Post by voice on Jun 10, 2016 19:24:49 GMT
6. A man named Brandon called together many "watchers" from many walls, and consolidated them into a brotherhood named "the Night's Watch"
That would mean the Last Hero was not a member of the Night's Watch when he set out into the frozen dead lands...
Makes more sense to me the other way around.
12. He set about building a great wall of ice along the northern boundary of the lands he saved (to protect the godswood of his mentor)
13. This man named Brandon became known as "the Builder"
13. This man named Brandon became known as "the Builder"
Ah, but if he himself was reconstructed magically as Night's King, he would have likely acquired some new technologies of construction...
Winterfell was built when he was Human.
15. One night, as he was building, he glimpsed a woman with skin as pale as the moon and eyes like bright glowing stars
We agree. And I have no issue with Night's Queen being a former member of House Bolton or even House Dustin, or some other corpse-ly house. But by the time she was glimpsed from atop Brandon's Wall, she was no longer human. Blue Bolton eyes may be, but they do not glow like stars.
There is also this statement
WIF - The enmity between the Starks and Boltons went back to the Long Night itself, it is claimed.
If it was just conquest during the LN, then wouldn't the other houses be pissed off too, the Barrow Kings, the Blackwoods etc? I feel there may be something else but don't know what.
I wish I had an answer. I agree there must be something else to the enmity. Houses Bracken and Blackwood have a similar everlasting feud, but at least we know more about it.
House Bolton may be a thorn in the side of House Stark, but are they really all that different from some of the more violent tribes of First Men we've heard about north of the Wall?
According to SSM, their words are "Our blades are sharp." That sounds really cheesy, but does call to mind the Others. I disagree with many heretics on this matter though. Their flaying of men is not so much a macabre, envious form of "skinchanging" as it is a very literal undoing of skinchanging.
Skinchanging is a mysterious and secretive form of espionage, but a man with no skin has no skin to change. To quote Ramsay as Reek:
"Strip off their skins," he urged, his thick lips glistening. "Lord Bolton, he used to say a naked man has few secrets, but a flayed man's got none."
So how does one learn all the secrets a warg carries? Skin the wolf, then flay the man.
"Strip off their skins" seems an interesting expression doesn't it? Varamyr had Six, not counting his own.
There is no disputing that BtB took over the Winterfell area.
However, this was Children's real estate.
Yes, but you are already assuming that Children view real estate the same way as Men, and we have no reason to equate the two. Men see a land to be owned, conquered, and exploited. Children see a collective consciousness, a co-dependent ecosystem, and sing songs about it.
Huge difference.
He then built his First Keep right on top of the Children's warm caves.
Well, not exactly.
Fan-made map of Winterfell prior to A Dance with Dragons. 1.North Gate 2.Broken Tower 3.Glass Garden 4.Crypts 5.First Keep 6.Godswood 7.Guards Hall 8.East Gate 9.Armory 10.Hunter's Gate 11.kennels 12.Guest House 13. Bridge between the Armory and the Great Keep 14.Great Keep 15.Maester's Turret 16.Kitchen 17.Courtyard 18.Bell Tower 19.Library Tower 20.Sept 21.Stables 22.Great Hall 23.Smithy 24.South Gate
I think the version above is more accurate in terms of the text, but it should be noted that HBO made the protection of the Godswood even more explicit:
Notice that the Godswood has its own walls, and is set apart to the right in its own ringfort not unlike the Fist.
But, back on topic...the entrance to the cotf cave is where its always been, as it is now (imo) the entrance to the crypts. Above those caves lies the Godswood. And Brandon did not molest it.
- Catelyn I AGOT:
At the center of the grove an ancient weirwood brooded over a small pool where the waters were black and cold. "The heart tree," Ned called it. The weirwood's bark was white as bone, its leaves dark red, like a thousand bloodstained hands. A face had been carved in the trunk of the great tree, its features long and melancholy, the deep-cut eyes red with dried sap and strangely watchful. They were old, those eyes; older than Winterfell itself. They had seen Brandon the Builder set the first stone, if the tales were true; they had watched the castle's granite walls rise around them. It was said that the children of the forest had carved the faces in the trees during the dawn centuries before the coming of the First Men across the narrow sea.
Thus, Brandon the Builder built granite walls around the cotf's Weirwood. I believe these are the first walls guarded by the Night's Watch, but that is another topic (LOL as you can tell, I am quite obsessed with this part of the story).
So I think Winterfell was created by Brandon when he was still "the Last Hero" in an effort to protect the cotf (and likely, greenseers) who had helped him. Or, he had already resumed the follies of Men, and had decided to fortify the refuge so that it could be protected from other men as well as Others. Either is likely, imo.
Men would not be. Men would be wroth. But we cannot know how the cotf felt about it.
The only thing that is certain, per the text anyway, is that they aided the Last Hero, and, per the WIF, taught Brandon the Builder their language (which I would argue is another way of expressing the "aid" they gave the Last Hero).
So it seems they were anything but antagonistic to Brandon's efforts.
He then decreed that there 'should always be a Stark in WF'.... to make sure no one would go poking under the First Keep.
Mayhaps. We don't know who decreed that decree, or if it is even a commandment. It could just be another family motto. I don't think it is, of course, but I cannot prove otherwise.
The admonition could have come from Brandon the Builder. He did after all establish House Stark. But it could also have come from the cotf themselves. There's no way to know. It does seem rather interesting to me though that once there were no longer Starks in Winterfell (unless there's one in the roots of their Heart Tree, or the stone kings in the crypts satisfy the commandment) that Winterfell seems to be emanating Winter itself, and is freezing over in a way (I believe) it has never done before.
Like an oasis in the desert, I see prehistoric Winterfell as a warm refuge in a frozen dead land. Now that the Starks have abandoned it (thanks to Cat...) the oasis has begun to freeze and die. Not good. (Here's a link to redriver's old theory on the topic, I've asked him permission to repost it here as well.
I have not looked into the Night's King yet, so can't comment much but yes, he must have been bi-polar.
At the very least.
Night's King was only a man by light of day, Old Nan would always say, but the night was his to rule. And it's getting dark.
In my thinking, Ned returned Dawn to Starfall because he knew his House no longer had any claim to it. Dawn/Ice represents the dark history of House (Star+Dark) Stark. And that shamed Ned. That sword now belongs to House (Day+Dawn) Dayne.
Thanks. The wordplay is fun. I hope it ends up being right.
I would also point out that the name "Daenerys" seems like little more than Dayne (Day+Dawn) combined with "aerys" (Fire) ... so she is another very strong candidate for SotM, if markg171 's (f)Dany theory ends up being right.
On this topic, i have seen in one of the babbles a discussion on what triggered the return of the Frosties, where you - I think it was you and The Sly Wren - argued that Ned killing Arthur was a pivotal point.
Have you considered that there may have been a slightly earlier one?
Yup, that was SlyWren and I. That's actually the entire, albeit subliminal, point of this OP. If Ice=Dawn for the reasons I have laid out here, then Ned's disarmament of Arthur was a very bad thing that undid a peace that had been in place for ~10,000 years.
And yes, I quite agree that the slightly earlier event has everything to do with it! I really like where you're going with this:
The False Spring of 281 AC lasted less than two turns. As the year drew to a close, winter returned to Westeros with a vengeance...
Definitely a hiccup. I cannot say why, but it certainly feels like a glitch in the matrix.
That was the year of the Harrenhal tourney where a Stark and a Dayne fell in love. An unlikely match considering their respective geographies. That could also be a dangerous union for those North of the Wall.
Just a thought.
A thought with which I certainly agree.
And as unlikely a match as geographically possible! North+South, Ice+Fire, Dark+Day.
The Seasons didn't know what to do.... winter roses do not normally dance with swords of the morning... they bloom in Winter, and solstice-dawn ends Winter and brings Spring!
That there were Winter Roses in bloom during the HH Tourney tells us a lot. They grew. They flowered. Yet, it was not Winter.
A blue flower grew from a chink in a wall of ice, and filled the air with sweetness. . . .
A hiccup in the guard of winter, a gap in the armor of a knight clad in white ice. . . .
Filling the air with what?? Sweetness? Well what is sweet, dearest Lyanna?
"Love is sweet, dearest Ned ..."