1.4 Eddard

There is an odd discrepancy in this chapter and the previous Catelyn Chapter. In this chapter, Ned recalls that the last time he saw Robert was 9 years previous during the Greyjoy Rebellion. In the previous Catelyn chapter, he says it's been awhile since he has seen Robert's children.



So Ned must be thinking of Joffrey as the youngest the last time he saw him nine years previous. We know Mya is older and Catelyn warns Ned to guard his tongue. So even before their arrival, there is an undertone of anxiety concerning Robert's bastards. This could also be a slip on Ned's part concerning Jon.   Joffrey is officially Robert's first born; but Ned thinks of him as the youngest of Robert's children.  Tommen, whom Ned confuses with Joffrey, has both an older sister and an older brother.

Catelyn recognizes that Ned is confusing the two and corrects him.  She also recognizes that Ned is thinking of Robert's bastards and warns him to guard his tongue.

Sly Wren has introduced the notion of justice in Bran's chapter and my attention was drawn to the statues of the king of winter:



My thoughts go immediately to the Black Gate, a ghost face that is also blind. So do we have the concept that justice is blind? Or that Ned is a just man?



biblehub.com/commentaries/proverbs/24-16.htm

A fallen man is a just man who is besieged by mischief and calamity.  Thus, the sword that is made from the heart of a fallen Stark can only be claimed by someone who is worthy of it... a just man (or woman).

Haha, true! Chronologically Robert and Rhaegar is the most logical options, but with the exception of Wylla every parent option has kingsblood in their lines. Or as you say, it could be a reforging of the Kings of Winter.


Not so sure it's "just" that rift, it feels too personal to me. I do think Lyanna more or less caused her own death, but that doesn't mean she also got caugth up in the last big game of thrones. And that includes Tywin.
Robert also mention that Tywin has never taken on a ward. Officially. Unofficially the closest thing he had was none other than Rhaegar, and that makes me ponder indeed! So at this point I had to wrangle my head back on point before it went totally off topic.


Yeah me too! And I do tend to mix up Jon and Jon in the text sometimes, so... Did Arryn know anything? Or suspect? And chose to keep his tounge?


As I keep all options open, I keep NAJ in this sack as well. It could also be inversion or something like that, with the sex of the stealing parent changed.

Before I dig in, I have to point out that this chapter is about an unhappily married man that is drinking himself to death. I can't help but wonder if this chapter also tells us about two other people who found themselves wishing to die rather than marry people they did not desire... I'll explain.


Clearly, Robert is not a man happy in his cups. 


The Lord's Kiss. 


TMI, Ned. 


Ned:    "Ah, yes. Those are very nice children born of incest you have there! If you ever need to someone to adopt them, let me know!"

Cersei: "Thank you very much! I didn't want to bear Robert's children, so I made them. I am a very proud lioness. People see my beauty, but ignore my iron underneath."

Ned"    "Cool."

This is one of the passages commonly cited by the RLJ crowd as a hint to Jon’s claim to the Iron Throne. And I thought that as well. Because when we start the story, there is only one king. The king on the Iron Throne. Ned is a lord, not a king. So it’s fairly understandable that this is going to color our perceptions of things throughout the series. That the natural order is that there is one king in Westeros, a Targaryen king.

But we learn in this very chapter that this was not always the case.



So now with this in mind, go back to the above quote. “Kings are a rare sight in the north”. Well that’s not always been the case. In fact until the Targaryens conquered, the North always had a king, and the king was in Winterfell.

Then Robert’s jest ”more likely they (the Northern Kings) were hiding under the (S)now.” can have this ulterior meaning. The true King of the North is a “Snow”.

It's curious that when Robert goes down to the crypts to see Lyanna that his face is lit with a red lantern light. Something that can be associated with brothels.



Also that there is a secret tunnel from KL to a brothel:



So Robert enters an underground tunnel to see Lyanna and his face is lit with the red lantern light of the brothel.  Has Robert come to Winterfell to dig for buried treasure now that Jon Arryn has told him that his 'seed is strong'?  Ned has his suspicions.

Part II

This chapter is full of descriptions of some of the possible parents of our XYZ soup, but also has a huge amount of information on Winterfell's crypt's and the Stark's that call this place home.

After the Stark and Lannister's have been aquainted with each other, Robert asks to visit the crypts, and it is our first introduction to this place that will play such a huge part in our story. The crypt's of Winterfell are almost like a character in the story! And I think they play a hugely important role.

So, what do we get told about the crypts as far as description.




Ned calls for a lantern, so the idea of the crypts being constantly lit with torches and candles is a show falsity. The crypts are a dark place! And as we will see, when the lights move in the darkness, so do the shadows and the statues. It is a place of the dead, but it seems alive!

The stairs that lead downward are winding and narrow, and we will see echoes of this in Jon's dreams and Theon's dreams.


Ned could feel the chill coming up the stairs, a cold breath from deep within the earth. From the first time I heard the story of The Ice Dragon by GRRM, I wondered if there was a dragon in this deep, deep place. A creature that has "a cold breath" the lies deep within the earth. I still wonder if it's down there, I wonder if that is why the crypts are so cold even though Winterfell is built over a hot springs, and I wonder if that is what is calling Jon in his dreams.

I also find it ironic that Ned claims that kings are rare in the north as he and Robert are walking down toward the resting place of the Kings of Winter and Kings in the North that have ruled this land for thousands and thousands of years. Kings are not rare in the crypts of Winterfell.


Here, in this place of darkness, when the light moves, so do the shadows, and it appears the statues of the Stark kings and lords do to, along with their stone direwolves. It is quite a mental picture! Shadows moved and lurched, the Lords of Winterfell watched them pass, and the shifting shadows made the stone figures seem to stir as the living passed by. I have always wondered if it is a trick of the light and shadows, or if those statues are actually moving and watching the living pass by? This is no normal burial place. And this place haunts Jon's sleep, and maybe Dany's too.


Jon's dreams are most definitely about the crypts of Winterfell, he has been in them and he recognizes the stone kings sitting in rows. He tells Sam exactly what he see's and where he is, but he does not know what he is looking for. And he is afraid, not of the kings, but for what he is searching for, for what is calling to him.

I am also beginning to suspect that it is important that Jon told these dreams to Sam, because I wonder if Sam also has a role to play in the crypts. After all, it is Sam who is in possession of the war horn that Jon found at the Fist of the First Men, the horn that Jon blew but could raise no sound from. Can Sam make the horn sing? I am becoming intrigued by Sam's possible parentage and looking forward to this XYZ reread to see what stirs about Sam, too!


This time, Jon is afraid of what is happening in the crypts. And I do think it's interesting that it is the light of dawn that brings him comfort!!!

Daenerys' has dreams that have some similar elements to Jon's dreams and the description of the crypts.

Dany has dreams that seem to have elements of Jon's crypt dreams, but seem to be in color and not in shadow. Dany dreams of ghosts that line a hallway, dressed like kings and they sound very similar to the rows of kings in the crypts of Winterfell. Dany does not recognize the crypts, as she has never seen them, but I really think she is dreaming about the Winterfell crypts, or a place that is so similar to the crypts. She is racing toward the red door as if is her salvation, and she feels an icy breath behind her. Of course, when Ned descends into the crypts, he feels the chill like an icy breath, but he doesn't shy from it. Neither does Jon seem afraid of the cold in the crypts. But Dany? She thinks if the icy breath catches her she will die a death that is more than death and she will be howling forever in the darkness. What? Why is she, a dragon, howling? It really makes one wonder about her having a Stark parent. Does she fear the wolf in her while she embraces the dragon?

Also, her feet are so hot that she melts stone as she runs in her dreams. While Jon might feel comfort in the crypts, Dany does not find comfort in the place she dreams of, which sounds a lot like the crypts. Is Dany running from something terrible in the Winterfell crypts? Is the red door her salvation in this place?

Swords of pale fire sound a lot like the sword of the Others and the greatsword Dawn, so is this a hint at Dayne parentage? The kings Dany see's have silver and gold and white hair. This sounds more Dayne like than Stark, but in Bran's vision in Dance, he see's a white haired woman sacrifice a man in front of the Weirwood, so white haired people have been at Winterfell in the past. I think there could be hints to who Dany really is in the crypts of Winterfell.

Elements of these dreams are similar and I wonder if that means both Jon and Dany could share a Stark blood? Is the same spirit sending them both a message of this place? Does this link the type of burial grounds the Starks have used to an much more ancient culture that also links to the Targaryen's? Could the Stark's and Targaryen's share a common ancestor, more than eight thousand years ago. Is that so long ago, it can't even matter?



We are told about a few customs, such as iron longswords placed over the laps of each Stark lord and a pair of direwolves at the feet of each statue. Ned thinks of the vengeful spirits of the the Stark lords whose swords have rusted to nothing and he worries that their ghosts are free to roam. Certainly, this sounds like a bit of an Old Nan Tale, but Ned is an adult and still uneasy when thinking of it. Why does he think those spirits are vengeful?

I also note that this dark and cold place has finally silenced Robert. Not much does that, so even he must be aware of some feeling in this place. Maybe Robert doesn't feel welcome. At times, it seems Ned doesn't feel welcome either. It always seems like Jon is not afraid of the crypts but the secret that they hold, while Dany, if she dreams of this same place, is running both away from something and toward something, and she seems to have both fear and also embrace something ahead of her. 

I don't think it is a coincidence that Ned mentions the Dragonlords while walking through this place of Stark dead! Just as I don't think it is coincidence that the First Keep is guarded by gargoyles, which have been used as a way to bind dragon's in the past. We will later find that Dragonstone is literally littered with gargoyles and we already know that "stones" cracked and broke according to Dany's story of the storm that raged as she was born.

Ned also seems uneasy when looking forward into the darkness at the empty tombs that were waiting for he and his children. Why does this make him uneasy? Because there is not a place for all of his children, or because he is claiming a child that is not his? Several possibilities. I also like to note that in Ned's thoughts, there is no place for Catelyn in the crypts, so either she chooses not to be buried here, or by custom, she is not allowed to be buried in this place that is only for the Starks.

When Robert and Ned turn and start to withdraw from the crypts, it seems like Ned can feel the blind statues watching.



I can't help but think the Stark dead do not appreciate neither Robert's laughter in their sacred place, nor the fact that he is taking the Lord of Winterfell from the place that he belongs.


Ned knows his place is in Winterfell, in the north, but for Robert, his best friend, who claims to need him because he can trust Ned, but also so Ned can run his kingdom while Robert's eats, drinks and whores himself to an early death, he is willing to leave. Robert and Cat, we will soon see, combined to take Ned away from the place he was meant to be, the role he was meant to play. Winter is coming! The Stark dead know it and so does Eddard.

This is how I think Jon feels about Winterfell. He know's his place is in Winterfell, or at least something calls to him from the place that he was raised. This is just one of the several similarities I see between Ned and Jon. And some thing about this place, or a place very similar, calls to Dany too, but she doesn't seem to find absolute comfort in it. Actually, Ned, Jon and Dany seem to feel unsettled by the crypts, but for different reasons.

Enough about the crypts, although I could ramble on for ages. Let's look at the Stark's that lie in the crypts.

Another important thing we get in this chapter is information on the dead of house Stark, namely Ned's siblings and father. Not to much on Brandon or Rickard, but more on Lyanna.



We find out that Rickard had a long, stern face. He sits with quite dignity, holding the sword across his lap. The long face is something we will come to associate with the Stark's, or at least the Stark's that have "the Stark look". We are not yet told much about Rickard's death, only that all words failed him, which is interesting, because it indicates he hoped to appeal to someone, but that did not work out.

Edit: the quote is actually "all swords failed him", which implies a very different meaning that what I had presented. This is a hint to the story we will later be told, about Rickard challenging Aerys champion in battle, only to find that champion was "fire" and his sword did not help him while he was burned to death.

Maybe if the Stark dead do rise, Rickard will have a chance to use a sword one final time? 


Brandon, his younger brother tells us, was twenty and died by strangulation. We get no description of what Brandon looked like, but we are informed that he was intended to marry Catelyn, whom we know that Ned has married in his brothers place. "He was the true heir, the eldest, born to rule". This line is quite interesting, because it might be our first clue that Ned might not feel worthy or adequate as Lord of Winterfell, and that he has taken his brother's place.

I also question what it means to the younger generation of Starks. If Jon is older than Robb, then maybe he is meant to rule. Of course, in my mind, both Jon and Robb would need to be trueborn for this to matter, and probably be the son's of the same man, so either Ned or Brandon. A little possible polygamy. A lot of if's.

We only touch on Brandon and Rickard. We will get more in coming chapters, the horror of their deaths.

But we get more detail on Lyanna. Maybe Ned thinks more about her because Robert is in the crypts with him, or maybe Lyanna is often on Eddards mind?



So, Lyanna was sixteen (when she died?, I always thought this was rather vague). She was lovely, a woman-child (whatever the heck that means), and Ned loved her with all his heart. I have always felt like this was an odd thing for a brother to think of his sister. With all his heart? Hhmmm! And Robert apparently loved her more and was going to get to marry her. Could this be a love triangle in the works?

We get the hints of "Promise me", so often debated in the fan base about what the heck that promise/those promises were about, and if Ned kept them or didn't. We find out that Lyanna had a fever, and she at some point had fear in her eyes, was in a room that smelled of blood and roses, but after Ned's promise, she smiled as she died. Wow! No wonder Ned had an emotional reaction. Blacked out, emotional with grief. They, Howland and somebody or possibly several somebodies, found him holding her body, and Howland had taken her hand from his. Also, Lyanna was fond of flowers.

Holy, information drop! That is a lot of stuff to process. I sometimes read that paragraph and have to shake my head to clear it. One thing I have always focused on was the "dead and black" reference, and I know many, many people think the reference is to flowers she was holding, but I read it as in reference to her palms. I think her palm was dead and black, and that brings to mind Coldhands, and the white walkers, and it makes me wonder about the Starks, their blood, and just what happens to them when they die.

I don't think it's like what happens to other people, and I think it could be why they have different burial customs than other places in Westeros, even in the north. The Starks are buried in the crypts, and Ned and Robert even disagree on where Lyanna should have been laid to rest. Ned says she is buried where she wanted to be, beside her father and her brother. I wonder if Lyanna knew that burial in the Stark crypts afforded her some type of second life, a possible rebirth that might await her in the crypts. We will later find out that Ned broke custom when he gave Brandon and Lyanna a statue, and I wonder if that is part of why Ned feels uncomfortable when the KoW/KitN look at him?

We don't know how Lyanna felt about Ned, but it is pretty apparent that Ned loved Lyanna and was willing to do a lot to make her happy. Someday we might know about the promises and the statue in the crypt, but for now, we can only speculate. But we are given a lot to digest about the Stark family in this chapter.

So many possible parents mentioned in this chapter: Ned, Lyanna, Brandon, Robert, Rickard, Howland (he has a mention, so he is it the soup pot, too), and Rhaegar.

Holy heck, how could I forget Rhaegar? Prince Silverstring!

So, the implication is that Rhaegar forced Lyanna into a sexual relationship (or, as we seen in the previous Daenerys chapter, that Rhaegar was in love and died for that woman, who is never named as Lyanna, but a relationship is implied between them ...)  We all know that sex leads to babies, and since we will soon find out that Jon's mother is a mystery, it must make his whole parentage a mystery, and R+L=J is born! I walked this path for a long time. And I can still see the progression. The story leads us there. But is it what we are expected to see, and  therefore a trap? I think it is. Like quick sand.

Of course, RLJ might very well turn out to be the case, and if it does, I don't think I would be disappointed, except in the fact that it really was so easy to see. At least for me, I was pretty damn sure by the end of Game the first time I read it. And then on rereads, when you look for it, it nearly slaps you silly it's so blatant! And I don't think GRRM wants the truth to be blatant, but that is just my opinion.  And I don't read much fantasy, more mystery and romance, and this seems like a trope that litters romance and mystery novels. 


As for Starkness in general, I will wrap this up with a few quotes.


Melancholy is something that is often attributed just to Rhaegar, but in this quote, it seems like something that is attributed to Stark's in general, and I believe it popped up in Catelyn I, as well, but in the face of the weirwood. The weirwood that has a "long and melancholy" face, just like the Starks.


I struggled trying to decide if I should include this quote in part I or part II (which will look at clues about the Stark's and the crypts) but the quote has landed here.

So, the Stark's have little humor, and have long faces. This certainly sounds like Jon. Those things don't trigger thoughts of Dany for me, but maybe others will think differently.

Not so surprising for me is all of the hints of Jon that I see in this chapter, but it seems pretty obvious that Jon has at least one Stark parent, but what is surprising is how much I think the crypts relate to Dany. I find the information to be a bit contradictory to whether or not that those hints are comforting or welcoming towards her, however!

Sorry, that was all so damn long. I find these early chapters are just packed full of hints, but I am going to wrap it up here, even though I could probably find more to say.