Did the Night's King rule during the Long Night?

[King Adrian Storm]

We know history muddles stories. Could the Night's King have been the one to lead the Others during the Long Night? First of all "Long Night" "Night's King" "King of the Night". His name hints that he could have been the one leading the invasion of the long night. I think before the Long night, the Others were a creation of the cotf, or maybe just another magical species like dragons and giants. The Night's Queen could have seduced him, and gotten him to build an entire army of Others and had him lead them against mankind. History says he was the 13th lord commander. I think that was probably just a spooky number they gave him on purpose (Which will come into play later in my theory), or maybe the night's watch existed before the long night, we don't know. I also think the night's king's story ties into the whole azor ahai/last hero tale with the Night's king's brother Brandon the breaker (iirc), being the one to take him down.  I think this particular Brandon was was the prince that was promised, hero/savior of the long night. We know the tale of the last hero, involves a man going to the lands of always winter with 12 other warriors making 13 and facing off against the Others. I find it very odd how both tales involve the number 13, I think it's because their connected. Anyway, what I think happened is Brandon the Breaker went to the Night Fort or wherever his brother was with Northmen and wildlings and killed his brother.

An observation- I find it interesting how a Stark led the Others on an invasion in Westeros (a Stark who joined the night's watch, and whose name has been stricken from all records, remember Ygritte telling Jon he has an evil name?) and his brother named Brandon was the one to take him down. I hadn't been on the side of this theory before but it would be a good set up for the 2nd long night. So maybe Jon is wighted or somehow turned into an Other and leads the Others, while Bran is the one who leads the charge against him. 

There are lots of times in Bran and Jon chapters when they think of each other, while something weird is happening. Bran's first dream sees him looking to the wall and seeing all warmth leave Jon. Jon also has a dream where he sees Bran's face on a weiwood tree. They seem to have multiple connected wolf dreams. Does the theory sound reasonable?

[Wisconsin]

Jon Snow will be the Night's King.  He will more than likely want revenge and will lead an army of wights like himself against the Boltons and the other humans in the north.  

[sweetsunray]

No, he did not rule during the Long Night. While there may have been some type of Night's Watch during the Long Night, just nowhere near in the present form and perhaps not even with vows, there was no wall during the Long Night, and therefore no Nightfort. We know it took many years to build the wall and the castles, and the result of a cooperative effort between CotF and humanity, possibly a century. While number 13 is most likely indeed a number to give the creeps, it's high enough to speak of a Lord Commander of a well established Night's Watch at the Wall, and thus he came after the Long Night. The story of the Last Hero makes quite clear that the Night's Watch only became well established after his adventures and efforts, resulting in a battle to beat the Others.  We also know that because of the Night's King, any set up to protect the castles of the Wall from the south were banned or taken down. This suggests that the Night's King lived in an era way way after the Long Night. And there is no mention of a generation long winter either with the Night's King.

The Age of Heroes lasted 2000-4000 years. That's a long time. And we know that the Others were not completely eradicated after the Long Night, since they operate in the present timeline. What makes you think they were completely inoperative for 8000 years? Makes more sense to me that the Corpse Queen (the Queen of the Others) attempted to reestablish a type of dominion centuries after the defeat of the Long Night, hoping to use the Night's King for this. Especially we also get hints that the CotF also had prior experience with them - they taught the proto-NW how to kill Others with Obsidian. This was the material they always hunted, and they tended to live in caves or high in trees. If you read the prologue of aGoT with care, you may notice that the Others didn't care about Will as long as he stayed in his tree, which compares to the CotF living in trees to survive, from what exactly?

[Quoth the raven,]

After.  He came along after.  The Night's Queen was a survivor of the war.  While the Night's King was a Stark. 

[chrisdaw]

These stories only exist in world to foreshadow what will happen in the series. Details only exist as they're required to be thought up.

[Lord Lannister]

Eh, I'll be kind of disappointed if the past foreshadows the future with the Night's King, AAR, the Prince that was Promised, the Last Hero and so on. If this story is just going to be defined by the past ones, why not just tell the past story to us? 

[sweetsunray]

10 hours ago, Lord Lannister said:

Eh, I'll be kind of disappointed if the past foreshadows the future with the Night's King, AAR, the Prince that was Promised, the Last Hero and so on. If this story is just going to be defined by the past ones, why not just tell the past story to us? 

Agreed. Past characters or events can have their echoes in the present, but often reworked or reversed. And imo one of the most important aspects of the story of the Night's King isn't the Night's King himself, let alone who he was (George will never reveal that imo), but that there is soemthing like a Corpse Queen. And the tale leaves out what happened to her. The tale is a tip off to include a female Other into the equation surrounding the mystery of "who or what are the Others really?"

[Curled Finger]

A while back I fell down the rabbit hole of trying to figure The Long Night out.  I agree 100% with @sweetsunray's comments regarding the timing of events.   Among the things I discovered while researching was that the brothers of the Nightswatch were originally called the Black Knights of the Watch.  Isn't that interesting as I ponder how the term Nightswatch originated.  I think it's one of those progressions of the spelling or pronunciation of the word knight, not Night.  With that in mind it's possible to turn the story around a bit with the addition of a single "K"; Knights Watch, Knights King and so on.  This is particularly interesting in that there were no knights around when the brothers were called Black Knights of the Watch.  There are those of us who are inclined to believe that the Knights Watch vows were changed over time.  Why not the spelling and actual meaning of the core word Knight or Night?  

To the number 13...maybe not everyone knows GRRM was a serious Dungeons & Dragons junkie back in the day.  D&D consists of 12 major character classes, hence 12.  GRRM doesn't appear to do much according to the rules so why the heck not beef his 12 heroes up with a boss hero?  We are bound to have 12 named magical weapons by the time the Battle for Dawn comes and a boss magical weapon named Dawn, or Lightbringer.  That math is no problem in my thinking.   It's not really 13 so much as 12 + 1 as I believe @LmL coined.  

I think the histories are as accurate as they can possibly be considering as much as 10,000 years has passed here.  Was NK the 13th LC?  Sure, why not?  It is symbolic of the corruption of power among men who are avowed to not be corrupted.   Nothing says the Corpse Queen didn't attempt to seduce every single one of the former LCs and the 13th just happened to be the one to fall for her.  The Others want something, likely the thing they've always wanted.   Ultimately the Knights of the Watch are just men.  

[kissdbyfire]

1 hour ago, Curled Finger said:

This is particularly interesting in that there were no knights around when the brothers were called Black Knights of the Watch. 

I think the bold is key here, and even more so the bold and underlined. There were no knights back in the early days and centuries and millennia between the formation of the NW and the Andal Invasion. The only two instances I was able to find where “black knights” is used in reference to the black brothers says “black knights of the Wall”, not Watch. And more, these two references come from a Sansa III back in AGoT, and she’s talking about how the black brothers are referred to in songs. And by the use of ‘Black knights’, I’d be willing to wager good money that these songs were written after the Andal invasion(s)

“In the songs, they were called the black knights of the Wall.”

The other instance is in the WB, and it’s an account by a maester of something that happened a long time ago. 

The World of Ice and Fire - The Wall and Beyond: The Night’s Watch

Unique in the Seven Kingdoms is the Night's Watch, the sworn brotherhood that has defended the Wall over centuries and millennia, born in the aftermath of the Long Night, the generation-long winter that brought the Others down on the realms of men and nearly put an end to them.

The history of the Night's Watch is a long one. Tales still tell of the black knights of the Wall and their noble calling.

So IMO Yandel or the other guy is just probably going by Romanticised and inaccurate bits of the songs Sansa’s referred to. My 2p worth. 

[Curled Finger]

2 minutes ago, kissdbyfire said:

I think the bold is key here, and even more so the bold and underlined. There were no knights back in the early days and centuries and millennia between the formation of the NW and the Andal Invasion. The only two instances I was able to find where “black knights” is used in reference to the black brothers says “black knights of the Wall”, not Watch. And more, these two references come from a Sansa III back in AGoT, and she’s talking about how the black brothers are referred to in songs. And by the use of ‘Black knights’, I’d be willing to wager good money that these songs were written after the Andal invasion(s)

“In the songs, they were called the black knights of the Wall.”

The other instance is in the WB, and it’s an account by a maester of something that happened a long time ago. 

The World of Ice and Fire - The Wall and Beyond: The Night’s Watch

Unique in the Seven Kingdoms is the Night's Watch, the sworn brotherhood that has defended the Wall over centuries and millennia, born in the aftermath of the Long Night, the generation-long winter that brought the Others down on the realms of men and nearly put an end to them.

The history of the Night's Watch is a long one. Tales still tell of the black knights of the Wall and their noble calling.

So IMO Yandel or the other guy is just probably going by Romanticised and inaccurate bits of the songs Sansa’s referred to. My 2p worth. 

I kept vacillating between Watch and Wall.  I had the 1st 2 letters right, dammit!  But I do appreciate your providing text for my claim.  Could be the songs were written much later and could be time is just flippin' wonky.   I've got Black Knights stuck and it ain't like to leave anytime soon.  Like when I hear Wake Me Up Before You Go Go--7 Hells.  I don't know where this NK served during the Long Night came from, but it doesn't fit the history, meager as it is.  I realize I cannot pick and choose which histories fit my head canon so I'm thinking knights were around long before the Andals landed.  How else can we explain The Sword of the Morning?  That seems to have been around longer than nearly anything.  

[kissdbyfire]

2 minutes ago, Curled Finger said:

The Sword of the Morning?  That seems to have been around longer than nearly anything.  

I must be missing something here... Sword of the Morning is the title the Dayne chosen to wield Dawn receives, but what’s that got to do w/ knighthood? I mean, sure AD had both, he was a knight, and he was the Sword of the Morning. But if the title SotM is as old as house Dayne and Dawn, it has nothing to do w/ knighthood, apart from some Daynes having been knights once knighthood became a thing in Westeros, after the Andal Invasions.

[Curled Finger]

4 minutes ago, kissdbyfire said:

I must be missing something here... Sword of the Morning is the title the Dayne chosen to wield Dawn receives, but what’s that got to do w/ knighthood? I mean, sure AD had both, he was a knight, and he was the Sword of the Morning. But if the title SotM is as old as house Dayne and Dawn, it has nothing to do w/ knighthood, apart from some Daynes having been knights once knighthood became a thing in Westeros, after the Andal Invasions.

I realize SOM doesn't say the word Knight, but the inference is there as I read in the World Book.  While we often get hung up on a specific word or term I think it's the spirit of the word knight in the term Sword of the Morning.  He's a knight of House Dayne.  That's sort of what I mean with the whole Black Knights of the Wall.  Theirs is a brotherhood with noble intent.  What did we call a fork before it became what is commonly understood to be a fork?  

[kissdbyfire]

13 minutes ago, Curled Finger said:

I realize SOM doesn't say the word Knight, but the inference is there as I read in the World Book.  While we often get hung up on a specific word or term I think it's the spirit of the word knight in the term Sword of the Morning.  He's a knight of House Dayne.  That's sort of what I mean with the whole Black Knights of the Wall.  Theirs is a brotherhood with noble intent.  What did we call a fork before it became what is commonly understood to be a fork?  

I get it. My point is, I think it’s unlikely that pre-Andal Westeros even knew the word “knight”, since knighthood didn’t exist. Or I may be misunderstanding everything. 

[TheLastWolf]

On 8/6/2020 at 2:57 AM, King Adrian Storm said:

History says he was the 13th lord commander. I think that was probably just a spooky number they gave him on purpose (Which will come into play later in my theory)

I was sure that I was not the only one to connect these.

On 8/6/2020 at 2:57 AM, King Adrian Storm said:

We know the tale of the last hero, involves a man going to the lands of always winter with 12 other warriors making 13 and facing off against the Others. I find it very odd how both tales involve the number 13

Quote

13th LC of nights watch became the  NightKing.

 

79 Sentinels of NIGHTFORT, 6 lords among them (semi-canon, saw somewhere)  79/6=13.16666..

 

[Brandon Ice-Eyes]

Lucifer Means Lightbringer has done quite a lot of videos on this which I subscribe to. His theories aren’t for everyone but I personally think he’s right. Would highly recommend u check them out  

[kissdbyfire]

9 minutes ago, Patchface. said:

Lucifer Means Lightbringer has done quite a lot of videos on this which I subscribe to. His theories aren’t for everyone but I personally think he’s right. Would highly recommend u check them out  

Right. Now the Night’s King is Azor Ahai, but a while back it was the Bloodstone Emperor or some other historical figure, at another point it was Dany, and on it goes. 

[BlackLightning]

On 8/5/2020 at 8:04 PM, Quoth the raven, said:

After.  He came along after.  The Night's Queen was a survivor of the war.  While the Night's King was a Stark. 

You don't think that the Night's King was a Bolton?

I'm not disagreeing, just curious....why a Stark?

On 8/6/2020 at 10:56 AM, sweetsunray said:

Agreed. Past characters or events can have their echoes in the present, but often reworked or reversed. And imo one of the most important aspects of the story of the Night's King isn't the Night's King himself, let alone who he was (George will never reveal that imo), but that there is soemthing like a Corpse Queen. And the tale leaves out what happened to her. The tale is a tip off to include a female Other into the equation surrounding the mystery of "who or what are the Others really?"

Exactly.

The fact that there are male Others and female Others and that a male human and a female Other can figure out of way to have some sort of intercourse....

It makes you wonder.

[sweetsunray]

2 hours ago, kissdbyfire said:

Right. Now the Night’s King is Azor Ahai, but a while back it was the Bloodstone Emperor or some other historical figure, at another point it was Dany, and on it goes. 

We should start a bingo card ;-) It was also the Grey King's brother, and Garth.

[Darth Sidious]

On 8/5/2020 at 8:04 PM, Quoth the raven, said:

After.  He came along after.  The Night's Queen was a survivor of the war.  While the Night's King was a Stark. 

[Quoth the raven,]

On 8/8/2020 at 1:16 PM, BlackLightning said:

You don't think that the Night's King was a Bolton?

I'm not disagreeing, just curious....why a Stark?

He was a Stark.  According to Old Nan.