Heresy 33

[Zupoleon]

I don't frequent the Heresy threads, but I am curious as to what the "heretic" opinion is of the Starks / Kings of Winter. The darker, more ambiguous view of them as mentioned in the first post of the thread intrigued me. Thanks in advance...

[Cryler]

Since timelines are being discussed here is the information given in the introduction of The Sworn Sword

The setting for the books is the great continent of Westeros, in a world both like and unlike our own,

where the seasons last for years and sometimes decades. Standing hard against the sunset sea at the

western edge of the known world, Westeros stretches from the red sands of Dorne in the south to the icy

mountains and frozen fields of the north, where snow falls even during the long summers.

The children of the forest were the first known inhabitants of Westeros, during the Dawn of Days: a race

small of stature who made their homes in the greenwood, and carved strange faces in the bone-white

weirwood trees. Then came the First Men, who crossed a land bridge from the larger continent to the

east with their bronze swords and horses, and warred against the children for centuries before finally

making peace with the older race and adopting their nameless, ancient gods. The Compact marked the

beginning of the Age of Heroes, when the First Men and the children shared Westeros, and a hundred

petty kingdoms rose and fell. Other invaders came in turn. The Andals crossed the narrow sea in ships, and with iron and fire they

swept across the kingdoms of the First Men, and drove the children from their forests, putting many of

the weirwoods to the ax. They brought their own faith, worshiping a god with seven aspects whose

symbol was a seven-pointed star. Only in the far north did the First Men, led by the Starks of Winterfell,

throw back the newcomers. Elsewhere the Andals triumphed, and raised kingdoms of their own. The

children of the forest dwindled and disappeared, while the First Men intermarried with their conquerors.

The Rhoynar arrived some thousands of years after the Andals, and came not as invaders but as

refugees, crossing the seas in ten thousand ships to escape the growing might of the Freehold of Valyria.

The lords freeholder of Valyria ruled the greater part of the known world; they were sorcerers, great in

lore, and alone of all the races of man they had learned to breed dragons and bend them to their will.

Four hundred years before the opening ofA Song of Ice and Fire , however, the Doom descended on

Valyria, destroying the city in a single night. Thereafter the great Valyrian empire disintegrated into

dissension, barbarism, and war.

Westeros, across the narrow sea, was spared the worst of the chaos that followed. By that time only

seven kingdoms remained where once there had been hundreds—but they would not stand for much

longer. A scion of lost Valyria named Aegon Targaryen landed at the mouth of the Blackwater with a

small army, his two sisters (who were also his wives), and three great dragons. Riding on dragonback,

Aegon and his sisters won battle after battle, and subdued six of the seven Westerosi kingdoms by fire,

sword, and treaty. The conqueror collected the melted, twisted blades of his fallen foes, and used them to

make a monstrous, towering barbed seat: the Iron Throne, from which he ruled henceforth as Aegon, the

First of His Name, King of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, and Lord of the Seven

Kingdoms.

The dynasty founded by Aegon and his sisters endured for most of three hundred years. Another

Targaryen king, Daeron the Second, later brought Dorne into the realm, uniting all of Westeros under a

single ruler. He did so by marriage, not conquest, for the last of the dragons had died half a century

before.The Hedge Knight, published in the firstLegends , takes place in the last days of Good King

Daeron’s reign, about a hundred years before the opening of the first of theIce and Fire novels, with the

realm at peace and the Targaryen dynasty at its height. It tells the story of the first meeting between

Dunk, a hedge knight’s squire, and Egg, a boy who is rather more than he seems, and of the great

tourney at Ashford Meadow.The Sworn Sword, the tale that follows, picks up their story a year or so

later.

[Black Crow]

Nice one, Maester Luwin's history lesson fleshed out quite substantially. Thanks for posting.

[Black Crow]

Didn't they always fight with obsidian though, because they don't work metal? So even against the first men? I suppose you could argue that they could have used bone, but instead use obsidian because of the white walkers.

Just to reinforce this, here again is Maester Luwin:

The wars went on until the earth ran red with the blood of men and children both, but more children than men, for men were bigger and stronger, and wood and stone and obsidian make a poor match for bronze.

What we have discussed before, is that the 100 pieces of dragonglass weren't a gun-running operation but a symbolic gift, corresponding to the original 100 kingdoms of First Men.

[Black Crow]

One reference is from where the 'hammer' was called from the tower at moat caillin, but its target is not mentioned. Still, what you're saying is true. Odd that they call it the hammer when it apparently failed on the neck but smashing a land bridge lacks the cool name :)

I can remember discussions a long way back - probably pre-Heresy - discussing the Hammer, which is of course something you hit things with and consistent neither with glaciers nor, at first sight, tsunami. The speculation was that the Hammer was a heavenly body - large meteorite or something like that, which impacted in the sea, causing it to "rise" dramatically.

[Black Crow]

I don't frequent the Heresy threads, but I am curious as to what the "heretic" opinion is of the Starks / Kings of Winter. The darker, more ambiguous view of them as mentioned in the first post of the thread intrigued me. Thanks in advance...

Stick around and you may learn a lot :cool4:

Right, the short answer can be summed up by the belief that "Winter is Coming" wasn't an injunction to lay in extra firewood and some good books, but was instead a battle cry, which is perfectly reasonable when you think that the Starks were once Kings of Winter and look on the emphasis in reviewing the statues in the crypts on the early ones being a hard lot and not at all cuddly.

Its when we start looking at why the Starks were once Kings of Winter that we stray into the heresy that there may be a connection to the Old Races and the price paid by the Last Hero for the ending of the Long Night. Now there may again be a perfectly reasonable explanation such as the Starks originally just being Kings of Winterfell but expanding their hegemony over all of the North during the creation of the Seven Kingdoms, but we prefer to look for something deeper.

As I said in the OP we're happy to discuss this further, but some of us have a shrewd suspicion that Jon's supposed Targaryen heritage is a red herring and that through his Stark blood he will become the King of Winter come again - because that blood is Faerie blood.

[Cryler]

I know "there must always be a Stark in Winterfell" has been discussed in heresy before. I was just wandering if the Starks in the crypts count. And wasn't sure if that possibility had ever been discussed.

[Black Crow]

Not really, its always been taken to mean living ones. There are thoughts that the missing swords could see a couple of the dead ones walk in some form or another, but broadly speaking its taken to mean that there must always be a Stark ruling there, and that as there currently isn't all sorts of dire prognostications are going down.

We think for example that the Starks are important in that they were instrumental in ending the Long Night and that one of the conditions of the Others/Sidhe retiring beyond the Wall was that there should be a Stark in Winterfell.

[jon rr stark]

Since timelines are being discussed here is the information given in the introduction of The Sworn Sword

If the first men and the children had made a compact before the andals came as implied in the intro. who were the heros in the age of heros being heroic againist. Was there a long struggle against the others before the long night??

[Black Crow]

We've always taken the Heroes as being Celtic or Homeric ones - fighting each other, for glory, just like knights really. Sam makes the comment about Symeon Star-eyes and the like being knights before there were knights, but that isn't necessarily the contradiction he thinks it is.

[Cryler]

Not really, its always been taken to mean living ones. There are thoughts that the missing swords could see a couple of the dead ones walk in some form or another, but broadly speaking its taken to mean that there must always be a Stark ruling there, and that as there currently isn't all sorts of dire prognostications are going down.

We think for example that the Starks are important in that they were instrumental in ending the Long Night and that one of the conditions of the Others/Sidhe retiring beyond the Wall was that there should be a Stark in Winterfell.

I've read most of the heresy threads I just don't post too often so I'm pretty familiar with the heretical thinking going on.

[Gar Weg Wun Sygerrik]

There's plenty of stories about giants, and dragons for the 'heroes' in the age of heroes to fight.

[Cryler]

I always thought of the Age of Heroes as more of a golden age than literally full of heroes. It just seems that any prominent figure from that time has gone from historical fact to exagerated legend through the millenia.

[Black Crow]

Twas ever this, as I say think of the Irish Heroes or the Greek ones for that matter, knocking lumps off each other, stealing women and cattle and still regarded by the bards as a "Golden Age"

[Black Wolf Smith]

Gosh, wouldn't it be ironic if the White Walkers were an unexpected side effect of the "hammer"?

I brought that up a couple weeks ago, maybe H29 or H30 ( yes we did 30 & 31 in about 10 days). My think was that maybe the CoTF sacrifice some of the wood dancers to build the Walls, and when the Hammer brought down the walls the Others came about as a side effect of it.

[Toccs]

I realize that many assume that we all know the timeline, but I would like to list some of the mostly-agreed upon events and when they happened, since they were recently discussed at the end of Heresy 32.

12,000 years ago: First Men arrived in Westeros. They cut down trees and burned the weirwood faces because they thought the Children were spying on them. The Children were horrified, and they went to war with the First Men invaders.

10,000 years ago: Moat Cailin is said to have held back southern armies for 10,000 years, so those southern armies were likely the First Men. We concur that the Pact was signed at this time, since the Pact lasted 4000 years and endured through the Long Night and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, until a few centuries after these 4000 years the Andals came.

8,000 years ago: LC Mormont said the Long Night happened 8,000 years ago. House Stark was established 8,000 years ago according to a Bran POV when he was watching the Karstark family enter Winterfell. King Robert says to Ned that the Wall is 8,000 years old. LC Mormont and Maester Luwin both say that the Children of the Forest and the Others have been dead for 8,000 years.

6,000 years ago: Alyssa Arryn saw her husband, brothers and children slain 6,000 years ago. The Arryn's are the earliest Andal settlers.

I agree with the sequence of events, but those dates are the "official" version of the history as believed by Westerosi. There are learned people such as the Maesters within the books who question it all and I am inclined to agree with them.

The problem is that it was all recorded in many cases thousands of years after the fact. Similar problems arise in the real world when dealing with ancient histories and attempting to date the events recorded. GRRM has confirmed that this is in effect.

[Black Wolf Smith]

And here we have the passage in question, Maester Luwin's history lesson without the interruptions¹:

They [the Children] were people of the Dawn Age, the very first, before kings and kingdoms. In those days, there were no castles or holdfasts, no cities, not so much as a market town to be found between here and the sea of Dorne. There were no men at all. Only the children of the forest dwelt in the lands we now call the Seven Kingdoms.

They were a people dark and beautiful, small of stature, no taller than children even when grown to manhood. They lived in the depths of the wood, in caves and crannogs and secret tree towns. Slight as they were, the children were quick and graceful. Male and female hunted together, woth weirwood bows and flying snares. Their gods were the gods of the forest, stream and stone, the old gods, whose names are secret. Their wise men were called greenseers, and carved strange faces in the weirwoods to keep watch on woods. How long the children reigned here or where they came from, no man can know.

But some twelve thousand years ago, the First Men appeared from the east,² crossing the Broken Arm of Dorne before it was broken. They came with bronze swords and great leathern shields, riding horses. No horse had ever been seen on this side of the narrow sea. No doubt the children were as frightened by the horses as the First Men were by the faces in the trees. As the First Men carved out holdfasts and farms, they cut down the faces and gave them to the fire. Horror-struck, the children went to war. The old songs say that the greenseers used dark magics to make the seas rise and sweep away the land, shattering the Arm, but it was too late to close the door. The wars went on until the earth ran red with the blood of men and children both, but more children than men, for men were bigger and stronger, and wood and stone and obsidian make a poor match for bronze. Finally, the wise of both races prevailed, and the chiefs and heroes of the First Men met the greenseers and wood dancers amidst the weirwood groves of a small island in the great lake called God’s Eye.

There they forged the Pact. The First Men were given the coast-lands, the high plains and bright meadows, the mountains and bogs, but the deep woods were to remain forever the children’s, and no more weirwoods were to be put to the axe anywhere in the realm. So the gods might bear witness to the signing, every tree on the island was given a face, and afterward, the sacred order of green men was formed to keep watch over the Isle of Faces.

The Pact began four thousand years of friendship between men and children³. In time, the First Men even put aside the gods they had brought with them, and took up the worship of the secret gods of the wood. The signing of the Pact ended the Dawn Age, and began the Age of Heroes.

So long as the kingdoms of the First Men held sway, the Pact endured, all through the Age of Heroes and the Long Night and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, yet finally there came a time, many centuries later, when other peoples crossed the narrow sea.

The Andals were the first, a race of tall, fair-haired warriors who came with steel and fire and the seven pointed star of the new gods painted on their chests. The wars lasted hundreds of years, but in the end the six southron kingdoms all fell before them. Only here, where the King in the North threw back every army that tried to cross the Neck, did the rule of the First Men endure. The Andals burnt out the weirwood groves, hacked down the faces, slaughtered the children where they found them, and everywhere proclaimed the triumph of the Seven over the old gods. So the children fled north -

1. Did you do the work and put it all together, or is this something from the new app?

2 & 3 IDK if Feather Crystal is getting the Andals at 8,000 from these numbers. Men should up and fought with the CoTF for some time(at least 2,000). Then had 4,000 years of peace with them because of the pact. Not as simple as 12-4=8

[TheTizer]

I know this is off topic, as are most things I post about as I'm tryign to catch up! But, this was within a nice little post by @BlackCrow in the last thread:

"every tree on the island was given a face, and afterward, the sacred order of green men was formed to keep watch over the Isle of Faces."

The thing that pops out to me is 'The order of the green men.'

Was Bloodraven continuing on this tradition with his 'Ravens teeth' (using weirwood longbows the children made famous) and of course his greenseeing? Are these men just greenseers or is there more known of them?

[TheTizer]

Also, I would like to offer a theory. In keeping with the Celtic mythilogical theme, Na Fianna being a very important group, I woudl draw a comparison with these and The Starks. Fionn being Bran's family and Oisin being Bran.

Oisin is brought to Tir na Nog by one of its natives, a land of immortality. Niamh, the person who brought him there, was the princess of Tir na Nog.(Bloodraven being Niamh, this ties in with Black Crows theory on how he is not the head honcho, but one of 'Morrigans' agents)

Oisin misses his family and friends back in Ireland and wants to see them. He rides Niamhs magical white horse home and is told not to touch the ground of Ireland.

He finally gets home and he sees men that needed help. When he leans down to help them he falls off his horse and is instantly turned into an old man. When he asks for his Father Fionn he finds that he died years ago. Oisin lives out is last few days an old man telling stories of the land of Tir na Nog.

Bran is brought to a cave north of the wall where Bloodraven has lived for near a century. This is a seat of magical power (Agelessness(kinda) and magic =Tir na Nog). I foresee Bran getting lost in time down there. He eventually leaves this cave only to find the world around him changed and his family gone.

Did get where I'm coming from? Please feel free to add, augment and disect. Especially add though...this theory needs help! :P

[rohit39]

Everyone here talks about the Stark- Others connection in the past. As in, they actually had dealings, which resulted in the ending of the Long Night. But one that puzzles me in the language barrier? There's been no mention that any of the "human" races have histories where they were fluent in WW language, so to speak. The language the Starks started off with was the language of the First Men, which is different from what WW seem to communicate in, right?