Heresy 237 The Ballad of Trouserless Bob Baratheon

[LynnS]

18 minutes ago, Tucu said:

Your quote reminded me of the prophecies in the WoT and I Iooked them up. So many little similarities; for example:

 

Yes.  I see the similarities.  What I'm looking for is Martin's truth and not necessarily how another writer will use these devices.  Euron. the blood eye on the sea and the blood eye in the sky look like the biggest threat to me.  The dragon reborn looks like Dany and she is his target according to Moqorro. 

[Melifeather]

GRRM refers to the author of the Wheel of Time series when he refers to Archmaester Rigney. Robert Jordan's real name was James Rigney.

Quote

 

A Feast for Crows - The Kraken's Daughter

"You must lend me Haereg's book, Nuncle." She would need to learn all she could of kingsmoots before she reached Old Wyk.

"You may read it here. It is old and fragile." He studied her, frowning. "Archmaester Rigney once wrote that history is a wheel, for the nature of man is fundamentally unchanging. What has happened before will perforce happen again, he said. I think of that whenever I contemplate the Crow's Eye. Euron Greyjoy sounds queerly like Urron Greyiron to these old ears. I shall not go to Old Wyk. Nor should you."

Asha smiled. "And miss the first kingsmoot called in . . . how long has it been, Nuncle?"

 

I believe that Westeros is under a wheel of time as well. The similarities are too obvious to ignore.

When looking at the parallels between Howland, Arya, and Shadrich they experience the same events, but in a jumbled way. I think this set is an good example of what I am talking about:

Howland:  A guest from a noble northern house, Howland is persuaded to sit at the table with the other guests of high birth. He mingles with the members of other northern houses.

Arya:  A captive from a noble northern house, Arya is forced to serve the people at the table, and sleep and dine in the cellar. Arya cannot mingle with members of other northern houses, because they are imprisoned in the dungeons.

Shadrich:  A hedge knight employed by a merchant, Shadrich is with Brienne when they stopped for the knight at the Old Stone Bridge Inn. His meal and stay are paid for by the merchant, while Brienne pays for herself and the two penniless hedge knights Creighton and Illifer. I guess you could say they are all staying the night with a symbol of Harrenhal.

If each parallel is jumbled then might we expect one where the mystery knight gets away with the maiden without either of them coming to harm and without being captured?

 

[LynnS]

9 minutes ago, Melifeather said:

If each parallel is jumbled then might we expect one where the mystery knight gets away with the maiden without either of them coming to harm and without being captured?

Where would they go?  Perhaps Ser Shadrich will stay for a while as her protector rather than as one of Robin's winged knights.

[alienarea]

3 hours ago, Tucu said:

Your quote reminded me of the prophecies in the WoT and I Iooked them up. So many little similarities; for example:

 

But Death rides a pale horse and carried a gun.

[Tucu]

26 minutes ago, alienarea said:

But Death rides a pale horse and carried a gun.

Quote

Grey Worm began the tale. "He came out of the morning mists, a rider on a pale horse, dying. His mare was staggering as she approached the city gates, her sides pink with blood and lather, her eyes rolling with terror. Her rider called out, 'She is burning, she is burning,' and fell from the saddle. This one was sent for, and gave orders that the rider be brought to the Blue Graces. When your servants carried him inside the gates, he cried out again, 'She is burning.' Under his tokar he was a skeleton, all bones and fevered flesh."

Not sure if they checked his saddles for guns.

[alienarea]

6 hours ago, Tucu said:

Not sure if they checked his saddles for guns.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Rider

[Black Crow]

19 hours ago, LynnS said:

I've got nothing on Trouserless Bob right now.  I don't know where that is going.

There may be a bit of drift [as always] but the real point is to look at him and other characters, easily dismissed but perhaps rather more important or at least significant than they at first appear. 

Bob first appears as the unreliable old drunk whose maudling fantasies aren't to be believed because they contrast and contradict the great love story of Rhaegar and Lyanna. Yet turn the clock back and we find Robert the Horned God, [and his hammer] the greatest threat to the House of the Dragon - and at the same time we become far more aware of the existential threat to mankind posed by the Dragons and Azor Ahai. So looking behind the obsession with R+L=J, are Bob and the Starks themselves right when they say that Lyanna was abducted and raped and died. Perhaps even to frustrate a Baratheon/Stark union?

Follow this theme, moving away from the Targaryens and their Dragons, and look instead at the real story in the background. From the very outset that story has been about the Starks and the Old Gods. Howland Reed knows too much says GRRM and so the R+L=J crowd instantly assume this means he was a witness who will somehow prove that Jon Snow is the son of Rhaegar Targaryen etc etc. But what if he's not a witness to that at all but instead is at one and the same time a link to the Old Gods and a protector of the Starks, who saved Lord Eddard Stark back in the day, has sent [sacrificed?] his children to lead Bran Stark into the Heart of Darkness and is now guarding Sansa Stark, the Lady of Winterfell - and what is her real purpose?

[LynnS]

1 hour ago, Black Crow said:

But what if he's not a witness to that at all but instead is at one and the same time a link to the Old Gods and a protector of the Starks, who saved Lord Eddard Stark back in the day, has sent [sacrificed?] his children to lead Bran Stark into the Heart of Darkness and is now guarding Sansa Stark, the Lady of Winterfell - and what is her real purpose?

I think the answer to this is understanding what Jojen is saying here:

Quote

A Storm of Swords - Bran II

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."

 

[Tucu]

2 hours ago, Black Crow said:

There may be a bit of drift [as always] but the real point is to look at him and other characters, easily dismissed but perhaps rather more important or at least significant than they at first appear. 

Bob first appears as the unreliable old drunk whose maudling fantasies aren't to be believed because they contrast and contradict the great love story of Rhaegar and Lyanna. Yet turn the clock back and we find Robert the Horned God, [and his hammer] the greatest threat to the House of the Dragon - and at the same time we become far more aware of the existential threat to mankind posed by the Dragons and Azor Ahai. So looking behind the obsession with R+L=J, are Bob and the Starks themselves right when they say that Lyanna was abducted and raped and died. Perhaps even to frustrate a Baratheon/Stark union?

Follow this theme, moving away from the Targaryens and their Dragons, and look instead at the real story in the background. From the very outset that story has been about the Starks and the Old Gods. Howland Reed knows too much says GRRM and so the R+L=J crowd instantly assume this means he was a witness who will somehow prove that Jon Snow is the son of Rhaegar Targaryen etc etc. But what if he's not a witness to that at all but instead is at one and the same time a link to the Old Gods and a protector of the Starks, who saved Lord Eddard Stark back in the day, has sent [sacrificed?] his children to lead Bran Stark into the Heart of Darkness and is now guarding Sansa Stark, the Lady of Winterfell - and what is her real purpose?

We met Bob in his withering phase. As the Horned God he defeated the Dragon (Rhaegar), got his sacrifices (Elia and his children), reigned over the longest Summer in memory, spread his seeds everywhere, withered and died. Now he is feasting in the halls of the Starks with Ned, Lyanna, Brandon and Rickard.

Quote

A few of the very oldest tales of Garth Greenhand present us with a considerably darker deity, one who demanded blood sacrifice from his worshippers to ensure a bountiful harvest. In some stories the green god dies every autumn when the trees lose their leaves, only to be reborn with the coming of spring. This version of Garth is largely forgotten.

Quote

Garth Greenhand brought the gift of fertility with him. Nor was it only the earth that he made fecund, for the legends tell us that he could make barren women fruitful with a touch—even crones whose moon blood no longer flowed. Maidens ripened in his presence, mothers brought forth twins or even triplets when he blessed them, young girls flowered at his smile. Lords and common men alike offered up their virgin daughters to him wherever he went, that their crops might ripen and their trees grow heavy with fruit. There was never a maid that he deflowered who did not deliver a strong son or fair daughter nine moons later, or so the stories say

Quote

God or man, Garth Greenhand fathered many children in this new land; on this all the tales agree. Many of those offspring grew to be heroes, kings, and great lords in their own right, founding mighty houses that endured for thousands of years

The seed is strong and Bob played his role.

[Black Crow]

7 minutes ago, Tucu said:

We met Bob in his withering phase. As the Horned God he defeated the Dragon (Rhaegar), got his sacrifices (Elia and his children), reigned over the longest Summer in memory, spread his seeds everywhere, withered and died. Now he is feasting in the halls of the Starks with Ned, Lyanna, Brandon and Rickard.

The seed is strong and Bob played his role.

Oh I do like this one 

[alienarea]

16 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

Oh I do like this one 

Seconded

[alienarea]

We had a long night (Last Hero) and now a long summer (King Robert).

The question is whether we will now get another long night or maybe a normal winter and the seasons are back in synch because of things we do not know yet?

[Frey family reunion]

On 8/5/2021 at 1:39 PM, Tucu said:

TIL that there is something fishy about Shadrich. The shad or river herring is a type of oily fish in the same family as the herring. So Shadrich is:

-an oily fish

-a rich fish, not a poor hedge knight as he claims

-given his red hair, he is a red herring

-he is from the Shady Glen, a vale of shades? a valley of shadows?

I think one of George's inspirations for the name Shadrich comes from the biblical tale of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.  Three jewish lads who refused to bow down to King Nebuchadnezzar's statue were thrown into a furnace, only to survive via divine intervention and thus promoted to higher office.  

In 1976 Robert Silverberg homaged the tale in his sci fi book, Shadrach in the Furnace.  It's certainly a book that would be on GRRM's radar since it won both the Nebula and Hugo awards.  In Silverberg's tale Dr. Shadrach Mordecai was the personal physician to the world's dictator, Genghis II Mao IV.  

The dictator was near the end of his life and financed three different projects to make him immortal:  Projects Phoenix, Talos, and Avatar.  Project Phoenix was an attempt to completely regenerate his physical body.  Talos was an attempt to make a robotic version of the dictator.  While Avatar, was a project to transfer his spirit/soul into the body of a younger man, the dictator's unwitting son, Mangu.  Project Avatar won out.  (Mangu believed that he was the heir to the throne, and he was in a sense, just not in the way he believed).   

Then someone got wind of the dictator's plan, and Mangu either jumped or was thrown out a window.  Hmmm, sounds familiar.

I think that GRRM gives a wink and a nod to his inspirations behind ASOIAF, and I think that perhaps Shadrich is one of those nods to Silverberg's book.  

 

[Tucu]

1 hour ago, Frey family reunion said:

I think one of George's inspirations for the name Shadrich comes from the biblical tale of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.  Three jewish lads who refused to bow down to King Nebuchadnezzar's statue were thrown into a furnace, only to survive via divine intervention and thus promoted to higher office.  

In 1976 Robert Silverberg homaged the tale in his sci fi book, Shadrach in the Furnace.  It's certainly a book that would be on GRRM's radar since it won both the Nebula and Hugo awards.  In Silverberg's tale Dr. Shadrach Mordecai was the personal physician to the world's dictator, Genghis II Mao IV.  

The dictator was near the end of his life and financed three different projects to make him immortal:  Projects Phoenix, Talos, and Avatar.  Project Phoenix was an attempt to completely regenerate his physical body.  Talos was an attempt to make a robotic version of the dictator.  While Avatar, was a project to transfer his spirit/soul into the body of a younger man, the dictator's unwitting son, Mangu.  Project Avatar won out.  (Mangu believed that he was the heir to the throne, and he was in a sense, just not in the way he believed).   

Then someone got wind of the dictator's plan, and Mangu either jumped or was thrown out a window.  Hmmm, sounds familiar.

I think that GRRM gives a wink and a nod to his inspirations behind ASOIAF, and I think that perhaps Shadrich is one of those nods to Silverberg's book.  

 

Can be a combination. Have shadrach in mind and wordplay with it while finding a name for the character.

[LynnS]

8 hours ago, Tucu said:

We met Bob in his withering phase. As the Horned God he defeated the Dragon (Rhaegar), got his sacrifices (Elia and his children), reigned over the longest Summer in memory, spread his seeds everywhere, withered and died. Now he is feasting in the halls of the Starks with Ned, Lyanna, Brandon and Rickard.

The seed is strong and Bob played his role.

Is this your long bet?  Is Robert back in the mix again?  

[Tucu]

17 minutes ago, LynnS said:

Is this your long bet?  Is Robert back in the mix again?  

You mean as Jon's father? I didn't intentionally include Jon in this interpretation of Bob's role...but again I have a multi-verse of long bets :-)

 

[LynnS]

Quote

The World of Ice and Fire - The Reach: The Gardener Kings

And yet there was a difference, in degree if not in kind, for almost all of the noble houses of the Reach shared a common ancestry, deriving as they did from Garth Greenhand and his many children. It was that kinship, many scholars have suggested, that gave House Gardener the primacy in the centuries that followed; no petty king could ever hope to rival the power of Highgarden, where Garth the Gardener's descendants sat upon a living throne (the Oakenseat) that grew from an oak that Garth Greenhand himself had planted, and wore crowns of vines and flowers when at peace, and crowns of bronze thorns (later iron) when they rode to war. Others might style themselves kings, but the Gardeners were the unquestioned High Kings, and lesser monarchs did them honor, if not obeisance.

Quote

A Game of Thrones - Eddard XV

Robert had been jesting with Jon and old Lord Hunter as the prince circled the field after unhorsing Ser Barristan in the final tilt to claim the champion's crown. Ned remembered the moment when all the smiles died, when Prince Rhaegar Targaryen urged his horse past his own wife, the Dornish princess Elia Martell, to lay the queen of beauty's laurel in Lyanna's lap. He could see it still: a crown of winter roses, blue as frost.

Ned Stark reached out his hand to grasp the flowery crown, but beneath the pale blue petals the thorns lay hidden. He felt them clawing at his skin, sharp and cruel, saw the slow trickle of blood run down his fingers, and woke, trembling, in the dark.

So a crown of flowers during peacetime and a crown of thorns during war.  So what do we make of the crown with hidden thorns?  

[Black Crow]

11 hours ago, Tucu said:

You mean as Jon's father? I didn't intentionally include Jon in this interpretation of Bob's role...but again I have a multi-verse of long bets :-)

 

It's an interesting thought, but given the earlier emphasis on "black of hair", I think its doubtful. In a wider sense though, recognising that at the end of the day this isn't the game of thrones but the Song of Ice and Fire then Bob's Role as the Horned God makes a lot more sense than the irrelevant drunk he first appears to be.

[Melifeather]

I agree with BC regarding Robert's offspring having black hair. It was a big deal when Ned was investigating Jon Arryn so I can't see the author then making Robert Jon's father when Jon so obviously looks like a Stark. 

The role as the Horned God, specifically the Oak King and also the Green Man, is Robert. Robert impregnated alot of maidens, but he never got the chance to impregnate the goddess. It appears someone stepped in and prevented completion. "Quence finally came on Allaquo abed with Sloey". Sloey is our "goddess", the beautiful violet eyed Ashara. I suspect that whoever Quence is, he stopped Robert from impregnating Ashara and she turned to "Stark" instead. The result was the birth of the Holly King.

[Tucu]

Jon links to the Corn King and Jon Barleycorn can also be traced to the Green Man and/or other seasonal deities. Maybe as the opposite; a King of Summer vs a King of Winter.