Li’ pup (Waymar’s Sword)

[Nadden]

Word play Li’ pup

I think I have a good thought. When two reflective things face one another (picture two large mirrors) the idea of infinity comes to mind. Like a mirror, an eye is also reflective. I believe we are seeing a mirror and an eye come together with some nice little word-play at the of Waymar’s duel.

 
Eyes in AGOT, Prologue are described like gems. And gems often symbolize stars.

Quote

 

AGOT, Prologue

Gared’s hood shadowed his face, but Will could see the hard glitter in his eyes as he stared at the knight.

 

In the Prologue of AGOT, Ser Waymar Royce’s Long Sword that shattered had jewels (plural) that glittered in its hilt. Later, in ADWD Jon XII, a member of the free folk seems to have found a broken sword hilt. Long ago, someone noticed this and understandably assumed it once belonged to Ser Waymar Royce. The broken sword hilt had three sapphires.

A long swords, so-called for its long hilt, is traditionally fashioned in the shape of a crucifix. (symbolic of death and rebirth) This allows the user to use one or both hands on the sword in battle. The arrangement of three sapphires on the hilt, most likely, is evenly spaced on the cross guard. Google “Narsil” the broken sword from LOTR and look at the images. A sword like that “trembling on high” against a clear night winter sky is a clever way for Martin to draw our attention to Orion’s Belt in my opinion. I mean Martin is literally shaking the sword against the sky. (In our narrative it’s called “The Sword of the Morning constellation”) Those stars are best viewed in the early night sky during the Northern Winter. This black sword (A constellation) would be located just above the ice wall (an ice sword) another symbolic sword. “As above, so below”, says the old maxim. The three, easily identifiable, evenly-spaced stars of Orion’s Belt (The sword of the Morning) match up precisely with the number of blue eyes in the chapter. Martin even states this about the Other’s eyes, “They fixed on the longsword trembling on high,…”, key word “fixed”, as in mounted. The three sapphires are literally paralleling Orion’s Belt. This is precisely what caught the Other eyes. They “fixed” on the hilt that matched near perfectly with the star directly behind it. The same blue eyes with a description that sounds like stars, “…its eyes; blue, deeper and bluer than any human eyes, a blue that burned like ice.” and “The pupil burned blue.”

Note: en tremblant is also a gem setting
Note: Also, Diamonds are a gem nicknamed “ice”.

A little known fact, Orion’s sword was once identified as the Mirror of Venus or Venus’ mirror.
 

Thus, waymar‘s sword paralleling Orion’s sword (The Sword of the Morning) could be seen as shattering like a mirror symbolically. In the main narrative Waymar’s Sword I believe is made of martensite, a form of carbon steel especially hard and brittle produced by undercooling during the forging process. (Side note: It’s interesting that Waymar’s cloak, made of little furry Martens, comes together and his sword, made of martensite, shatters.) The cloak symbolizes many deaths with,
 

Quote

 

AGOT, Prologue

“twisted their little heads off, our mighty warrior.”

 

and the sword symbolizes birth. The birth being the word-play I wanted to share. “Pupil”(eye) where the reflective shard or the shining steel ends up is also reflective at the moment just before impact. Like when two reflective things face one another (picture two large mirrors) the idea of infinity again comes to mind.

Using your minds eye hold the book to a mirror. Read the leaf until you see the word “pupil”. In your minds eye you’ll see “liquq”. Truth, one would have to mind their ”p’s” and “q’s”, an old idiom, to get it right. Typesetters often confused the two similar-looking letters. In this case, if the typesetters get it wrong we end up with lipup or li’pup. Short for little puppy. Look at this quote again,

Quote

 

AGOT, Prologue

“His fine clothes were a tatter, his face a ruin. A shard from his sword transfixed the blind white pupil of his left eye.”

 

Now we have an injured eye(symbolic gem) that is trans”fixed” with the sword shard. Not eyes fixed on a trembling sword. “Trans” is a prefix meaning across, beyond or through. “Trans” can also suggest gender neutrality.

Li’ pup -

“…blind white…” Ghost!? I think so. “Left” also symbolically lines up with our little bastard according to Gared’s little finger. The two ears and three toes line up with the Other pups. “Three male, two female.” “His fine clothes were a tatter, his face a ruin.”, Also presents a lot of symbolism but I don’t think I need to cover that here.

In summary, we have a shining steel reflective shard entering into Waymar’s eye(also reflective) creating this sense of infinity. We get a blind white Ghost …

Sorry for the long explanation. The word-play on pupil would be otherwise easy to disregard.