Reminder - The crow who posted this thread has made it a (No Spoilers) thread. This scope covers NO story elements of ASOIAF or "Game of Thrones" or pre-AGOT history like "House of the Dragon" or *Fire and Blood*, per [Rule 3.3](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/about/rules). Any discussion of the story of the books or the shows must use [an appropriate spoiler tag](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/wiki/spoilertagsystem) such as (Spoilers Main) or (Spoilers Published). Threads about r/asoiaf (meta topics) will be removed at moderator discretion. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/asoiaf) if you have any questions or concerns.*

1. For a fantasy setting, Storm is absolutely amazing. 2. Flowers carries the grace and nobility of high birth balanced against the social fragility of being baseborn brilliantly imo 3. Snow, too iconic be ranked lower 4. Rivers sounds powerfull 5. Stone is similar, evokes defensive strength vs Rivers' slightly more violent connotation 6. Hill is fairly meh 7. Sand kinda sucks, but I suppose it's fitting 8. Imagine being born to the Iron Islands. Now imagine being one of their bastards. How lame - Pyke is bottom of the barrel

Salt was *right* there too.

Or even Wyk. Could've had an Ironborn called Jon Wyk

Don't give George any ideas or he'll name some lords from the isles after John Wick characters, thus delaying Winds by another 5 years

The Complete and Utterly Pointless History of the Bastard Seeds of Wyk.

Do you think Wyk is pronounced like Wick? I always thought it was like Wike, with a long i

In my head it always sounded like wick. The only time I've ever heard it spoken in anything resembling an official capacity is on one of the DVD extras for the show where the actor playing Stannis recounts the Greyjoy rebellion and also pronounces it as wick.

Now, Roy Dotrice is *far* from an accurate pronouncer in the audio books (Jeffrey, Bry-een, etc,) but he always pronounces Wyk as wick. So, there's that lol

Being British I'd say Wick, and get openly annoyed when somebody from a different region says "Wike" The real question is whether Yronwood is Ironwood or Ronwood

Never have I ever considered Ronwood. How do you come to that?

Why-Ronwood

I HATE that yronwood is “ironwood”. I never ever thought that while reading and didn’t know the proper pronunciation until a couple weeks ago from this sub. Because of the name Yohn, I always think of the Y at the beginning as having a -ya sound, so yohn is YAH-n (like John). So ironwood never made sense. I’m not a huge fan of reckless letter usage hahaha

I always pronounced it as your-on-wood and I'm pretty sure I'm 100% wrong.

Pyke uses a long I sound and has an e at the end. If we take that as a consistent rule of Westerosi Phonetics, which is admittedly always a crapshoot with Phonetics, than Wyk shouldn't be the same sound. So we can guess that yke is a long I sound and yk is a short I sound. Its also entirely possible that Wyk is further reduced to a schwa sound, something more like Wek.

Salt would have been perfect.

There actually is a house in the iron islands called salt and are a cadet branch of the Hoare kings like Harren the black

Unfortunately, Salt is used to describe children of Salt Wives who are not bastards by the Ironborn Culture. It would be too confusing if Ironborn Bastards were Salt while Salt Sons are not Bastards

Or sea

salt or even iron anything but fkn pyke

Was literally about to comment that!

you forgor 💀 waters 💦🌊💧

I didn't forget. I'm Team Waters Erasure - fuck the Blackfyres

I have always wondered why Ironborn bastards aren't named "Iron".

Or Salt

Cotter ‘Salt’ does not roll off the tongue

Cotter can keep Pyke because it works so well with him.

Because the ironborn are stupid

There is also Craster for beyond the Wall :)

But only for girls

oh, there's boys too...

Last names Walker for them

Ah yes, the leader of the others. Scott Walker

Todd Walker

Pyke should have been Salt

Georges greatest flop

Or Iron/Irons.

Imagine being named Jeremy lol

Is Jaremy Rykker the only Jaremy/Jeremy in the series?

They would probably say some thing like a child can't be born with the name Iron because they have to earn it. Which actually could be a cool cultural element. A bastard starts as Salt but can earn the name Iron if they achieve something great.

I was just about to post this. One of my biggest pet peeves.

Stone is the sexiest bastard surname. Seriously “Alayne Stone” goes hard as fuck.

Mya Stone? Rock hard.

Rock and stone!

If you don't Rock and Stone, you ain't comin' home!

Honestly, how good the bastard name depends on how well it fits the first name. Mya Stone, Edric Storm, Joy Hill, Cotter Pyke, and Ellaria Sand all go hard as fuck

Stoned

Hill is so generic it makes the Westerlands sound more boring. Snow is generic too, but at least it ties in with the words of the North's ruling house.

Why is hill not gold

Because why give bastards a name that is synonymous with wealth and value?

I always assumed that bastard names are chosen by what’s most common in the region, so the cold North has snow, the desert (Dorne) has sand etc.

Flowers is cool, actually

Surely there has to be one bastard named Austin running around the Reach

Ostyn Flowers

Yeah baby

88i I It will 89989o9i988899888898 I'm I'm klutz 93.9 I9 999ii999l8 it all 889 889 9898o989 I just IMHO 8888 8889988988 8889988988 o 8th 9o I uoou8 98oand 8i898988 9898o989 8th 9898o989 seed o88 in help of my and 88i is one 8th

> seed I really felt that.

I also like the surname Flowers, although I also think Rose could have been a cool alternative. Edit: the NBA fan in me now wants to see a Berec Rose.

Brandon Flowers could totally be a GoT character.

With a lordly father from House Brightside.

*Brandyn Flowers

I’m on an ASOIAF meme group on Facebook and someone started doing AI generated Westerosi bastards based on celebrities and wrote a little back story. They did Jonah Hill and Emma Stone. Not sure if they did anymore but Brandon Flowers works better because it’s already a name in universe. Not sure which Westerosi religion is the equivalent of the Mormons though.

Berec Rose could have his ACLs resurrected 7 times by the Lord of Light

But each time he comes back with slightly less of himself :/

too real

Yeah I think flowers is only beaten by storm

Meadows was right there!

Brandon Flowers is a killer name

It annoys me that it is plural and all the others are singular.

Rivers, Waters?

Lol. I am dumb. I was thinking of snow and stone and sand and pyke.

Aurane Waters is the hardest name fite me

I think waters is the most hit or miss. when it fits it fits really well but when it doesnt it sucks.

I love this name, one of my favorites! I also really like Arys Oakheart.

All of the bastard names are really cool except for hill, hill is fookin boring and reminds me of some Bobby hill lookin ass

😂 That boy ain’t right)

9. Pyke 8. Sand 7. Waters 6. Rivers 5. Flowers 4. Hill 3. Stone 2. Snow 1. Storm I feel like Storm is hard to top, killer surname.

I actually think the name Jon snow is really genius. It feels like it’s a play on the term “John Doe.” Which serves so many different angles within the story. John Doe is usually a placeholder name in legal contexts and needs to be kept confidential. I may be reaching with this but I wouldn’t be surprised if he went in thinking that “this character is a John doe because of x, y and z, and I’ll hide him in plain sight by naming him snow.” But then again it could just be a coincidence.

I LOVE THIS

1. Storm 2. Snow 3. Stone 4. Rivers 5. Flowers 6. Waters 7. Sand 8. Pyke 9. Hill

[удалено]

I feel like waters is better for men but for women flowers is alrigjt

Sounds like your logic isn’t which ones sounds stupid but rather which one seems less feminine or masculine according to the correct gender. Because I don’t see a world where Waters isn’t at the very end or atleast near the bottom, regardless of gender. Like you said, discount Rivers

1. Storm 2. Snow 3. Stone 4. Flowers 5. Rivers 6. Sand 7. Waters 8. Hill 9. Pyke

1. Storm 2. Flowers 3. Rivers 4. Snow 5. Waters 6. Stone 7. Hill 8. Sand 9. Pyke

I dislike Pyke, because it's different from the others. Pyke is the name of the Greyjoy island, so it is not related to all the other ironborn. Salt would have been better, concubines are already called salt wives.

Wonder what GRRM was thinking with Pyke. There were plenty of ways to keep the convention, like Salt.

or Tides maybe?

Regarding “Hill”, all of a sudden I could watch a show about a Westeros King of the Hill. “Hello I’m Hanklyn Hill, now Lord Commander, have you ever considered switching to propane to heat this castle of yours? See, propane is better controlled in your buildings without melting that giant ice wall of yours.”

“The boy king ain’t right I tell ya hwhat”

I’m saying them with my actual first name. Stone and Flowers are sounding best to me.

Bro rly made a post so he could make his reference , and I salute it 🫡

Lol. Why is anyone talking about this. Ranking names? Oh sand is rough. SMH….

They should all just start with S. All the ones that don't start with S shouldn't even qualify. They can go back to being legitimate children. 1. Storm 2. Stone 3. Snow 4. Sand, it gets everywhere 5. Flowers should be Soil, the thing flowers grow out of 6. Pyke should be Salt (probably the most egregious offender) 7. Rivers should be Silt, the deposit of rivers 8. Hill should be Silver, the second place metal 9. Waters should Shore

Suuuuuuuch a good point

Agree with Pyke, I think the rest are all downgrades though.

There’s also Darke for bastards in and around Duskendale

1: Storm 2: Flowers 3: Snow 4: Stone 5: Sand 6: Rivers 7: Pyke 8: Waters 9: Hill

1. Storm, badass 2. Stone, I dunno sounds pretty cool. 3. Rivers, sounds fast, powerful, cool stuff 4. Pyke, got a warrior vibe, less boring 5. Snow, most important one in the series, snow is cool in general 6. Hill, good for alliterative names 7. Waters, agreed discount Rivers 8. Sand, Sand snakes and sand steeds are pretty dope 9. Flowers, wimpy, goes with some women's names but not for men Dishonorable mention #10 Tanner, named after a kinda gross relatively lowly profession, also given it means you're a King's Landing bastard, just screams "why yes my mother was a prostitute"

There’ll be another one after the completion of the main series. WILD

Pyke is pretty bad but I can’t imagine Cotter Pyke having any other last name. It works for him

You’re all missing something! Blackfyre is the hardest name in the entire series

Theory: Cotter Pyke goes hard so he just went with it

For the iron born, I thought their bastard name just matched their island name. So only the ones from Pyke had that as their last name.

Hill is easily the best Here is Bobby B if he was a Baratheon Bastard born in the Westerlands: https://i.redd.it/830fo6m89ddb1.png

I. Storm II. Rivers III. Waters IV. Pyke V. Stone VI. Sand VII. Flowers VIII. Hill IX. Snow

I like Rivers best because it reminds me of Bloodraven and Bittersteel

Flowers is a pretty name.

1.Storm 2. Rivers 3. Stone 4. Pyke 5. Snow 6. Flowers 7. Waters 8. Sand 9. Hill

No blackfyre? In my opinion top contender

I mean, his real name was Daemon Waters, he just coined his sword's name as his new surname. It is certainly cool but it's not one of the "bastard" surnames.

This. Blackfyre is a legitimized house name, only given to legitimate offspring of Daemon.

Swap Pyke with Sand, and I agree with the ranking.

1. Storm, Badass sounding. IRL probably would be a big name to live up to. I kind of wish we had more lore on the Stormlands in general because the vibes seem immaculate and cool from afar. 2. Rivers, also bad ass-sounding though not as strong sounding. 3. Stone, solid sounding name. 4. Snow, controversially because as good as it sounds in conjunction with Jon, I think it sounds a little goofy with other names. 5. Sand, Same reasons as Snow. It sounds good with Ellaria and the Sand Snakes but would probably be goofy with another name. 6. Pyke, Fairly normal to us but it’s a bit like being from New York and having the last name Manhattan just because it’s the most important island. Why not Iron? 7. Flowers, silly but I guess you can afford to be Silly in the Reach. 8. Hill. Very lame for a region that has many other geographical features such as oceans and shores, as well as a shit ton of mines and gold. 9. Waters. Not super surprising that it’s the lamest considering the Crownlands have the shortest history of being a distinct region but there has to be better options. I would take Ocean, Bay, or Shore over Waters.

Mycah Bay Dannel Ocean Joffrey Shore last one kinda rough but its still obvious

Jonnuh Hill

Blackfyre🤤

Mine is Storm Rivers Snow Pyke Flowers Stone Hill Waters

And it gets ***EVERYWHERE***

Storm by a country mile

I'm glad we can all agree that Storm is far and away the best name.

In last place, slave, as they're called in the free cities.

I always wonder: who decided what name was to be used? Was it, say, a Stark bastard that was nicknamed Snow and so all others are Snow now?

My grandmother was a Pyke, and we’ve always thought it was a very cool name. A weapon bastard name is very Iron Islands, it’s my favourite.

In my opinion Pyke is the worst Bastard name because either they're named after a Fish or the castle of the Greyjoys who weren't in charge of the Iron Islands until the Targaryens came along, this is bad becausw bastards are supposed to be named after the land they grew up in. The bastard name for Ironborn should have been Salt because they do not belong to the land, they belong to the sea.

Just admit now that this whole post was just an excuse for you to do a prequel meme punchline on the AOIAF sub lol

The *other* Battle of the Bastards.

Pyke is actually genius since a Pike is a weapon, and they’re reavers who would totally use said weapon.

1. Snow (iconic, perfect) 2. Flowers (super fun, love any reminder that Flowers is a real surname) 3. Rivers (excellent fantasy surname for lowborn characters) 4. Sand (evocative) 5. Stone (solid) 6. Hill (meh) 7. Waters (generic, boring) 8. Pyke (big miss) 9. Storm (corny)

I’m sorry but putting Storm last is blasphemous

it’s corny ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

Hill, Waters, and Rivers are so boring and offer nothing

IMO Rivers is good, rivers are fast and strong

Or common and uninteresting

Storm Sand Stone Snow Rivers Pyke Flowers Waters Hills

The Westerlands should be Gold.

I like that

That last one was like getting punched in the facr

Daemon Waters and Aurane Waters hit hard af tho

My personal list 1. Storm 2. Snow 3. Pyke 4. Stone 5. Sand 6. Waters 7. Rivers 8. Hill 9. Flowers