leading theories explaining the screwed up seasons

[Brother Seamus]

much ink has been spilled hypothesizing on virtually all of the many many overt mysteries in ASOIAF, and much ink has even been spilled finding new mysteries not superficially apparent in the novels.

I have spent excessive time reading this kind of stuff, (and even, lately, watching youtube videos, e.g. lucifermeanslightbringer's videos) ) and yet I can't recall seeing any real cogent theorizing about why the seasons are messed up, beyond the notion that it's attributable to some sort of magical/supernatural cause; among other things, it pretty much has to be magic, because variations in seasons like this would seem to me to be astronomically/scientifically impossible, though I am open to being corrected.

Can anyone summarize the leading theories - or any theories for that matter - on how the seasons came to be irregular and what the mechanism for that happening might be, beyond just saying it's magic?

[Black Crow]

GRRM long ago said that the cause is not astronomical/scientific/cosmological

[alienarea]

1 hour ago, Black Crow said:

GRRM long ago said that the cause is not astronomical/scientific/cosmological

That leaves magic or storytelling.

Let's blame it on McGuffin ;)

[LynnS]

One thing we do know is that the winters last as long as the summers with varying durations.  The maesters seem to know when winter is coming and it's length seems to depend on the length of the summer.  The false spring is an anomaly not explained. 

As Black Crow says,  GRRM said it's cause was magical in origin.  The only clue seems to be something that Jojen tells Bran:

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A Storm of Swords - Bran II

"Oh, I do. My lord father told me about mountains, but I never saw one till now. I love them more than I can say."

Bran made a face at her. "But you just said you hated them."

"Why can't it be both?" Meera reached up to pinch his nose.

"Because they're different," he insisted. "Like night and day, or ice and fire."

"If ice can burn," said Jojen in his solemn voice, "then love and hate can mate. Mountain or marsh, it makes no matter. The land is one."

"One," his sister agreed, "but over wrinkled."

Or perhaps north and south, divided by the Wall.  The Wall is a source of magic.  So we are told by Melisandre.

The Wall is 400 miles long and 700 feet high.  It stands to reason that it would have an impact on climate.  It's also described as a sword to the east and serpent to the west.  Sorcery is like a sword without a hilt.  So it's magic fluctuates waxing and waning, stronger and weaker, etc.  It make sense to me that the Wall contributes to the magical climate of Westeros.   

[Melifeather]

I posit that the extended and erratic seasons are due to historic events being locked in a continual loop, an idea inspired by the Marvel comics character Dr Strange who placed time into a loop using the Eye of Agamotto to defeat Dormammu. Each time Dormammu killed Dr Strange, the loop would reset, and Dr Strange would reappear. Bran is Dr Strange, and Bloodraven is his Sorcerer Supreme aka the Ancient One. The white walkers are Dormammu. Each loop has a Brandon Stark. When one Brandon dies the loop is reset, and another Brandon is born to take his place. That is why Bloodraven said:

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"I have been many things, Bran. Now I am as you see me, and now you will understand why I could not come to you … except in dreams. I have watched you for a long time, watched you with a thousand eyes and one. I saw your birth, and that of your lord father before you. I saw your first step, heard your first word, was part of your first dream. I was watching when you fell. And now you are come to me at last, Brandon Stark, though the hour is late."

The sun rises and sets normally, babies are born, and people grow old and die, so it’s not "time" that is locked into a continual loop, but rather the historical events such as the conquering invaders, the Long Night, the Last Hero, King Sherrod's curse against the Andals, the Nights King, the King in the North, the Bastard of Winterfell, the marriage pact between the Dornish and the Rhoynar, and the Faith of the Seven's fanaticism. I think history was placed into a continual loop in order to defeat the Others, because whoever worked that magic didn’t want a specific event to be repeated: the resurrection of Brandon Stark. The cycle needed to be interrupted - reset - so that it couldn't reoccur. If certain events occur in specific seasons then it has to remain in that season until the event reoccurs - THEN history can move forward towards the next event.

The story of the Last Hero ends with the Children helping him defeat the Others. Maybe the Last Hero was a Brandon Stark and he died - slain by a white walker? It's said his sword broke just as Waymar Royce's did right before he was slaughtered and rose again as a wight. The Children may have intervened in his resurrection and magically reinserted his consciousness so that he wasn't just another mindless wight, but an undead creature like Coldhands - maybe he IS Coldhands - in order to hunt and kill off white walkers and end the Long Night.

The Long Night is coming again. What is dead cannot die, but rises again stronger and harder. Maybe in the past the Last Hero became the first Lord Commander of the Watch and the Nights King was the first human greenseer? Did these historic roles change places? Before Bloodraven's intervention, were Jon and Bran "destined" to play different roles with Jon as the Last Hero and Brandon as the Nights King? I suspect that this time around the Jon, as the Nights King will remain alive, albeit as an undead creature, and Bran, as the Last Hero, will die.

[Brother Seamus]

On 8/17/2020 at 1:31 AM, Melifeather said:

I posit that the extended and erratic seasons are due to historic events being locked in a continual loop, an idea inspired by the Marvel comics character Dr Strange who placed time into a loop using the Eye of Agamotto to defeat Dormammu. Each time Dormammu killed Dr Strange, the loop would reset, and Dr Strange would reappear. Bran is Dr Strange, and Bloodraven is his Sorcerer Supreme aka the Ancient One. The white walkers are Dormammu. Each loop has a Brandon Stark. When one Brandon dies the loop is reset, and another Brandon is born to take his place. That is why Bloodraven said:

The sun rises and sets normally, babies are born, and people grow old and die, so it’s not "time" that is locked into a continual loop, but rather the historical events such as the conquering invaders, the Long Night, the Last Hero, King Sherrod's curse against the Andals, the Nights King, the King in the North, the Bastard of Winterfell, the marriage pact between the Dornish and the Rhoynar, and the Faith of the Seven's fanaticism. I think history was placed into a continual loop in order to defeat the Others, because whoever worked that magic didn’t want a specific event to be repeated: the resurrection of Brandon Stark. The cycle needed to be interrupted - reset - so that it couldn't reoccur. If certain events occur in specific seasons then it has to remain in that season until the event reoccurs - THEN history can move forward towards the next event.

The story of the Last Hero ends with the Children helping him defeat the Others. Maybe the Last Hero was a Brandon Stark and he died - slain by a white walker? It's said his sword broke just as Waymar Royce's did right before he was slaughtered and rose again as a wight. The Children may have intervened in his resurrection and magically reinserted his consciousness so that he wasn't just another mindless wight, but an undead creature like Coldhands - maybe he IS Coldhands - in order to hunt and kill off white walkers and end the Long Night.

The Long Night is coming again. What is dead cannot die, but rises again stronger and harder. Maybe in the past the Last Hero became the first Lord Commander of the Watch and the Nights King was the first human greenseer? Did these historic roles change places? Before Bloodraven's intervention, were Jon and Bran "destined" to play different roles with Jon as the Last Hero and Brandon as the Nights King? I suspect that this time around the Jon, as the Nights King will remain alive, albeit as an undead creature, and Bran, as the Last Hero, will die.

That's a hell of a theory.

Anyone else? Anything buried in the forum archives?

[Free Northman Reborn]

When the Children sacrificed a thousand of their own to power the Hammer of the Waters the spell targeted the Northern Ice Cap, melting a section of it sufficiently to raise sea levels and submerge the Arm of Dorne. Centuries later, when they tried to call a second Hammer down on the Neck, the spell failed, disrupting the Natural Balance and the souls of those  greenseers were somehow malevolently twisted, eternally retaining their enmity towards mankind.

Over time these sacrificed greenseers established second lives by skinchanging into human babies offered by the wildlings, becoming the first Others, or “Neverborn” as Martin called them in his original manuscript.

The Winters were the result of the second Hammer of the Waters spell which misfired and the Others are the souls of the greenseers who tried to cast it from the Children’s Tower in the Neck.

[hiemal]

My tinfoil is that the seasons first became unbalanced when the then Winter Pole (the magickal focal point of Ice Magic) of K'dath was destroyed during a war between the Deep Ones and the inhabitants of Yeen (the Summer Pole at that time), causing the first Long Night.

Now the Summer Pole of Valyria was recently destroyed and the Land of Always Winter marches southwards...

I was going to find and link to a thread I had a while back breaking this down in more detail but it seems to have evaporated.

[Saer]

I don't have any specific theories except that I think that the end of the series will restore regular 3 month seasons to the planet. Because the world book said that they were like that once.

[MaesterSam]

I don't have my own theory but there are at least two (slightly different) theories both involving the second moon that was once in the sky and was said to have "cracked". This is based on the Qartheen legend that the moon is an egg: once there was a second moon in the sky but it flew too close to the sun and cracked from the heat, and a thousand thousand dragons poured forth and drank the fire of the sun. This legend explains the origin of dragons according to Qarth but also suggests a second moon existed and does not exist anymore. In addition, the AA legend from Asshai states that when he stabbed Nissa Nissa her scream cracked the face of the moon - so there is overlap between these stories, clearly. In any case, the theories differ on how or why the moon was destroyed, but claim that the messed up seasons are a result since in a stable system with two moons you can't just remove one and expect things to stay the same. Benerro in a Tyrion chapter seems to predict the second moon will also explode, and the Qartheen legend predicts this as well, so it's possible this event will restore the seasons to normal though it may also cause the second Long Night. Again, not my theories, I claim no credit, just sharing what I've read. The first person to really dive into all this was Lucifer means Lightbringer who also goes by LmL. 

[Shagwell the mad jester]

The reason is magical, as was pointed out here already. That means: it seems to be a side effect of magic to disturb nature's due course.

And dragons are somehow (in a way we don't really understand) connected to magic. The glass candles began to burn when Dany's dragons were hatched. With the dragons growing, magic becomes more powerful again. When was the last long winter? When the Targaryens, the dragonlords ruled over Westeros. Now dragons are alive again and once more we have the threat of a long, abysmal winter.

The maesters in Oldtown worked hard to eradicate magic and to bring rationality and enlightenment to Westeros, something they cannot be praised enough for. But for the moment it seems that they have worked in vain (which makes it btw interesting what Maester Marwyn is up to - this is something I hope to learn in TWOW, should it ever appear *lol*)

I also believe that at the end of the story the seasons will return to normal. I expect that at the end of the story the magical powers of fire and ice will be annihilating one another and the world will be freed from magic once and for all. But of course I may be wrong here.

[TheBlackSwan]

Martin said it was a magical explanation.
I believe in Alabastur's theory Who Taught the Valyrians to Tame Dragons?
The seasons are link to elemental forces of nature. Winter is link to Ice and Summer to Fire.

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There is ice and there is fire. Hate and love. Bitter and sweet. Male and female. Pain and pleasure. Winter and summer. Evil and good." She took a step toward him. "Death and life. Everywhere, opposites. Everywhere, the war.
A Storm of Swords - Davos III

One group of people are known to be users of these magical elements: the Children of the Forest. They are call "the Singers" and "Those who sings the songs of Earth". Their magic is call "song" so their nickname means "those who use the magic of Earth/of nature".
The Singers made the Others with ice magic, it's their Song of Ice. In a certain way they fucked up and disrupt the forces of nature, ice started to take over the other forces and it lead to a long winter: the Long Night.
A hero went to seek their help and convinced them to save the world. To do that they to make another song to counter the Song of Ice, they made the Song of Fire. 

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According to these tales, the return of the sun came only when a hero convinced Mother Rhoyne’s many children—lesser gods such as the Crab King and the Old Man of the River—to put aside their bickering and join together to sing a secret song that brought back the day.
TWOIAF – Ancient History: The Long Night

 

And who represent the forces of Fire? The Dragonlords.

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« The things that are going north of the wall and Daenerys Targaryen on the other continent with her dragons are, of course, the ice and fire of the title. »
https://youtu.be/GaPZGDlm2F4?t=293

 

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I did consider in the very early stages not having the dragons in there. I wanted the Targaryen’s symbol to be the dragons, but I did play with the notion that maybe it was like a psionic power, that it was pyrokinesis — that they could conjure up flames with their minds.
https://goodqueenaly.tumblr.com/post/172280524783/i-saw-your-debate-on-prophecies-and-i-think

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The summers have been shorter since the last dragon died, and the winters longer and crueler.
The Hedge Knight

The Song of Ice, the Others, control ice forces, responsible for the long winters and have swords containing ice magic.
The song of Fire, the Dragonlords, control fire forces, responsible for the long summers and have steel containing fire magic known in the legends as dragonsteel or Lightbringer.