Spinoff: Pale blades and Other magic swords

Ok, so, this may be a really stupid observation that has been done to death already, but I'm going to bring it up anyway. It popped into my mind thanks to snowfyre ‘s collection of book quotes in the Shadows/Sacrifice thread – what stood out for me at that three seconds was the description of the Others’ swords as “crystal”.

Now, ice is crystallized water, yeah yeah. We get that. However, ice as a particularly strong handheld weapon, not such a thing, right? We’re talking about this thing slicing and dicing like a Ginsu knife, and being able to hold withstand blows from iron/steel while remaining unscathed, right? (The exception being the show-fic of Valyrian steel, which may actually make sense – I’ll get to that in a sec.)

So I was thinking about crystals and properties of metals and all that, and I thought about obsidian – obsidian/dragonglass being the one substance thus far in-story that can kill an Other. And then I thought about obsidian being a byproduct of volcanoes…and that led me to the thought about another byproduct of volcanic activity: one that is almost invulnerably hard, one that is translucent, one that is used in real world applications for precise cutting and cutting of very hard/resistant materials.

Diamond.

**Warning: boring science talk**

Diamonds are sloooowwwwllllly formed deep in the earth at an average of 2000 deg F (1100 C for the rest of the world), but are slooooowwwlllly brought to the surface by volcanic eruptions deep in the earth. This means that diamonds on the surface of the earth are very, very old. Diamonds are the hardest materials on earth and have extreme resistance to breakage even though the crystal orientation can result in very fine/sharp edge surfaces for the cutting and such.

Recall also that diamonds in their natural and unpolished form are rather….opaque, “milky” if you will:





BUT, they can also have a distinctive blue color due to the infusion of boron –
- Boron being a very light element produced entirely by 1) cosmic ray spallation, or a type of nuclear fission occurring due to the impact of cosmic rays on an object, and 2) supernovae, “rare astronomical event that occurs during the last stellar evolutionary stages of a massive star's life, whose dramatic violent and catastrophic destruction is marked by one final titanic explosion.”

Also see: carbonado diamonds, a form of diamond deposited on the earth via asteroid/meteorite impact; impact diamonds, diamonds that form under the appropriate temperature/pressure conditions that result from the impact of a meteor (giant Popigai crater in Russia). 

Rough BLUE diamond:





Now compare to obsidian - the inverse parallel to a diamond – which is
- Black
- Shiny
- Brittle
- Formed by volcanic eruption at the surface of the Earth
- Formed very quickly as volcanic lava cools
- Relatively ‘young’ as far as minerals go


Another point of interest: obsidian is not a true mineral – it’s actually glass. In Earth-realm, what’s the most effective cutting material for glass? That’s right…diamond. But flip it around, GRRM style, and you have the inverse: glass cuts diamond.


Now, without going into further scientific blahblahblah, I’m thinking about connections between:
   the Others in the Lands of Always Winter, hot springs beneath Winterfell, the CotF gifting obsidian, Ice, Dawn and Starfall, the mines of Old Valyria, Valyrian Steel.     Also, since this is my thread, I’ll throw in the Marvel ref: the Black Knight (ASOIAF counterpart Arthur Dayne) carries the Ebony Blade – a sword made from a meteor, a sword that is only vulnerable to a blow from an object made from the same meteor.



We know that the whereabouts/fate of the original Ice is TBD. Ice1 was replaced by Ice2, made of Valyrian Steel prior to the Doom – meaning, it was forged when the mines were still in operation and the Fourteen Fires still burned.    Following the breadcrumbs, it is possible that Ice1 - perhaps a diamond/Dawn-like sword - and Ice2, dragonglass, and Valyrian Steel could have the following elements in common: minerals from deep in the earth, volcanoes, meteors. I have no idea how they all tie together, but I bet they are related.

Or, you know, the Others’ swords are in fact real ice and are awesome because magic.


Discuss.

Ok, so, this may be a really stupid observation that has been done to death already, but I'm going to bring it up anyway. It popped into my mind thanks to snowfyre ‘s collection of book quotes in the Shadows/Sacrifice thread – what stood out for me at that three seconds was the description of the Others’ swords as “crystal”.

Now, ice is crystallized water, yeah yeah. We get that. However, ice as a particularly strong handheld weapon, not such a thing, right? We’re talking about this thing slicing and dicing like a Ginsu knife, and being able to hold withstand blows from iron/steel while remaining unscathed, right? (The exception being the show-fic of Valyrian steel, which may actually make sense – I’ll get to that in a sec.)

So I was thinking about crystals and properties of metals and all that, and I thought about obsidian – obsidian/dragonglass being the one substance thus far in-story that can kill an Other. And then I thought about obsidian being a byproduct of volcanoes…and that led me to the thought about another byproduct of volcanic activity: one that is almost invulnerably hard, one that is translucent, one that is used in real world applications for precise cutting and cutting of very hard/resistant materials.

Diamond.

**Warning: boring science talk**

Diamonds are sloooowwwwllllly formed deep in the earth at an average of 2000 deg F (1100 C for the rest of the world), but are slooooowwwlllly brought to the surface by volcanic eruptions deep in the earth. This means that diamonds on the surface of the earth are very, very old. Diamonds are the hardest materials on earth and have extreme resistance to breakage even though the crystal orientation can result in very fine/sharp edge surfaces for the cutting and such.

Recall also that diamonds in their natural and unpolished form are rather….opaque, “milky” if you will:





BUT, they can also have a distinctive blue color due to the infusion of boron –
- Boron being a very light element produced entirely by 1) cosmic ray spallation, or a type of nuclear fission occurring due to the impact of cosmic rays on an object, and 2) supernovae, “rare astronomical event that occurs during the last stellar evolutionary stages of a massive star's life, whose dramatic violent and catastrophic destruction is marked by one final titanic explosion.”

Also see: carbonado diamonds, a form of diamond deposited on the earth via asteroid/meteorite impact; impact diamonds, diamonds that form under the appropriate temperature/pressure conditions that result from the impact of a meteor (giant Popigai crater in Russia). 

Rough BLUE diamond:





Now compare to obsidian - the inverse parallel to a diamond – which is
- Black
- Shiny
- Brittle
- Formed by volcanic eruption at the surface of the Earth
- Formed very quickly as volcanic lava cools
- Relatively ‘young’ as far as minerals go


Another point of interest: obsidian is not a true mineral – it’s actually glass. In Earth-realm, what’s the most effective cutting material for glass? That’s right…diamond. But flip it around, GRRM style, and you have the inverse: glass cuts diamond.


Now, without going into further scientific blahblahblah, I’m thinking about connections between:
   the Others in the Lands of Always Winter, hot springs beneath Winterfell, the CotF gifting obsidian, Ice, Dawn and Starfall, the mines of Old Valyria, Valyrian Steel.     Also, since this is my thread, I’ll throw in the Marvel ref: the Black Knight (ASOIAF counterpart Arthur Dayne) carries the Ebony Blade – a sword made from a meteor, a sword that is only vulnerable to a blow from an object made from the same meteor.



We know that the whereabouts/fate of the original Ice is TBD. Ice1 was replaced by Ice2, made of Valyrian Steel prior to the Doom – meaning, it was forged when the mines were still in operation and the Fourteen Fires still burned.    Following the breadcrumbs, it is possible that Ice1 - perhaps a diamond/Dawn-like sword - and Ice2, dragonglass, and Valyrian Steel could have the following elements in common: minerals from deep in the earth, volcanoes, meteors. I have no idea how they all tie together, but I bet they are related.

Or, you know, the Others’ swords are in fact real ice and are awesome because magic.


Discuss.

Can't believe more people aren't chiming in on this topic!

Also see: carbonado diamonds, a form of diamond deposited on the earth via asteroid/meteorite impact; impact diamonds, diamonds that form under the appropriate temperature/pressure conditions that result from the impact of a meteor (giant Popigai crater in Russia). 

ah, but that is because some of us weren't born then!

what is also worth mentioning is the likeness between Dawn and the raw material of the melting frosty fruit:

although, as you know - for the time being anyway - i think the 'not ice as we know it' ice of the WW is 'magic' CO2 ice:

CO2? So ........... destroying the WWs releases CO2 into the atmosphere? How much CO2 is locked up in the Wall? Enough to precipitate global warming and melt the ice north of the Wall?

In other words, the building of the Wall was the event that precipitated the Long Night, not the other way round. Boom!