Are the Maesters responsible for the incredibly small Great Houses?

[Seams]

6 hours ago, Ran said:

One would have to imagine it, since there is no such reference made in the books, that I can think of. Until there is, the idea that they're pouring heated wine into bodily orifices sounds unlikely. 

It's in The Hedge Knight:

"Get him drunk and pour some boiling oil into it," someone suggested. "That's how the maesters do it."

"Wine." the voice had a hollow metallic ring to it. "Not oil, that will kill him, boiling wine. I'll send Maester Yormwell to have a look at him when he's done tending my brother."

Although your point may still be valid: maesters use boiling oil, according to the first speaker, which would be pretty harmful if things work the same way in Westeros as they do in this world. Only Prince Baelor seems to know that boiling wine is the better treatment, and he may take this information to his grave moments after recommending it. Further, the boiling wine may be a special "transfusion" from Prince Baelor to Dunk, who may be uniquely suited to receive Targaryen wine.

I'm a fan of @Voice's miasma theory and believe it is an accurate metaphor that explains a major plot conflict.

My own theory is that dragon glass is the answer to the miasma. The maesters call it obsidian.

[Ran]

4 hours ago, Seams said:

It's in The Hedge Knight:

"Get him drunk and pour some boiling oil into it," someone suggested. "That's how the maesters do it."

"Wine." the voice had a hollow metallic ring to it. "Not oil, that will kill him, boiling wine. I'll send Maester Yormwell to have a look at him when he's done tending my brother."

We've already referred to boiling wine and its use on wounds. Varys is suggesting that maesters might pour boiling wine into women's vagina's (an orifice) after they deliver a child, for which there is absolutely no evidence. For wounds on the exterior of the body, yes, wine is what is used.

4 hours ago, Seams said:

Although your point may still be valid: maesters use boiling oil

No, Baelor is correcting the person when he says it's wine, not oil.

 

[sweetsunray]

On 10/20/2020 at 8:57 AM, Manderly's Rat Cook said:

The last one I'm going into is Jeyne Royce; Jon Arryn's wife, since I believe the way she dies serves as important purpose as well. We are meant to think about whether Jon Arryn was the one who had fertility issues, rather than Lysa. This can only happen if we know that he had problems producing offspring with other women than Lysa. His previous wife had to die as well for him to be able to marry Lysa as well. Now the point of her dying in childbed, was not that she was a woman giving birth, but that she died because she was giving birth to a stillborn child. Probably a child that didn't die because of a lack of oxygen during birth, but one that was already dead in the womb, and thereby making the birth harder and more dangerous. The way she dies is intended to make us think that there is a genetic defect on Jon's side, rather than Lysa's. Luckily his second wife just died of a chill, otherwise it would be overkill.

This goes for Jorah Mormont as well. He never produced an heir with either his first wife or Lynesse, and he uses this to build up totemic bear ancestry references for the Mormont women who have children but no known husband in sight, aside from having been fathered by a bear.

[sweetsunray]

17 hours ago, Ran said:

One would have to imagine it, since there is no such reference made in the books, that I can think of. Until there is, the idea that they're pouring heated wine into bodily orifices sounds unlikely. 

Sounds like torture to me, and a sure way to have a woman voluntarily become a septa to forever swear off sex for the rest of her life.

[Bernie Mac]

27 minutes ago, sweetsunray said:

This goes for Jorah Mormont as well. He never produced an heir with either his first wife or Lynesse, and he uses this to build up totemic bear ancestry references for the Mormont women who have children but no known husband in sight, aside from having been fathered by a bear.

I assume that Alysane is being facetious when she is talking to Asha, given the animosity the people of Bear Island have for the Ironborn, rather than being serious.

We don't now the husbands of Maege and her daughter, that does not mean they do not exist or that the people of the North don't know their identity. Given the North's attitude to skin changers, seems unlikely this would be accepted by her own people or other Northerners if this was the case.

[sweetsunray]

1 minute ago, Bernie Mac said:

I assume that Alysane is being facetious when she is talking to Asha, given the animosity the people of Bear Island have for the Ironborn, rather than being serious.

We don't now the husbands of Maege and her daughter, that does not mean they do not exist or that the people of the North don't know their identity. Given the North's attitude to skin changers, seems unlikely this would be accepted by her own people or other Northerners if this was the case.

Of course she's facetious. Even if Mormont women are skinchangers, we know they don't actually shift into a bear shape and get preggers that way. So, their children were fathered by human males. However, either that makes their children bastards or normally would give the children the name of their father's house. Maege had her daughters while Jorah was Lord of Bear Island. Alysane wasn't Maege's heir until her eldest sister died at the Red Wedding. But somehow, Maege's daughters and Alysane's children all go by the House name Mormont. The "fathered by bears" claim is used imo to preserve the house name amongst their children, no matter whether they were fathered by a peasant, a lover, or a husband.

Totemic bear ancestry and bear-maiden weddings were real thing rituals in the past. The Wayland the Smith legend is a remnant of it (he's a hidden bear figure: that is "generally described as a man, but often surrounded by bear attributes," such as sleeping on a bear skin, or being captured while bear staeks are cooking, living alone in a forest, ...). In our folkloristic histories a maiden would be picked who would go through a wedding ritual with a dead bear (after ritualistic capture), as a bride was the gift in thanks for his death, and his death and capture was important for a village, as they believed a bear to be the guardian of the forest. One bear a year was believed to bring them good hunting of other forest fauna. But a bear was like a man (a skinned bear looks humanoid), could understand human speech, had a bird spirit, was a fertility male symbol akin to bulls in the mediterranean, and very vengeful even after death if he felt cheated. The wedding ritual was one of the things people did to placate that possible vengeful spirit. Wayland the Smith tells the story of a bear's vengeance if his captor (a king) refuses to give Wayland the bride (his daughter) and keeps him laboring for him like a prisoner (instead of burrying him and allowing his bird spirit to fly to his brothers in the afterlife): he kills the king's sons and "rapes" or "seduces" the princess. Her child by him becomes the new heir and the sword he made is given to the princess (the mother of his child).

Many elements surrounding this have been worked in by George, in particularly with the Mormont women. Aside from the "fathered by bears" comment, we also learn of the special carving at their house of a naked lady wearing a bear skin and holding an axe while suckling her child. On top of that Maege sent the Mormont VS sword that Jorah left behind to her brother Jeor at the Wall.

Northern, bear island, mostly forest, skinchanging, absent/unknown fathers, claim their children were fathered by bears, children carrying on the house name (despite such children either would be regarded bastards or havign their father's name), swords, a type of special lady with a dead bear's pelt and child: it all fits the folklore George must have used for inspiration.

So, why do the Mormont women claim their children were fathered by bears? Since the previous totemic bear line would die out via Jorah, it's up to the women to make sure the Mormont line continues and does not lose their rights to bear island. Their house is protected from being taken via wedding by a husband or his ancestral house (like the Lannisters and Boltons attempt with Sansa and fArya, or Baratheon did by marrying Argilac's daughter), or by an outsider who would accuse the Mormont women of only having bastards. Since the previous bear line has gone extinct, they must establish a new bear-line and that can only be done with the claim that their children were fathered by a bear. Sending the sword that is tied to the bear-line that dies with Jorah to Jeor is a sign that Maege admits the previous totemic-bear-line has ended and she is establishing a new totemic bear-line, like the female ancestor on the carving above their hall.

Not only does Alysane reveal and hint at this for the reader to figure out what's going on with House Mormont - Alysane gave Asha a hint on how to establish her own Greyjoy line if she is to acquire the rule over the Iron Islands. Before being captured Asha had intercourse and she has not had any chance to take something to prevent pregnancy. The father is a lover and not someone she's bound to wed. In fact, she was already wed by proxy. If Asha is smart and takes the hint of Alysane, and ends up preggers, she can proclaim herself a kraken skinchanger and claim her child was fathered by a kraken, and therefore her child would be a Greyjoy. Remember that Alysane's talk of her children being fathered by bears occurs in the context of a southern landless lord hoping to be allowed to wed Asha, so he can become master of a castle and Iron Islands.

Alysane is not actually hostile to Asha at all, but guarding her from such men and anyone wanting to avenge the Ironborn attacks on the north, not as a guard of a captive (though Asha sees it that way initially), but as a protective bodyguard. The main reason for this is because Asha has hostages with her uncle - the heirs of Lord Glover, the children of his sister in law. Their house and Sybelle may have been liberated, but Asha sailed for the Iron Islands with Sybelle and her children for the Kingsmoot, and upon her return to Deepwood Motte, she brought Sybelle, but Sybelle's children remained at her nuncle's. It's also imo the reason why the man who swore at Asha and hit her on the head later apologizes to Asha. Why the northerners may clamor for Theon's execution, but not one of them demands Asha's head. I also think that Alysane left to liberate Deepwood Motte, way before Stannis sent his letters to the Northern houses. That's why Lyanna Mormont wrote the reply to Stannis - her sister, the new heir of Maege was not at Bear Island anymore. Nor do I believe Alysane decided it on her own, but left under the directive of Maege and Lord Glover - a letter sent to Bear Island, before Maege and Glover sailed to the Neck from Mallisser's house. Lord Glover would have apprehended retaliation against his sister in law and hairs once Northerners would move against Vic at Moat Cailin, and thus his house and the hostages liberated. But the Kingsmoot threw a timing wrench into that plan. Once Alysane got there, Asha was gone to the Kingsmoot with Sybelle and her children. So, she had to wait for Asha's return, only to then learn only Sybelle was returned. Once Stannis made his move onto Deepwood Motte, Alysane's hand was forced. She had to make a move, to ensure no Ironborn could sail to her uncle and retaliate against the hostages at Asha's nuncle and reveal her presence to Stannis and the other mountain clan Northerners to make sure no harm could come to Asha. 

Anyway, more on the totemic-bear-line can be read in here: https://sweeticeandfiresunray.com/2015/12/05/bear-ancestry/

[Bernie Mac]

3 hours ago, sweetsunray said:

Of course she's facetious. Even if Mormont women are skinchangers, we know they don't actually shift into a bear shape and get preggers that way. So, their children were fathered by human males. However, either that makes their children bastards or normally would give the children the name of their father's house.

We don't know that. Lady Oakheart's sons are named after her, Lady Waynwood's children are named after her. Lady Stokeworth's daughters after her. In Dorne when there is a Lady ruler her children are named after her.

Given they live on Bear Island and stand to inherit those lands, it makes sense that Maege and her offspring would call themselves Mormonts as that name is going to hold more power on that island than the names of their husbands.

 

[Seams]

11 hours ago, Ran said:

We've already referred to boiling wine and its use on wounds. Varys is suggesting that maesters might pour boiling wine into women's vagina's (an orifice) after they deliver a child, for which there is absolutely no evidence. For wounds on the exterior of the body, yes, wine is what is used.

No, Baelor is correcting the person when he says it's wine, not oil.

My bad. I've been crazy sick this week. I should have done my due diligence on the whole thread before commenting.

[Lord Varys]

On 10/22/2020 at 9:51 PM, Ran said:

You do realize that washing hands is something that doctors, surgeons, and healers did not do until the 19th century?  Or even sterilizing equipment? People survived such treatment for centuries, but not as well as they could have. And in the very specific case of childbirth, early modern medicine -- with its lack of germ theory and antiseptic routines -- actually increased, not decreased, mortality. And it did it for centuries before someone pulled their head out of their rear and realized that it was the doctors themselves, and their direct interventions, that were the cause in the increase.

Of course I know that. My point is that maesters and castle environments are not the same as early modern doctors and hospitals. To my knowledge, death in childbirth increased because women were giving birth in less sterile/more contaminated areas while being attended by men who were very close to corpses, dying people, and very sick people in general.

We cannot make that comparison for Westeros where only the maester element would have changed over the centuries. It is simply not the case that the average maester at a castle or at court is routinely doing autopsies or has to do with very sick people all the time (unlike people who work in/run hospitals).

And if the childbed fever thing is due to bad hygiene - which we don't really know, if we are honest, just as don't know how many of our dead mothers actually died of that and not some other complication - then I really don't think the maesters would have changed those statistics. Midwives and other people assisting during births - both with commoners and noblewomen - wouldn't have had cleaner hands than the maesters.

After all, we don't have any reason to assume the arrival of maesters had any effect - positive or negative - no childbirth mortality.

On 10/22/2020 at 9:51 PM, Ran said:

Maesters, as described, should increase childbirth mortality for women, not decrease it, compared to more traditional  midwives.

One would have to imagine it, since there is no such reference made in the books, that I can think of. Until there is, the idea that they're pouring heated wine into bodily orifices sounds unlikely. 

The impression I get is that people - especially nobility - care more about hygiene and cleanliness than we think people did in the real middle ages.

[Lady Dacey]

The presence of maesters giving assistance to childbirth could be the driving force behind the high morality rate. This obviously would qualify as retconning, but it's something I could get behind, and I believe many readers who care about such issues would too. For it to work, though, it would have to make it into the story some way or another.

@Ran is making a terrible argument on this, though. If maesters contribue to death in childbirth its definitely not by spreading infection because they are unaware of germ theory. Think more on the line of restricted liberty of movement, forced lithotomy, administration of poppy milk during labour, and more importantly: fundal pressure (Kristeller maneuver) and episiotomy (this one could be an entryway to infection). Interventions such as these increase by manyfold the likelyhood of postpartum hemorrhage and puerperal fever.

If maesters assisting highborn births adopt such practices, this could reasonably explain the maternity mortality rate in Westeros. If GRRM wants to go in that direction, he needs to do the work and put it in the books. Maybe have Sam hear an off remark about a archmaester who will be giving a speach on "how to properly extract babies when the woman isn't strong enough". Of course this guy should be considered a lesser scholar because he dedicates his studies to women's health. Maybe he could be called Sims.

[Lord Varys]

13 hours ago, Ran said:

We've already referred to boiling wine and its use on wounds. Varys is suggesting that maesters might pour boiling wine into women's vagina's (an orifice) after they deliver a child, for which there is absolutely no evidence. For wounds on the exterior of the body, yes, wine is what is used.

I did not suggest they do - I said I'd expect them to do that if they expected that they could infect wounds by touching/treating them with their dirty hands. But if you are right - and I think you are right there - that they have no idea of germs then the reason why they wash out wounds would have nothing to do with potentially infected hands ... and then it is odd that they do not reinfect the dreadful they apparently treat rather successfully in comparison to women in childbirth.

After all, we do have a tendency of those wounds being treated very well by the maesters, with considerable indication that no maester treatment is hastening death if you wounds are infected/very bad.

28 minutes ago, Lady Dacey said:

@Ran is making a terrible argument on this, though. If maesters contribue to death in childbirth its definitely not by spreading infection because they are unaware of germ theory. Think more on the line of restricted liberty of movement, forced lithotomy, administration of poppy milk dyring labour, and more importantly: fundal pressure (Kristeller maneuver) and episiotomy (this one could be an entryway to infection). Interventions such as these increase by manyfold the likelyhood of postpartum hemorrhage and puerperal fever.

If maesters assisting highborn births adopt such practices, this could reasonably explain the maternity mortality rate in Westeros. If GRRM wants to go in that direction, he needs to do the work and put it in the books. Maybe have Sam hear an off remark about a archmaester who will be giving a speach on "how to properly extract babies when the woman isn't strong enough". Of course this guy should be considered a lesser scholar because he dedicates his studies to women's health. Maybe he could be called Sims.

For that we would have the author actually portray and care about births in his series. I'm dubious about such an idea because we do see Dalla and Lya die the same way the many women under maester care did ... while there is no indication maesters did something different or better than midwives or other experts on childbirth.

We do have no in-universe reason to make the Westerosi maesters chauvinistic early doctors who thought they knew childbirth better than women. Instead, we could give them the benefit of the doubt and imagine them being less patriarchal in this manner and having actually decided to collect and use the traditional knowledge about this subject.

Especially since we can also count the successes of maesters - Luwin delivered all of Cat's children. Important female characters don't have this issue. It is a thing only women have to deal with who the author doesn't care about.

And we can bet that Lyarra Stark - the woman George only invented because fans pointed out to him that Ned was apparently motherless - also died in childbirth, either delivering Benjen or during a later pregnancy which the child didn't survive, too. That is just the pattern.

[Lady Dacey]

@Lord Varys I agree with you (actually there shouldn't be a debate around that, but oh well ) 

I'm sort of arguing the counterfeit. If the author were so inclined, he could try to retcon this to some degree. I don't think GRRM cares about that. 

[Lord Varys]

8 minutes ago, Lady Dacey said:

@Lord Varys I agree with you (actually there shouldn't be a debate around that, but oh well ) 

I'm sort of arguing the counterfeit. If the author were so inclined, he could try to retcon this to some degree. I don't think GRRM cares about that. 

Of course he could do that. He even tried something like that with those magical arrows in ASoS ... although that didn't really work.

But in light of the amount of women he killed by childbirth in FaB - and is likely to kill in FaB II in the same manner - I don't think he would want to try. It is his world, after all, and he does what he wants.

[sweetsunray]

7 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

We don't know that. Lady Oakheart's sons are named after her, Lady Waynwood's children are named after her. Lady Stokeworth's daughters after her. In Dorne when there is a Lady ruler her children are named after her.

Given they live on Bear Island and stand to inherit those lands, it makes sense that Maege and her offspring would call themselves Mormonts as that name is going to hold more power on that island than the names of their husbands.

 

Oh, it does happen that heirs get the name of their mother, if her husband is either of a minor house or something. However, do you have any evidence that Lady Oakheart, Lady Waynwood and Tanda Stokeworth are in fact née Oakheart, Waynwood and Stokeworth, or are they the widows of the deceased Lord Oakheart, Lord Waynwood, Lord Stokeworth? Take for instance Lady Dustin. She's the head of House Dustin, because she's the widow of Lord Dustin. She's née Ryswell though. In case of bastards becoming heirs, yes they too may be given the legal right to acquire the name of their house, but then this tends to be done for that particular bastard child, while the other bastards are still referred to as a Snow/Rivers/Sand/Storm/Stone. More, it's the king who decrees this, not the head of the house.

In case of Alysane though we know she is unmarried. She explicitly tells Asha she is unmarried, before she answers her children were fathered by a bear.

Quote

A stab at me, Asha thought, but let it be. “You are wed.”
“No. My children were fathered by a bear.” (aDwD, The King’s Prize)

And we have something similar from Jeor's mouth.

Quote

Mormont snorted. “My sister is said to have taken a bear for her lover." (aCoK, Jon I)

Now Jeor may disbelieve the lover was in fact a bear. I would too. But the point here is "lover". Jeor did not say "my sister is said to have taken a bear for a husband".

Maege and Alysane are unwed, the father purposefully kept anonymous and totemic, yet their children aren't called Snow. Something is going on here, and it ain't "they're married to a third son of a lesser house or peasant", let alone "they're protecting their husband from the Ironborn" when Alysane has no issues with mentioning her only son is a babe of 2 on Bear Island with Lyanna Mormont (a kid sister) as supervisor.

[Bernie Mac]

1 hour ago, sweetsunray said:

Oh, it does happen that heirs get the name of their mother, if her husband is either of a minor house or something. However, do you have any evidence that Lady Oakheart, Lady Waynwood and Tanda Stokeworth are in fact née Oakheart, Waynwood and Stokeworth, or are they the widows of the deceased Lord Oakheart, Lord Waynwood, Lord Stokeworth?

They are the Ladies of their House, with adult children.

Waynwood has a grandson who is a knight, yet her heir is still Ser Morton. Aryns Oakheart is the youngest son of Lady Oakheart, she is still ruler, her sons still knights.

Quote

 

 

 

In case of Alysane though we know she is unmarried. She explicitly tells Asha she is unmarried, before she answers her children were fathered by a bear.

Again, she may well be facetious considering Asha is her enemy.

"Your king will not take a woman's word."

The She-Bear growled. "Why should we trust the word of any ironman after what your brother did at Winterfell?"

 

She has little reason to be exchanging stories to her enemy about who she is.

Quote

And we have something similar from Jeor's mouth.

Now Jeor may disbelieve the lover was in fact a bear. I would too. But the point here is "lover". Jeor did not say "my sister is said to have taken a bear for a husband".

Could be, could be her husband is dead.

But Jeor disbelieves the whole story

"Aye, Dywen says. And the last time he went ranging, he says he saw a bear fifteen feet tall." Mormont snorted. "My sister is said to have taken a bear for her lover. I'd believe that before I'd believe one fifteen feet tall.

I'm not sure he believes any part of it, it sounds he is commenting on a tall story, not talking about her actual lover.

Quote

Maege and Alysane are unwed,

We don't know that. Their children being Mormonts rather than Snow's suggests that they are not bastards.

 

[sweetsunray]

8 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

They are the Ladies of their House, with adult children.

Waynwood has a grandson who is a knight, yet her heir is still Ser Morton. Aryns Oakheart is the youngest son of Lady Oakheart, she is still ruler, her sons still knights.

Yes, I would lean to these Ladies being the heirs of their house and née Waynwood, Oakheart and Stokeworth, for the same reason, especially with grown sons. That said I would not automatically assume a woman who's "the head of a house" to be born to the house (see Lady Dustin) and we also explicitly know that the three you bring up are widowed.

8 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

Again, she may well be facetious considering Asha is her enemy.

"Your king will not take a woman's word."

The She-Bear growled. "Why should we trust the word of any ironman after what your brother did at Winterfell?"

 

She has little reason to be exchanging stories to her enemy about who she is.

She has little reason to exchange stories to her enemy, right? Seems a weird argument in light of Alysane's openness here

Quote

“Do you have brothers?” Asha asked her keeper.
“Sisters,” Alysane Mormont replied, gruff as ever. “Five, we were. All girls. Lyanna is back on Bear Island. Lyra and Jory are with our mother. Dacey was murdered.”
“The Red Wedding.”
“Aye.” Alysane stared at Asha for a moment. “I have a son. He’s only two. My daughter’s nine.”
“You started young.”
“Too young. But better that than wait too late.”

A stab at me, Asha thought, but let it be. "You are wed."

"No. My children were fathered by a bear." Alysane smiled. Her teeth were crooked, but there was something ingratiating about that smile. "Mormont women are skinchangers. We turn into bears and find mates in the woods. Everyone knows." (aDwD, The King’s Prize)

The above is the complete context of the conversation: she reveals to Asha how many sisters she has, where they are (though Maege's wheareabouts are undisclosed), the age of her children, etc... She's already exchanging rather sensitive and vital information to her enemy.

Her "no" to Asha's statement that she is wed itself is not facetious. We know this, because Asha's comment about marriage was not a question. People respond facetiously with the opposite to a question, not to a statement. It would look like this if it was completely facetious:

Quote

 

"Oh, you have kids. Are you married?"

"No, my kids were fathered by a bear." Rolls eyes. [And no explanation would follow about being skinchangers]

 

On to Maege

8 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

Could be, could be her husband is dead.

But Jeor disbelieves the whole story

"Aye, Dywen says. And the last time he went ranging, he says he saw a bear fifteen feet tall." Mormont snorted. "My sister is said to have taken a bear for her lover. I'd believe that before I'd believe one fifteen feet tall.

I'm not sure he believes any part of it, it sounds he is commenting on a tall story, not talking about her actual lover.

Sure, Jeor disbelieves the whole story, and indeed brings it up to comment on a tall story, but you're missing the point.

Quote

George: "Maege Mormont is called Mormont because no one knows her husband's name, or even if she has one. There is all the talk that she beds with a bear. She prefers to keep her own counsel." (https://www.westeros.org/Citadel/SSM/Entry/SF_Targaryens_Valyria_Sansa_Martells_and_More

The claim his sister took a bear for a lover precedes the tall story about a bear of fifteen feet tall. Jeor is Maege's brother and while he seriously questions his sister's story, you would expect her brother (who was once the head of the house) to know who she married and who fathered her children and whether she's widowed or not. But even Jeor has no knowledge of that. He's not an enemy. He's her older brother, once head of House Mormont, then LC of the NW, with whom she grumpily argues by letter and sends the ancestral VS sword to.

Why the hell would a married or widowed woman, who is now the head of her house, keep her husband a secret to her own brother? Why would such a woman purposefully create a situation where people question how she came to have 5 daughters (and potentially raise questions about the legitimacy of her heirs)? In a society where kids of nobility are instructed in learning house names, words, sigils and current heads by heart? In a society where it's everybody's business who is who? Just for the heck of it?  

As for George, if there is no mystery intended with Maege (and Alysane), if they were widowed like Anya Waynwood, Tanda Stokeworth, etc. then he showed with the other women how easily he could have avoided mystery: just mention they're widowed. He inserts deceased wives who died in childbed or from a chill and dead husbands as background story wherever he pleases, but not just avoids doing that for Maege. He repeats it with her heir. And he brings it up in an interview. It is not written in by George just as a joke, but treated as a mystery for us to make us wonder about.

[LynnS]

8 hours ago, sweetsunray said:

Quote

A stab at me, Asha thought, but let it be. “You are wed.”
“No. My children were fathered by a bear.” (aDwD, The King’s Prize)

 

I  can't help noticing that Tormund tells a bawdy story of sleeping with a she-bear and wondering if he is the lover in question.

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Jon XI

Finally, as the shadows of the afternoon grew long outside the tent, Tormund Giantsbane—Tall-Talker, Horn-Blower, and Breaker of Ice, Tormund Thunderfist, Husband to Bears, Mead-King of Ruddy Hall, Speaker to Gods and Father of Hosts—thrust out his hand. "Done then, and may the gods forgive me. There's a hundred mothers never will, I know."

 

Quote

But he was a man of the Night's Watch, he had taken a vow. I shall take no wife, hold no lands, father no children. He had said the words before the weirwood, before his father's gods. He could not unsay them . . . no more than he could admit the reason for his reluctance to Tormund Thunderfist, Father to Bears.

Quote

 

A Storm of Swords - Jon II

"Yes, but . . . Tormund, I swear, I've never touched her."

"Are you certain they never cut your member off?" Tormund gave a shrug, as if to say he would never understand such madness. "Well, you are a free man now, but if you will not have the girl, best find yourself a she-bear. If a man does not use his member it grows smaller and smaller, until one day he wants to piss and cannot find it."

 

 

[sweetsunray]

3 minutes ago, LynnS said:

I  can't help noticing that Tormund tells a bawdy story of sleeping with a she-bear and wondering if he is the lover in question.

 

 

I know, but I don't consider Tormund, Maege's or Alysane's "bear". He is another bear character in the books, but there are plenty. There's always a bear in George's aSoIaF plots. Tormund's tall story is written imo to help the reader identify Tormund as a bear character in Jon's plot, a replacement of Jeor to Jon. Free Folk have no sigils, so George has to use other ways, such as stories, names, pelts worn, etc...

Mormonts are black bears (sigil). Umbers and Tormund are giant white snow bears (giants are bearlike, Tormund is white haired, and aside from she-bear story he wintered in the womb of a giant and suckled). Lothor Brune is a brown bear (name Brune and House Brune sigil).

[Ran]

15 hours ago, Lady Dacey said:

The presence of maesters giving assistance to childbirth could be the driving force behind the high morality rate. This obviously would qualify as retconning

Not within the text, one notes. It's never been indicated within the books that the maesters are better or worse than midwives when it comes to childbirth specifically. While authorial statements outside of the text are certainly important, they are not canon until enshrined in the text. This particular idea has not been, yet, and I don't think it will be.

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, but it's something I could get behind, and I believe many readers who care about such issues would too. For it to work, though, it would have to make it into the story some way or another.

Why would it need to be in the text? George has basically never described childbirth in any great detail and I do not expect he will start now. What we do have are some concrete details that need to be aligned, and the suggestion that maesters are making similar mistakes to early modern doctors feels like that resolves that.

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@Ran is making a terrible argument on this, though.

Well, I'd say "incomplete" rather than terrible... But that's because while we can definitely say that maesters do not appear to have even basic antiseptic practices for themselves or their instruments, and that maesters do some things that early modern doctors did that medieval midwives did not (i.e. study and handle corpses and bodily organs as part of their studies), I can't say for sure the other things you suggest are or are not part of the (misguided) practices of the maesters, as there's no direct evidence. I think the things you mention could all be part of practices we simply do not see because GRRM doesn't describe them.

[Lord Varys]

Maege Mormont must have (had) a husband. It makes no sense for her daughters to be legitmate Mormonts if they were born out of wedlock. Not in a society in which bastards are branded with those silly names. If the daughters of Maege could be Mormonts even if they were technically bastards, then the son of Ned, Jon Snow, could also be a Stark, considering that the Starks have much more power and authority than the Mormonts.

But George fucked up his naming system. If Rhaenyra's sons don't go by her name despite the fact that they are kings-in-waiting as her heirs, then it makes actually no sense that any son would go by his mother's name even if he is her heir.

The reason why children take the names of their fathers is the patriarchal nature of the society (and the same is also the reason why wives take the names of their husbands, very aptly seen in FaB when Baela and Rhaena Targaryen are turned into Baela Velaryon and Rhaena Corbray by their marriages) ... and the same nature should see to it that female heirs lead to the eradication of a dynasty because her children will go proudly by the names of their fathers. Instead it is completely unclear when and why sons should go by their mothers' names and when that's improper.

It just makes no sense that Arwyn Oakheart, Anya Waynwood, and Maege Mormont do have sons and daughters who go by their names unless their husbands were Oakhearts, Waynwoods, and Mormonts themselves ... or it makes no sense that Rhaenyra's were called Velaryon by their peers and the historians writing about them if we assume that she had the right/opportunity to call the boys Targaryen.

This is what happens when you have an author who doesn't seem to have thought about any husbands for the few ladies who rule in their own right. And that extends to Dorne - it seems as if the children there go by the name of the ruling parent, but what do they do if two heirs/rulers from two houses marry each other? Is the society so egalitarian that sons are truly happy taking the names of their mothers even if they like their father more?

What happens with second and third sons and daughters who don't inherit anything?