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Are the people of Skagos true to the old ways?


Moiraine Sedai

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Cannibals. Isolated. Cruel. Like the First Men. Are they the ones who remained faithful to their religion? Bolton  and Stark are the savages in the North. But the people of Skagos may be more so.  Rickon will learn what the Starks were like during the days of his grandfather. 

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Skagos is met, in the books, via third parties' account and rumours. The truth may be much simpler: insular people, more akin to the mountains clans than inland northerners, etc.  I don't think unicorns are common there, but they should exist in the property of skagosson nobles. These beasts are hardly known even in Essos, so I don't see any reason they are common in Skagos.

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On 6/1/2022 at 10:52 AM, Canon Claude said:

I feel like the people of Skagos are going to be misunderstood. They’ll definitely be big people who ride around on unicorns, but their supposed savagery will be Andal prejudice more than anything. 

The belief has been around for a long time. People who visited the island saw the cannibalism.  

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I feel like we're building to a moment where the Boltons are outmatched by their enemies in terms of ferocity and savagery, since this is what happened when they and the Others push things too far. We've already seen how the Free Folk are allying with Jon Snow, Bran learning the ways of the Children, communicating through the trees, House Manderly making everyone at Ramsay Bolton's wedding feast on human flesh. Now we'll have the half-giant cannibalistic Stoneborn making their own appearance, riding unicorns and wielding dragonglass in the name of their savage young Stark lord. Rickon's not going to be tied down to Andal Arryn notions of honour like his dad, and he won't be burded by southron influence from his Tully side. Rickon is going to be a new Hungry Wolf, if he lives long enough to become the next Lord Stark, anyway.

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I think he could be more wolf than boy and I wonder about his warging abilities.

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A Game of Thrones - Bran IV

In the yard below, Rickon ran with the wolves.

Bran watched from his window seat. Wherever the boy went, Grey Wind was there first, loping ahead to cut him off, until Rickon saw him, screamed in delight, and went pelting off in another direction. Shaggydog ran at his heels, spinning and snapping if the other wolves came too close. His fur had darkened until he was all black, and his eyes were green fire. Bran's Summer came last. He was silver and smoke, with eyes of yellow gold that saw all there was to see. Smaller than Grey Wind, and more wary. Bran thought he was the smartest of the litter. He could hear his brother's breathless laughter as Rickon dashed across the hard-packed earth on little baby legs.

Rickon is part of their pack.  Could he lead the pack?

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On 6/1/2022 at 10:10 AM, Moiraine Sedai said:

Cannibals. Isolated. Cruel. Like the First Men. Are they the ones who remained faithful to their religion? Bolton  and Stark are the savages in the North. But the people of Skagos may be more so.  Rickon will learn what the Starks were like during the days of his grandfather. 

We have seen from the Weirtree visions of what the Starks were like.  They were murdering people to worship and fertilize their trees.  The First Men were doing this.  The Skagos never paused.  The eating of the flesh is part of the sacrifice.  As the saying goes "waste not want not."  Rickon will be doing what his people did before.

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Old way is savage way.  In that context, yes.  Cannibalism probably began during famine.  The locals got used to the taste and adapted their seasoning skills to the material.  Seal meat had to get tiring.  Whales are not easy to catch.  Humans reproduce like crazy.  So yeah.  They are cannibals.  Long winters in the north and I am sure cannibalism happens during those years when food is hard to come by.  

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I think I will have a kinda unpopular theory from what I see, but I don't think Skagosi are First Men exactly. 

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Because of their size and smell, some maesters believe the hairy Skagosi have a strong admixture of Ibbenese blood, whereas others suggest they may be partially descended from giants. The Skagosi are said to live in caves or mountain fastnesses. Traders claim the lords of stoneborn clans ride shaggy unicorns.

And to me it doesn't sound like first men, but it does sound like Hairy Men. 

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There are tales of Hairy Men, a race of savage and shaggy warriors who rode to battle on unicorns, established on the central grasslands of Essos stretching between the Forest of Qohor to the Bone Mountains. These people were larger in size than the Ibbenese, who may descend from them

 Adakhakileki is located in the foothills of the western Bone Mountains. Little is known of its inhabitants, although its Dothraki language name means "The Cannibals".

It's almost identical.

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The people of Skagos are generally despised by the rest of the northmen, who derisively call them "Skaggs". They regard Skagosi as little more than tribes of raiders and savages, not dissimilar to wildlings. They are considered a backward folk, rumored to still perform human sacrifices to weirwoods, lure passing ships to destruction with false lights, and engage in cannibalism during winter.

So, they don't have the same exact way of life with the rest of the northmen, and in I don't think the first men ate human flesh in general, only during winter and that is because they wanted to survive. Actually we know from wargs and wildlings that eating human flesh it's a sin in the eyes of the old gods. 

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Men may eat the flesh of beasts and beasts the flesh of men, but the man who eats the flesh of a man is an abomination.

If this is the case, it explains why we have some contradicting stories about giants. 

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She also told the children about a man who escaped the castle of evil giants only to fall victim to Others.

Men believe that giants eat human flesh, and Nan claims that giants mix blood into their porridge and eat bulls whole.

 While hostile to men, giants are a shy folk who use little technology, and Wun Weg Wun Dar Wun is a vegetarian.

Giants roam freely and reside beneath tall trees or in caverns. Scholars believe giants probably lived in the caverns beneath Casterly Rock, for instance.

It seems like the stories were mixed with time. The first two sound way more like Skagosi than the Westerosi Giants we know, and if that was the case then the rest of the first men obviously didn't have the best relationship with them. 

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Jhogwin is the Dothraki name for the stone giants that once inhabited the Realm of the Jhogwin. The northernmost region of the snowcapped Krazaaj Zasqa in northern Essos. They were massive creatures, said to have been twice as large as the giants of Westeros.

The Krazaaj Zasqa, meaning "White Mountains" in the Dothraki language, is what the Dothraki call the northern Bone Mountains in central Essos.

The northern section of the Krazaaj Zasqa contains the Realm of Jhogwin. West of the mountains are the forested Kingdom of the Ifequevron.

So, it seams the Essosi cotf and giants were leaving closely, like in westeros. The name stone giants it's kinda eye catching. We don't know the name for the hairy men that also were riding in these areas, but Skagossons means stone borns and Skagosi are rumored to be part giants. 

All in all, I think hairy men sailed north at some point and reached skagos, by accident or not. We know they were sailing to Lorath and had settlements there too. Skagos and Skane had first men already and when they arrived in Skagos probably did what they did in Skane. So, yeah  I believe that they are kinda different and more brutal, bc they probably have their own unique practices too, along with the first men practices that kept from the women there, probably. 

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Jon is an angry icicle who can only think of Arya and revenge. Arya is crazy and training to increase her murder quota. Rickon is killing and eating people with the Skagosi. What little bit of humanity is left will soon be gone in these three Starks. They are worse than the ancient followers of the Old Gods.

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20 hours ago, Darth Sidious said:

Jon is an angry icicle who can only think of Arya and revenge. Arya is crazy and training to increase her murder quota. Rickon is killing and eating people with the Skagosi. What little bit of humanity is left will soon be gone in these three Starks. They are worse than the ancient followers of the Old Gods.

What does 'worse than the ancient followers of the old gods' even mean?  Worse at what, growing oranges?

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I think so.

I don't know about cannibalism (at least in the sense of murdering living, healthy people and them eating them) but I definitely believe that they still perform sacrifices to the weirwoods. More than that, I think that their worship of the old gods is structured, perhaps with a hierarchy.

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18 minutes ago, BlackLightning said:

I think so.

I don't know about cannibalism (at least in the sense of murdering living, healthy people and them eating them) but I definitely believe that they still perform sacrifices to the weirwoods. More than that, I think that their worship of the old gods is structured, perhaps with a hierarchy.

Maybe it’s a version of Ynys Mon which wasn’t destroyed by the Romans…

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