If the dragons truly were poisoned by the maesters, is it possibly that Aegon III may have supported them in this? He was said to have been terrified of the dragons, and after the civil war that left him an orphan, I can see him viewing the dragons as a cause for destruction.

I doubt it. Aegon III might have personally been afraid of dragons, but he understood that dracocracy had been the foundation of his House from the beginning.

All the evidence we have points to Aegon going to some lengths to bring them back:

“Did we learn nothing…from the nine mages?”

“Nine mages crossed the sea to hatch Aegon the Third’s cache of eggs. Baelor the Blessed prayed over his for half a year. Aegon the Fourth built dragons of wood and iron. Aerion Brightflame drank wildfire to transform himself. The mages failed, King Baelor’s prayers went unanswered, the wooden dragons burned, and Prince Aerion died screaming.“

“Yet together, Aegon and Viserys ably dealt with the remaining turmoil in the realm…they even attempted to restore the Targaryen dragons, despite Aegon’s fears—for which none could blame him after witnessing his mother being eaten alive. He dreaded the sight of dragons—and had even less desire to ride upon one—but he was convinced that they would cow those who sought to oppose him. At Viserys’s suggestion, he sent away for nine mages from Essos, attempting to use their arts to kindle a clutch of eggs. This proved both a debacle and a failure.”

For me, it works much better for Aegon to be genuine in those efforts – it’s the politically smart thing to do, as without dragons the Targaryens were doomed to diminishment; narratively, it’s a great case of the human heart at war with itself. Aegon steeled himself to overcome his worst nightmare for the good of his family, and still failed. No wonder they called him the Broken.

Why do you think the lords of the Vale arte so poor?!

I think there’s a couple reasons:

there’s a sharp division between the lords of the Vale proper and the lords of the Fingers and the islands. The former have all the rich farmland and arable land of the valley, whereas the latter have less and poorer soil that’s much more mountainous. So there’s a lot of inequality within the nobility: consider the difference between Petyr Baelish’s father and the Royces of Runestone, for example.
the lords of the Vale are traditionalists, even more than most. They don’t act in a profit-maximizing fashion, they concentrate on agriculture rather than trade (hence why Gulltown is so small), and they would never think of economic development (hence why the mineral resources of the mountains haven’t been tapped into as in the Westerlands).
when you get down to it, the Vale is not that big. It’s quite fertile, but it’s not as big as the Reach and it’s not going to grow any time soon. This means that the Vale can’t expand its economy easily just by bringing new land under the plow (because all the land that can be grown on already has been) or by increasing the number of hands in a field (because that threatens overpopulation).

Steven Xue Asks: Do lords normally sell food right before winter?

I did a reread of the Alynne spoiler chapter and I find the way the lords of the Vale are trying to sell off their gain reserves and doing it so eagerly as lord Grafton says “the lords are eager to sell” very baffling because winter is fast approaching. I find this really bizarre because I’ve always been under the impression that before the 19^th century, people had a tendency to stock up on food supplies before winter to ensure they had enough food to last the winter months.

In Westeros where winter can last for many years, I would have thought that right now the conservation of food would be considered a huge prerogative for both the nobility and the smallfolk (who should know that winter is just right around the corner). I suppose these lords are just trying to make a quick buck while the going is good, but even from a monetary standpoint it doesn’t make a lot of sense as Littlefinger points out that when winter is in full swing, he will then be able to sell their grain back to them at a higher rate.

With all this in mind I’m just wondering if it makes any sense at all for the lords of the Vale to be selling off their grain reserves right before winter and did this actually happen in real life?

I would disagree with “winter is fast approaching.” Autumn may be lingering in the fields of the Vale, but Jaime has seen snow falling in the Riverlands, which means winter is here.

And the lords of the Vale want to sell their food now because that’s what they (and the Reach) have historically done: exported their surplus so that the rest of Westeros can eat. While they’ll make a substantial profit due to higher prices – which is a significant source of their wealth and power – they wouldn’t dream of holding back supply from the market to maximize profit.

That would violate the honor code of noblesse oblige, their reciprocal obligation to their smallfolk. It would be precisely the kind of selfish and materialist action that marks one out as a merchant rather than a nobleman, who acts in a disinterested fashion.

What Littlefinger is doing is known as “Engrossing, forestalling and regrating.” He’s withholding goods from market and buying up other supplies to resell later, with the intended purpose of raising prices. And historically, this kind of monopolistic behavior was considered highly illegal, because creating artificial scarcities threatened social disorder (bread riots).

Shouldn’t the Lannisters try to become a naval power given their wealth and proximity to the Iron Islands?

They have some naval power – 25 warships isn’t nothing. And at times they have had more: there was the extended war with the Iron Islands during the Famine Winter over the mutilation of Lelia Lannister, there was Gerold Lannister’s raid of the Iron Islands to take his hundred hostages, Tommen II’s great golden fleet lost in Valyria, Tommen I’s fleet which he used to bring Fair Isle into the Kingdom of the Rock.

But something happened at some point to moderate the Lannisters’ naval ambitions, and led them to discourage Fair Isle from maintaining a navy of its own despite the Ironborn threat. Not sure what that was; it’s possible that, after the Conquest, the Lannisters thought they didn’t need a navy since they could call upon the Royal Fleet.

Help me solve a dispute- do the secondary lords pay taxes to their Lord Paramount lieges?

It’s not entirely clear how taxation interacts with the process of subinfeudation, and it’s not helped by the fact that when we see lords interacting with their vassals, it’s almost always between immediate vassals.

The only clue I can think of is that the Redwynes have to pay excise taxes on wine to the Crown despite being vassals of the Tyrells. That may suggest that lords pay taxes both to their immediate liege lord and that lord’s liege lord, or that the Redwynes are a special case because they are directly exporting goods to foreign countries on a scale that most vassals wouldn’t.

Would you say that High Heart is a possible “thin place”, knowing what happened their? “When [the Singers] died, they went into the wood, into leaf and limb and root, and the trees remembered.” (DwD Bran III). RSAFan

Maybe a mini-one? After all, that is where Erreg became known as a kinslayer, so something had to go down there.

The thing about thin places is that it’s not just a place of supernatural power, it’s a concentration of human suffering. Hence why I would say that a place like Winterfell is NOT a thin place. Nor is the Isle of Faces, or similar places. They are places of power yes, but that power derives from sources other than human suffering.

I think it’s surprising that Maidenpool is considered part of the riverlands, when given the history of House Mooton it was amongst the first to realise the power of the dragons and swear fealty to Aegon. Wouldn’t it make more sense for the Iron Throne to want it in the Crownlands, for their own coffers, to act as a strong northern defence on the border of royal lands, and to act as a counter-weight to Duskendale (re: second port status)?

I don’t find it that surprising. Maidenpool has been part of the Riverlands for thousands and thousands of years before the Targaryens ever arrived in Westeros. And the Mootons only swore fealty after having been beaten on the field and having their lord slain in battle, so it wasn’t painless.

As to why it wasn’t included in the Crownlands…well, Aegon had already considerably extended the Crownlands by incorporating a good chunk of the northern Stormlands, and that had a deleterious long-term effect of weakening the Stormlands vis-a-vis Dorne and other potential threats. Taking Maidenpool from the Riverlands would significantly diminish an already-weak province, leading to greater problems in the future.

Also, he just didn’t need it. Aegon’s policy and that of his successors, was to boost King’s Landing as a port at the expense of Duskendale. Why include another potential competitor port?

How common historically were secret treaties like the marriage pact for Viserys and Arianne? It makes sense that you would want a heavy hitter with at least a veneer of impartiality as witness for an agreement like this (thus the Sealord rather than some random clerk from the Iron Bank), but were witnesses more likely to be strictly impartial, or were they usually involved to some degree? Thank you!

Secret treaties were absolutely commonplace for much of recorded history – hence why it was such a big deal when Woodrow Wilson put banning them as one of the first of his Fourteen Points during WWI . According to Chad Khal, there were no less than 593 such treaties made between 1521 and 2004.

As for witnesses, that’s a bit more unusual. In no small part because they were so common, states just treated them like normal treaties, requiring only the signatures of the parties involved. You’d hardly want a lot of witnesses to a secret treaty, lest you compromise the treaty’s secrecy.

Hi! Couple of questions: what does a steward actually do, and what were the real-world equivalents of maesters and Hands of the the King?

A steward is the chief servant of an estate: they are responsible for the condition of the buildings, the productivity of the land, whether the taxes are being paid, and at least in the early period, they were also in charge of the household and thus managed all the staff.

However, the term can also be used to describe more illustrious offices: in the UK, the Lord Steward is one of the highest-ranking officials of the royal household and historically both carried out normal stewardly duties (for the king, mind you) and carried messages between King and Parliament and swore in new members of Parliament; the Lord High Steward is one of the Great Officers of State, outranking even the Lord Chancellor, responsible for bearing the crown during coronations, historically responsible for trials of peers in the Lords, and attached to the Earldom of Leicester since the 12th century.

In Holland, Norway, Denmark, etc. the etymologically equivalent term – statholder – referred to an official appointed by a feudal lord (more often king) to govern part of their estate, essentially a royal governor.

In the real world, the closest thing to maesters were university-educated priests, who were among the literate elite and thus invaluable in running both secular and church bureaucracies. There isn’t exactly a Hand of the King analogue, because historically no one gave out that many powers and authorities to just one man. The Hand is like the entire Privy Council rolled up into one.

So do you now believe that Euron DID go to Valyria? If so what is the relevance of Rodrik calling him out at the Shields?

poorquentyn:

racefortheironthrone:

Yeah, pretty much. At this point, the evidence is pretty substantial.

I don’t know about Rodrik Harlaw – that part still confuses me. Any thoughts @poorquentyn?

I’ve had to reconsider this m’self, because as seriously as I take Euron, I didn’t actually think he’d been to Valyria…until the armor. And I’m willing to bet that was deliberate on GRRM’s part–he’s out to undercut and rattle us with Euron at every turn. As @boiledleather put it in the recent relevant BLAH installment, Euron levels up with every appearance and mention, and our understanding of him is supposed to evolve accordingly.

So here’s what I got atm: his reaction to the Reader in “The Reaver” isn’t about being called on a lie. After all, back in his introductory scene in Vic’s feast tent, he couldn’t have cared less about Asha calling him on his bullshit RE Balon’s death, or Damphair calling him on his bullshit RE the pirate suit. Why? Because those subjects don’t actually matter to Euron; they’re means to an end. Valyria, though, matters to him, because that is his end. So Euron’s blue-hued smile vanishing upon hearing “have you?” so softly (such a perfectly written moment!) isn’t about his public image being endangered. It’s about his self-conception as the self-made heir of the One True Empire (or rather, heir to its Doom). In other words, mock the pirate suit all you want, but don’t you dare mock the monster wearing it.

Of course, it could also just be because Euron doesn’t really know how to handle the Reader, especially compared to the heinous alacrity with which he plays his brothers like so many fiddles.

Bit of a tinfoil theory which I don’t think much of because it kind of lets Euron off the hook…(b/c maybe demonic possession?)

But Valyria and the surrounding seas are called demon-haunted. And from Varys et al., we know that demons are quite real in ASOIAF, and are interested in conducting rituals with humans.

Maybe Euron freaked out because someone with Rodrik’s book-smarts might guess what he’s about if it became clear that he set foot on demon-haunted Valyria and met its inhabitants? (and maybe struck a deal?)