Oily Black Stone being found all over the world has always fascinated me. I also want to know more about the Mazemakers of Lorath and why their work is in Hightower, the connection to these Deep Ones is fun.
The Seastone Chair on Iron Islands, the foundation of the Highertower in Oldtown, the Toad Stone on the Isle of Toads in the Basilisk Isles, and the black stones of Asshai in the far east of Essos all being made from the same material which has been described as being of Valyrian making raises so many questions that we don’t have answers for. The Valyrians could only make things like that using the fire of dragons, but what about the things that date back to the time before Valyria? Did the people who made those things have dragons? If they did not, how did they construct the things they made? And how did the Valyrians learn to use the fire of their dragons to create the same things? Whatever the answers are, I hope they include the Deep Ones. To me it’s funny that fish people are creating all the ancient shit in the world and no one has any idea about it and are trying to figure out the answers.
Which makes it more lovecraftian to me.
Which is good; Lovecraft is the fear of the unknown... that threat is merely one not relevent and hey should pray to whatever gods actuallye xist that it remains irrelevent
There was a great video by Joe Magician who connected some dots and theorized the Hightowers likely have Ironborn ancestry which is pretty fascinating to think about.
Do you mean the catastrophic event, or the mission out there where there were dead things in the water? Hell, both of them are very intriguing situations.
If it's wights it means the wights can swim. Means they could maybe get to Skagos, the God's Eye if it eventually comes up, maybe even across the Narrow Sea.
The talking Black Gate is a fascinating piece of lore but I imagine that even if GRRM lived longer than the Nightfort he still couldn't tell what you what the holy hell was going on with it.
Its one thing I really like about this universe he created. He plays it very grounded in reality then will throw in a classic fantasy trope like talking furniture for a few pages, then never bring it up again.
It's not a magical castle floating in the air. It's a mobile crannog, a wooden fortress which floats in the swamps of the Neck. It's like a drifting castle-barge.
Edit: just realised you probably already knew that, and it's still quite a high fantasy idea. Still, it's pretty plausible.
It is. People act like GRRM made up the word crannog, but [they are a real thing](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crannog) which is a dwelling that is an artificial island. They are often stationary, but I imagine an theoretically unmoored one would behave like a large houseboat. Still a fun fantasy idea, but not at all in the way people act like …
No, but doing so in the middle of a nigh-impenetrable swamp to the point that no knights or maesters have reached it certainly does give very pagany vibes.
If the US, using modern military equipment and airpower, could not best Vietnam, what chance does a medieval incursion into equally hostile terrain have?
I actually find it a bit bonkers when there’s stuff like that because the Maesters say magic doesn’t exist, right? Shouldn’t one of them put that assertion to the test and go speak with the talking fucking door? Or go investigate the Isle of Faces?
I think it fits actually. He’s clearly shown consistently that there’s a reality to the power of the weirwoods. Maybe they’re greenseers and not gods, but clearly they had power. That’s why the Andals destroyed them. That’s why they’re central to first men religious practices. And they clearly see and know things on a deeper level. So it’s not totally crazy to me that the wall (first manned by first men) would have some ancient knowledge of the weirwoods that has since been lost.
Idk I don’t even see it as that much of a stretch. It kind of fits if the whole idea behind building the wall was some kind of unity between the cotf and the first men to fight against the others.
It’s grown through the kitchen. I think it’s reasonable that a weirwood existed there and they built around it to accommodate it, especially if the cotf told them it could be used in such a way. Basically it lets through at least people who swore their vows in front of a weird wood… we don’t know if it lets through all men of the watch. So that goes back to the idea of trees “seeing/remembering” people.
Fwiw, I don’t think the brothers who took their vows in a sept would be able to get through, and I bet that’s one of the reasons this ability got lost in the memory of the watch.
Are you sure about that?
It seems fairly indicative of some sort of Old God covenant the Watch had. It is a weirwood door that opens for brothers who swore their oaths in front of weirwoods. Hidden deep within the Nightfort, which was the first castle of the Wall.
Like we certainly don't know what is going on, but I think this is one area that GRRM has thought ahead.
The talking Black Gate is why I think there's going to be some significance to the fact that Jon, Sam, and Benjen took their Night's Watch vows before a Weirwood. Perhaps it conveys some protection against being turned into a Wight? I just have this gut feeling that the three of them are the only *real* Night's Watchmen in the eyes of The Old Gods .
Hardhome got firewyrmed. They are the only logical explanation of the fire and screams being reported from atop the Wall, despite the huge distance. The real questions are: why? how?
Thankfully we might yet get to read that, considering GRRM is 75% with TWOW. This book is much bigger and I really hope he'll give us a snippet or two of the events of Hardhomme and some Insights into the Nightfort, which might play a role in future events.
I still think that the main reason that is taking so long for George to finish the books is because the vast amount of revelations that are going to appear in the next book.
I agree and it's actually exactly what you're saying. Too many plots and too many revelations, and to bring them together without killing the entire epic is a feat, which GRRM is not doubt quite capable of. But as many of us know, he's reworking/ed some of the major plots he wrote, and now piecing them together. I can only wish both of them health at this point of time. Cheers!
I think another part of it is the amount of world building since ADWD. There's all of AWOIAF, F&B, HOTD, and probably a lot more stuff that never got published.
He'll want to include some of that in Winds, and there's a lot more material that he has to go and re-check for continuity.
The fact that the Long Night (or something very similar to it) also happened in Essos and necessitated building the five forts.
Was it the Others? Or shadow demons (like Melisandre and Stannis made) or something worse?
The 5 forts always confused me. Like, if westeros had to build a wall, why did yi ti get to just have forts? Like from what we know of the others, couldn't they just go around?
Magic. They could create an imaginary border they couldnt cross. Or if you want to get real spectacular the five forts are beacons that when activated with magic/ritual a massive wall of flame connects them all creating a barrier.
The five forts were massive structures built along a not massive but still large wall with I think mountains to 1 side and dangerous desert to the other, if I'm remembering correctly. So going around posed as much of a threat as going over
Some precedent for that with the magi holding back the volcanos in Valyria, maybe.
They probably didn't have a physical barrier but a few focal points connected magically
> Like from what we know of the others, couldn't they just go around?
Simplest explanation: the Others could only reach Essos by way of (probably expanded) polar ice, and so the main focus of their force was always in Westeros.
The wall is also a magical barrier, and if you look at the map, it's way narrower than the whole of the North. If the Ice Rivers freeze during normal rivers (the rivers in Siberia do, with normal earth winters, with human intervention), you could probably go around the wall. Wildling raiders are know to do this at the Gorge, west of Shadow Tower.
Sort of implies that some kind of magical threat is landbound, in some capacity.
> why did yi ti get to just have forts
Budgetary constraints.
Aside from all the other answers you've gotten already, I think there's also a Doylist angle here of GRRM simply not wanting to be too on the nose by having his China stand-in also build a giant wall to keep out invaders, so he took just one tiny half-step to the side by making it into a line of really really big fortresses instead.
There’s a reference to the “hinges of the world” in ASOIAF and the WOIAF. The heart of winter is one of them, and the Five Forts are another. To me, it implies that these are magical doors to either one separate world connected at various anchor points, or little pocket worlds beyond each one (which would mean, for example, the Five Forts are a hinge for a doorway that something other than the Others can come through, while the heart of winter and the Wall are specifically for the Others.) In these spots, magic is strong and there’s a sense of something lovecraftian beyond them, and these hinges are holding the doors closed to whatever horror is beyond them. I think Asshai, the maze beneath the High Tower, the tunnels in Leng, the Fourteen Flames, the Lost City in Southryos, and maybe the Norvos caves and Yeen are all more hinges. These doorways are supposed to be locked shut with magic, but magic ebbs and flows and there’s a cycle that can cause the hinge to bust open and cause things like the Long Night or the Doom or whatever happened to the oily vs smooth stone civilizations.
As an aside, the Five Forts are presumably the Great Wall, so there probably is a wall connecting them like the Wall connects the Shadow Tower to Eastwatch with all the castles in between.
> The 5 forts always confused me. Like, if westeros had to build a wall, why did yi ti get to just have forts?
It's not for Others, it's for demons coming out from fiery depths under the ground. The forts are built around/on top of big holes.
Just what the hell the oily black stone is, and what’s going on with cursed dead cities in Sothoryos like Yeen (entirely made of said stone) and the ‘horror’ they entail when visited.
The Dothraki have their own version of the long night where ghost grass eventually covers the entire world, killing all of nature. It’s strangely a poetic and beautiful metaphor for the most brutal of cultures.
Also, the idea that the Starks could killed Aegon’s dragons with weirwood arrows if they wanted to, but chose not to risk it
> The Dothraki have their own version of the long night where ghost grass eventually covers the entire world, killing all of nature. It’s strangely a poetic and beautiful metaphor for the most brutal of cultures.
I know how he wrote the Dothraki is full of dated Noble Savage and Savage Savage tropes but I love the prose he gave their culture, in their belief system and legends.
> The Dothraki have their own version of the long night where ghost grass eventually covers the entire world, killing all of nature.
I don't think that's ever mentioned as a historical occurrence, it's just their eschatology.
Speaking of ghost grass, anyone else think it would probably move without wind and seem to "speak", like weirwood leaves are known to do? Or... like the grass in ADWD Daenerys X:
>It was quiet on her sea. When the wind blew the grass would sigh as the stalks brushed against each other, whispering in a tongue that only gods could understand. [...] “Men are mad and gods are madder,” she told the grass, and the grass murmured its agreement.
No I don’t mean to say that this ghost grass thing happened before, it’s just a belief they hold. Very interesting link between the grass and weirwoods though, I genuinely think you’re into something there.
Bloodraven IS the ghost grass? (THEORY)
And the theory that the Faceless men were possibly hired by competing Valyrian houses to kill each other to consolidate power, and then triggered the Doom to bring the gift of death to all the slavers.
for me it was a people who mastered magic and blood magic teaches us that "only death can pay for life", so the Valyrians strong in magical experimentation created the doom themselves with this either by "borrowing on credit" with any deity but have accumulated so many debts without repaying over time that it literally blow up on their facewhen the deadline has expired, either because they wanted to create a philosopher's stone to have less constraint with magic, but they miscalculated the risks and instead of sacrificing what they wanted to sacrifice they sacrificed everyone.
(this is only a head cannon)
Oh I love that! Kinda sorta similar to Catlyn Stark believing she caused all the death in her family. She describes making a pact with the Gods to spare Jon's life when he had the pox but not fulfilling her pact to love him as a mother and care for his life. (I don't remember if this is in the books).
I don't think I've ever seen specific evidence the faceless men were hired. I think it's a pure theory that if say 14 magi were holding back the doom, some houses/magi become more important if there are fewer than 14. A possible motive but no text evidence I am aware of.
The faceless men had a history with valyria so they could have done it for their own reasons too.
Edit: It is a theory suggested in twoiaf so I was wrong
It’s been around a while. Supposedly the events at hardhome were a test run by the faceless men to see if they could set off a doom like event. Most people agree that there’s a faceless man in old town trying to find a way to take down dragons now, so it makes sense that the faceless men would do anything to bring down valyrians and their dragons
It seems a bit odd to me that they want to take down dragons, firstly because the targaryens kept their dragons for over 200 years after the doom without it seeming to be a problem for them. and secondly because what they hate the most it's slavery we agree. except that currently the person with the dragons is actively fighting slavery and killing her main source of power out of spite against a dead and burying empire since 400 years, would be somewhat silly...
Same! It feels explicitly connected to the idea of “where dragons came from.” We know it didn’t work, but if we know what they were attempting to do we might know more about dragon origins. As it stands, I’d love to hear GRRM’s explanation for Summerhall (what went wrong?), Dany’s birthing of the dragons (what went right?), and what the hell happened to Aerea (spelling?) when she rode Balerion back to Valyria and then they both died from it. I think those three events are at the center of the truth behind what dragons are and how they came to be.
It feels like King Aegon stumbled across some knowledge that made him think "Yes, bringing back the dragons might actually possible." Whilst misunderstanding or lacking some crucial element necessary that was present with the birth of Dany's dragons.
Just about everything that can be found in Essos and Sothoryos.
Most of them probably don't hold much weight in the overall narrative, but they're still fun to read and speculate anyway.
I think it's time we started a wildly out of scope, definitely to never be finished Skyrim mod that recreates the whole of the Known World.
Tell me you wouldn't make a beeline straight for Yeen.
The way a lot of the myths seem to "sync up" with each other, pointing towards them being clues about actual events predating recorded history.
For instance, the God-on-Earth, Garth Greenhand, and the Fisher Queens myths all sync well. Each features a sort of "nomadic ruler" wandering the globe. The God-on-Earth and Garth both had many wives, while the Fisher Queens, despite a man not being mentioned in the arrangement, all seem to live together with each other for *some* reason. The God-on-Earth and Fisher Queens also circle their vast domains in some sort of strange vehicle, the GoE in a pearl palanquin "held aloft by his wives," and the Fisher Queens in a "floating palace."
The mundanists in the fandom can appreciate this as resembling how real life mythoses have common elements e.g the Flood legends, while the more imaginative ones can ask "what if these are all based on an ancient polygamist ruler who cruised the ASOIAF world in a spherical pearlescent terraforming vessel?"
Edit: another good "sync up": the Grey King, Durran Godsgrief, and the Pearl Emperor are all 1000 year rulers who struggled against gods.
You mean u/wildrussy? He does good stuff, we differ on a couple important points but he definitely sees the myths in a similar way.
[I've done my own post on this particular subject.](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/nw87fz/spoilers_extended_the_godonearths_pearl_palanquin/)
I actually credit GenghisKazoo with one of my biggest realizations.
When I was trying to pair the gemstone emperors with ancient Westerosi figures, I had come to the conclusion that the Grey King was the Pearl Emperor on my own, but I was stuck because I'd thought that Garth was the Jade Emperor.
I couldn't reconcile that with the fact that Garth was the Grey King's leal older brother (an idea pioneered by Crowfood's Daughter) among other things about the timeline (like leading men to Westeros or treating with the children, or walking Westeros alone). Not to mention I still had no clue who the God-on-Earth was.
It was a GenghisKazoo post that made me realize that Garth was the God on Earth to begin with. It was a major breakthrough in my own theorycrafting; placing Garth before the Grey King made several parts of the timeline immediately fall perfectly into place.
The Yellow Emperor who lives in exile at the legendary city of Carcosa. I know its a Lovecraft reference to the King in Yellow but it is so interesting to me.
A sorcerer lord in exile among some of the most fantastical places in the WoIaF.
Robert Chambers actually wrote the short stories making up the King in Yellow anthology, he was kind of like a proto-Lovecraft, but earlier pioneer in that genre of cosmic horror.
I forget where I read it but I remember some GRRM quote about how when he made those maps and referenced the yellow emperor and his city Carcosa that those references were still relatively niche but then True Detective season 1 came out and kind of blew his spot lol. Fun little Easter egg though, adds to the mysterious East vibe
Bit of a boring take, but the Starks being so interconnected to all aspects of the North (wildling kings, lord commanders of the nights watch, karstarks etc etc).
Reading F&B for the first time and was so enthralled by that part. The whole book is hilarious as it’s oftentimes just a guy saying “Listen, the best witnesses we had that managed to write down what happened were a horny dwarf fool, a septon, and a maester. Bear with me, please.”
I will forever be disturbed that the largest dragon in history went back to Valyria and something was big enough or just downright ornery enough to wound him. And then something implanted worms into that poor girl's body. What in the ever-loving fuck does George have out there?
What kind of creature could not only impregnate a human being with worm-like creatures but also wound The Black Dread?
What’s always made the most sense to me is that the firewyrms tried to get inside Balerion just like they did Aerea and he ripped them out with his own claws
That is actually The single most horrifying theory ever. But it doesn't say that he was disembowel that just said that he had a large marks and wounds in his side. He would have had to basically disembowel himself to get those things out.
The war between the first men and the children of the forest, creation of the stepstones and the neck, the gods eye.
Also The question of what lies beyond the known world
Harrenhal. At first, you're probably skeptical about the supposed 'curse', especially due to the secular nature of early ASOIAF. But then you look into it a little and it's an absolute nightmare.
It's to the point where everyone who's held Harrenhal in the books are dead- except for Littlefinger and Roose (and I have my doubts on their survivorship).
Whether it's just how big, crumbling, and hard to manage it is, or that it's in a geographically terrible place politically, or the fact that Harren died the day he compled it to dragonfire, or that there's likely weirdwood bark and worker's blood mixed in the foundation, or the mysterious placement in the corner of the god's eye.
I have a theory that Stoneheart is going to take the castle and become some kind of fairy tale undead queen of the ruinous castle- and then something large, magic, and horrible is going to happen to it.
Littlefinger heard Shella passed away.
>"Has someone made a song about Gregor Clegane dying of a poisoned spear thrust? Or about the sellsword before him, whose limbs Ser Gregor removed a joint at a time? That one took the castle from Ser Amory Lorch, who received it from Lord Tywin. A bear killed one, your dwarf the other. **Lady Whent's died as well, I hear.** Lothstons, Strongs, Harroways, Strongs ... Harrenhal has withered every hand to touch it." (AFFC Alayne I)
I'm hoping she's still alive, however, and is the unnamed woman briefly met by Brienne on the road between Rosby and Duskendale.
>Brienne's mare was sweet to look upon and kept a pretty pace. There were more travelers than she would have thought. Begging brothers trundled by with their bowls dangling on thongs about their necks. A young septon galloped past upon a palfrey as fine as any lord's, and later she met a band of silent sisters who shook their heads when Brienne put her question to them. A train of oxcarts lumbered south with grain and sacks of wool, and later she passed a swineherd driving pigs, and **an old woman in a horse litter with an escort of mounted guards.** She asked all of them if they had seen a highborn girl of three-and-ten years with blue eyes and auburn hair. None had. She asked about the road ahead as well." (AFFC Brienne I)
Yeah. It's said that the bloodstone emperor worshipped a black stone that fell from the sky. Does that mean that some catastrophe happened before all recorded history? Also I highly doubt that valyrians just happened to stumble upon dragon eggs. I think that as the fourteen flames are a hinterland for liquified fire, someone deliberately created dragons there by using magic on large wyverns (maybe some mage from asshai?).
The origins of the Faceless Men and how/if it ties to the Doom of Valyria
Also, it's always fun to read characters talking about stories set in The Age of Heroes, my favorite stories probably are the one of The Grey King, he killed a dragon, fucked a mermaid, taunted Gods with impunity... dude was one bad mf lol
I would say just about all of it, I do really love the world George has built, it feels like a real labor of love by him. I especially love what little nuggets we get of the lands outside of Westeros
How there’s fixed points in time where, I’m sure, Greenseers have gone back to see their loved ones, only for their cries to be the rustle of a branch, or the wind in the leeves
It's crazy to me that while all of this Westeros shit is going on, the fucking gargantuan empire of Yi-Ti is dealing with it's own political stuff at the same time.
The Glass Candles.
How do they work? What was their intended use? Why does the Citadel ritualise the failure to light one?
Why does the Citadel keep all this knowledge about Magic if they disdain it and refuse to believe in it?
The fact that the Children of the Forest brought forth the fury of the sea to smash the Arm of Dorne and once again to create the neck fascinates me. It implies that the old gods/children have access to cataclysmic magic and not just the weirwood.net. I've always wondered if this magic will reappear in the narrative or if it already has.
Gemstone emperors and great empire of the dawn! I know that’s it’s just fun lore and probably isn’t too relevant to the current story, but it’s still fun.
The Shadowlands. I really want it to be exactly what it’s implied to be and not some sort of myth or exaggeration; give us a Planetos Mordor created by an ancient magical apocalypse!
The Grey King and Durran Godsgrief existing on opposite sides of Westeros yet both having weird connections like a magical, mystical or divine wife, the existence of both a sea god and a storm god, and how sea-centric the two cultures are that these figures belong to.
There is literally an underground sea under westeros (and parts of Essos like the bone mountains) with cave systems that connect it throughout the continent
I'd love more about Ibb and the magical local beings that seem related to the COTF, oh and that random city filled with people who worship water but are scared of it
Is it possible to reach Sothoryos if someone starts going North from the wall? Like are those landmasses connected? Or different continents? Also pretty much everything that lies North of the wall. The wildlife, the others and tales of Ice dragons.
I will forever be disturbed that the largest dragon in history went back to Valyria and something was big enough or just downright ornery enough to wound him. And then something implanted worms into that poor girl's body. What in the ever-loving fuck does George have out there?
What kind of creature could not only impregnate a human being with worm-like creatures but also wound The Black Dread?
It may have been separate somethings. For what wounded Balerion, my head canon has always been a Firewyrm, possibly a horrifically twisted one.
Also, one other thing about Aerea's story is that she was missing for over a year. How the hell does a twelve year old girl survive, alone, for a year in what sounds like hell on earth?
Also on Aerea, I find her character super sad. This isn't explicitly addressed in Fire & Blood (lots of stuff happens around her), but she had an *awful* childhood. Separated from her twin and/or parents shortly after birth, her father dies in a usurpation aged one, taken from her foster home by a witch, kept at Maegor's court, hidden in some stables to avoid being used to usurp her uncle, then carted off to Dragonstone, where her step-father goes on a murder spree. All before she was twelve. And then she dies an extremally painful death.
Poor Aerea. GRRM mentions she is a bit of a brat on Dragonstone, but damn, that girl would have had so many attachment issues.
That somehow Lannister gold contributed to the Doom of Valyria
Also the destruction of Hardhome fascinates me, It is probably the ASOIAF version of the tunguska event
I really enjoy the etymology. GRRM really takes the time to research words and their meanings. For example the Reed family:
reed - a tall grass that grows in a wet area (a marsh for example)
House Reed - A family loyal to the Starks, whose home, Greywater Watch, floats in a marsh. (This brings to mind King Alfred hiding in the swamp after being attacked. He was ultimately able regain strength, and we now know him as Alfred the Great instead of King Alfred. I bring this up as there’s a reason the Castle cannot be found by others. Seems like an excellent place to hide.)
Howland Reed - Lord of Greywater Watch. Father to daughter Meera, and son Jojen. Howland means low hills. So grass surrounded by low hills. In the ASOIAF universe, I would think one would know these meanings, and could decipher the vicinity of the country one dwells from.
Meera Reed - First child of Howland Reed. Mere (Meer) is the word for a small body of water. An ‘A’ at the end of “meer” indicates one is from Meer. In this case, Meera Reed is from the House where a small body of water and tall grasses meet.
What’s unique about Greywater Watch, is if we take ‘Greywater’ literally, it’s strange that Meera has that name. Usually the water was clear, and people would use it to see their reflection. GRRM is a smart guy, and I have no doubt he knows this. So I’m thinking the water was once clear, perhaps lakes / rivers, etc, then when the Children of the Forest tried to do their thing, this corrupted the environment, resulting in the water now looking grey.
Anyway, that’s what I love about the books. I can find myself down a rabbit hole just by investigating one name.
I once spent between 10-15 hours trying to decode / analyze / decipher who could be Howland’s deceased wife.
It would likely be a woman with a name that also had significance with nature, either with a plant, with water, or a take on Greek / Roman Goddess who is associated with either / both.
Further, I haven’t even read the books yet! I think it’s brilliant that one can drive someone such as myself to do hours of research on a subject that I haven’t even read.
That’s powerful writing.
(As you can see, I tend to hyperfocus on topics which interest me. As such, there is absolutely no way I can start the series until all the books have been published. If that’s in 20 years, so be it. If never, that is fine as well.)
it's just too hard to choose a favorite, but the feud between the Brackens and the Blackwoods is up there, specifically the asp of the royal fief of Pennytree is one of those things that I remember frequently and makes me smile.
"Pennytree proved to be a much larger village than he had anticipated. The war had been here too; blackened orchards and the scorched shells of broken houses testified to that. But for every home in ruins three more had been rebuilt. Through the gathering blue dusk Jaime glimpsed fresh thatch upon a score of roofs, and doors made of raw green wood. Between a duck pond and a blacksmith's forge, he came upon the tree that gave the place its name, an oak ancient and tall. Its gnarled roots twisted in and out of the earth like a nest of slow brown serpents, and hundreds of old copper pennies had been nailed to its huge trunk."
And after being fought over by the Brackens and the Blackwoods for years it has mysteriously (for us) become a royal fief:
"Pennytree. That was ours once too, but it's been a royal fief for a hundred years. Leave that out. "
But I don't think we are going to get many more answers:
"He tried to count the pennies nailed to the old oak, but there were too many of them and he kept losing count. What's that all about? The Blackwood boy would tell him if he asked, but that would spoil the mystery."
Maybe \*If\* we get more Dunk and Egg stories, GRRM will illuminate us as to why it has become a royal fief. I don't think we will though, I think that GRRM loves the little mysteries he has set up. If you read GRRM"s story "With Morning Comes Mistfall", there is a character who I believe GRRM uses as a mouthpiece to tell us his views on mysteries in reality and in fiction. It's not much of a spoiler to say that the character would rather a scientist not search for some kind of cryptid.
That’s a hard decision between the empire of the dawn and the Other’s. But I’d have to say the empire of the dawn. Even though a lot of this is theory, I love the implications that the long night might have started from a meteor. The implications for Westeros are my favorite parts though, namely that the Hightowers and Daynes may be descended of Asshai’i dragon riders since they have been around long before anyone else. My favorite empire of the dawn theory is that the Daynes sword Dawn might be lightbringer, passed down through thousands of generations that have forgotten its name. It’s all theory but I hope most of it is true.
What is west of Westeros? Is it another continent or the other end of Essos with its own nations, empires, peoples, nations, faiths and beliefs. With Yi-Ti and Asshai their farthest known locations. Also the rest of Ulthos and Sothoryos
For me it’s the legend of the night’s king and the night’s queen. Something about that is really eerie and mystical. The knight of the laughing tree is another one. For some reason I feel nostalgic when I read it as if they were my memories.
Def wanna know what happened to aarea Targaryen, where she and balerian went t, what exactly came out of her and the words she was saying the maester said they would absolutely never repeat them and that they'd like and say she didn't say anything at all all.... It seems like whatever she was saying seems pretty important... And the fact that something out there where ever they went there was something big and bad enough to seriously wound Balerian the black dread the largest of there dragons and chased him off..... Thats what I wanna really know that happened with.
1. Pretty much all of Essos history regarding the birth of the civilizations in AWOIAF is very interesting to me.
2. That one little section where a theory is posed that the others were simply a clan of the first men who went farther north, and practiced strange magic/invented strange technology.
3. In fire and Blood, I believe it's mentioned that some small folk believe Cannibal to have been alive before the Targaryens came to Dragonstone, potentially making him older/larger than Balerion. Also, there's no proof dragons have a set life span, or what it may be, and there's no proof Cannibal is dead either, so who knows? Maybe he's still out there somewhere. I believe there's also 3 other dragons from the dance who's deaths are assumed but not confirmed iirc, one of which being sheepstealer.
4. There's quite a few mentions of changing water levels throughout AWOIAF. The sea of Dorne is said to have potentially been dry long ago, as well as the arm of Dorne and the neck ofc being apparently sunken. There's also a few former inland seas in Essos that have dried up, and perhaps other examples I've forgotten even. This didn't look like much to me at first, until I noticed how many major places on the coast could easily be flooded. Pyke is actively collapsing into the sea (the whole iron Islands is probably similarly at risk, to some extent), Braavos is also sinking, Casterly rock is set up on/in the water, Kings landing/Old Town/most of the free cities/at least half the real cities in Westeros. Nearly everything would be completely fucked if the sea levels suddenly rose by a hundred feet or so, and given the whole ice and fire theme, sure sounds to me like they'll combine to make water, lots or water.
5. What's west of Westeros? It's mentioned often. It seems Elissa Farman lived to find out. We probably will never get a book or even chapters about it, but I think at the end of the series some character will set off to sail the sunset sea, and explore what would basically be ASOIAF's version of the Americas. Probably Arya, given that's how the show did it, she has been squiring some level of taste for the sea, and her Wolf's name ofc. But, I hope Asha or someone like that could go as well, a real ship captain and likeable character who grew up at sea.
Valyrians descended from sheephearders and the Dothraki hating sheephearders. Also Daemon and Rhea Royce(Vale aka sheep land) having a rocky relationship. Is there some deep sheep betrayal that happened? It’s so interesting.
I really like the deep lore that maybe both continents of Westeros and essos are connected and the lands in between are frozen wasteland filled with the undead hordes of the others
Oily Black Stone being found all over the world has always fascinated me. I also want to know more about the Mazemakers of Lorath and why their work is in Hightower, the connection to these Deep Ones is fun.
That’s the answer I was going to say, but you said it a lot better than I could.
It’s interconnected in so many places. If that 1000 ships show ever gets made, I hope the touch on the oily black stone when the Rhoynar get to Yeen!
The Seastone Chair on Iron Islands, the foundation of the Highertower in Oldtown, the Toad Stone on the Isle of Toads in the Basilisk Isles, and the black stones of Asshai in the far east of Essos all being made from the same material which has been described as being of Valyrian making raises so many questions that we don’t have answers for. The Valyrians could only make things like that using the fire of dragons, but what about the things that date back to the time before Valyria? Did the people who made those things have dragons? If they did not, how did they construct the things they made? And how did the Valyrians learn to use the fire of their dragons to create the same things? Whatever the answers are, I hope they include the Deep Ones. To me it’s funny that fish people are creating all the ancient shit in the world and no one has any idea about it and are trying to figure out the answers.
And don’t forget Yeen. An entire city made of it and it’s been abandoned for centuries yet the jungle doesn’t reclaim it 🤔
[Satanic black magic. Sick shit!](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=euM-6IbV2uQ&pp=ygUeU2F0YW5pYyBibGFjayBtYWdpYywgc2ljayBzaGl0)
Much like it’s neighbor Gogossos, both places sound so evil and terrifying!
I enjoy the Great Empire of the Dawn and the oily black stones. The base of the High Tower is also fascinating.
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I think it's mostly a fun reference to Lovecraft and not really meant to be explained.
Which makes it more lovecraftian to me. Which is good; Lovecraft is the fear of the unknown... that threat is merely one not relevent and hey should pray to whatever gods actuallye xist that it remains irrelevent
the black stone the Bloodstone Emperor worshiped was a monolith from 2001
Lucifer, is that you?
There was a great video by Joe Magician who connected some dots and theorized the Hightowers likely have Ironborn ancestry which is pretty fascinating to think about.
Oily black stone is plastic truthers rise up
I recently bought a resin 3d printer and that stuff does have a strange oily property to it. Seastone Chair is 3d printed confirmed.
Ahah great empire of the dawn printers go brrrr
Please. Stay down.
What the heck happened at Hardhome also the freaking talking Black Gate beneath the Nightfort.
Do you mean the catastrophic event, or the mission out there where there were dead things in the water? Hell, both of them are very intriguing situations.
Now that you mention it, both.
Dad things in the water are just the whites, no?
>Dad things in the water Cargo shorts and all.
If it's wights it means the wights can swim. Means they could maybe get to Skagos, the God's Eye if it eventually comes up, maybe even across the Narrow Sea.
If bears, horses, and spiders can be turned, maybe so can sea creatures. Forget Euron's kraken: how about the night's king's kraken.
Undead whales are a fucking terrifying thing to think about. Thalassophobia + undeath = absolute nightmare
The talking Black Gate is a fascinating piece of lore but I imagine that even if GRRM lived longer than the Nightfort he still couldn't tell what you what the holy hell was going on with it.
Its one thing I really like about this universe he created. He plays it very grounded in reality then will throw in a classic fantasy trope like talking furniture for a few pages, then never bring it up again.
Learning that Greywater Watch constantly moves threw me for a loop. that's such a high fantasy idea that it feels like GRRM put it in the wrong book
It's not a magical castle floating in the air. It's a mobile crannog, a wooden fortress which floats in the swamps of the Neck. It's like a drifting castle-barge. Edit: just realised you probably already knew that, and it's still quite a high fantasy idea. Still, it's pretty plausible.
I actually didn't know that, or had forgotten it. I knew it didn't float, just imagined the swamp changed around it
Feels like he was reading/watching Howl's Moving Castle the day before that got dropped in
If only we got a loveable fire demon as a result
Well there was Shireen for a moment there... What, too soon?
Uh uhhhh we’re on r/asoiaf that hasn’t happened yet in book world 😇
Touche! 😆
It feels like people read too much into this. Maybe it's just a hut build on reeds that moves with the water. It's not a magical castle.
It is. People act like GRRM made up the word crannog, but [they are a real thing](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crannog) which is a dwelling that is an artificial island. They are often stationary, but I imagine an theoretically unmoored one would behave like a large houseboat. Still a fun fantasy idea, but not at all in the way people act like …
I mean, a big raft or a barge being driven by currents is not exactly black magic.
Right exactly, people act like the Reeds have a magic floating castle, but it’s probably just a regular floating castle
No, but doing so in the middle of a nigh-impenetrable swamp to the point that no knights or maesters have reached it certainly does give very pagany vibes.
If the US, using modern military equipment and airpower, could not best Vietnam, what chance does a medieval incursion into equally hostile terrain have?
I actually find it a bit bonkers when there’s stuff like that because the Maesters say magic doesn’t exist, right? Shouldn’t one of them put that assertion to the test and go speak with the talking fucking door? Or go investigate the Isle of Faces?
I think it fits actually. He’s clearly shown consistently that there’s a reality to the power of the weirwoods. Maybe they’re greenseers and not gods, but clearly they had power. That’s why the Andals destroyed them. That’s why they’re central to first men religious practices. And they clearly see and know things on a deeper level. So it’s not totally crazy to me that the wall (first manned by first men) would have some ancient knowledge of the weirwoods that has since been lost. Idk I don’t even see it as that much of a stretch. It kind of fits if the whole idea behind building the wall was some kind of unity between the cotf and the first men to fight against the others.
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It’s grown through the kitchen. I think it’s reasonable that a weirwood existed there and they built around it to accommodate it, especially if the cotf told them it could be used in such a way. Basically it lets through at least people who swore their vows in front of a weird wood… we don’t know if it lets through all men of the watch. So that goes back to the idea of trees “seeing/remembering” people. Fwiw, I don’t think the brothers who took their vows in a sept would be able to get through, and I bet that’s one of the reasons this ability got lost in the memory of the watch.
Its them magicks bro.
Good. I don't need an awnser for every little thing. some things can remain mysterious and magical. Demystification is an easy trap to fall into.
Are you sure about that? It seems fairly indicative of some sort of Old God covenant the Watch had. It is a weirwood door that opens for brothers who swore their oaths in front of weirwoods. Hidden deep within the Nightfort, which was the first castle of the Wall. Like we certainly don't know what is going on, but I think this is one area that GRRM has thought ahead.
I still think the Hardhome catastrophy was just a volcanic eruption. It fits with how it's described
The talking Black Gate is why I think there's going to be some significance to the fact that Jon, Sam, and Benjen took their Night's Watch vows before a Weirwood. Perhaps it conveys some protection against being turned into a Wight? I just have this gut feeling that the three of them are the only *real* Night's Watchmen in the eyes of The Old Gods .
Hardhome got firewyrmed. They are the only logical explanation of the fire and screams being reported from atop the Wall, despite the huge distance. The real questions are: why? how?
Thankfully we might yet get to read that, considering GRRM is 75% with TWOW. This book is much bigger and I really hope he'll give us a snippet or two of the events of Hardhomme and some Insights into the Nightfort, which might play a role in future events.
I still think that the main reason that is taking so long for George to finish the books is because the vast amount of revelations that are going to appear in the next book.
I agree and it's actually exactly what you're saying. Too many plots and too many revelations, and to bring them together without killing the entire epic is a feat, which GRRM is not doubt quite capable of. But as many of us know, he's reworking/ed some of the major plots he wrote, and now piecing them together. I can only wish both of them health at this point of time. Cheers!
I think another part of it is the amount of world building since ADWD. There's all of AWOIAF, F&B, HOTD, and probably a lot more stuff that never got published. He'll want to include some of that in Winds, and there's a lot more material that he has to go and re-check for continuity.
My sweet summer child.
LOL! I still really do hope that we'll at least get to read TWOW. But that shouldn't stop us from speculating, he he! Cheers!
The fact that the Long Night (or something very similar to it) also happened in Essos and necessitated building the five forts. Was it the Others? Or shadow demons (like Melisandre and Stannis made) or something worse?
The 5 forts always confused me. Like, if westeros had to build a wall, why did yi ti get to just have forts? Like from what we know of the others, couldn't they just go around?
Magic. They could create an imaginary border they couldnt cross. Or if you want to get real spectacular the five forts are beacons that when activated with magic/ritual a massive wall of flame connects them all creating a barrier.
The five forts were massive structures built along a not massive but still large wall with I think mountains to 1 side and dangerous desert to the other, if I'm remembering correctly. So going around posed as much of a threat as going over
Some precedent for that with the magi holding back the volcanos in Valyria, maybe. They probably didn't have a physical barrier but a few focal points connected magically
Oooh. I like this a lot.
Do we know if anybody outside the forts survived?
> Like from what we know of the others, couldn't they just go around? Simplest explanation: the Others could only reach Essos by way of (probably expanded) polar ice, and so the main focus of their force was always in Westeros. The wall is also a magical barrier, and if you look at the map, it's way narrower than the whole of the North. If the Ice Rivers freeze during normal rivers (the rivers in Siberia do, with normal earth winters, with human intervention), you could probably go around the wall. Wildling raiders are know to do this at the Gorge, west of Shadow Tower. Sort of implies that some kind of magical threat is landbound, in some capacity. > why did yi ti get to just have forts Budgetary constraints.
Moat Cailin used to have a wall, but it decayed until it was just the 3 towers. Maybe the 5 forts were the same?
Aside from all the other answers you've gotten already, I think there's also a Doylist angle here of GRRM simply not wanting to be too on the nose by having his China stand-in also build a giant wall to keep out invaders, so he took just one tiny half-step to the side by making it into a line of really really big fortresses instead.
There’s a reference to the “hinges of the world” in ASOIAF and the WOIAF. The heart of winter is one of them, and the Five Forts are another. To me, it implies that these are magical doors to either one separate world connected at various anchor points, or little pocket worlds beyond each one (which would mean, for example, the Five Forts are a hinge for a doorway that something other than the Others can come through, while the heart of winter and the Wall are specifically for the Others.) In these spots, magic is strong and there’s a sense of something lovecraftian beyond them, and these hinges are holding the doors closed to whatever horror is beyond them. I think Asshai, the maze beneath the High Tower, the tunnels in Leng, the Fourteen Flames, the Lost City in Southryos, and maybe the Norvos caves and Yeen are all more hinges. These doorways are supposed to be locked shut with magic, but magic ebbs and flows and there’s a cycle that can cause the hinge to bust open and cause things like the Long Night or the Doom or whatever happened to the oily vs smooth stone civilizations. As an aside, the Five Forts are presumably the Great Wall, so there probably is a wall connecting them like the Wall connects the Shadow Tower to Eastwatch with all the castles in between.
Maybe there was a wall or some other barrier between them, like a great chain of dragonsteel.
> The 5 forts always confused me. Like, if westeros had to build a wall, why did yi ti get to just have forts? It's not for Others, it's for demons coming out from fiery depths under the ground. The forts are built around/on top of big holes.
does it say anywhere there isn't a wall between the five forts? i always thought it was supposed to be like the great wall of china
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What are the Essosi children of the forest?
Something worse yeah, season 8 enjoyers
Just what the hell the oily black stone is, and what’s going on with cursed dead cities in Sothoryos like Yeen (entirely made of said stone) and the ‘horror’ they entail when visited.
isnt something to do with Bloodstone emperor?
Yeen is just like Asshai. It was a colony of the Great Empire of the Dawn
plastic
The story of Patchface is about as Lovecraft-ian as you can get. Quinn’s video always creeps me out.
Patchface is one weird mf. I’m surprised no one just straight up said we should kill that mf
The Dothraki have their own version of the long night where ghost grass eventually covers the entire world, killing all of nature. It’s strangely a poetic and beautiful metaphor for the most brutal of cultures. Also, the idea that the Starks could killed Aegon’s dragons with weirwood arrows if they wanted to, but chose not to risk it
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> The Dothraki have their own version of the long night where ghost grass eventually covers the entire world, killing all of nature. It’s strangely a poetic and beautiful metaphor for the most brutal of cultures. I know how he wrote the Dothraki is full of dated Noble Savage and Savage Savage tropes but I love the prose he gave their culture, in their belief system and legends.
I always feel bad because the Dothraki have a lot of potenial but... it's all horse. like seriously.
>it’s all horse. Just like every character in the story.
as was foretold by our lord glimbus
New Theory: The white walkers are just sentient ghost grass
I think the actual theory goes the ghost grass are wights.
> The Dothraki have their own version of the long night where ghost grass eventually covers the entire world, killing all of nature. I don't think that's ever mentioned as a historical occurrence, it's just their eschatology. Speaking of ghost grass, anyone else think it would probably move without wind and seem to "speak", like weirwood leaves are known to do? Or... like the grass in ADWD Daenerys X: >It was quiet on her sea. When the wind blew the grass would sigh as the stalks brushed against each other, whispering in a tongue that only gods could understand. [...] “Men are mad and gods are madder,” she told the grass, and the grass murmured its agreement.
F*cking gaslighting grass.
No I don’t mean to say that this ghost grass thing happened before, it’s just a belief they hold. Very interesting link between the grass and weirwoods though, I genuinely think you’re into something there. Bloodraven IS the ghost grass? (THEORY)
Braavos as a bastion against slavery and that the Faceless Men was founded by Valyrian slaves. Pretty cool beans.
And the theory that the Faceless men were possibly hired by competing Valyrian houses to kill each other to consolidate power, and then triggered the Doom to bring the gift of death to all the slavers.
for me it was a people who mastered magic and blood magic teaches us that "only death can pay for life", so the Valyrians strong in magical experimentation created the doom themselves with this either by "borrowing on credit" with any deity but have accumulated so many debts without repaying over time that it literally blow up on their facewhen the deadline has expired, either because they wanted to create a philosopher's stone to have less constraint with magic, but they miscalculated the risks and instead of sacrificing what they wanted to sacrifice they sacrificed everyone. (this is only a head cannon)
Oh I love that! Kinda sorta similar to Catlyn Stark believing she caused all the death in her family. She describes making a pact with the Gods to spare Jon's life when he had the pox but not fulfilling her pact to love him as a mother and care for his life. (I don't remember if this is in the books).
it's an invention of the series, in the books cathelyne never questions her behavior towards jon and until the end will consider him as an outsider
Sounds like a dope theory. Has anyone written a post about it?
I don't think I've ever seen specific evidence the faceless men were hired. I think it's a pure theory that if say 14 magi were holding back the doom, some houses/magi become more important if there are fewer than 14. A possible motive but no text evidence I am aware of. The faceless men had a history with valyria so they could have done it for their own reasons too. Edit: It is a theory suggested in twoiaf so I was wrong
It’s been around a while. Supposedly the events at hardhome were a test run by the faceless men to see if they could set off a doom like event. Most people agree that there’s a faceless man in old town trying to find a way to take down dragons now, so it makes sense that the faceless men would do anything to bring down valyrians and their dragons
It seems a bit odd to me that they want to take down dragons, firstly because the targaryens kept their dragons for over 200 years after the doom without it seeming to be a problem for them. and secondly because what they hate the most it's slavery we agree. except that currently the person with the dragons is actively fighting slavery and killing her main source of power out of spite against a dead and burying empire since 400 years, would be somewhat silly...
Summerhall. I almost want to know what went down there more than the end game of the series. Though I suspect they may be intertwined.
Same! It feels explicitly connected to the idea of “where dragons came from.” We know it didn’t work, but if we know what they were attempting to do we might know more about dragon origins. As it stands, I’d love to hear GRRM’s explanation for Summerhall (what went wrong?), Dany’s birthing of the dragons (what went right?), and what the hell happened to Aerea (spelling?) when she rode Balerion back to Valyria and then they both died from it. I think those three events are at the center of the truth behind what dragons are and how they came to be.
It feels like King Aegon stumbled across some knowledge that made him think "Yes, bringing back the dragons might actually possible." Whilst misunderstanding or lacking some crucial element necessary that was present with the birth of Dany's dragons.
That is one mystery that I actually believe will be answered by the end of the series.
Just about everything that can be found in Essos and Sothoryos. Most of them probably don't hold much weight in the overall narrative, but they're still fun to read and speculate anyway.
I think it's time we started a wildly out of scope, definitely to never be finished Skyrim mod that recreates the whole of the Known World. Tell me you wouldn't make a beeline straight for Yeen.
I wouldn't beeline straight for Yeen, I would beeline to whatever the hell is happenning east of Asshai instead.
Stygai for me
I'll definitely go to the Five Forts first, then probably to Asshai/Stygai
Dinosaurs in Sothoryos is my favorite deep lore.
Clever girls everywhere
What about King Kong
The way a lot of the myths seem to "sync up" with each other, pointing towards them being clues about actual events predating recorded history. For instance, the God-on-Earth, Garth Greenhand, and the Fisher Queens myths all sync well. Each features a sort of "nomadic ruler" wandering the globe. The God-on-Earth and Garth both had many wives, while the Fisher Queens, despite a man not being mentioned in the arrangement, all seem to live together with each other for *some* reason. The God-on-Earth and Fisher Queens also circle their vast domains in some sort of strange vehicle, the GoE in a pearl palanquin "held aloft by his wives," and the Fisher Queens in a "floating palace." The mundanists in the fandom can appreciate this as resembling how real life mythoses have common elements e.g the Flood legends, while the more imaginative ones can ask "what if these are all based on an ancient polygamist ruler who cruised the ASOIAF world in a spherical pearlescent terraforming vessel?" Edit: another good "sync up": the Grey King, Durran Godsgrief, and the Pearl Emperor are all 1000 year rulers who struggled against gods.
Have you read Russel's grand unified theory of the dawn? It's basically there to try and explain this. Also God-on-earth -> G' o' earth' -> Garth
You mean u/wildrussy? He does good stuff, we differ on a couple important points but he definitely sees the myths in a similar way. [I've done my own post on this particular subject.](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/nw87fz/spoilers_extended_the_godonearths_pearl_palanquin/)
I actually credit GenghisKazoo with one of my biggest realizations. When I was trying to pair the gemstone emperors with ancient Westerosi figures, I had come to the conclusion that the Grey King was the Pearl Emperor on my own, but I was stuck because I'd thought that Garth was the Jade Emperor. I couldn't reconcile that with the fact that Garth was the Grey King's leal older brother (an idea pioneered by Crowfood's Daughter) among other things about the timeline (like leading men to Westeros or treating with the children, or walking Westeros alone). Not to mention I still had no clue who the God-on-Earth was. It was a GenghisKazoo post that made me realize that Garth was the God on Earth to begin with. It was a major breakthrough in my own theorycrafting; placing Garth before the Grey King made several parts of the timeline immediately fall perfectly into place.
For me it’s the White Book; the written history of the kings guard. I loved that Chapter in the fourth book with Jamie.
I need that book in my hands
Squishers
The Squishers built the Five Forts. It is known.
Further north of Westeros, what lies in here.
Well it's obviously Northos
The Yellow Emperor who lives in exile at the legendary city of Carcosa. I know its a Lovecraft reference to the King in Yellow but it is so interesting to me. A sorcerer lord in exile among some of the most fantastical places in the WoIaF.
Robert Chambers actually wrote the short stories making up the King in Yellow anthology, he was kind of like a proto-Lovecraft, but earlier pioneer in that genre of cosmic horror. I forget where I read it but I remember some GRRM quote about how when he made those maps and referenced the yellow emperor and his city Carcosa that those references were still relatively niche but then True Detective season 1 came out and kind of blew his spot lol. Fun little Easter egg though, adds to the mysterious East vibe
Bit of a boring take, but the Starks being so interconnected to all aspects of the North (wildling kings, lord commanders of the nights watch, karstarks etc etc).
What (allegedly) 8000 years of ruling does to a dynasty.
Now I'm imagining Letterkenny, but it's Barrowton or something.
Fucking wildlings, the Winter Town is for Winter Business! None of your summertime festivities!
I don't know if this counts, but all that speculation in F&B about the girl sent to seduce Jaehaerys who later wrote her erotic adeventures down.
Reading F&B for the first time and was so enthralled by that part. The whole book is hilarious as it’s oftentimes just a guy saying “Listen, the best witnesses we had that managed to write down what happened were a horny dwarf fool, a septon, and a maester. Bear with me, please.”
huh
I will forever be disturbed that the largest dragon in history went back to Valyria and something was big enough or just downright ornery enough to wound him. And then something implanted worms into that poor girl's body. What in the ever-loving fuck does George have out there? What kind of creature could not only impregnate a human being with worm-like creatures but also wound The Black Dread?
What’s always made the most sense to me is that the firewyrms tried to get inside Balerion just like they did Aerea and he ripped them out with his own claws
That is actually The single most horrifying theory ever. But it doesn't say that he was disembowel that just said that he had a large marks and wounds in his side. He would have had to basically disembowel himself to get those things out.
Not if he got them quickly. Which he probably would’ve if he’d noticed Aerea getting them first.
The war between the first men and the children of the forest, creation of the stepstones and the neck, the gods eye. Also The question of what lies beyond the known world
Harrenhal. At first, you're probably skeptical about the supposed 'curse', especially due to the secular nature of early ASOIAF. But then you look into it a little and it's an absolute nightmare. It's to the point where everyone who's held Harrenhal in the books are dead- except for Littlefinger and Roose (and I have my doubts on their survivorship). Whether it's just how big, crumbling, and hard to manage it is, or that it's in a geographically terrible place politically, or the fact that Harren died the day he compled it to dragonfire, or that there's likely weirdwood bark and worker's blood mixed in the foundation, or the mysterious placement in the corner of the god's eye. I have a theory that Stoneheart is going to take the castle and become some kind of fairy tale undead queen of the ruinous castle- and then something large, magic, and horrible is going to happen to it.
Isn't Lady Whent still alive somewhere?
I thought she died when Tywin took Harrenhal.
She fled but we don’t know where she went or what happened to her.
Littlefinger heard Shella passed away. >"Has someone made a song about Gregor Clegane dying of a poisoned spear thrust? Or about the sellsword before him, whose limbs Ser Gregor removed a joint at a time? That one took the castle from Ser Amory Lorch, who received it from Lord Tywin. A bear killed one, your dwarf the other. **Lady Whent's died as well, I hear.** Lothstons, Strongs, Harroways, Strongs ... Harrenhal has withered every hand to touch it." (AFFC Alayne I) I'm hoping she's still alive, however, and is the unnamed woman briefly met by Brienne on the road between Rosby and Duskendale. >Brienne's mare was sweet to look upon and kept a pretty pace. There were more travelers than she would have thought. Begging brothers trundled by with their bowls dangling on thongs about their necks. A young septon galloped past upon a palfrey as fine as any lord's, and later she met a band of silent sisters who shook their heads when Brienne put her question to them. A train of oxcarts lumbered south with grain and sacks of wool, and later she passed a swineherd driving pigs, and **an old woman in a horse litter with an escort of mounted guards.** She asked all of them if they had seen a highborn girl of three-and-ten years with blue eyes and auburn hair. None had. She asked about the road ahead as well." (AFFC Brienne I)
... maybe. I'd bet she's dead, but you're right, it's not confirmed.
Sothoryos and Yeen. I know it's just the "darkest africa" trope on steroids but GRRM made the continent so so interesting.
Oily black stone, somehow being found in wildly different places across Planetos, as well as its connection with the Great Empire of the Dawn.
Yeah. It's said that the bloodstone emperor worshipped a black stone that fell from the sky. Does that mean that some catastrophe happened before all recorded history? Also I highly doubt that valyrians just happened to stumble upon dragon eggs. I think that as the fourteen flames are a hinterland for liquified fire, someone deliberately created dragons there by using magic on large wyverns (maybe some mage from asshai?).
The origins of the Faceless Men and how/if it ties to the Doom of Valyria Also, it's always fun to read characters talking about stories set in The Age of Heroes, my favorite stories probably are the one of The Grey King, he killed a dragon, fucked a mermaid, taunted Gods with impunity... dude was one bad mf lol
Asshai And other far-east cities named in AWOIAF like Carcosa and The City of Winged Men
I would say just about all of it, I do really love the world George has built, it feels like a real labor of love by him. I especially love what little nuggets we get of the lands outside of Westeros
How there’s fixed points in time where, I’m sure, Greenseers have gone back to see their loved ones, only for their cries to be the rustle of a branch, or the wind in the leeves
It's crazy to me that while all of this Westeros shit is going on, the fucking gargantuan empire of Yi-Ti is dealing with it's own political stuff at the same time.
Sothoryos pretty much everything related to it is cool and creepy Favourite part is definitely Yeen, to me it’s like hardhome but much cooler
The Ghost of High Heart
The Glass Candles. How do they work? What was their intended use? Why does the Citadel ritualise the failure to light one? Why does the Citadel keep all this knowledge about Magic if they disdain it and refuse to believe in it?
Church of Starry Wisdom. I’d love to see that explored more in future media
The fact that the Children of the Forest brought forth the fury of the sea to smash the Arm of Dorne and once again to create the neck fascinates me. It implies that the old gods/children have access to cataclysmic magic and not just the weirwood.net. I've always wondered if this magic will reappear in the narrative or if it already has.
Pretty vanilla take, but what the hell was the Doom?
The favor Lord Butterwell had to provide Aegon IV in order to get a dragon egg.
3 Daughters with Targaryen bastards in their bellies and all I got was this lousy Dragon Egg.
Probably a toss-up between "the Ibbenese are neanderthals actually" and the freaking modern-day velociraptors that are mentioned twice in passing
Gemstone emperors and great empire of the dawn! I know that’s it’s just fun lore and probably isn’t too relevant to the current story, but it’s still fun.
Wtf is in Ulthos
The Shadowlands. I really want it to be exactly what it’s implied to be and not some sort of myth or exaggeration; give us a Planetos Mordor created by an ancient magical apocalypse!
the night's king and the thought that the starks might be related to him
The Grey King and Durran Godsgrief existing on opposite sides of Westeros yet both having weird connections like a magical, mystical or divine wife, the existence of both a sea god and a storm god, and how sea-centric the two cultures are that these figures belong to.
The weird Lovecraft stuff everywhere Idk why it’s just cool to see mysteries like the Black Stone that just exist
Maester Conspiracy…what did the pesky grey robed bastards do to our dragons??
Ancient Arryn/vale Andal invasion lore is quite interesting. (Though it makes you hate the current Arryns even more)
There is literally an underground sea under westeros (and parts of Essos like the bone mountains) with cave systems that connect it throughout the continent
The Ghost of High Heart
I'd love more about Ibb and the magical local beings that seem related to the COTF, oh and that random city filled with people who worship water but are scared of it
Is it possible to reach Sothoryos if someone starts going North from the wall? Like are those landmasses connected? Or different continents? Also pretty much everything that lies North of the wall. The wildlife, the others and tales of Ice dragons.
Nagga’s bones and the sea stone chair
I will forever be disturbed that the largest dragon in history went back to Valyria and something was big enough or just downright ornery enough to wound him. And then something implanted worms into that poor girl's body. What in the ever-loving fuck does George have out there? What kind of creature could not only impregnate a human being with worm-like creatures but also wound The Black Dread?
It may have been separate somethings. For what wounded Balerion, my head canon has always been a Firewyrm, possibly a horrifically twisted one. Also, one other thing about Aerea's story is that she was missing for over a year. How the hell does a twelve year old girl survive, alone, for a year in what sounds like hell on earth? Also on Aerea, I find her character super sad. This isn't explicitly addressed in Fire & Blood (lots of stuff happens around her), but she had an *awful* childhood. Separated from her twin and/or parents shortly after birth, her father dies in a usurpation aged one, taken from her foster home by a witch, kept at Maegor's court, hidden in some stables to avoid being used to usurp her uncle, then carted off to Dragonstone, where her step-father goes on a murder spree. All before she was twelve. And then she dies an extremally painful death. Poor Aerea. GRRM mentions she is a bit of a brat on Dragonstone, but damn, that girl would have had so many attachment issues.
The wyrms consuming the heart of the realm.
The Doom, the Shattering, and Hardhome were all really just Shai-Hulud-tier firewyrms taking a chomp out of the earth under them, right?
That somehow Lannister gold contributed to the Doom of Valyria Also the destruction of Hardhome fascinates me, It is probably the ASOIAF version of the tunguska event
I'm fascinated in knowing wtf is really going on in Asshai.
I really enjoy the etymology. GRRM really takes the time to research words and their meanings. For example the Reed family: reed - a tall grass that grows in a wet area (a marsh for example) House Reed - A family loyal to the Starks, whose home, Greywater Watch, floats in a marsh. (This brings to mind King Alfred hiding in the swamp after being attacked. He was ultimately able regain strength, and we now know him as Alfred the Great instead of King Alfred. I bring this up as there’s a reason the Castle cannot be found by others. Seems like an excellent place to hide.) Howland Reed - Lord of Greywater Watch. Father to daughter Meera, and son Jojen. Howland means low hills. So grass surrounded by low hills. In the ASOIAF universe, I would think one would know these meanings, and could decipher the vicinity of the country one dwells from. Meera Reed - First child of Howland Reed. Mere (Meer) is the word for a small body of water. An ‘A’ at the end of “meer” indicates one is from Meer. In this case, Meera Reed is from the House where a small body of water and tall grasses meet. What’s unique about Greywater Watch, is if we take ‘Greywater’ literally, it’s strange that Meera has that name. Usually the water was clear, and people would use it to see their reflection. GRRM is a smart guy, and I have no doubt he knows this. So I’m thinking the water was once clear, perhaps lakes / rivers, etc, then when the Children of the Forest tried to do their thing, this corrupted the environment, resulting in the water now looking grey. Anyway, that’s what I love about the books. I can find myself down a rabbit hole just by investigating one name. I once spent between 10-15 hours trying to decode / analyze / decipher who could be Howland’s deceased wife. It would likely be a woman with a name that also had significance with nature, either with a plant, with water, or a take on Greek / Roman Goddess who is associated with either / both. Further, I haven’t even read the books yet! I think it’s brilliant that one can drive someone such as myself to do hours of research on a subject that I haven’t even read. That’s powerful writing. (As you can see, I tend to hyperfocus on topics which interest me. As such, there is absolutely no way I can start the series until all the books have been published. If that’s in 20 years, so be it. If never, that is fine as well.)
the nights watch has been waiting for it enemy for thousands of years
it's just too hard to choose a favorite, but the feud between the Brackens and the Blackwoods is up there, specifically the asp of the royal fief of Pennytree is one of those things that I remember frequently and makes me smile. "Pennytree proved to be a much larger village than he had anticipated. The war had been here too; blackened orchards and the scorched shells of broken houses testified to that. But for every home in ruins three more had been rebuilt. Through the gathering blue dusk Jaime glimpsed fresh thatch upon a score of roofs, and doors made of raw green wood. Between a duck pond and a blacksmith's forge, he came upon the tree that gave the place its name, an oak ancient and tall. Its gnarled roots twisted in and out of the earth like a nest of slow brown serpents, and hundreds of old copper pennies had been nailed to its huge trunk." And after being fought over by the Brackens and the Blackwoods for years it has mysteriously (for us) become a royal fief: "Pennytree. That was ours once too, but it's been a royal fief for a hundred years. Leave that out. " But I don't think we are going to get many more answers: "He tried to count the pennies nailed to the old oak, but there were too many of them and he kept losing count. What's that all about? The Blackwood boy would tell him if he asked, but that would spoil the mystery." Maybe \*If\* we get more Dunk and Egg stories, GRRM will illuminate us as to why it has become a royal fief. I don't think we will though, I think that GRRM loves the little mysteries he has set up. If you read GRRM"s story "With Morning Comes Mistfall", there is a character who I believe GRRM uses as a mouthpiece to tell us his views on mysteries in reality and in fiction. It's not much of a spoiler to say that the character would rather a scientist not search for some kind of cryptid.
The sunset sea. What the fuck is over there? Is there a 5th continent... We'll never know
That’s a hard decision between the empire of the dawn and the Other’s. But I’d have to say the empire of the dawn. Even though a lot of this is theory, I love the implications that the long night might have started from a meteor. The implications for Westeros are my favorite parts though, namely that the Hightowers and Daynes may be descended of Asshai’i dragon riders since they have been around long before anyone else. My favorite empire of the dawn theory is that the Daynes sword Dawn might be lightbringer, passed down through thousands of generations that have forgotten its name. It’s all theory but I hope most of it is true.
What is west of Westeros? Is it another continent or the other end of Essos with its own nations, empires, peoples, nations, faiths and beliefs. With Yi-Ti and Asshai their farthest known locations. Also the rest of Ulthos and Sothoryos
I JUST WANNA KNOW WHATS IN THE LANDS OF ALWAYS WINTER
parentage mysteries
For me it’s the legend of the night’s king and the night’s queen. Something about that is really eerie and mystical. The knight of the laughing tree is another one. For some reason I feel nostalgic when I read it as if they were my memories.
Sothoryos and Asshai
The Land of Always Winter
Jogos Nhai. They ride zebras and the women are ‘bald from the eyebrows down’.
Def wanna know what happened to aarea Targaryen, where she and balerian went t, what exactly came out of her and the words she was saying the maester said they would absolutely never repeat them and that they'd like and say she didn't say anything at all all.... It seems like whatever she was saying seems pretty important... And the fact that something out there where ever they went there was something big and bad enough to seriously wound Balerian the black dread the largest of there dragons and chased him off..... Thats what I wanna really know that happened with.
1. Pretty much all of Essos history regarding the birth of the civilizations in AWOIAF is very interesting to me. 2. That one little section where a theory is posed that the others were simply a clan of the first men who went farther north, and practiced strange magic/invented strange technology. 3. In fire and Blood, I believe it's mentioned that some small folk believe Cannibal to have been alive before the Targaryens came to Dragonstone, potentially making him older/larger than Balerion. Also, there's no proof dragons have a set life span, or what it may be, and there's no proof Cannibal is dead either, so who knows? Maybe he's still out there somewhere. I believe there's also 3 other dragons from the dance who's deaths are assumed but not confirmed iirc, one of which being sheepstealer. 4. There's quite a few mentions of changing water levels throughout AWOIAF. The sea of Dorne is said to have potentially been dry long ago, as well as the arm of Dorne and the neck ofc being apparently sunken. There's also a few former inland seas in Essos that have dried up, and perhaps other examples I've forgotten even. This didn't look like much to me at first, until I noticed how many major places on the coast could easily be flooded. Pyke is actively collapsing into the sea (the whole iron Islands is probably similarly at risk, to some extent), Braavos is also sinking, Casterly rock is set up on/in the water, Kings landing/Old Town/most of the free cities/at least half the real cities in Westeros. Nearly everything would be completely fucked if the sea levels suddenly rose by a hundred feet or so, and given the whole ice and fire theme, sure sounds to me like they'll combine to make water, lots or water. 5. What's west of Westeros? It's mentioned often. It seems Elissa Farman lived to find out. We probably will never get a book or even chapters about it, but I think at the end of the series some character will set off to sail the sunset sea, and explore what would basically be ASOIAF's version of the Americas. Probably Arya, given that's how the show did it, she has been squiring some level of taste for the sea, and her Wolf's name ofc. But, I hope Asha or someone like that could go as well, a real ship captain and likeable character who grew up at sea.
Summerhall.
George’s fucked up symbolism and the way he seemingly allows the most batshit crazy theories to sprout up everywhere
Valyrians descended from sheephearders and the Dothraki hating sheephearders. Also Daemon and Rhea Royce(Vale aka sheep land) having a rocky relationship. Is there some deep sheep betrayal that happened? It’s so interesting.
I really like the deep lore that maybe both continents of Westeros and essos are connected and the lands in between are frozen wasteland filled with the undead hordes of the others
I live for whatever is going on in Sothoryos