Heresy 14

[bloodymime]

Regarding the size of weirwoods, it's been theorized (convincingly, in my opinion) that weirwoods grow larger in response to blood. Remember, Winterfell's is quite large, and we see from Bran's visions that executions definitely occurred under the heart tree in the past. And from what we learn of White Harbor in ADwD, there were a LOT of bloodthirsty folk about those parts and that weirwood is positively huge.

I wonder about that. The last vision he is the sacrifice. Is that the 'birth' of the tree? I don't know how to describe it but I'm mainly wondering if that's the last vision he has because that's the first vision there is to be seen from the tree. It's awakening.

[hotweaselsoup]

I'd imagine weirwood grows reall-really slow. The Riverrun one is slender, suggesting relatively young, yet it has a face so it has to be from before the Andal invasion, 2-4-however many thousand years ago. Also, isn't the one in Whitetree ridiculously huge? Anyway, I think IRL trees have some limitations for root system/leaves ratio, but any such limitations probably don't apply for weirwoods. I do wonder how they reproduce/spread, though - the idea of suckers came up and makes sense, but the why aren't there any around the heart trees, or even the ones that were cut?

I wonder if they need blood sacrifice to grow, and the more they get, the bigger they get? The one at Riverrun probably wouldn't have seen much in the way of blood, but we do know that the great monstrous one at White Harbor gorged on entrails at one point. And the huge one at Whitetree clearly was "fed" regularly.

(ETA: posted before I saw Onion Ring Knight's response above. Needless to say, I concur with Ser Onion Ring!)

I don't know either how they reproduce, but I suspect it isn't natural.

Jon sees more than one weirwood from the Fist.

I wonder if it's possible to guess Bran's route...probably not enough info - we don't know the location of any villages (other than whitetree) or lakes beyond the wall, do we?

The thing that struck me most about Bran's journey was the unease Meera felt about all the circling that was going on. They seemed to cross and re-cross a river, I think, and they skirted a lake while en route to the deserted village. They also went through forest, and Bran mentions having to skirt lakes and hills. They had to climb a bit to get to the cave entrance, which makes me think that they might be in the foothills of the Frost Fangs, but that's a pure guess.

Love that map!

Yes, it's a truly awesome accomplishment. No idea about the figure slouched against the weirwood way up north, though. He or she seems to be wearing leaves, and looks to be carrying either a staff or club of some sort, but I'm drawing a blank as to who it's supposed to portray.

Wildlings steal their women, so someone might have stolen one of Craster's daughters (although with all the inbreeding can't see why anyone would want to). Except, Dalla is Val's sister, so...it's more likely to be a mistake. Although, Mance was a wildling originally, no? Could be that Gilly wasn't the first to try to save her son...

We have speculated that Craster's blood is somehow important, and that's what makes his boy children special to the White Walkers. But why the incest, then? If it's Craster's blood that's meaningful, then why doesn't he have a dozen different wildling wives? After all, all his offspring would have Craster's blood, no matter which mother bore them. So, maybe the incest is a clue that it's the mother's blood that is important - the blood of Craster's first wife? Only by marrying and procreating with his daughters could the maternal bloodline be propagated, right? And if Dalla is Craster's daughter (I think it's possible that Val is not truly Dalla's sister - it may be a ruse to keep Dalla's identity a secret), then both Dalla's boy and Gilly's boy might have this special (maybe) maternal blood. Then again, Craster might just be a sick perv who gets off on diddling his daughters :ack:

And I wonder if the White Walkers aren't eating or sacrificing or recruiting Craster's sons at all. Maybe they require the boys because they are waiting for "the one"? Bloodraven and his lot have been waiting for a long time for Bran to show up. They've kept an eye on the male Stark offspring over the years, preparing for Bran's arrival. For them, Bran seems to be "the one". Could the White Walkers have a similar purpose, vis a vis Craster's sons?

ETA x2: on the subject of weirwoods, do you think it's possible that a weirwood could go rogue? If we judge by their faces, they all seem either sad or angry or menacing. I suppose they could just be pissed at the general state of affairs, but more and more I'm thinking that the faces belong to the sacrifice victims that woke the trees in the first place. I wonder if the nine weirwoods north of the Wall have any relation to the nine swords on the KotN crown? Sorry - this was a bit of a ramble...

[7V3N]

snip

Whitetree was the name! Thanks you.

[Orrin Storm]

I'm kind of under the impression that the size and number of weirwoods in an area have to do with the greenseers that marked them/are them. The Stark face is stern, Tully weirwood is slim, the manderly weirwood is thick, fat and angry, etc....

[7V3N]

I'm kind of under the impression that the size and number of weirwoods in an area have to do with the greenseers that marked them/are them. The Stark face is stern, Tully weirwood is slim, the manderly weirwood is thick, fat and angry, etc....

That's a good catch, but the Manderly's are Andalish so I doubt they ever had a greenseer.

[bloodymime]

“The old ones.” When Ser Bartimus grinned, he looked just like a skull. “Me and mine were here before the Manderlys. Like as not, my own forebears strung those entrails through the tree.”

The heart tree was definitely there before the Manderlys, an interesting thought though that the weirwood could reflect the personality of a place. Need to look at other trees that have their faces described.

Just a sidenote but part of the pact with the Children is "no more weirwoods were to be put to the axe anywhere in the realm."

I wonder if that means chopped down or weirwood used for anything. The cotf use weirwood, they had their bows and the paste Bran is given is served in a weirwood bowl. The wildlings use it, Yrgritte with her bow and the Magnar with his spear yet in all the talk of weirwood items the North is largely absent which seems strange since that's where all the weirwoods are now mainly unless they honor the pact of the first men still.

[7V3N]

“The old ones.” When Ser Bartimus grinned, he looked just like a skull. “Me and mine were here before the Manderlys. Like as not, my own forebears strung those entrails through the tree.”

The heart tree was definitely there before the Manderlys, an interesting thought though that the weirwood could reflect the personality of a place. Need to look at other trees that have their faces described.

That was not what I meant (if that was directed at me). I just meant that the Manderly's, being Andalish and worshipers of the Seven, are highly unlikely to have ever had a greenseer.

[bloodymime]

Nope, just agreeing with you by pointing out the heart tree was there long before the Manderlys came.

[winterstood]

What all these (GREAT!) Heresy threads tell me is that GRRM has such a rich tapestry to draw upon to write EXCELLENT 1500 page prequel novels to ASOIAF!!! There's SO much there - just in the intimations that we've (you guys have) been able to find in the current series.

[nanother]

First of all, I'm not sure the fine details of weirwood growth are supposed to make sense. I suspect Martin has bigger concerns than to keep this stuff fully consistent. For example, the first thing we heard about them, from Cat, that they were all burned in the South (except isle of faces). Yet it turns out there was one in the very castle she grew up. That said, it might be worth to try to make sense of it.

The only weirwood we have an explicit size for is the Whitetree one (7ft). All others Jon came across before are significantly smaller. Even the one Sam sees in the other village is smaller.

Hight Heart had a ring of 31 - that's bigger than anything so far, and we're told that the Old Gods still linger there...could be because that place was of particular importance to the Children? Did it have that many trees because a largne number of Children/greenseers gathered there, or was it the other way around? Arya states that some of the stumps were big enough for her to make a bed on them.

Bran also remarks on the weirwood roots in the cave, thinking that they're even thicker than the Winterfell one and so many that there must be a whole grove above - I really wish we could see this grove, I imagine it being something big like the High heart one (possibly even bigger)

There's of course the isle of faces, with loads of weirwoods, supposedly and clearly very important/powerful. Another place I'd really like to see. I wonder how it managed to avoid Andal destruction.

Also, there are some weirwood roots where Beric & co is hiding, but they don't seem to be bothered at all.

As for the growth, it crossed my mind that it might have to do with getting 'fed', but then the 2 young ones (Nightfort and wherever Brienne went) presumably weren't sacrificed to, so I assumed there's a natural growth. Now it occurs me that Brienne's did get some blood when she was there, even though it wasn't meant as a sacrifice, and similar incidents might have happened. We don't know anything about the Nightfort one (but it's likely to be less than 200 years old, seeing that the building was used by the NW before). I don't know. The older the tree is the more chance it had to get fed, so it's not so easy to tell apart from natural growth.

I'd like to think they grow fiercer with sarcifices, though. But there also seems to be some mirroring of the character of the place with shape and face - Riverrun slender and more sad than fierce, Harrenhal gnarled and hateful etc

ETA just struck me that the poor Nightfort weirwood is probably doomed...if it somehow survives the castle being repaired Mel will surely off it if she ever sets foot there

[Sword Of Mid Afternoon]

Btw. Whenever I read about Wargs, the Wolfriders from LOTR and zhe Hobbit pop up in my head. Now imagine those fierce and hairy old Starks riding their Direwolfs to war. Would you want to mess with those guys? I realy wouldn't

Curiously enough, Tolkien calls them "Warg riders"

Perhaps the source of a bit of inspiration for GRRM?

[winterstood]

Who did that map! Anyone know? They need acknowledgement!!!!

[Stark@heart]

I think Sam is referring to Gilly being the babes milk mother and assumed mother and that she will raise/claim him for her own.

Also, I keep seeing reference to a "sucker" tree at the Nightfort, like a new growing tree but I don't think that right. Bran describes it as slender and growing at an angle out of the ground, unlike any Weirtree he's ever seen.

I think it's a branch poking up from the Gate Tree at the bottom of the Well but that's just my 2 cents cuz I have a theory about the trees that revolves around the planting of the trees and why they may be known as "heart trees" but that's for later.

[bloodymime]

Who did that map! Anyone know? They need acknowledgement!!!!

Other-in-Law, a poster here actually I believe and has done other maps as well.

[Sword Of Mid Afternoon]

I was asking about this in the last topic but don't think I saw any replies. What do people think the difference is between Jon not being able to sense Ghost yet Bran is able to warg into the heart tree at Winterfell without even knowing what he was doing?

I don't see the Wall acting like a two mirror. Is Bran just that much stronger as well as Bloodraven? Is it different entering a tree than an animal? I know Mr. Martin has said all the children are full wargs, not just Bran but maybe it's a difference between warg and greenseer?

Weir-net definitely follows different rules.

Also,

I concur with the weirwood slow growth rate hypothesis... but NANOTHER also has a point... recall GRRM's view of the two types of fantasy writers... the architect type & the gardener type...

(For those unfamiliar, the 'architect' would be Tolkien, who spent FAR more time shaping and detailing all aspects of Middle Earth than he did actually writing Hobbit/LotR, or a Frank Herbert. A 'gardener' is how GRRM categorizes himself... he writes the story prior to or concurrent with his construction of his world; sort of fleshing it out as he goes... His gardener claim really, really bothers me when I think of it, the pospect of GRRM not having mapped out the meaning/significance behind things like Bran's vision from AGoT Bran II or III makes me extremely sad/alarmed)

BUT I DIGRESS... were GRRM an Architect writer, there would without-a-doubt be a defined weirwood growthrate...

[bloodymime]

Here's all the weirwood faces I could find described. Not all that many really unless I missed a lot. There are other minor passages but not very desriptive. The tree Asha sees is just thought of as slitted eyes and red mouth.

winterfell

its features long and melancholy,

riverrun

a slender weirwood with a face more sad than fierce.

white tree

monstrous great weirwood.

It was the biggest tree Jon Snow had ever seen, the trunk near eight feet wide, the branches spreading so far that the entire village was shaded beneath their canopy. The size did not disturb him so much as the face . . . the mouth especially, no simple carved slash, but a jagged hollow large enough to swallow a sheep.

harrenhal

It was a terrible face, its mouth twisted, its eyes flaring and full of hate.

storm's end

a huge white weirwood with a solemn face.

unknown village of sam

The face carved into the bone pale trunk was long and sad;

white harbor

its trunk so wide that the face carved into it looked fat and angry.

And the grove where they say their vows though there's no specific description.

There were nine, all roughly of the same age and size. Each one had a face carved into it, and no two faces were alike. Some were smiling, some were screaming, some were shouting at him.

One description I thought about including but didn't is Theon in Dance because well he's nuts now and it's hard to say but anyways,

despite the face being described as long and melancholy he sees 'its great red mouth open as if to laugh.'

And later on he sees Bran.

"And for one strange moment it seemed as if it were Bran’s face carved into the pale trunk of the weirwood, staring down at him with eyes red and wise and sad."

One last thing that struck me the other day is where the mountain clans are using camouglage Asha thinks back to childhood stories where "the greenseers turned the trees to warriors."

[winterstood]

Other-in-Law, a poster here actually I believe and has done other maps as well.

Wow! Impressive. I'm going to look him up. He needs to sell those maps. I'll buy one!

[winterstood]

Here's all the weirwood faces I could find described. Not all that many really unless I missed a lot. There are other minor passages but not very desriptive. The tree Asha sees is just thought of as slitted eyes and red mouth.

winterfell

its features long and melancholy,

riverrun

a slender weirwood with a face more sad than fierce.

white tree

monstrous great weirwood.

It was the biggest tree Jon Snow had ever seen, the trunk near eight feet wide, the branches spreading so far that the entire village was shaded beneath their canopy. The size did not disturb him so much as the face . . . the mouth especially, no simple carved slash, but a jagged hollow large enough to swallow a sheep.

harrenhal

It was a terrible face, its mouth twisted, its eyes flaring and full of hate.

storm's end

a huge white weirwood with a solemn face.

unknown village of sam

The face carved into the bone pale trunk was long and sad;

white harbor

its trunk so wide that the face carved into it looked fat and angry.

And the grove where they say their vows though there's no specific description.

There were nine, all roughly of the same age and size. Each one had a face carved into it, and no two faces were alike. Some were smiling, some were screaming, some were shouting at him.

great info! thanks.

[Uncat]

The dragon egg he supposedly threw in the sea would be my guess!

That would be worth quite a fortune, but one that had not been cashed in yet and thus hadn't have any impact on his life.

But compared to what he wants and what he has and is, I don't know if this is enough, because it is no real sacrifice. Up to the waif's tale we only know that the FM are so expensive, that king Robert would rather throw in a Lordship then pay their price.

But then the waif names a price for a life taken by the FM and this is a real live altering sacrifice: Two thirds of your fortune AND your only child. But this is going OT. I think I'll rather take it to the Howlong thread or turn it into a topic.

[Uncat]

Possibly the line from Sam on the boat calling him Craster's grandson?

"The boy was Mance Rayder’s son and Craster’s grandson, after all."

I know I've seen discussion about this but not sure why people think it's necessarily a mistake.

Yepp that was the very one. I had never noticed it before and was really surprised, that A Craster and Mance are so close and B the two boys would be... what are they then? Uncle and nepew?