So...the Mystery Knight alluded to this "Lord's" bastardy?

[KingMaekarWasHere]

I've been reading through the Mystery Knight short story once again, because my first reading didn't lead to much absorption. Needless to say there is a certain "baby" or "child" who is described as being the most annoying child ever to be born in Westeros. YOU KNOW WHO I MEAN. WALDER FREY. One of the worst human beings in Westerosi history. What's more is that his father is not portrayed as being ugly or "snot-nosed" by Dunk, but rather from what we can gather from certain illustrations in A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, Walder's "father" was a very respectable and decent looking young man. As I recall, at one point in the story there is an allusion made to the possibility that Lord Frey's wife (during the reign of Aerys I) slept with a rather disreputable individual. And then...the horrible future Lord Walder Frey pops out! Much like King Joffrey Baratheon, the total opposite of his sire!  

I need to ask, am I the only one who caught this tid-bit? I seriously doubt it! GRRM is without a doubt telling us something about bastards in the series! Ramsay is evil, Joffrey was horrible, Walder is horrendous, some descendants of the Blackfyres were awful as well! Not to mention, that Jon who was more than likely fathered by Rhaegar, and because his folks were married, he is only a bastard in name! George is saying something about ACTUAL bastard blood here I believe. Tainted perhaps? (Chicken or the egg question.) Either bastards are born with a predisposition toward rottenness, or...they are raised to HATE themselves and therefore come back later to hurt a good many others! 

By the way, whether or not Walder is actually legitimate, he's still a horrible abomination of a human being! I've said my piece.  

[Lord of Raventree Hall]

9 minutes ago, KingMaekarWasHere said:

I've been reading through the Mystery Knight short story once again, because my first reading didn't lead to much absorption. Needless to say there is a certain "baby" or "child" who is described as being the most annoying child ever to be born in Westeros. YOU KNOW WHO I MEAN. WALDER FREY. One of the worst human beings in Westerosi history. What's more is that his father is not portrayed as being ugly or "snot-nosed" by Dunk, but rather from what we can gather from certain illustrations in A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, Walder's "father" was a very respectable and decent looking young man. As I recall, at one point in the story there is an allusion made to the possibility that Lord Frey's wife (during the reign of Aerys I) slept with a rather disreputable individual. And then...the horrible future Lord Walder Frey pops out! Much like King Joffrey Baratheon, the total opposite of his sire!  

I need to ask, am I the only one who caught this tid-bit? I seriously doubt it! GRRM is without a doubt telling us something about bastards in the series! Ramsay is evil, Joffrey was horrible, Walder is horrendous, some descendants of the Blackfyres were awful as well! Not to mention, that Jon who was more than likely fathered by Rhaegar, and because his folks were married, he is only a bastard in name! George is saying something about ACTUAL bastard blood here I believe. Tainted perhaps? (Chicken or the egg question.) Either bastards are born with a predisposition toward rottenness, or...they are raised to HATE themselves and therefore come back later to hurt a good many others! 

By the way, whether or not Walder is actually legitimate, he's still a horrible abomination of a human being! I've said my piece.  

No, he isn't. That's a prejudice. GRRM wrote it as a prejudice. Prejudices sometimes can appear true due to the nature of how prejudices effect the individuals affected by them. See : Tyrion's speech about wishing he was the monster everyone treated him as. If you get treated like shit enough, it effects who you are. Not that I think Walder Frey was treated like shit. Ramsay quite possibly was though. And Walder Rivers also comes to mind as being pissed off at the world (he also appears to be one of the more capable of Walder Frey's children, which...certainly would make me pissed off if I constantly got ordered around by idiots). As to your Joffrey comment, Tommen and Myrcella are also bastards, and are lovely little angel children. 

[KingMaekarWasHere]

33 minutes ago, Lord of Raventree Hall said:

No, he isn't. That's a prejudice. GRRM wrote it as a prejudice. Prejudices sometimes can appear true due to the nature of how prejudices effect the individuals affected by them. See : Tyrion's speech about wishing he was the monster everyone treated him as. If you get treated like shit enough, it effects who you are. Not that I think Walder Frey was treated like shit. Ramsay quite possibly was though. And Walder Rivers also comes to mind as being pissed off at the world (he also appears to be one of the more capable of Walder Frey's children, which...certainly would make me pissed off if I constantly got ordered around by idiots). As to your Joffrey comment, Tommen and Myrcella are also bastards, and are lovely little angel children. 

I understand where you are coming from. On a side note, I am not alleging that in our world that bastard blood makes sense at all or effects anybody. I was just putting out the idea that in Platenos, the rules may have been different. I mean most Valyrians have silver hair and purple eyes after all! Who can say what the whole truth may be! Having said that I believe that I confused Walder's mother with Lord Butterwell's daughter! My mistake!

Tommen and Myrcella are good kids, and (F)Aegon who descends from Blackfyres is ok too. So I see your point. I can't figure out this whole blood/DNA thing that GRRM is going for to be honest.  

[Here's Looking At You, Kid]

6 hours ago, KingMaekarWasHere said:

I've been reading through the Mystery Knight short story once again, because my first reading didn't lead to much absorption. Needless to say there is a certain "baby" or "child" who is described as being the most annoying child ever to be born in Westeros. YOU KNOW WHO I MEAN. WALDER FREY. One of the worst human beings in Westerosi history. What's more is that his father is not portrayed as being ugly or "snot-nosed" by Dunk, but rather from what we can gather from certain illustrations in A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, Walder's "father" was a very respectable and decent looking young man. As I recall, at one point in the story there is an allusion made to the possibility that Lord Frey's wife (during the reign of Aerys I) slept with a rather disreputable individual. And then...the horrible future Lord Walder Frey pops out! Much like King Joffrey Baratheon, the total opposite of his sire!  

I need to ask, am I the only one who caught this tid-bit? I seriously doubt it! GRRM is without a doubt telling us something about bastards in the series! Ramsay is evil, Joffrey was horrible, Walder is horrendous, some descendants of the Blackfyres were awful as well! Not to mention, that Jon who was more than likely fathered by Rhaegar, and because his folks were married, he is only a bastard in name! George is saying something about ACTUAL bastard blood here I believe. Tainted perhaps? (Chicken or the egg question.) Either bastards are born with a predisposition toward rottenness, or...they are raised to HATE themselves and therefore come back later to hurt a good many others! 

By the way, whether or not Walder is actually legitimate, he's still a horrible abomination of a human being! I've said my piece.  

This is a series about ambitions so yes.  George is saying give someone a little chance they start getting big ideas on their heads.  Now, I don't know about Walder Frey.  It's not unusual for a father and his son to look different.  Do all of Walder's sons look like him?  I don't think so.  Hosteen looks different.  Jon is a bastard if he is Rhaegar's son.  Rhaegar was locked into a marriage that was consummated. 

[The hairy bear]

We have seen plenty of bastards in the series portrayed in a positive light: Mycella and Tommen, Edric Storm, Gendry, Sarella Sand, Rolland Storm,... All of them are nice people. 

I'd also say the some of the most evil characters in the series are trueborn children: Twyin Lannister, Gregor Clegane, Roose Bolton, Euron Greyjoy... 

[Lee-Sensei]

I don't think Walder Frey's a bastard or that his mother cheated on his father. Lord Frey in the Mystery Knight seems to be an okay looking guy. At least he was called lean and elegant. Walder's weaselly. I think that's more of George winking and nodding about his character. He's backstabbing, sly and treacherous. Also, I don't think his father was a young man. Walder was about 4 years old and his sister was caught having sex with a servant (R.I.P.), so she had to hastily get married. If she was caught having sex, she's probably at least a decade older than him. He also had two other sisters. The guy was probably in his mid to late 30's by that point (which is still relatively young in our world, but people in Westeros have shorter lives).

[KingMaekarWasHere]

6 hours ago, Lee-Sensei said:

I don't think Walder Frey's a bastard or that his mother cheated on his father. Lord Frey in the Mystery Knight seems to be an okay looking guy. At least he was called lean and elegant. Walder's weaselly. I think that's more of George winking and nodding about his character. He's backstabbing, sly and treacherous. Also, I don't think his father was a young man. Walder was about 4 years old and his sister was caught having sex with a servant (R.I.P.), so she had to hastily get married. If she was caught having sex, she's probably at least a decade older than him. He also had two other sisters. The guy was probably in his mid to late 30's by that point (which is still relatively young in our world, but people in Westeros have shorter lives).

Very good points. The Freys are quite the odd family in the series, so I guess I was drawn to the idea that Walder was a bastard and perhaps ironically not a "true" Frey. Of course by the times of the events of the main series no body alive would even dare to guess that Walder was illegitimate. It honestly makes you wonder about all of the house lineages in Westeros in general. We know that the Targaryens, Starks, Blackwoods, and Lannisters tried to keep their bloodlines "pure" but the minor houses didn't seem to care as much. While Starks married cousins and First men blooded folks, Targ's married siblings, and Lannisters married cousins as well (like Tywin) the minor lords seemed to just care if they could make any "good" match whatsoever. 

[Lee-Sensei]

On 10/28/2023 at 9:35 PM, KingMaekarWasHere said:

Very good points. The Freys are quite the odd family in the series, so I guess I was drawn to the idea that Walder was a bastard and perhaps ironically not a "true" Frey. Of course by the times of the events of the main series no body alive would even dare to guess that Walder was illegitimate. It honestly makes you wonder about all of the house lineages in Westeros in general. We know that the Targaryens, Starks, Blackwoods, and Lannisters tried to keep their bloodlines "pure" but the minor houses didn't seem to care as much. While Starks married cousins and First men blooded folks, Targ's married siblings, and Lannisters married cousins as well (like Tywin) the minor lords seemed to just care if they could make any "good" match whatsoever. 

I don't think any of them were concerned with blood purity tbh. The Targaryens were the exception. The Starks mostly married First Men houses, because they were surrounded by them. They still married Arryns (the most andal of the andals) along with Blackwoods and Royces who have both intermarried heavily with andal families in the south.

[Loose Bolt]

10 hours ago, Lee-Sensei said:

I don't think any of them were concerned with blood purity tbh. The Targaryens were the exception. The Starks mostly married First Men houses, because they were surrounded by them. They still married Arryns (the most andal of the andals) along with Blackwoods and Royces who have both intermarried heavily with andal families in the south.

Some of Starks married their cousins (like Lord Rickard) and couple of them seemed to marry their nieces. So they cared either about blood purity or just wanted to minimize number of people with strong claim to Winterfell.

[Lord of Raventree Hall]

4 hours ago, Loose Bolt said:

Some of Starks married their cousins (like Lord Rickard) and couple of them seemed to marry their nieces. So they cared either about blood purity or just wanted to minimize number of people with strong claim to Winterfell.

I think this is just common practice amongst nobles...like in real history and our books. Probably lowering the number of claims...or having affection for that part of the house (say a beloved cousin's daughter marrying your son), or even just no other eligible people around that age. Or even a situation like Arnolf Karstark and Alys Karstark but no Jon Snow to save Alys. I mean wasn't Tywin-JoAnna kind of a love marriage? I'm not sure about this at all, so don't hold me to it. Everybody kind of seems okay with love marriages as long as they are to other noble houses (or within houses) and the child wasn't directly needed for ally-making. It's only love marriages while marrying down, or when another betrothal was supposed to happen, that seem big problems for the houses in question.