Crippled Walkers

[Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe]

The Crippled Masters Or The Crypt-ILL Masters ?

I wanted to make a list of all the crippled who must be assisted in moving. Please add any you feel should join. Also anything you feel or think their inability to move freely may represent.  
I shall post more later.
 

——Lord Wyman Manderly

Lord Wyman Manderly had arrived from White Harbor two days past, traveling by barge and litter, as he was too fat to sit a horse. 
 

On the dais, Lord Wymanattacked a steaming plate of lampreys as if they were an enemy host. He was so fat that Ser Rodrik had commanded that a special wide chair be built for him to sit in, but he laughed loud and often, and Bran thought he liked him. 
 

Nor did he find any welcome in the pale blue eyes of Wyman Manderly. His lordship's cushioned throne was wide enough to accommodate three men of common girth, yet Manderly threatened to overflow it. His lordship sagged into his seat, his shoulders slumped, his legs splayed, his hands resting on the arms of his throne as if the weight of them were too much to bear. Gods be good, thought Davos, when he saw Lord Wyman's face, this man looks half a corpse. His skin was pallid, with an undertone of grey.

Kings and corpses always draw attendants, the old saying went.

 

——-Prince Bran Stark

 

Bran had welcomed them to Winterfell from his father's high stone seat with the direwolves carved into the arms, and afterward Ser Rodrik had said he'd done well. 

Hodor hummed tunelessly as he went down hand under hand, Bran bouncing against his back in the wicker seat that Maester Luwin had fashioned for him. Luwin had gotten the idea from the baskets the women used to carry firewood on their backs; after that it had been a simple matter of cutting legholes and attaching some new straps to spread Bran's weight more evenly. It was not as good as riding Dancer, but there were places Dancer could not go, and this did not shame Bran the way it did when Hodor carried him in his arms like a baby. Hodor seemed to like it too, though with Hodor it was hard to tell. The only tricky part was doors. Sometimes Hodor forgot that he had Bran on his back, and that could be painful when he went through a door.

 

——-Lord Walder Frey

Lord Walder was ninety, a wizened pink weasel with a bald spotted head, too gouty to stand unassisted. His newest wife, a pale frail girl of sixteen years, walked beside his litter when they carried him in. She was the eighth Lady Frey.

They shifted Lord Walder from his litter and carried him to the high seat of the Freys, a tall chair of black oak whose back was carved in the shape of two towers linked by a bridge. 

 

———Prince Doran Martell

Bowing, he took the chest from the hands of the white knight and carried it to the dais, where Doran Martell sat in his rolling chair between his daughter Arianne and his dead brother's beloved paramour, Ellaria.

The prince turned his chair laboriously to face her. Though he was but two-and-fifty, Doran Martell seemed much older. His body was soft and shapeless beneath his linen robes, and his legs were hard to look upon. The gout had swollen and reddened his joints grotesquely; his left knee was an apple, his right a melon, and his toes had turned to dark red grapes, so ripe it seemed as though a touch would burst them. Even the weight of a coverlet could make him shudder, though he bore the pain without complaint. Silence is a prince's friend, the captain had heard him tell his daughter once. 

——-Willas Tyrell

Willas is crippled, with a bad leg.

 

 

 

[EggBlue]

what's the point?

[Seams]

The search site is not working for me right now, for some reason. Here are some examples of leg injuries:

1) Ned's leg broken when his horse falls on him when Jaime attacks him outside the brothel where Robert's bastard lives.

2) Jon's leg shot by Ygritte with an arrow outside the ruins of the inn near Queen's Crown.

3) The stone man with a broken bone protruding from his leg attacks Tyrion at the Bridge of Dream.

Additionally, Cersei is carried in a big room on wheels when she makes the trip from Winterfell back to King's Landing. We never see her ride a horse.

 

[Hugorfonics]

Tyrions always had trouble walking, Blackwater didn't help 

 

When Pod and he reached the serpentine steps, however, Tyrion could only gape at them in dismay. I will never climb those by myself, he confessed to himself. Swallowing his dignity, he asked Bronn to carry him, hoping against hope that at this hour there would be no one to see and smile, no one to tell the tale of the dwarf being carried up the steps like a babe in arms.

[Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe]

1 hour ago, Seams said:

We never see her ride a horse

Nice  Thank you. 

[Jaenara Belarys]

Very nice. But what exactly is the point here?

[Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe]

1 hour ago, Jaenara Belarys said:

Very nice. But what exactly is the point here?

Oh, I wanted to see if a thought would pan out. I completely forgot about Lord Frey having to be carried and his cool chair. I had assumed it was only Bran and Duran. The Sun in the north (Karstark), and the sun in the south Martell (Nymeria). The words of Martell, unbowed, unbent, Unbroken, I always thought of as their family tree, unboughed, unbent, unbroken. Anyway, something may be ascending through descendents. Crippled equals dead? Crypt? Not moving is important to chess and other games. What people “mount” in book may have a meaning.

Just wanted to gather information before posting. I need to look at chair and throne. Some other people and etc

[James West]

The author has a fascination with the grotesque.  Some of the examples given paint this kind of image.  A crippled boy who rides on the back of a simple giant.  A bitter prince suffering from gout and guarded by a giant.  It is lost to me if there is a significance beneath the surface here. 

[Seams]

I have always hoped this forum could compile a comprehensive list of maiming and wounding. I expect the patterns could tell us some things. 

As for foot and leg injuries, long ago I took these notes from a book analyzing myths across cultures:

Quote

Splitting the difference: gender and myth in ancient Greece and India, by Wendy Doniger

University of Chicago Press, 1999

P. 175

The Mortal Foot

Why should the foot that touches the ground be a sign of mortality, in contrast with the gods’ feet, which float ever so slightly above the ground like hovercraft?  Perhaps, thought the literal-minded play of the imagination, because the point of the body where we are earthbound is what binds us to the grave, and the foot is in touch with Earth as opposed to the heavens.  “Both feet on the ground” is what we say of a particularly “down-to-earth” or realistic person, but it is what our myths say of one who is doomed to mortality. . . . Antaeus, in Greek myth, is said to have remained victorious in combat while his feet touched the ground because the god of the earth endowed him with power.  On the other hand, the Irish hero Ossian remained immortal as long as his feet did not touch the ground on his visit back to our world from Tir-na-nog; when he slipped from the saddle to the ground he dissolved into dust.

p. 177

Our feet symbolize our separation not only from the gods above us but from the animals below us (or, by some calculations, also above us).

p. 180

Bruce Lincoln has illuminated a more general Indo-European paradigm in which the sovereign (the first of Georges Dumezil’s three functions) loses an eye or his head, the representative of martial force (the second function) loses a hand or arm, and the one responsible for production, consumption, and reproduction (the last function) loses a foot or leg or is wounded in the lower body.  Within this third category, the one that concerns us here, in Norse sagas and Roman sources the ravening Fenris wold is bound by its leg, Egil’s feet are fettered, and Guntharius, the greedy king, loses his leg. . . .

The myths tell us that we suffer injuries to our legs when we try, hubristically, to separate ourselves from animals by standing upright.  E. M. Cioran suggests that we lost a metaphysical as well as physical advantage when we made this transition: “One can only think horizontally.  It is almost impossible to conceive of eternity from a vertical position.  Animals may well have evolved to the rank of men when they started to walk upright, but consciousness was born in moments of freedom and laziness.”  The injured foot symbolizes the hobbling of uprightness and the inauthenticity of our relationship with the earth.  It symbolizes the deal that we made with the (limping) devil: the use of our hands, for the loss of the power of our (four) legs.

P. 181

Oedipus’s foot (in Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex) is the key to the Sphinx’s riddle: the creature that goes on four feet, then two feet, then three feet is the human being who crawls as a child (or an animal), walks upright as a man (or human), walks with a cane as he ages – and then, we might add, dies.  Oedipus himself is that man; his name means “Swollen Foot,” and his feet are pierced when, at his birth, he is exposed on the hillside – among the animals. . . . Oedipus’s mutilated feet further connect him, especially in Claude Levi-Strauss’s analysis, with other mortals who are paradoxically born from the earth (the place where our feet make contact) and born from their mothers; they remind us that we too were born of the earth, not of the gods.

P. 184

The wounded foot may stand as a metaphor for someone higher instead of (or as well as) lower, than the rest of us: the godlike artist.  Indeed, lameness may literally signal the touch of the gods: when Jacob wrestles with the angel his thigh is touched and wounded so that he limps forever after, and Hephaestus, the lame artisan of the Greek gods, becomes lame when he is hurled from Heaven to Earth – like the devil. . . . We use our hands to write, and by writing we extend our individual memories into the future, a kind of immortality. . . . The privilege of being artisans is balanced by the loss of the swift and secure movements of quadrupeds . . . .

GRRM could have his own reason for giving specific injuries to specific characters. But we know that he draws a lot of parallels with Egyptian, classical, Norse and Celtic mythology. 

[Tucu]

From F&B we get Larys Strong and his cursed clubfoot:

Quote

Next (and last) to die was Lord Larys Strong. When asked if he wished to take the black, he said, “No, my lord. I’ll be going to a warmer hell, if it please you … but I do have one last request. When I am dead, hack off my clubfoot with that great sword of yours. I have dragged it with me all through life, let me be free of it in death at least.” This boon Lord Stark granted him.

Thus perished the last Strong, and a proud and ancient house came to its end. Lord Larys’s remains were given over to the silent sisters; years later, his bones would find their final resting place at Harrenhal … save for his clubfoot. Lord Stark decreed that it should be buried separately in a pauper’s field, but before that could be done, it disappeared. Mushroom tells us it was stolen and sold to some sorcerer, who used it in the casting of his spells. (The selfsame tale is told of the foot torn off Prince Joffrey’s leg in Flea Bottom, which makes the veracity of both suspect, unless we are meant to believe that all feet are possessed of malign powers.)

 

[Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe]

2 hours ago, Tucu said:

From F&B we get Larys Strong and his cursed clubfoot:

 

Bah! I forgot about him. Now I gotta tinker my “seed is strong” angle. I really enjoyed this character. I Don’t even recall the prince Joffrey leg. :sigh: I only read that book once, looks like I gotta read a lot more.

[Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe]

3 hours ago, Seams said:

Splitting the difference: gender and myth in ancient Greece and India, by Wendy Doniger

 

I really like this. Now I gotta buy it. A new book to feed my thoughts, and double bonus my own creative  imagination. Ty ty.

[Tucu]

3 hours ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

 

Bah! I forgot about him. Now I gotta tinker my “seed is strong” angle. I really enjoyed this character. I Don’t even recall the prince Joffrey leg. :sigh: I only read that book once, looks like I gotta read a lot more.

One more for the list: Aegon II and his crippled dragon. He never climbed the Iron Throne again after his fall with Sunfyre and was murdered in his litter.

[Seams]

14 hours ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

What people “mount” in book may have a meaning.

This is a helpful observation, I think. There seem to be few foot and leg injuries (compared to the many finger, hand and arm injuries) but there are additional people who do not ride and numerous people who are carried or ride funny things. If the non-riders and the carried people are related to the foot and leg injuries, this could be an important clue to the larger motif. 

In addition to being carried up the serpentine steps by Bronn, Tyrion declines to ride the pig at Joffrey's request (declines to be his "champion") but eventually rides the pig when Penny tells him she will teach him how to be a dwarf (or to use that status to keep himself safe). We also have scenes where Bronn and Shea help Tyrion to wear armor and then mount a horse and (in one of the released chapters?) where Penny helps Tyrion to wear armor. 

If you buy into the notion that there are patterns in stories of the Hero's Journey, It seems to me that these are examples of mentors helping the hero to overcome obstacles and develop new powers. Tyrion could not put on his own suit of armor and could not climb onto the back of a horse on his own. Maybe he can climb onto the back of the pig on his own, and this reflects his evolution under the guidance of Penny. 

Jon Snow is on horseback when Ygritte shoots him with an arrow. Ned Stark's leg injury is caused by his horse falling on him. 

Bran rides into the harvest feast on the back of his horse, Dancer. He leaves the feast on the back of Hodor, who did some dancing at the feast. Bran became wistful in that POV because he knew he would never be able to dance. Later, Bloodraven tells him that he will never walk again but he will fly. So maybe this is the tradeoff, similar to that mentioned in the mythology book ("deal with the devil"): lose the ability to walk but gain the ability to fly. 

Sansa does some dancing at King's Landing - notably dancing a Joffrey's wedding feast just before fleeing from King's Landing on her own two feet. I believe Jon Snow dances with Alys Karstark at her wedding, and she recalls dancing with Robb (and Jon?) during a childhood visit at Winterfell.

We know from Quaithe's cryptic prophecy that Dany will know three mounts. 

P.S. I wonder how Lomas Longstrider fits with the walking/riding/unable to walk symbolism? He seems related to Gerion Lannister, in my mind, as a world traveler. Gerion gave copies of his books to Tyrion.

[corbon]

23 hours ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

The Crippled Masters Or The Crypt-ILL Masters ?

I wanted to make a list of all the crippled who must be assisted in moving. Please add any you feel should join. Also anything you feel or think their inability to move freely may represent.  
I shall post more later.
 

——Lord Wyman Manderly

Lord Wyman Manderly had arrived from White Harbor two days past, traveling by barge and litter, as he was too fat to sit a horse. 
 

On the dais, Lord Wymanattacked a steaming plate of lampreys as if they were an enemy host. He was so fat that Ser Rodrik had commanded that a special wide chair be built for him to sit in, but he laughed loud and often, and Bran thought he liked him. 
 

Nor did he find any welcome in the pale blue eyes of Wyman Manderly. His lordship's cushioned throne was wide enough to accommodate three men of common girth, yet Manderly threatened to overflow it. His lordship sagged into his seat, his shoulders slumped, his legs splayed, his hands resting on the arms of his throne as if the weight of them were too much to bear. Gods be good, thought Davos, when he saw Lord Wyman's face, this man looks half a corpse. His skin was pallid, with an undertone of grey.

Kings and corpses always draw attendants, the old saying went.

He's too fat for a horse, and needs a wider chair than usual. Doesn't mean he's crippled.

We saw another fat man, Illyrio, riding a litter. But he was quite able to move about under his own power.

23 hours ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

——-Lord Walder Frey

Lord Walder was ninety, a wizened pink weasel with a bald spotted head, too gouty to stand unassisted. His newest wife, a pale frail girl of sixteen years, walked beside his litter when they carried him in. She was the eighth Lady Frey.

 

23 hours ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

——-Willas Tyrell

Willas is crippled, with a bad leg.

He has a busted knee. He is 'crippled' in the context of no longer being able to be a knight (and thus overall). It is not clear that he cannot ride at all, or walk at all. He may still qualify, but I don't think we have evidence that he requires assistance to move. He still has a passion for and owns some of the finest horse, hounds and hawks in the seven Kingdoms and may still actively use them, we can't tell.

[Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe]

44 minutes ago, corbon said:

He's too fat for a horse, and needs a wider chair than usual. Doesn't mean he's crippled.

We saw another fat man, Illyrio, riding a litter. But he was quite able to move about under his own power.

Yea, I was hemming and hawing over or not about him. He’s a litter rider but we see him ambulate,first time?,(make a move?) with Davos. Plus he sits a throne and not a chair at White Harbor. 
*I know after White Castle I need to sit a throne too. Ha!  
 

I need to put Illyario and Cersei in. Illyario is definitely a move maker. But I still haven’t concluded if Wyman and Illyario are the same guy or do they play each other’s role? Is it one guy two or three? 
Durran is able to stand suspiciously well at times. Bah! So many cripples and mounts.