Why didn't the Starks eliminate all of the Boltons

[Tyrosh Lannister]

In the past, the Boltons have been a nuisance to the stark kings, always rising up in rebellion. But they always bend the knee when they are going to lose and the starks forgive them. This has happened a lot. Why didnt the starks just eliminate every single bolton the next time they rebelled? Bloodthirsty, cruel and traitorous monsters these boltons are.

[Corvo the Crow]

Because it isn't the norm of their society. Tywin did that with Reynes and Tarbecks, it kept his vassals under check for a while but with Tywin dead Tywin's legacy will go down the privy. 

Houses extinguishing in war is acceptable, taking away lands and titles of rebels too, but not killing every last one of them after the war is over.

People think that the Boltons are powerful but from what we've seen so far, they aren't among the top 3 in the North, perhaps not even top 4. All Roose managed to do was through luck and deception and treachery and we also know for a fact that Boltons command less land now than they used to before submitting to Starks, they most likely lost more land in their rebellions after bending the knee.

[King_Tristifer_IV_Mudd]

Plot reasons

[Canon Claude]

27 minutes ago, Tyrosh Lannister said:

In the past, the Boltons have been a nuisance to the stark kings, always rising up in rebellion. But they always bend the knee when they are going to lose and the starks forgive them. This has happened a lot. Why didnt the starks just eliminate every single bolton the next time they rebelled? Bloodthirsty, cruel and traitorous monsters these boltons are.

Presumably they didn’t want to slaughter the Bolton kids who were taken captive or surrendered then the adults died? 

[Nevets]

40 minutes ago, Tyrosh Lannister said:

In the past, the Boltons have been a nuisance to the stark kings, always rising up in rebellion. But they always bend the knee when they are going to lose and the starks forgive them. This has happened a lot. Why didnt the starks just eliminate every single bolton the next time they rebelled? Bloodthirsty, cruel and traitorous monsters these boltons are.

Because unlike the Boltons the Starks are not bloodthirsty and cruel.  They aren't the type to kill an entire family because of the actions of rogue members or the off chance that one of their descendants will cause trouble some time in the future.

[King_Tristifer_IV_Mudd]

I’d also like to point out we don’t know all the context of each conflict. And we likely never will.

[frenin]

1 hour ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Because it isn't the norm of their society. Tywin did that with Reynes and Tarbecks, it kept his vassals under check for a while but with Tywin dead Tywin's legacy will go down the privy. 

 

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  Chronicles found in the archives of the Night’s Watch at the Nightfort (before it was abandoned) speak of the war for Sea Dragon Point, wherein the Starks brought down the Warg King and his inhuman allies, the children of the forest. When the Warg King’s last redoubt fell, his sons were put to the sword, along with his beasts and greenseers, whilst his daughters were taken as prizes by their conquerors.

House Greenwood, House Towers, House Amber, and House Frost met similar ends, together with a score of lesser houses and petty kings whose very names are lost to history.

 

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Ser Bartimus had no interest in the world outside, or indeed anything that had happened since he lost his leg to a riderless horse and a maester's saw. He had come to love the Wolf's Den, however, and liked nothing more than to talk about its long and bloody history. The Den was much older than White Harbor, the knight told Davos. It had been raised by King Jon Stark to defend the mouth of the White Knife against raiders from the sea. Many a younger son of the King in the North had made his seat there, many a brother, many an uncle, many a cousin. Some passed the castle to their own sons and grandsons, and offshoot branches of House Stark had arisen; the Greystarks had lasted the longest, holding the Wolf's Den for five centuries, until they presumed to join the Dreadfort in rebellion against the Starks of Winterfell.

So it's obviously something the Starks were fond of doing, so I'm inclined to think plot reasons too.

 

54 minutes ago, Nevets said:

hey aren't the type to kill an entire family because of the actions of rogue members or the off chance that one of their descendants will cause trouble some time in the future.

Their past actions say otherwise.

[John Suburbs]

1 hour ago, Tyrosh Lannister said:

In the past, the Boltons have been a nuisance to the stark kings, always rising up in rebellion. But they always bend the knee when they are going to lose and the starks forgive them. This has happened a lot. Why didnt the starks just eliminate every single bolton the next time they rebelled? Bloodthirsty, cruel and traitorous monsters these boltons are.

Because if you eliminate a rival house, it disincentivizes the others from bending the knee.

[Craving Peaches]

1 hour ago, KingEuronGreyjoy said:

I’d also like to point out we don’t know all the context of each conflict. And we likely never will.

Hot Take: the Starks started it. We all think they are really nice people. It would be a twist if they used to be less nice.

[Moiraine Sedai]

3 hours ago, Tyrosh Lannister said:

In the past, the Boltons have been a nuisance to the stark kings, always rising up in rebellion. But they always bend the knee when they are going to lose and the starks forgive them. This has happened a lot. Why didnt the starks just eliminate every single bolton the next time they rebelled? Bloodthirsty, cruel and traitorous monsters these boltons are.

The Boltons capitulated but that doesn’t mean they could not have prolonged the war. They would keep fighting if it meant their deaths.  The Starks got the upper hand but that doesn’t mean they had the means to wipe out the Boltons.  

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

The story needed a traitor house to betray the Starks and ruin their chances of winning the war, and to make them unable to go back to Winterfell for a time. 

[King_Tristifer_IV_Mudd]

19 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

Hot Take: the Starks started it. We all think they are really nice people. It would be a twist if they used to be less nice.

It is canon that the old Kings of Winter Starks were a lot more ruthless than they are now

[frenin]

1 hour ago, John Suburbs said:

Because if you eliminate a rival house, it disincentivizes the others from bending the knee.

The Starks have done this way too much for this to be true and the Castamere experience also proves otherwise.

It makes little sense that the Starks murdered their own kin for joining the Boltons  in rebellion but left the Boltons be after defeating them.

And long sieges usually makes men grow restless and invoke the "no quarter order". 

[Corvo the Crow]

2 hours ago, frenin said:

So it's obviously something the Starks were fond of doing, so I'm inclined to think plot reasons too.

 

Read again:

 

3 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Houses extinguishing in war is acceptable, taking away lands and titles of rebels too, but not killing every last one of them after the war is over.

 

I wrote this with that specific quote you added in mind, what you said happened during a war, we have plenty of examples on that, two such being Hoares and Gardeners but it is very rare to do this if they've managed to survive the war, in fact, I can't even recall this being done by anyone other than Tywin and some Targaryen Kings.

 

2 hours ago, frenin said:

So it's obviously something the Starks were fond of doing, so I'm inclined to think plot reasons too.

 

Nope, it wasn't and what would be those plot reasons anyway? The part that Boltons played could just have been given to any other house and Boltons aren't the only house that weren't extinguished despite rebelling over and over.

[Canon Claude]

29 minutes ago, Moiraine Sedai said:

The Boltons capitulated but that doesn’t mean they could not have prolonged the war. They would keep fighting if it meant their deaths.  The Starks got the upper hand but that doesn’t mean they had the means to wipe out the Boltons.  

I believe this. Same way that the Children of the Forest couldn’t defeat the First Men but the First Men didn’t want pay the cost of wiping out the Children, so they made peace. 
And besides, it’s not like all the Boltons were evil. Domeric seemed like a very decent person, and so was Barba.

[frenin]

2 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

I wrote this with that specific quote you added in mind, what you said happened during a war, we have plenty of examples on that, two such being Hoares and Gardeners but it is very rare to do this if they've managed to survive the war, in fact, I can't even recall this being done by anyone other than Tywin and some Targaryen Kings.

Did it happen during the war or did the Starks simply chose to eliminate the male line? The text implies the latter.

 

4 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Nope, it wasn't and what would be those plot reasons anyway? The part that Boltons played could just have been given to any other house and Boltons aren't the only house that weren't extinguished despite rebelling over and over.

That the Boltons were a large looming threat for the Starks.

Or as Jaime would say, an unruly house that envied the position of their overlords.

 

2 minutes ago, Canon Claude said:

I believe this. Same way that the Children of the Forest couldn’t defeat the First Men but the First Men didn’t want pay the cost of wiping out the Children, so they made peace. 

There is at least one instances in which the Starks had the means, reasons and opportunity to take them out but chose not to.

After the Starks laid siiege to the Dreadfort for three years.

[Corvo the Crow]

26 minutes ago, frenin said:

Did it happen during the war or did the Starks simply chose to eliminate the male line? The text implies the latter.

 

"When the Warg King’s last redoubt fell"  So still part of that battle and even if not, definitely not comparable to what the title says, eliminating them all, like what was done to Reynes, Tarbecks, Darklyns...

 

And then there's the example of Dustins:
 

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The rusted crown upon the arms of House Dustin derives from their claim that they are themselves descended from the First King and the Barrow Kings who ruled after him. The old tales recorded in Kennet's Passages of the Dead claim that a curse was placed on the Great Barrow that would allow no living man to rival the First King. This curse made these pretenders to the title grow corpselike in their appearance as it sucked away their vitality and life. This is no more than legend, to be sure, but that the Dustins share blood and descent from the Barrow Kings of old seems sure enough.

 

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More historical proof exists for the war between the Kings of Winter and the Barrow Kings to their south, who styled themselves the Kings of the First Men and claimed supremacy over all First Men everywhere, even the Starks themselves. Runic records suggest that their struggle, dubbed the Thousand Years War by the singers, was actually a series of wars that lasted closer to two hundred years than a thousand, ending when the last Barrow King bent his knee to the King of Winter, and gave him the hand of his daughter in marriage.

 

Barrow King bent the knee and his family was spared, they continued to exist with their descendants the Dustins reaching to the current era.

[astarkchoice]

2 simple reasons

1) exterminating an enemy house utterly is not the norm , breaking the enemy and making them bend the knee and swear oaths is far more common

 

2) the early starks seem to have been both ruthless and cunning ,milking former foes strengths! House bolton as a sworn vassal adds both  strength  and of course their fearsome rep (the flayed man sigil... we can assume they didnt hide that stuff back then) ..behave or our new vassals will make you into 'reeks' !

In fact you could even take that further and maybe speculate that having the nasty scary boltons as an ally and boogeymannto keep houses in line  allowed the more honourable image of the starks to be born in the north! 

[frenin]

10 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

"When the Warg King’s last redoubt fell"  So still part of that battle and even if

It is not part of the battle... 

 

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not, definitely not comparable to what the title says, eliminating them all, like what was done to Reynes, Tarbecks, Darklyns...

the Starks did before, while and after conquering the North.

 

12 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Barrow King bent the knee and his family was spared, they continued to exist with their descendants the Dustins reaching to the current era.

They did not however keep rebeling and rebelling and rebellng.

[Craving Peaches]

1 hour ago, KingEuronGreyjoy said:

It is canon that the old Kings of Winter Starks were a lot more ruthless than they are now

I know, I meant it would be funny if they were downright evil as a contrast to the present day Starks.