Are Walkers Actually Young Weirwoods?

[Phylum of Alexandria]

1 hour ago, Evolett said:

The animated weirwood faces are an example of the magic of shape-changing,

This is great, thanks. I'll have to chew on it a bit.

[LongRider]

3 hours ago, Evolett said:

The weirwood moon-doors at the HoBaW also add to solving the mystery. The moon has one trademark – just like the god of many faces, the moon has many faces, its phases, appearing in the sky with a different face each night. And like the moon, the weirwood too can have many faces, differing according to who is looking through it.  

The face at the Black Gate mirrors the black door half at the HoBaW with the white moon face in the middle.

In addition to the WW/ebony doors at the HoBW, there is also; beneath the temple of HoBW the room had 11WW chairs, on the chair backs were faces carved of Ebony.

I made a list of WW objects awhile back, can't claim it's complete, think I'll go ahead and show the list.

Quote

in the House of the Undying, Dani goes through a ebony and WW door
Black Gate
old WW table, White Sword Tower of the KG, first floor
Lysa's WW chair at High Hall in the Eyrie
the Moon Door is made is made of WW
WW and ebony door at the HoBW
the old High Septon in KL has a WW staff
Varamyr finds a broken branch of WW he uses as a crutch (prologe of Dance)
Leaf has WW bowl of paste WW seeds for Bran
Morna has WW mask
Val has a WW pin
beneath the temple of HoBW the room had 11WW chairs, on the chair backs were faces carved of Ebony

 

 

edt:  The 11 ebony faces on WW chairs in HoBW, what do they see and hear, whom do they tell?

[Evolett]

9 minutes ago, LongRider said:

I made a list of WW objects awhile back, can't claim it's complete, think I'll go ahead and show the list.

Thanks for the list . I'm sure the white WW faces represent greenseers within the WWs but the black faces are still a bit of a mystery. They could be connected to the Shade Trees, that would make sense. I once had this notion that the Undying actually live within the Shade Trees and that what Dany sees is a projection, or perhaps they ported there somehow....  

There is also full moon and new moon imagery there. In the text, the new moon is often "a black hole in the sky." It is also called a "Traitor's moon" (quote by Tyrion). On checking, I found the black moon does often correlate with treacherous acts. The moon on the Moon Door at the Eyrie is a cresent - sickle shaped and an apt choice for a door that leads to certain death. 

 

[LongRider]

In the wiki, the HoBW doors "In Braavos, Yorko Terys rows Arya Stark to the House of Black and White. Its doors are closed when she arrives, but they open after she says "valar morghulis" while presenting the worn iron coin previously given to her by Jaqen H'ghar."

Well, well, more magic doors, magic spells and a magic coin.  The Black Gate, needs a magic spell spoken by a Sworn Brother of the Night Watch.   The HoBW needs a magic spell and token, for Arya.  How does the door know the difference between Arya and the other folks coming to the door?  Do the faces see the difference?

The Moon Door, no faces, just a crescent moon carved into it.  This is a door anyone can open.

Weirwoods are beginning to seem more like portals and liminal spaces, giving sight of the now and the past, allowing movement through the portals and doors with the proper incantations, or for some, free movement.  

I don't see the WW as being associated with the White Walkers.       

 

[Phylum of Alexandria]

13 hours ago, LongRider said:

I made a list of WW objects awhile back, can't claim it's complete, think I'll go ahead and show the list.

Nice!

There's also Weirwood used for the rafters of Whitewalls, mentioned in The Mystery Knight. We don't know for sure, but it's implied that Bloodraven was able to spy on the conspirators via these Weirwood rafters. If that is the case, then that would be the strongest evidence available that it's not simply "a magical tree".....those rafters may still be alive!

 

[Phylum of Alexandria]

I guess one thing I'm still struggling to understand is how magical blood was introduced to humans.

There seem to be indications (maybe metaphorical, maybe not) of sexual union with magical non-human beings.

Garth Greenhand and the God-on-Earth have a lot of parallels. Both founded magical human lineages, and Garth's passages play with language about seed and fecundity, but also are explicit about him impregnating women.

There is the story about the Night's King giving his seed and soul to an icy "Corpse Queen."

And yet, the Others need living babies for some reason, possibly to make more "brothers."

The "baby as host to grow a Walker" idea would explain how the Others are made. And if they grew to be sexually mature humanoid hybrids, then they could presumably copulate and reproduce with human women. Same for the Green Men. That would go a long way toward explaining how magical bloodlines were started in humans.

But then, I go back to: what about the CotF? Were they born with green blood? Or did they acquire it? There's a line about Garth sharing the gift of seed with humans but not CotF because "the gods provided for their needs," which strikes me as sexual symbolism, but I don't quite know what it's getting at. 

[LongRider]

5 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

Nice!

There's also Weirwood used for the rafters of Whitewalls, mentioned in The Mystery Knight. ...

 

Thanks, I'll put that on my list.   

[Evolett]

12 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

I guess one thing I'm still struggling to understand is how magical blood was introduced to humans.

If humans originally possessed no intrinsic magical traits at all, then the most likely source are the elder races. We know of the CotF and the Giants and there is speculation in the World Book on a third race:

Quote

A possibility arises for a third race to have inhabited the Seven Kingdoms in the Dawn Age, but it is so speculative that it need only be dealt with briefly. 

Osha also speaks of "the other old races." I strongly suspect the "merlings" were the third elder race. There are too many mentions of races we can associate with the sea to ignore. People on the Three Sister Islands are often born with webbed hands and feet, another clue, and we have the those on the Toad Isle with a fish-like aspect to their faces, nevermind all the mentions of selkies, squishers, mermaids and the like. The Grey King is said to have married a mermaid. The Manderlys have an entire "Merman's Court."

Perhaps these "merlings" were originally amphibious beings (as the toad suggests), with a water / land life-cycle and were humanoid enough to interbreed with humans, eventually dying out but leaving their DNA behind in certain human populations, as was the case with the giants and the CotF.

A water-based culture such as the Rhoynar certainly had magic: the power to command the waters of the Rhoyne as well as water witches who could make deserts bloom:

Quote

Even more crucially, it is said the Rhoynish water witches knew secret spells that made dry streams flow again and deserts bloom. tWoIaF

Further, those Rhoynish refugees who stuck to their Rhoynish customs are known as "Orphans of the Greenblood." That should set our bells ringing. The fertility magic of Garth Greenhand could well stem from the same roots as the magic of the Rhoynar. I also think these "green men" belong in the "merling" category.

The Crannogmen of the Neck also appear to be throwbacks to this merling culture (as well as CotF traits). They live in a watery, swampy region, live off fishing and frogs, weave nets and carry trident-like weapons.  Meera and Howland Reed can breathe mud and Howland seems to be something of an alchemist as well, capable of changing earth to water and water to earth.

Quote

“No,” said Meera, “but he could breathe mud and run on leaves, and change earth to water and water to earth with no more than a whispered word. He could talk to trees and weave words and make castles appear and disappear.” 

Are we meant to take this literally? Perhaps not but it does strongly suggest that the Crannogmen are capable of magic outside of green dreams (which Howland does not have, according to Meera). 

 

12 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

The "baby as host to grow a Walker" idea would explain how the Others are made. And if they grew to be sexually mature humanoid hybrids, then they could presumably copulate and reproduce with human women.

The white walkers may be humanoid looking but their physiology is too far removed from the flesh and blood of humankind to produce viable hybrids, imo. I don't see how ice-flesh and blue blood could mix on a genetic level. It's different with the giants and the CotF. These share common features with humans - flesh, blood, organs, brains, fingers and toes etc.   But it's fantasy, so who knows?

The only way I can see babies turn into Others is through the use of their souls to animate what basically is an ice golem. 

[LongRider]

13 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

The "baby as host to grow a Walker" idea would explain how the Others are made. And if they grew to be sexually mature humanoid hybrids, then they could presumably copulate and reproduce with human women.

For me, only the books are cannon, not the Mummer's show.

Baby as a host to grow a walker, is not making a hybrid.  What your describing is similar to the egg of a parasite embedded in the flesh of the host, then the hatchling devours the host until it can live on its own, killing the host.  Ain't nature beautiful!

Craster's offspring come from a very limited gene pool, even domestic animals aren't that closely related.  GRRM has one of the women tell Sam ""The boy's brothers," said the old woman on the left. "Craster's sons. The white cold's rising out there, crow. I can feel it in my bones. These poor old bones don't lie. They'll be here soon, the sons."  But neither she nor GRRM tell us more about ''the sons."

Craster claims he is 'right with the Gods' and it's insinuated he gets 'right' by sacrificing his newborn sons.  Blood sacrifice to the gods?  What we don't know is how do the babes disappear?  Do the Others or the White Walkers take them?  Perhaps wolves?   So far, the only magicked humans I've seen are the wights and Cold Hands.  Could the sacrificed babes' souls be used for some icy magic as Evolett suggests?

Craster's baby sacrifices are very systematic, and he tells the NW "Only the gods will help you then. You best get right with the gods."  What he doesn't tell us is, what gods?

 

[Phylum of Alexandria]

12 hours ago, Evolett said:

Osha also speaks of "the other old races." I strongly suspect the "merlings" were the third elder race

That was my first guess when I read that passage. Now I'm not so sure.

I posted that same quote in the "Puns and Wordplay" section as a possible winking reference to panspermia. It's mentioned in a passage that also talks about the black oily stone Seastone Chair:

On 12/3/2022 at 6:53 PM, Phylum of Alexandria said:

"A possibility arises for a third race to have inhabited the Seven Kingdoms in the Dawn Age, but it is so speculative that it need only be dealt with briefly. Among the ironborn, it is said that the first of the First Men to come to the Iron Isles found the famous Seastone Chair on Old Wyk, but that the isles were uninhabited. If true, the nature and origins of the chair's makers are a mystery. Maester Kirth in his collection of ironborn legends, Songs the Drowned Men Sing, has suggested that the chair was left by visitors from across the Sunset Sea, but there is no evidence for this, only speculation."

I was thinking that "across the Sunset Sea" could be a cheeky way for GRRM to play with "from outer space." Not least because the whole notion of merpeople worshipping a black oily stone of a kraken is a clear reference to Lovecraft. But it raises the question: who was it they were worshipping, or trying to summon? Who is the "Chthulu" of Planetos? I am inclined to say it's the Weir-species, come from above.

I think my 3-bloodline theory is more about warring factions than it is about type of magic per se. I think the Weir-organism seems highly adaptable to its surroundings, both channeling elemental magic reflective of its terrain, and perhaps also changing itself in the process. So Team Winter likely now cannot survive Southron summers, but that it because of its past adaptation to the extreme cold. Team Green seems to have a good deal more flexibility in the magic they can express. A lot of the earlier nature folk of TWOIAF seem to have a water theme, including the fisher queens, the merlings, and the followers of the Grey King. As for the merlings themselves, they seem to be one of several possible hybrid races littered throughout the world's history. I have tended to also think that stuff like "took a mermaid to wife" served symbolic purposes, but if the idea of hybrids was indeed to get magic into the bloodlines, then it wouldn't be merely symbolic.

I said before that I think that the "kraken" Euron summons from the deep will be an activated Weirwood, which from a certain vantage point might be indistinguishable from a kraken. Different communities interacted with these Old Ones in different terrains, thus interacting with different elemental magic, and therefore named them as distinct gods. I always thought it interesting that it was in the presence of Weirwoods that Mel and Beric's fire magic seemed to strengthen, whatever their own beliefs were. 

Interestingly though, the Grey King/Goodbrother story seems to indicate a rivalry among Weir-folk, and implicates both black and white (the white being the "ribs" of Nagga). Crowfood's Daughter points to evidence that the Grey King has a lot of Team Fire imagery, while Team Green seems to link to the older Water folk like the Fisher Queens. And yet...the Grey King is now revered by the Ironborn, who worships the Drowned God, a water deity who has given Patchface prophetic visions quite like ghost of High Heart near her Weirwoods. So it's not at all clear what's what, partially because Team Fire might have evolved over time, and partially because older religious traditions are blindly rooted in histories people no longer know.

12 hours ago, Evolett said:

The white walkers may be humanoid looking but their physiology is too far removed from the flesh and blood of humankind to produce viable hybrids, imo

Perhaps. But if that's the case, what do you think was the purpose of the Night's King giving away his seed and soul to the icy Lady of Winter? Obviously that will tie somehow to Stannis and Melisandre's shadow baby, but it's one more example of sexual union with the magical. And that one was mentioned right before child sacrifice, thought what that phrase means is unclear.

[Phylum of Alexandria]

10 hours ago, LongRider said:

Baby as a host to grow a walker, is not making a hybrid.  What your describing is similar to the egg of a parasite embedded in the flesh of the host, then the hatchling devours the host until it can live on its own, killing the host.  Ain't nature beautiful!

I was thinking of something parasitic like the ichneumon wasp, or the cordyceps fungus (which controls the nervous system of its host to guide it to the best place to grow and spread its spores). Admittedly, this leaning of mine is partly based on other works that GRRM has written, like A Song For Lya and The Monkey Treatment. But I think that's fair game. Reading his larger oeuvre, you can get a feel for what his interests and recurring patterns are, how his mechanics of supernatural things work, what tones he tends to go for, etc. And body horror is a big part of GRRM's work. 

So when I read about Aerea Targaryen in Fire and Blood, I really perked up. Parasitic baby fire wyrms gestating inside the body of this young dragon rider. We don't know exactly what it means, but it might suggest something important for the birth of dragons. As for me, I take it as reflective something interesting about the fire wyrms themselves. Do they need to feast on blood to grow? Maybe these beasts were not always fiery, and they fused with a fiery magical root that grew into the volcanic depths of Asshai and Valyria--not unlike the dragon at the one root of Yggdrasil.

Maybe they're not at all related to the Weirwoods or Black trees. At this point we don't have much information to go on. But certainly that kind of clinical creepiness and body horror is something I think will emerge more and more as magical forces come to the fore of the story proper.

[Phylum of Alexandria]

13 hours ago, LongRider said:

For me, only the books are cannon, not the Mummer's show.

Definitely true. I disliked the show from Episode 1 onward. 

I did have an intro bit on this original post where I talked about the show, though. As idiotic as D&D are, they got unfettered access to GRRM's big plans for the plot. We don't know what was said, and what was fully fleshed-out vs broad sketches, but it's totally possible that their version, while wrong, preserves some elements or basic gists of what GRRM told them. It's at least worth thinking about. 

[Evolett]

3 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

I said before that I think that the "kraken" Euron summons from the deep will be an activated Weirwood, which from a certain vantage point might be indistinguishable from a kraken. Different communities interacted with these Old Ones in different terrains, thus interacting with different elemental magic, and therefore named them as distinct gods. I always thought it interesting that it was in the presence of Weirwoods that Mel and Beric's fire magic seemed to strengthen, whatever their own beliefs were. 

The idea of the Drowned God actually being a drowned weirwood has been around for a while. Its possible even if there's no direct evidence for it. Driftwood could be a reference to "drifting" or "floating" conciousness, with the wood being the source of that conciousness, as we see with the weirwoods. The Damphair enters the sea to be able to hear the "song of the leviathan" for advice on what to do about Euron claiming the Seastone Chair, so for Aeron, the sea serves a purpose similar to the "whispering heads" of Crackclaw point.

An uprooted tree hurtling down a river is also compared to a kraken in one of Arya's chapters:

Quote

The ferrymen were rushing forward, poles in hand. For a moment, she did not understand what was happening. Then she saw it: an uprooted tree, huge and dark, coming straight at them. A tangle of roots and limbs poked up out of the water as it came, like the reaching arms of a great kraken. 

 

There's another kraken reference, though the text does not actually mention the kraken itself. This time its linked to wildfire:

Quote

Fifty feet high, a swirling demon of green flame danced upon the river. It had a dozen hands, in each a whip, and whatever they touched burst into fire.

Since the clay pots in which liquid wild fire is stored are fruit-shaped, we have a definite link to plants here. 

It's entirely possible that all magic is connected to the weirwoods and takes on different forms, functions and outcomes depending on the accompanying element (earth, water, fire, ice).

 

3 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

So when I read about Aerea Targaryen in Fire and Blood, I really perked up. Parasitic baby fire wyrms gestating inside the body of this young dragon rider. We don't know exactly what it means, but it might suggest something important for the birth of dragons. As for me, I take it as reflective something interesting about the fire wyrms themselves.

The parasitic fire worms which also have faces are particularly disturbing and explicit. There's no doubt about them, it seems. It had me wondering whether GRRM has hidden any similar examples in the text and I think he has:

Quote

Dany watched the flies. They were as large as bees, gross, purplish, glistening. The Dothraki called them bloodflies. They lived in marshes and stagnant pools, sucked blood from man and horse alike, and laid their eggs in the dead and dying. Drogo hated them.

These flies lay their eggs not only in the dead but also in the dying, while the person is still alive. 

 Same goes for Ralf Kenning who is alive but also full of white worms: 

Quote

The arm on that same side was big as a log and crawling with white worms.

.......

“Kill him,” Reek told the guard. “His wits are gone. He’s full of blood and worms.”

 

I would also add the planting of illegitimate children in the "nest" of a lawful husband as Cersei and Rhaenyra do to this parasitic symbolism, i.e. the cuckoo's nest principle where the cuckoo lays its eggs in the nest of another bird species. The cuckoo is a classic brood parasite. Robert is a cuckolded husband.  I think this is quite significant, especially since Cersei's children are pure Lannisters and the Lannisters have been referred to as an "infestation." 

The patrilineal system dictates that children take their father's name and heritage, this on the assumption that the children are true born of their parents. It's also the lords and kings who pass on genetic heritage, legacy and leadership of their House on to their sons. Cersei basically guaranteed that the true House of Baratheon would die out by fathering children with Jamie. House Baratheon would have become a shadow House Lannister. 

In Rhaenyra's case, Harwin Strong fathered her children. Isn't it interesting that Ser Lucamore Strong is the one who spread the news about Aerea's condition? Perhaps there's a connection between brood parasites and blood parasites. 

I think this issue of brood paratisism could be important to the discussion on hybrids and how certain magical bloodlines manage to enter and perhaps even take over a bloodline. The prevelance of rape as well as the ubiquity of sex workers throughout the story could also be a pointer in this direction. Neither a woman who suffers gang rape and gets pregnant nor a sex worker with many clients a day can conclusively determine the father of a child born of such a union.
Someone in the forum referred to Lollys' child as the "King's Landing bastard," very true. Also interesting that the child is named after Tyrion who is closely tied to sex workers and to the fate of gang-raped Tysha, his first love. Then of course there is the suspision that he may have fathered by the Mad King. So there's definitely something going on here. 

 

 

[Phylum of Alexandria]

7 minutes ago, Evolett said:

I think this issue of brood paratisism could be important to the discussion on hybrids and how certain magical bloodlines manage to enter and perhaps even take over a bloodline. The prevelance of rape as well as the ubiquity of sex workers throughout the story could also be a pointer in this direction. Neither a woman who suffers gang rape and gets pregnant nor a sex worker with many clients a day can conclusively determine the father of a child born of such a union.

I was just re-listening to Fire and Blood yesterday, and was on the section where Alysanne convinced Jaehaerys to ban the right of the First Night. And in defense of the practice, it was said that the First Men thought the notion of mothering a whelp from some powerful warlord was considered to be a "blessing." If there were magical powers that emerged as a result, perhaps that is how such a tradition could have arisen.

Certainly Varamyr Sixskins had expected some of the children from his various rapes to show his gift. Those much closer in descent to the source of the magical blood would have a much better chance.

12 minutes ago, Evolett said:

The idea of the Drowned God actually being a drowned weirwood has been around for a while.

Yeah, that's probably true of everything I write about! I came to the series late, and have had the benefit of culling together the thoughts and contributions of people who have been toiling over this stuff for decades.

Truly we stand on the shoulders of magical underground giants. 

[LongRider]

2 hours ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

Certainly Varamyr Sixskins had expected some of the children from his various rapes to show his gift. Those much closer in descent to the source of the magical blood would have a much better chance.

WOW, this makes me go back to my comment of Craster’s offspring and their limited gene pool.  In animals this called line breeding and is done to concentrate selected traits.

 Is Craster concentrating magic traits that are only expressed in his mail offspring?  We know from Gilly she doesn’t seem to have any magic abilities, unless they are latent.

[Ser Leftwich]

On 12/3/2022 at 9:43 AM, Phylum of Alexandria said:

How are White Walkers made?

[GoT intro content of this post redacted due to stupid rules].

Exactly what the Others have been doing with Craster’s infant sons is not yet clear in the books Some of Craster’s daughter-wives do refer to the White Walkers of the wood as the brothers of Gilly’s newborn baby. And TWOIAF mentions that the CotF engaged in child sacrifice.

Before we get into this topic, let me first remind you of a big theory I’ve been pushing so far: the red-green-blue color trio imagery that’s peppered throughout the story are hints from GRRM that there are three warring magical bloodlines, all brother or sister lines of the same eldritch species. The sigil of House Massey, the colors of the Trident’s three forks, the three colors of the cyvasse board, and most egregiously, the Muppet names found in House Tully. This red-green-blue imagery is telling us that the Dragons, Weirwoods, and Others are all not just linked, but related to one another by blood, albeit with distinct bloodlines and subtle territory-based variations. And they’re at war with one another.

 

No they are not. Brienne sees a sapling weirwood, as does Bran and company at the Nightfort. This idea makes less than no sense.

[Phylum of Alexandria]

2 minutes ago, Ser Leftwich said:

No they are not. Brienne sees a sapling weirwood, as does Bran and company at the Nightfort. This idea makes less than no sense.

Fine if you're not into it. I say in the post that it's tinfoily. More often than not I try to focus on plot-based details rather than hints and symbolism, but sometimes you have drink the wine of the worlocks and get creative. Once in a while you hit on something important. I found the discussion in the comments here quite valuable.

[Craving Peaches]

I'm not sure. The way the Other that Sam kills just disintegrates makes me think they are in a being held together by magic that is disrupted by obsidian situation. I also think it's likely that they need human babies to make more Others and not just wights. If they were baby weirwoods, should they not have more plant-like features? These make me think that someone made the Others, someone from the planet, given they have a weakness to obsidian, the main material used by the CotF, it sounds like it could be a built-in weakness/failsafe if they ever got out of control.

Don't we also hear someone speaking about trying to get a weirwood to take root or plant one? This would imply that there are already young weirwoods in terms of seeds or saplings.

Though maybe the 'Great Other', if it exists in some shape or form, could be a big weirwood like thing.

[Phylum of Alexandria]

3 hours ago, Craving Peaches said:

I'm not sure.

I myself am leaning against the Walker-as-young-weirwood theory. But because of that I still have outstanding questions that need explaining by some better theory! Donations accepted.

3 hours ago, Craving Peaches said:

If they were baby weirwoods, should they not have more plant-like features?

LmL does have a video where he goes into language tying the Others to weirwoods. They both have a moonglow to their milkglass bodies, Others are hard as old bones..or petrified weirwood, etc. But I don't think they are the guardians of the weirwoods we have seen in the story.

3 hours ago, Craving Peaches said:

Though maybe the 'Great Other', if it exists in some shape or form, could be a big weirwood like thing.

I think we shall see something in the Heart of Winter that's functionally quite weirwood-like. Maybe quite similar in appearance as well, but not necessarily.

One thing that makes me think maybe not is the fact that Weirwoods apparently go quite deep into the earth. The deeper it would go, the more it would have to contend with tectonic activity/heat/magma. While the Winterfell weirwood didn't seem to mind the surrounding hot springs, a cold-adapted variant would need to be ultra-careful of how and where it grows.

 

[Craving Peaches]

1 minute ago, Phylum of Alexandria said:

While the Winterfell weirwood didn't seem to mind the surrounding hot springs, a cold-adapted variant would need to be ultra-careful of how and where it grows.

Trees in cold/low nutrient climates also tend to be rather stunted. Beyond the Wall, being closer to the 'North Pole' equivalent, must see less sunlight than further south. So I think the Weirwoods could possibly have an alternative source of 'food' besides soil nutrients and photosynthesis. Given that their leaves are red all seasons round, they seem to lack chlorophyll.