Reading from The World of Ice and Fire

[jblair]

Comparing the Ironborn fighting strength to the rest of Westeros is a fool's errand. The % of men they can mobilize is far beyond what would be acceptable in the Seven Kingdoms. They don't really have a functioning economy or complicated trade, and they don't exactly have a standard peasantry tilling fields. They're pretty much a massive group of pirates with a few castles.

Their very existence as a power/threat still bothers me, as I see no way for them to have completely rebuilt their fleet from scratch in a decade while lacking wood, pitch, rope and everything else needed to create a navy on the fly. It's not as though they can rely on trade to make up the difference. I really just don't see how they continue to survive - there's not much to reave in the barren western north, the Reach has shut them down in the south until very recently. I don't even understand how they feed themselves, when all potential trading partners just happen to be their reaving targets. Are we supposed to believe they plunder everything they need to survive?

[Cinder and Dust]

^Reaving and Piracy generally pay pretty well I imagine. Scruples don't count for much for some if the client has got the necessary coin to pay for said materials, even if they're also pillaging your kingdom while they're at it.

In all this questioning of the ability for the Ironborn's armies to occupy the Riverlands aren't you all leaving out the most crucial element of their war machine; their navy? With a quick enough response force one doesn't necessarily need a large army to occupy or control a large amount of territory.

Think about it for a second, no other Kingdom is probably more ideal then the Riverlands for the Ironborn to occupy, with their naval superiority they could quickly deploy their forces to deal with any any potential threat. Even if the Riverlords did revolt it would be relatively easy given the geography for the Ironborn isolate them into pockets and destroy them one at a time. That the Riverlords only revolted after Aegon had set the Ironborn navy ablaze would give my theory some consideration I think.

[Cory Lee Hill]

Comparing the Ironborn fighting strength to the rest of Westeros is a fool's errand. The % of men they can mobilize is far beyond what would be acceptable in the Seven Kingdoms. They don't really have a functioning economy or complicated trade, and they don't exactly have a standard peasantry tilling fields. They're pretty much a massive group of pirates with a few castles.

Their very existence as a power/threat still bothers me, as I see no way for them to have completely rebuilt their fleet from scratch in a decade while lacking wood, pitch, rope and everything else needed to create a navy on the fly. It's not as though they can rely on trade to make up the difference. I really just don't see how they continue to survive - there's not much to reave in the barren western north, the Reach has shut them down in the south until very recently. I don't even understand how they feed themselves, when all potential trading partners just happen to be their reaving targets. Are we supposed to believe they plunder everything they need to survive?

Asha talks about going on trading runs. Theon discusses farming fishing and mining done on the islands. Aeron laments that they no longer reave as they had before. Rember all the lines about trying to bring back the Old Way? Or other lines talking about how Aegon ended the Old Way when he burned Black Harren.

[Evrach]

Any clue of Orys Baratheon being Aerion Targaryen's illegitimate son or Valaena Velaryon's illegitimate son ? He was Aegon's bastard brother, yeah, but from wich parent ?

[Ran]

His father.

[Evrach]

Thank you Ran :)

Another question, about "Gaimon Targaryen" (Gaemon ?) and his daughter Elena (Elaena), what are the correct spellings if known, because I saw all and much more in the differents reports I've read ^^;

[Lord Varys]

My guess is 'Gaemon' and 'Elaena'. At least 'Elaena' is a known female Targaryen name, and I guess it has been recycled later on. I'm intrigued if they are any more Aelixes and the like farther down the complete family tree...

Oh, and was there some kind of civil war/succession war thing between the Aegon's uncles and his father Aerion which led to him becoming the guy who inherited everything? Somebody had to kill the other four dragons, after all... Sure, they could have died during wars with some other unknown people, but since Aenar brought them to Dragonstone with him, they would have been as big as Balerion during Aerion's time, and possibly even bigger if they had been older than him...

As to Orys: Do we know what's the deal with the name 'Baratheon'? Is this some kind of Valyrian noble bastard name thing, or is it a (meaningful?) name Orys chose for his house?

[Fire Eater]

Orys is described with a black beard. Does that mean the Baratheon look came from him and not the Durrandons? Then, Orys got it from his mother who was most likely a servant or washerwoman.

[Bushido]

^ Where was he described as black-bearded?

[Lord Varys]

I guess the Durrandons were all rather dark people. Even if Orys's mother was black as night, his father was a Targaryen, so we can assume that coal would have not become the trademark of House Baratheon if the Durrandons had been fair-haired.

This whole Orys-Aegon-friendship-thing is really interesting. Right now it's not that unlikely that House Baratheon was very much the first cadet branch of House Targaryen. The question now is - were there other Targaryen-Baratheon-marriages beside the marriage between Rhaelle and Robert's grandfather? Beside House Velaryon, they seem to be the house with the oldest connections to the Targaryens, and the whole black hair thing makes it very possible that they are closer related than we already know. I'd not be surprised if one of Elaena Targaryen's husbands was a Baratheon...

[Fire Eater]

^ Where was he described as black-bearded?

Here

When Argilac the storm king heard of Harren’s end, he decided not to die in his castle. Marched forth w/ his army. Battle in a thunderstorm - Targs outnumbered 2 to 1, battle called “the last storm”. Storm lords broke through only to come face to face w/ R and her dragon. Finally Argilac Durandan fought one on one w/ black bearded Orys and lost.

[Francisco Araujo da Costa]

Orys is described with a black beard. Does that mean the Baratheon look came from him and not the Durrandons? Then, Orys got it from his mother who was most likely a servant or washerwoman.

Why would that be? She might have been a noblewoman from the Crownlands, a prostitute, an assassin, a septa, a hell of a lot. We know as much about her as we know about several other bastards' mothers, such as Larence Snow, Rolland Storm, and Daemon Sand, which is to say, nothing at all.

[Fire Eater]

Why would that be? She might have been a noblewoman from the Crownlands, a prostitute, an assassin, a septa, a hell of a lot. We know as much about her as we know about several other bastards' mothers, such as Larence Snow, Rolland Storm, and Daemon Sand, which is to say, nothing at all.

It was just a guess.

[Bushido]

Thanks,Fire Eater! :)

[Werthead]

He stated that Dorne is the least populous of the Seven Kingdoms. The Seven Kingdoms in today's Westeros are:

The North

The Vale

The Riverlands

The Westerlands

The Reach

The Stormlands

Dorne.

No, they're not.

The Seven Kingdoms are:

The North, the Vale, the Riverlands, the Westerlands, the Reach, the Stormlands, the Iron Islands, Dorne and the Crownlands. Yes, that's nine regions or 'kingdoms', and yes, they're still called the 'Seven Kingdoms'. People just deal with it :)

The HBO series has explicitly stated that the Riverlands are seen as a sort-of administrative subdivision, along with the Crownlands, so you have 'seven kingdoms plus the Riverlands', but the books have made no such declaration. It just appears that the name refers to the seven kingdoms extant in Westeros when Aegon invaded and the name stuck, with no change for what the Riverlands was created as a 'new' kingdom (or a revived old one, more accurately) or when Dorne joined the realm.

[Ser Lepus]

No, they're not.

The Seven Kingdoms are:

The North, the Vale, the Riverlands, the Westerlands, the Reach, the Stormlands, the Iron Islands, Dorne and the Crownlands. Yes, that's nine regions or 'kingdoms', and yes, they're still called the 'Seven Kingdoms'. People just deal with it :)

The HBO series has explicitly stated that the Riverlands are seen as a sort-of administrative subdivision, along with the Crownlands, so you have 'seven kingdoms plus the Riverlands', but the books have made no such declaration. It just appears that the name refers to the seven kingdoms extant in Westeros when Aegon invaded and the name stuck, with no change for what the Riverlands was created as a 'new' kingdom (or a revived old one, more accurately) or when Dorne joined the realm.

I think the Crownlands doesn't count as a Kingdom, since they were never united before Aegon's Conquest.

The Riverlands/Iron Islands should count as the same kingdom; before the Conquest they were kind of "the kingdom of the Iron Islands plus the Riverlands", and afterwards the Riverlands were "the kingdom of the Hoares minus the Iron Islands", that is, the Iron Islands were the most important part at the beginning, but afterwards the Riverlands became the most important part, and people thought of them (and not the Iron Islands) as the Kingdom among the Seven.

I think that the Greyjoys occupy a weird middle ground: they aren't considered or treated as being as important as the Lord Paramounts Martell, Tyrell, Baratheon, Lannister, Tully, Arryn and Stark, but, on the other hand, they are direct vassals of the Targayren and have a lot of vassals themselves.

One of the reasons of this weird situation (the Seven Kingdoms that are in fact eight) is that Aegon crowned himself "King of the Seven Kingdoms" at Oldtown before conquering Dorne or the North, and then his sister Rhaenys failed to conquer Dorne, so Aegon decided to "forget" Dorne and consider the Riverlands, Iron Islands, North, Westerlands, Reach, Vale and Stormlands as the "Seven Kingdoms", but afterwards the Targayren managed to annex Dorne, so they "forgot" the Iron Islands and considered Dorne, Riverlands, North, Westerlands, Reach, Vale and Stormlands as the "Seven Kingdoms", because of the importance of the number seven.

[Evrach]

Lord Mace Tyrell came forward to present his gift: a golden chalice three feet tall, with

two ornate curved handles and seven faces glittering with gemstones. “Seven faces for

Your Grace’s seven kingdoms,” the bride’s father explained. He showed them how each

face bore the sigil of one of the great houses: ruby lion, emerald rose, onyx stag, silver

trout, blue jade falcon, opal sun, and pearl direwolf.

Seven Kingdoms clearly defined (by the sigils of their master house) in ASOS.

[Free Northman]

Seven Kingdoms clearly defined (by the sigils of their master house) in ASOS.

Excellent. That settles it quite satisfactorily, I think.

The fact is the Seventh Kingdom at the time of Aegon's conquest, was the Kingdom of the Iron Isles and the Riverlands. That Kingdom has since split apart, but in such a way that about 90% of the territory and population of this former kingdom now falls under the Tully rule.

SO, if you're going to refer to this Seventh Kingdom, which one will you refer to? The one that constitues 90% of its former contents, or the one left with the 10%?

It's pretty obvious that you're going to refer to the Riverlands as the Seventh Kingdom, not the Iron Isles.

This is backed by the obvious logic that there is no way that Dorne has a lower population than the Iron Isles, and yet Doran clearly stated that Dorne has the lowest population of the Seven Kingdoms. Hence, he must be including the Riverlands as the Seventh Kingdom, and excluding the Iron Isles.

[Sworn Shield]

Its called the seven kingdoms because there were 7 Kings in Westeros at the time of invasion.

[Quentyn Baratheon]

The whole Dark coal of hair and deep blue eyes would make sense if it was a Durrandon thing, not a Targ thing.