“And my father? Who does he have spying on me?”
This time the eunuch laughed aloud. “Why, me, my lord.”
Synopsis: Tyrion meets with Varys (yay!) and then with Shae (boooo!).
SPOILER WARNING: This chapter analysis, and all following, will contain spoilers for all Song of Ice and Fire novels and Game of Thrones episodes. Caveat lector.
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Well, I think your question hits on the difficulty of the term “modernize.” The Valyrians absolutely saw themselves as a modernizing, civilizing force, bringing literacy, public works, commerce, freedom of religion, and republican government to the less civilized ends of the earth. I’m sure that during the Freehold, the proudest boast one could make was “dāero valyrio iksan.” (not sure about the Valyrian there, but hey, you get what you pay for…) But to the slaves toiling underneath the Fourteen Flames, they were anything but modernizing.
So if Jojenpaste is a theory I understand even though I think it’s unlikely, this one just baffles me to no end. Cersei has no motivation whatsoever to bear Robert’s child, and the text from AGOT to AFFC makes it clear she didn’t:
“Your Robert got me with child once,” she said, her voice thick with contempt. “My brother found a woman to cleanse me. He never knew. If truth be told, I can scarcely bear for him to touch me, and I have not let him inside me for years. I know other ways to pleasure him, when he leaves his whores long enough to stagger up to my bedchamber. Whatever we do, the king is usually so drunk that he’s forgotten it all by the next morning.”
Whilst you snored, I would lick your sons off my face and fingers one by one, all those pale sticky princes. You claimed your rights, my lord, but in the darkness I would eat your heirs.
Also, I mean, she’s the Queen. Pulling off assignations with Jaime is tricky enough. Carrying a pregnancy to term in secrecy is simply not possible.
“He asked me questions is all, m’lord.”
“What sort of questions?”
The boy shrugged. “How was I, and was I well treated, and if I liked the work, and stuff about my mother. Who she was and what she looked like and all.”
“What did you tell him?” Ned asked.
The boy shoved a fresh fall of black hair off his forehead. “She died when I was little. She had yellow hair, and sometimes she used to sing to me, I remember. She worked in an alehouse.”
So it’s not just Cersei acting completely out of character based on both dialogue and inner monologue, it’s not just the complete logistical absurdity of the Queen hiding a pregnancy to term, this theory involves the complete erasure of another person.
Now, there are some people who willingly misinterpret the detail about the hair color to argue that this woman was Cersei in disguise, when it is blindingly obvious that it’s just one more piece of evidence for the “seed is strong”/Baratheon dominant hair color gene. This is even more logistically insane: it’s impossible enough for Cersei to hide a pregnancy to term; how the hell is she going to sneak away from the Red Keep to be a single mother to Gendry and hold down a low-wage service sector job?
But what really irritates me about this theory is that (as best as I can recall) it only came about because of that stupid added scene from Game of Thrones Season 1 where Cersei decides to tell Catelyn about a made-up black haired baby. So I blame Benioff and Weiss for this one.
I think it’s possible to recognize that Rhaenrya was a victim of sexism while recognizing that she was also a brutal tyrant. And as with Cersei, I think we can say that Rhaenrya was a victim of the patriarchy but also someone who responded to her treatment by lashing out at everyone around her, especially those below her. Calling for the assassination of Nettles isn’t exactly an act of solidarity.
But I do want to push back on something that seems to be suggested by your question: I don’t see the Storming of the Dragonpit, by which term I meant the smallfolk uprising in King’s Landing against *both* Rhaenrya and Aegon III, as motivated by gender bias. Rather, it was motivated by the fact that Rhaenrya was a dragonrider, and dragons had been murdering smallfolk by the tens of thousands from Rook’s Rest down to Tumbleton. For further evidence of this, consider the willingness of the smallfolk of King’s Landing to follow the gender-egalitarian decrees of “King” Gaemon Palehair.
Hey folks! So Tyrion II’s up to 3200 words, and finally coming along after a few rather tricky parts where I was stuck for a while. So forward momentum again! In the meantime, I’ve got some rather good stuff on the Tumblrs: Why were swords so culturally important in medieval Europe? My advice to Bloodraven. Part II Part III Pre-unification currency headcanons. Where are Starpike, Dunstonbury, and…
As I understand it, it’s similar to the difference between the first face of power (the coercive authority to achieve compliance) and the second and third (agenda-setting and hegemonic ideological power) faces of power. Namely, that a strong king’s authority is so secure that they don’t need to engage in displays of coercive authority because everyone already accepts them as the true source of legitimacy.
What he’s really talking about is Aerys. Aerys was paranoid and insecure, so he kept lashing out with displays meant to emphasize his kingship – burning people alive, having people’s tongues torn out, etc. The effect was the opposite, to make him seem like a weak, mad king who didn’t deserve to be on the Iron Throne.
Contrast Aerys to Jaehaerys I – a king so secure that he doesn’t need to make open displays of force to get what he wants. All he has to do is show up on a royal progress with all of his dragons and his force of personality and his expert administrators and people knuckle under because they already believe resistance is futile.
I have noticed that I think there is, if anything, an overabundance of cynicism towards Westerosi politics, which is to an extent understandable and to an extent a barrier to understanding the people involved. Unless they’re a POV character in the novels, I think there’s a real tendency to view everything through a lens of naked, selfish, calculated power politics. Everyone is out for number one, everyone’s motives are suspect.
And that just isn’t true. In a feudal system, as Steve keeps saying because it is true, all politics are personal, and that means that personal character and beliefs are going to play a big role. There are people not named “Eddard Stark” or “Daenerys Targaryen” or “Davos Seaworth” who are genuinely good people who believe in the social contract and system of reciprocal debts and obligations they’re bound up in, and will work very hard not to just uphold that system but to improve it. They might not think about it that way; I don’t think very many people in Westeros have the same sophisticated, conscious understanding of their politics that someone like Steven or, in-setting, Varys and Littlefinger do.
Wyman Manderly has never behaved as anything less than upright. The only people he’s played false are the Frey’s and the Bolton’s, and let’s be real here: he doesn’t have much of a choice. If he’d gone all Eddard and refused to be party to deception and betrayal from within and regarded his sworn word to be loyal if his son was returned as a binding, legitimate oath the North would be fucked right now. Everything we’ve seen indicates that he’s a good dude. Sometimes people are just good dudes. That happens.
Here’s the thing about our good friend Wyman Manderly: he believes in doing well by doing good and vice-versa. He’s always going to be there for the Starks, and he’d never be so crude to demand to be compensated first…he’s not a Frey after all. Instead, he steps forward as the good vassal in times of need, and then he comes forward with all kinds of helpful suggestions about how he can be even more helpful if he was given all kinds of new offices. And it’s understood that, just as it would be crude to demand payment in advance, it would be rude to deny such a loyal vassal such a minor favor…
But here’s the thing – he’s not lying about any of it, because he doesn’t have to. Of course the royal customs officers who were in place before the War of Five Kings aren’t going to support a rebellion against the Iron Throne, so they need to be replaced. And I’m sure the people who replaced them were loyal to Robb Stark, because Wyman Manderly would have made sure of it. Likewise, establishing a mint or a royal navy are absolutely in Robb Stark’s best interests – but they’re also going to rebound to Wyman Manderly’s benefit by boosting White Harbor’s economy and military power.
Where things get trickier is the Hornwood Question and what happens when Wyman starts conflating what’s good for House Manderly and what’s good for the North. On the one hand, Wyman was perfectly happy to play the normal Northern political game when it came to the Hornwood lands. But when Ramsay broke the rules and it didn’t look like Rodrik was going to do anything, Wyman didn’t hesitate to occupy the Hornwood lands “for their own protection.” And that’s the kind of thing that can be politically destabilizing, and you get the sense that, as with Garth Greybeard, the Manderlys were not entirely innocent when it came to their feud with the Peakes.
But…and this is important, they’re still mostly constructive, and as long as their liege lord maintains a firm hand, giving them enough of a return on their good work without giving away the shop, and making sure that the rewards get spread around liberally and the Manderlys are made to play nicely with the others so that jealousy doesn’t give way to feud, they’re a credit to their kingdom.
But when Ramsay broke the rules and it didn’t look like Rodrik was going
to do anything, Wyman didn’t hesitate to occupy the Hornwood lands “for
their own protection.”
I’m not sure Wyman looks as good in that specific situation as he’s being made out to be; my understanding of that timeline is that Rodrik didn’t have time to decide what he was going to do re: events in the east. Ramsay moved on the Hornwood lands, Manderly gets wind of it before Winterfell because of distance and geography, and while he informs Winterfell of what he’s doing he does not waitto see how they respond; he goes in hard after Ramsay before Winterfell could, logistically, even have had a chance to do so. That’s bad form.
But that said… Wyman Manderly is a difficult position, because he has his own lands to protect and a responsibility to his own people. It can be argued that he should have waited for either permission from his liege lord or for the Bolton’s to actually enter his sphere of influence before acting… but standing on the defensive is a great way to find yourself outmaneuvered and destroyed, and Manderly has to be thinking “if the Dreadfort is willing to seize the Hornwood lands they must think they have the means to make good on that somehow. If I wait, I might find an army marching into my own lands, killing my people and driving them from their homes.”
It’s not entirely unreasonable for him to move on the Hornwood lands first in that situation. If it turns out he’s pre-empting Winterfell, it is nothing an apology can’t fix; no harm, no fall. He’ll withdraw peacefully and be full of genuine, fulsome regret. If it turns out he’s right, he’s arranging for the upcoming conflict to take place well away from his own people and own lands.
Agreed. I don’t want to paint Wyman’s actions wrt to the Hornwood lands as underhanded or malicious. He’s following his imperatives in feudal politics and Rodrik is kind of out to lunch and Ramsay is a really bad actor who can’t be dealt with normally.
It’s more that I’m saying, if that kiind of action becomes a pattern, that’s how you get the situation in the Reach under Garth Greybeard even if everyone involved is well-intentioned.
Here’s the thing about our good friend Wyman Manderly: he believes in doing well by doing good and vice-versa. He’s always going to be there for the Starks, and he’d never be so crude to demand to be compensated first…he’s not a Frey after all. Instead, he steps forward as the good vassal in times of need, and then he comes forward with all kinds of helpful suggestions about how he can be even more helpful if he was given all kinds of new offices. And it’s understood that, just as it would be crude to demand payment in advance, it would be rude to deny such a loyal vassal such a minor favor…
But here’s the thing – he’s not lying about any of it, because he doesn’t have to. Of course the royal customs officers who were in place before the War of Five Kings aren’t going to support a rebellion against the Iron Throne, so they need to be replaced. And I’m sure the people who replaced them were loyal to Robb Stark, because Wyman Manderly would have made sure of it. Likewise, establishing a mint or a royal navy are absolutely in Robb Stark’s best interests – but they’re also going to rebound to Wyman Manderly’s benefit by boosting White Harbor’s economy and military power.
Where things get trickier is the Hornwood Question and what happens when Wyman starts conflating what’s good for House Manderly and what’s good for the North. On the one hand, Wyman was perfectly happy to play the normal Northern political game when it came to the Hornwood lands. But when Ramsay broke the rules and it didn’t look like Rodrik was going to do anything, Wyman didn’t hesitate to occupy the Hornwood lands “for their own protection.” And that’s the kind of thing that can be politically destabilizing, and you get the sense that, as with Garth Greybeard, the Manderlys were not entirely innocent when it came to their feud with the Peakes.
But…and this is important, they’re still mostly constructive, and as long as their liege lord maintains a firm hand, giving them enough of a return on their good work without giving away the shop, and making sure that the rewards get spread around liberally and the Manderlys are made to play nicely with the others so that jealousy doesn’t give way to feud, they’re a credit to their kingdom.
Wyman Manderly had a great booming laugh. It was small wonder he could not sit a saddle; he looked as if he outweighed most horses. As windy as he was vast, he began by asking Winterfell to confirm the new customs officers he had appointed for White Harbor. The old ones had been holding back silver for King’s Landing rather than paying it over to the new King in the North. “King Robb needs his own coinage as well,” he declared, “and White Harbor is the very place to mint it.” He offered to take charge of the matter, as it please the king, and went from that to speak of how he had strengthened the port’s defenses, detailing the cost of every improvement.
In addition to a mint, Lord Manderly also proposed to build Robb a warfleet. “We have had no strength at sea for hundreds of years, since Brandon the Burner put the torch to his father’s ships. Grant me the gold and within the year I will float you sufficient galleys to take Dragonstone and King’s Landing both.”
…I would lean heavily towards the former. The customs officers serve the King in the North, and the king has the power to confirm them or not, but Wyman gets to appoint them (although he might have to pay for them as quid-pro-quo). Likewise, I’d assume that Wyman pays for the mint, gets to appoint the officials, Robb confirms them and keeps the right of seignorage, etc.
So with the fleet, I would imagine that, especially if Robb is paying for them with royal funds as Wyman suggests, it’s a royal navy based out of White Harbor. Which means that there will be lots of offices and sinecures in this new royal navy for Manderlys and Manderly vassals, as per usual subject to the king’s approval.
To answer your last question…it’s tricky. Under the normal rules of feudalism, military capabilities were limited by the terms of the feudal agreement – you get so much land, you agree to raise so many men, the number of men per unit of land is fairly standardized – and it was hard to alter that, because the vassals’ vassals know their rights in law and get pretty litigious about it.
It’s really more when you get to what’s known as “bastard feudalism” that things start to go off the rails. Under bastard feudalism, instead of relying on those feudal agreements to raise soldiers, you convert military service obligations into taxes paid in cash and then use the cash to put fighting men on the payroll, who wear your livery and are counted as members of your “affinity.”
So now you have a system where noblemen can raise and maintain private military forces above and beyond their feudal rights – and the only limit to how many of these guys you have on the payroll is your ability to make payroll on the first of the month.
That’s what leads to “over-mighty vassals” starting private wars and making themselves extremely difficult to govern by their liege lords, because they might have more military manpower than their overlords. And that’s what eventually brings down heavy regulation where vassals did indeed need legal permission to have any military power whatsoever.
Unless you’re dealing with a situation where you want to trade up a riverrine network where ships with deeper drafts can’t go (or if you’re trying to set up a smuggling network where you can’t dock in a normal port and need to beach and then ship out in a hurry) no there is no advantage whatsoever.
Longships aren’t that suited to trade – they’re very small vessels with very limited holds so you can’t carry very much, only one sail as opposed to two or three, they’re very low to the water so rough seas run some pretty serious risks of swamping, etc.
By contrast, your galleys, galleases, cogs, carracks, etc. are much better suited to trade: they’re much bigger so that they can hold more per trip (which leads to economies of scale), they have multiple sails in addition to often having more oars so they’ll generally be faster than longships (which people often get backwards), they’re higher out of the water so they can deal with rough seas more easily, etc.
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