so much time on horseback. Arya, who is said to resemble her aunt Lyanna, is sometimes called Arya Horseface. When Arya tries to escape from the Brotherhood Without Banners, it is Harwin, son of the Master of Horse at Winterfell, who manages to catch her and rein her in. 

Another major hint that horses can tell us about their riders is that Jaime Lannister maintains two regular mounts that his squires have named Honor and Glory. Sometimes Jaime rides one and sometimes the other. Jaime also maintains two suits of armor - a gold "Lannister" suit and a white King's Guard suit. There has been a lot of talk about Jaime's redemption arc in this forum, but it seems he is still wrestling with the competing instincts toward Honor and Glory. (And he gives away a sword called Oathkeeper.) 

Off the top of my head, I can list the following named horses:

  • Craven - found by Arya and The Hound after the Red Wedding
  • Smiler - Theon's black warhorse, purchased by Theon from Lord Botley (an Ironman) but only if he also takes Wex Pyke as his squire. Ironmen usually "ride" ships, not horses.
  • Dancer - Bran's horse at the Harvest Feast at Winterfell. Bran rides him into the feast, using the saddle designed by Tyrion, but rides Hodor out of the feast when he goes to his room.
  • My Silver - Dany refrains from naming her horse (Dothraki custom) but refers to it as "my silver." It is her wedding gift from Khal Drogo and she immediately jumps the horse over a fire, impressing the Dothraki observers. 
  • Stranger / Driftwood - probably the same horse. Stranger is Sandor Clegane's warhorse.

Podrick Payne's horse is unique and is very specifically described: The old piebald rounsey is a swaybacked, broken-down stot. Why does GRRM give Pod this particular and unique type of horse? 

There is extensive symbolism around eating a stallion's heart or horse flesh or blood. Dany eats a stallion heart to help prove that her baby will be the Stallion the Mounts the World. From within the crypt, Bran wargs into the direwolf Summer while the carnivore eats flesh from dead horses in the burned ruins of Winterfell. Qhorin Halfhand requires his remaining rangers to mix blood from a lame / euthanized horse with oats and to eat the mixture. I suspect "oats" might be wordplay with "oath" as Qhorin is very focused on Jon's oath to the Night's Watch. 

Gregor Clegane beheads his own horse with a sword after the horse is distracted by the horse ridden by Ser Loras Tyrell.

My goal here is to pin down the meaning of horses vis-a-vis riders. I know there is a theory that red horses have a special meaning, but I can't remember what it is or whether the cited evidence stands up. If you can think of other named horses or if you can help crack the code that tells us the meaning of colors, genders, palfreys, destriers, warhorses, garrons and ponies, please share your thoughts in the comments. 

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Hmm, interesting post.

I find that horse and dragon symbolism seems to be related.

Like the Dothraki myths about horses could be referring to dragons. Much like how Mel's pyre rituals might work better if she used dragon eggs instead of swords. 

So horses being accepted or refused may have some symbolic relation to falling dragon meteors or who gets stabbed by a flaming sword. 

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Once there were two moons in the sky, but one wandered too close to the sun and cracked from the heat. A thousand thousand dragons poured forth, and drank the fire of the sun.

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When your dragons were small they were a wonder. Grown, they are death and devastation, a flaming sword above the world.

I've also been thinking that there may be a relation between the 4 Horsemen and Dany's dragons. 

Sacrifice Head Color Rider Horsemen
Drogo Drogon Black Dany Famine
Viserys Viserion White Aegon? Pestilence
Rhaego Rhaegal Green Jon Death
Mirri Maz Duur Tail Red Comet War
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The horse or type of horse (and their names) always represent their riders to some respect. And George extends this even beyond horses in some cases, and uses it to hint at something of the "people" that ride those animals, or who see them and comment on them (whtie dwarf elephants and Tyrion come to mind).

A clear example of this horse-rider analogy is Theon. First he has the black Smiler. It burns and dies in WF after Ramsay put WF to the torch. A transformed Theon later rides an old skin over bone horse that's in as bad a shape as Theon himself towards Moat Cailin. And then afterwards he gets to ride a "mare" (no stallion, as Theon doesn't have his "something" anymore).

And of course "red stallions" don't tell us something about the rider's personality, but rather that they will disappoint/lie/be false/are not the horse to bet on/will die.

https://sweeticeandfiresunray.com/parallelism/the-trail-of-the-red-stallion/

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35 minutes ago, sweetsunray said:

The horse or type of horse (and their names) always represent their riders to some respect. 

Yes, but on the other hand, a horse is a superficial aspect of a rider's identity, that may be used to confuse the reader and/or another observer, if another rider ends up riding the horse.  I expect this to happen with the horse "Stranger", just as we have already seen it happen with the Hound Helm.  As for Sandor, I don't expect him ever to ride Stranger again.

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On 12/7/2019 at 7:38 PM, sweetsunray said:

And of course "red stallions" don't tell us something about the rider's personality, but rather that they will disappoint/lie/be false/are not the horse to bet on/will die.

Thanks for the link (and several links leading from that post). I don't remember whether I read those posts years ago and forgot, or whether I had seen references to them but never read the originals. Fascinating insights.

I've always admired your well-reasoned and well-documented insights about tournaments as foreshadowing. I continue to look for hints in tourneys and your analysis put me onto that line of thinking.

I like your idea of the human on horseback as a sort of mummer performance. Your words: "And so, the finale day of the Hand’s Tourney is actually more of a mummer’s play of the Hand’s Life, with the mummers being horses and jousters."

Instead of two separate mummers, I wonder whether the rider and horse combine to form a single mummer? Maybe this is already your point. Like Brandon and Lyanna as centaurs, the jouster and horse become a single entity. For instance, Ser Loris combines with the sexually irresistible, fertile female horse (similar to Margaery becoming Renly's nominal wife but Loris remaining Renly's true love).

In your "Promising List of Red Stallions," a detail impressed itself on me: the fiery manes of some of the blood bay horses. Fire and blood?

I believe that both the horse Ned returned to Lady Dustin and the horse offered by Rohanne Webber (rejected by Ser Duncan the Tall) were blood bays with fiery manes. Lady Rohanne even called her horse "Flame." I'm wondering whether the point here is that Ned and Dunk are both symbolically declining the offer of fire? By contrast, Egg accepts a gift horse from Lady Rohanne. Dany seems to accept fire when Khal Drogo gives her the silver horse. The first thing Dany does when she rides the horse is jump over a fire. Theon sees his horse on fire as he realizes that "Reek" tricked him and has destroyed Winterfell.

Perhaps some horses symbolize "the taming of fire" or test a character's compatibility with fire. There may be something about ambition mixed in with the symbolism: Ned and Dunk do not aspire to rule Westeros; Dany and Aegon V / Egg do seem to want the throne. Theon's hubris in invading Winterfell leads to his downfall.

Also, I can't help thinking of a poem that may apply. I have shared my suspicion that GRRM is inspired by the poet William Blake in some of the details of ASOIAF. There is a Blake poem called The Tyger in which the poet describes a creation myth for the tiger involving a deity that brings together magical and powerful elements and combines them to form a magnificent animal. There is something about the eyes / fire stanza that makes me think some people are willing to ride horses with a fiery mane, and some would rather not:

In what distant deeps or skies. 
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?

Theon describes Lady Dustin as she begins the story of Brandon Stark: The lantern light in her eyes made them seem as if they were afire. In other words, she has fiery eyes.  Maybe she dared seize the fire.

If the fiery horses are a special category, I bet they are linked to Thoros of Myr. You made a good analysis of his melee victory at the Hand's Tourney, before he becomes a surprise sorcerer who uses fire to revive dead people. (Interesting that Brienne, the melee victor at Renly's tourney, is revived by food provided by Thoros after she is hanged by Lem Lemoncloak and other of the BwB.)

Returning to the list of red horses, I wonder whether we need to make a distinction between the blood bay red horses and the chestnut red horses? I suspect the tree symbolism of chestnut horses might take us in a different direction from the horses with fiery manes.

I just had a new thought:

Years ago, I saw a brief comment that a character in mythology who suffers a broken leg or a foot injury is often someone being punished for hubris - aspiring to be god-like. While Ned successfully returned the blood bay horse to Lady Dustin, avoiding the pitfall of riding a fiery horse, he does start to interfere with the succession to the Iron Throne, investigating the nature of Robert's bastards and the different appearance of the children borne by Cersei. It is after his visit to Robert's most recent child that Ned's horse falls on him and he suffers the excruciating leg injury. I like your Fisher King connection, but it would not surprise me if Ned's fate is part of an archetype involving the mortal man whose reach exceeds his grasp, and who is punished for interfering with things within the purview of the gods.

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On 12/8/2019 at 4:37 AM, Seams said:

 

Podrick Payne's horse is unique and is very specifically described: The old piebald rounsey is a swaybacked, broken-down stot. Why does GRRM give Pod this particular and unique type of horse? 

 

Your comment made me wonder if we know where he got the horse. Apparently we don't but the wiki says this:

Where Pod acquired the horse is not known, but presumably as it is such pitiable quality he was able to make it his own as nobody else wanted it. Its coat is a piebald pattern.

The piebald rounsey’s constitution must be much better than its appearance as the horse serves Pod well enough. He rides it throughout his travels with Brienne of Tarth across all sorts of terrain and it does not break down or go lame and can keep up with Brienne’s bay mare, which was given to her by Jaime Lannister.

 

That is sort of what I had assumed - that it was a fairly useless cast-off horse that Pod has adopted. But as per the wiki comments about it apparently being a sound horse, the horse is very much like Pod - unprepossessing and underestimated. Its really a bargain - so bad looking no-one bothers to take it from Pod.

 

 

 

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On 12/7/2019 at 12:37 PM, Seams said:

Podrick Payne's horse is unique and is very specifically described: The old piebald rounsey is a swaybacked, broken-down stot. Why does GRRM give Pod this particular and unique type of horse? 

Probably to confuse the reader with false clues.  The reader will think he can identify the rider by the horse (even though by now, the horse has probably changed hands).  And there are a number of curious parallels between Podrick Payne and Edric Dayne (apart from the curiously similar names), which suggests, to my mind, that they are being set up to be mistaken for one another.

Similarly, I think the next person we see riding Stranger, and perhaps wearing the Hound Helm, will not be Sandor.

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22 hours ago, Seams said:

Returning to the list of red horses, I wonder whether we need to make a distinction between the blood bay red horses and the chestnut red horses? I suspect the tree symbolism of chestnut horses might take us in a different direction from the horses with fiery manes.

Over time I've come to see chestnut horses as "not to be confused with red stallions or blood bays". Chestnuts are indeed tree-related and the riders are suspected to have a positive role of influence.

I like your idea of the centaur - horse and rider are one.

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How exciting! I love threads like this. Thanks @Seams. I am really exhausted and can't contribute much right now, but there are something from the top of my head I can't not comment on.

First, I was rereading the battle of the wispering wood just last week and it stood out to me for the first time that Catelyn notices Robb comes back from the battle on a different horse than the one he rode going in. Jaime Lannister kills his first horse (a warhorse I guess? Can't remember right now but shall look for the quotes for later) and he substitutes it for a pieblad gelding. I immediately thought of Poddrick! Maybe there is a connection there? I don't know. I don't think the piebald thing comes up too often though, so its worth looking into.

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On 12/7/2019 at 2:37 PM, Seams said:

I suspect we are supposed to compare the death of Chestnut (or Dunk's dream version of the death) and the death of Lyanna Stark at the Tower of Joy. Both incidents occur in the Prince's Pass in the red sands of Dorne, if I recall correctly. In one case, the horse is returned (along with the Dane family sword); in the other case, the dead horse is left for sand dogs to scavenge the carcass. Is Ned's gesture of returning Lord Dustin's horse similar to Dunk rejecting the gift horse offered by Lady Rohanne? 

Oh, I agree with the bolded so very much. I only got to reading the novellas after I was deep into asoiaf, so it JUMPED to my eyes when we got to the burrial scene and then it was a dream. I really believe Dunk's dreams in The Sworn Sword are a framework to interpret other dream sequences in the main novels. I'm excited to dig into that later when my brain doesn't feel like oatmeal between my ears. 

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Craven will be a nod to Robert Arryn, allowing GRRM the line

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she was a good enough horse, but Arya could not love a coward. 

Arya tends the horse but can never love it. As will be Arya's relationship with her husband Sweetrobin, her marriage to him will be a duty. Arya brushing down the sorrel horse is a nod to Sweetrobin's hair.

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He does have pretty hair. If the gods are good and he lives long enough to wed, his wife will admire his hair, surely. That much she will love about him.

 

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Adding a few excerpts from an old thread about Joffrey's wedding gifts that may have relevance here. Riding boots, a jousting pavilion, a jousting saddle - why didn't anyone give Joffrey a horse?

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So many of the gifts are about jousting and combat. What did these people envision for Joffrey's future?

...

I'm thinking we are probably meant to compare Joffrey's gifts to Dany's wedding gifts. That's the only other place where we are given a list of gifts, isn't it? Here's a summary from the chapter index:

...

Last of all Drogo brings forward his own bride gift, a fine grey filly. Drogo easily lifts her by the waist up to the saddle. She does not know what to do. Ser Jorah tells her to take the reins and ride. She is only a fair rider, having traveled almost exclusively by other means, but as she rides, she forgets her fears and eventually sends the horse into a gallop, and even has it leap over a firepit. She returns and tells Illyrio to tell her husband that he has given her the wind, and Drogo smiles. (AGoT, Chapter 11)

So we see Dany actually riding, not just receiving riding equipment.

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Horse symbolism is complex and layered (almost as complicated as food?) but I think riding a horse often represents power and strength. We see Jon Snow ride a horse when he decides to leave Castle Black after Ned's death, but he slows down and then gets off the horse when he passes Mole's Town. Using the saddle Tyrion made for him, Bran rides a horse named Dancer into the Harvest Feast at Winterfell. (Hodor dances at the festival and Bran "rides" Hodor out of the hall when he goes back to his bedchamber. A topic for another thread: Hodor is Bran's "horse" in the "afterlife journey" to Bloodraven.) Theon has a first-class horse named Smiler which is set on fire when Theon is taken prisoner by Ramsay Snow. Sandor Clegane has Stranger. I'm not sure what to make of Craven, the name Arya gives her horse. Jaime's horses are named Honor and Glory. Dany receives a beautiful horse from Khal Drogo as a wedding gift.

So many of the gifts for Joffrey are horse-related: supple riding boots, a saddle, spurs, a jousting pavilion. The people of Westeros expect Joffrey to be powerful; to be a rider of horses. But he never becomes that powerful figure.

Interesting to note, though, that Joffrey urges Tyrion to become a "rider" at that feast - he wants Tyrion to ride the pig.

Those thoughts were from 2016. Ideas may have evolved.

For instance, if the theory is correct that the horse and rider become a "centaur" (in all circumstances? only some situations?) the fact that Joffrey dies before his bedding may be linked to the fact that he does not receive a horse as a groom's gift. He never reaches the point of combining with a mate or a horse to create a new entity.

Another related tangent?

I have been thinking about Brienne and her first appearance in the books at the melee at Bitterbridge. GRRM makes a point of mentioning that Brienne's horse is covered in the bardings of House Tarth. As the blue knight (also referred to as cobalt) during the melee, I can't help but wonder whether the author is telling us to connect Brienne to the Blue Bard, the singer who is part of Margaery Tyrell's entourage in a later book?

If Brienne becomes one with her horse, and the horse is like the Blue Bard, we have a new set of hints to help us understand both characters. During his torture by Qyburn, the Blue Bard reveals that his real name is Wat. Based on the several smallfolk bannermen in The Sworn Sword, I'm pretty sure that the name Wat relates to water. So Brienne and her horse may represent a force of water, somehow.

"Loras'll do for that blue - " a companion answered before a roar drowned out the rest of his words.

(ACoK, Catelyn II, Chap. 22)

 

 

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On 12/17/2019 at 9:00 PM, Seams said:

dding a few excerpts from an old thread about Joffrey's wedding gifts that may have relevance here. Riding boots, a jousting pavilion, a jousting saddle - why didn't anyone give Joffrey a horse?

I remember this, and there are two things I've thought since then.

First idea - the key might be the Unsullied, who have no horses, and are totally without self-will or self-interest of any kind. They are set up in contrast to the Dothraki, who are crazy about horses, and always on a mission, hungry for the prizes of victory. It could be a general sort of pattern - Arya and Dany both seem more purposeful with a horse of their own. A horse is a liberation for Bran. Sansa's use of horses is severely restricted.

Without a horse, there is a sense of drifting and helplessness. For Joffrey, no horse = the death of an ego.

Second idea - the key might be Jaime's phantom fingers, a nothing that feels like something. Add to that the one-eyed characters who so often have the gift of prophecy, seeing more with less. It follows that Joffrey has been given a phantom horse to carry him to death, but also the horse might possibly represent drive and mobility after death. The young sun king is dead, but maybe not totally gone.

The two ideas contradict each other, of course. Take your pick. :)

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  • 1 month later...

On my first reading of ASoS I noticed the care GRRM took in describing the three horses Brienne, Jaime, and Cleos rode from the Inn of the Kneeling Man ("a lumbering brown plow horse" for Brienne, " a knight's palfrey, dapple grey and spirited" for Cleos - with a saddle in Bolton colours, and "an anceint white gelding blind in one eye" for Jaime.)

As I read on, it seemed to me that these three types of horses (big, fast, poor) were reappearing in a "three mounts shall you ride" pattern, for example, Brienne on the big grey courser, Hyle on the chestnut palfrey, and Pod on the gelded rounsey.

So I did some keyword searches with respect to horses:

a/ Brown, dray, plow,

b/ dapple, grey, spirited, palfrey

c/ Ancient, white, one-eyed, gelding

on the strength of the results I added 'warhorse', 'destrier', and 'courser' to group A, as it seemed to me that Lord Darry's former stable hand in Wendish town made a point of saying a warhorse was not the same as a plow horse, because people like Brother Gilliam would try to harness horses like Stranger, and while Hullen might know the difference between a destrier and a courser, they were equally warhorses as far as Sansa was concerned, and possibly as far as Gregor Clegane was concerned, too.

I added "sorrel" and "gait" to group B, as gait is what defines a palfrey. I wish I had added "chestnut" and "bay" as well as "sorrel", as quite a lot of the road horses are that color brown (and quite a few of the big horses are greys).

To group C I added " piebald", "rounsey", "stot" and "swayback". I am now almost certain I should have added "mule" "charger" "garron" to my list. It seems to me now that Dray/ Rounsey/ Mule is just the poor man's version of Warhorse/ Palfrey/ Gelding.

Anyway, these searches, rather than nicely crystallizing around Brienne, or a particular set of horses, has rather expanded my groups of three.

For example: As Lord Commander, Jon takes a grey gelding to the Godswood to swear in the new Nightswatchmen (including Leathers) when he meets Wun Wun and company. He takes a palfrey to Moletown, where he sees the faces on the three trees, and where he invites Mance's people to join the watch. When he welcomes Tormund's host to Castle Black, Satin saddles him up a firey grey courser, a stallion.

As the steward of the Lord Commander, Jon leaves for the Great Ranging on a garron. At Queenscrown he changes to a sway-backed black mare (who is nonetheless a swift and tireless roadhorse), he exchanges her for a black gelding at Molestown, which he rides back to Castle Black.

We are not told the horse that Theon leaves Winterfell on, but we know it isn't Smiler. At a guess it would most likely be a palfrey or a hunter ( palfrey because and a road horse was what was required, and hunter, because Theon had spent a lot of time on hunters, and might have a favourite horse of his own. I could imagine that Robb might foresee and attempt to ally Catelyn's concerns about Theon riding to war by not giving him a warhorse, just the sort of minor quibble to keep her from the point that Ned would raise if he were able to weigh in, that Theon had goaded Robb (and Catelyn) into leaving Winterfell.)  He takes up the heavy courser when he takes up his identity as Prince Theon. He takes up the old broken stot as Reek, so Theon has had three mounts (or possibly, his first horses went unnamed and undescribed because he is going to have a third horse).

 Robb also meets the 'three mounts' criteria: at Winterfell he rides a big grey and white gelding into the Wolfswood (with Bran on Dancer, and Theon on an unspecified mount), then the grey stallion to war, returning on the piebald.

Tyrion has the blood bay courser mare that Jaime gave him as a birthday present, swaps it for Jyck's spotted gelding for his arrival at the Eyrie (and I'm guessing, his departure), and then swaps that horse for a "a formidable brown courser armored as heavily as he was" at the Green Fork. 

Drogo also seems to have three mounts: the lean red stallion that he falls from, the stallion that Rakharo chose and Aggo felled (note the tree-magic reference - as Seams has pointed out, it happens a lot around horses) for his pyre, and the "great grey stallion, limned in smoke, it's mane a nimbus of blue flame" that Dany saw him depart on.

Joffrey rides a "blood bay courser, fast as the wind" along the Trident with Sansa (on her chestnut mare - shades of brown being strongly associated with Sansa as well as with horses), and to the defence of King's Landing with Hearteater. He flees the riots on a tall grey palfrey, and he and Margery steal Tyrion's place as the most absurd sight at his wedding feast by entering the feast hall on "matched white chargers"

Brienne on her grey appears in yet another group of three with Ser Creighton (swayback brown gelding with rhumey eyes) and Ser Illifer (weedy half-starved horse - but a war horse, in that it was the one he took into battle.) 

As well as the individual 'three mounts' and the trios of riders on war/hack/pack horses, some horses might link to people with one eye/ear/hand. Of course, a lame horse isn't going to figure much in the narrative (there is Roose Bolton's favourite courser coming up lame, the day he raped Ramsey's mother, but mostly the story is too fast-paced to wait on a lame horse). There are a few horses blind in one eye (Val's horse, for instance) , which I think might be throwing out foreshadowings and parallels to characters like Timett, Jack-be-Lucky, Ser Philip Foote of Nightsong, Crowfood Umber, Yna,  long dead Lord Jonnel Stark, or, obviously, BloodRaven. (I bet @The Fattest Leech has found the one-eye and wood references to horses already) 

There are plenty of Black Stallions in the narrative (typically destriers or coursers), and I notice both Ser Waymar and Lord Beric lose an eye and have big black horses. Brienne is one of a number of people who lose an ear or part of an ear (her injury seems to mirror Lord Hoat's, and Shagwell's, but Jorah has lost a bit of an ear, and there are a few others I can't immediately recall). Jaime of course loses a hand, and as the force of narrative is likely to make him and Brienne two of a group of three, I'm guessing there will be a one-eyed person joining them. Maybe actually one-eyed, or maybe, like Lord Walder Frey, or Edmure Tully's one-eyed pike, metaphorically one-eyed and described as such in the narrative.

Geldings seem to be an ill omen as well as red horses. Little Cat used to wait for old Lord Hoster Tully to come home from endlessly facilitating disputes between the Blackwoods and the Brakens, on a brown gelding. Stevron greets Robb at the gate at the Green Fork on a gelding. Ser Illyn rides a gelding, and a one-eyed mule watches him duel Jaime in a stable.

 I'm particularly struck by the horses that Prince Aegon, Griff, and Halder ride to meet the Golden Company. We know from the start that it is too soon, and too rash, and Aegon is too trusting of the Golden Company and Tyrion both, while the Griffin shows us there is no fool like an old fool. The 'best' horse they have is a large grey gelding, so pale he is almost white, so Aegon rides that. Griff is (we infer) on the same white courser he rode up the throat on beside Homeless Harry Strickland (Griff is, I suspect, due to lose a hand, if he doesn't get his throat cut first). Haldon has a 'lesser mount'. It is probably not the mare with the sweet gait that Ser Rolly shared with Tyrion when they first met, as they didn't take horses onto the Shy Maid, and they were certainly not walking them along the Rhoyne - so Haldon's horse is, like the gelding and the courser, newly purchased. We can suspect it is inferior to both. After all, he is a half-maester. Full maesters don't get horses at all, but donkeys and mules.

Brienne, Arya, and Horse are 'horse faced'. Patchface is described as piebald (because of his alopecia - a trait which he shares with Ser Archibald Yronwood, and could probably be applied to nearly any bald man that still had bits of hair left).  Ser Robert Strong has a chest "worthy of a plowhorse", and Hodor is compared to and described as a large horse. Smiler is thus named because he bit off part of the cheek of his last owner - the loss of an ear tends to also result in a cheek injury, a la Myrcella, so there could be a connextion between those bad-tempered destriers and people who have lost an ear.

Freys <3 Greys: There are a lot of Freys on grey palfreys. Merret, Petyr, Ryman. Cleos. Lady Dustin gives the Walders a pair of fine grey colts.  I notice that Cleos' spirited grey palfrey had a pink and black saddle - the Bolton colours. Perhaps Lady Dustin gave the horse as a tribute to Lord Bolton, or perhaps as a gift to Lord Bolton's son Domeric. Such a fine horse, such a fine saddle, could hardly have been ridden into battle by a mere henchman - unless said henchman was pretending to be Lord Roose, as happened when Ramsey met his father at Moat Calin. I'm wondering if the Freys have been given gift-greys (or purchased them) from Lady Dustin, also (Perhaps the wedding of the Leech Lord to Fat Walda would give her the opportunity?). In addition to the bad-luck Red stallion of the Dustin sigil, Lady Dustin has her Ryswell arms, with their Black, Grey, Brown and Gold horses. I notice there hasn't been a reference to a golden or palamino horse in the narrative yet. Perhaps the famous Dornish sand steeds, whose color has not been noticed in the narrative thus far, are the color of sand.

When Brienne is in Rosby, she notices Podrick following her, and a septon in a hurry on a fine grey palfrey. I'm wondering if the septon might have been a Frey, and suspect he was hurrying to King's Landing, perhaps to get there before the High Sparrow and his quarrel.

Speaking of gift horses - Symond, Rhaegar and Ser Lucan Frey are another group of three. They are all given palfreys by Lord Manderley, although he doesn't say what colour.

Freys are not the only people with greys: Ser Arys has one, Jaime has Glory, Barristan has a dapple and Jhogo a plain grey. Tatters has a huge grey war horse, Loras a grey mare,  Hibald a grey road-horse. Ser Bonifer and his 86 ride tall grey geldings. While horses are unlucky for Freys, greys seem to be more generally a horse for people who know what they are about.  Grey is also associated with mist (very bad - a vehicle for the Others), and the grey plauge, Garrin's curse, the Grey Kings of the Iron Isles.

Proud Marttyn Cassel, faithful Theo Wull, Ethan Glover, ser Mark Ryswell, Howland Reed appear as "grey wraiths on horses made of mist". Lord Dustin isn't noticed in Eddard's dream, on his great red stallion in the red lands.

SweetRobin rides a grey mule and Penny her grey dog, if they count. ( I think now that Camels, elephants, mammoths, goats, unicorns, donkeys, elk, zebras, dogs and pigs probably do count, if used as a mount, although they might not have exactly the same meaning as horses. Mules seem to be as good as geldings - they are as likely to bear fruit as geldings, anyway. And Garrons are analogous to small weedy horses. Interestingly, this "3 mounts" pattern seems to be exclusive of dragons, except in the explicit 'three mounts shall ye ride' of Daenarys. The trios of riders do not seem to have a connection with the three heads of the dragon, either, as far as I can see. There does seem to be foreshadowing for flying horses and flying pigs and griffins/flying lions, though, so maybe later.

Some other individuals that might become 'three mount' people are: 

Tommen: Rides the quintain on Joffrey's thirteenth name day on his pony, and later, as King, under Loras's supervision, rides the quintain on a bigger white charger ... one more horse to go.

Loras: his slim grey courser at the Tourney of the Hand, his stallion (probably a destrier or a heavy courser, as he was in a melee) at Bitterbridge, and the horse he rode to the gates of Dragonstone, or from them. (We know there is something very strange happening there, because he has not died, and we the readers are not getting as much information on what he is up to now as characters like Mace and Swyft)

Dolorus Ed: he mentions 'losing' a white horse in a snow storm, and he is in charge of the mules at Longbarrow. One more mount and he will have three.

White horses: Pate dreams of "being a maester in a castle, in service to some open-handed lord who would honor him for his wisdom and bestow a fine white horse on him to thank him for his service...How high he would ride." Although he realises later that he will have "no chain, no seat at the lord's high table, no tall white horse to ride. His days would be spent listening to the ravens quork and scrubbing shit stains off Archmaester Walgrave's smallclothes." Of course, his fate is worse than that, but as his body is still moving around, it could conceivably end up in either scenario. 

Jaime dreams of two figures on silent, pale destriers, under Casterley Rock. One he identifies as Eddard Stark, the other he doesn't identify at all. Behind them are his original Kingsguard.

Tommon has a white horse, Triarch Horanro, the rider that Varamyr heard shouting "that the Weeper was gathering warriors to cross the Bridge of Skulls", the Girl General, Griff, Ser Mandon Moore. The Kingsguard, generally (although not exclusively). They seem to symbolise puissance, or at least, the trappings of power. The dream of power. Come to that, we don't know if Dolorous Edd's white horse was real or imaginary.

Sam (who rides a plow horse), sang to Gilly's baby that the Smith's motif are "hammer, plow, and fire bright" I'm thinking War hammer, plow horse, firey: like those big black destriers the Cleganes, Lord Bracken, Lord Blackwood, King Robert, Prince Rhaegar ride. 

Of course, R'hollr also has red fire, and grey ash, and white, and black char. So he figures in the horse symbols too. 

And the Old God of Wood. For instance, when Stranger makes a fuss crossing the river, and the branch of a tree sweeps some of the oarsmen into the stream, and when Ser Godry Farring's courser led the King-Beyond-the-Wall/Rattleshirt to the weir-wood wicker cage to be burnt with his Old Gods. 

There are lots of destriers around Arya's PoV of the Red Wedding. In contrast to the many palfreys in Catelyn's.   

Tyrek's palfrey was found, but not it's rider.

There is imagery about a sack of flour over a horse (Mycah, sweetRobin, Brienne) 

Out of time, and that is all I have for now.

Edit 15th Feb: Rereading the Hota chapter where the Sand Snakes are introduced, Lady Nym rides a golden horse. 

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