How powerful are the Mallisters? I mean, they hold the entire west coast of the riverlands and are bound to be the shield against the iron islands, so they should have some big fleet and also fast response cavalry in enough numbers to deal with any raids and invasions. Also, do you think Seagard is a trading port, cause i for sure wouldnt go trade there if i had to pass right through the ironborn to make any deal. How do you think that works for the people around Seagard and the Mallisters?

That’s a tough one.

We don’t have much in the way of hard textual evidence, and the Riverlands in general are really tricky because they underperform in power given their population and relative prosperity. What we know is that A. the Mallisters have a fleet of six longships and two war galleys (which is not a large fleet, but not a small one either), and B. were able to hold off the main force of the Ironborn during Greyjoy’s Rebellion.

I did an estimate in the past and said that I thought 4,000-5,000 was a reasonable figure. It’s not the most solid estimate I’ve ever done, for the reasons stated above, but I don’t think they’re particularly weaker than the Freys, given their geostrategic location, its economic advantages in trade (to the extent that the Freys are wealthy, most of their trade has to pass through Seagard), and the historical evidence.

As to Seagard itself. It definitely is a port – Theon sails to Pyke from Seagard on a merchant ship from Oldtown – although it’s definitely a port town at most. As for why it has trade despite the Ironborn presence, keep in mind Ironborn piracy has lapsed for long periods of time (several thousand years), and that the presence of pirates tends to presuppose trade since pirates don’t bother to sail where there’s no one to rob, because often geography means that ships have to sail through a given region no matter what. (Think about the real world example of huge amounts of shipping going through certain pirate-infamous locations like the Caribbean or the South China Sea or the Horn of Africa….)

In this case, if you’re going to trade from the North, the Vale, or the Riverlands to the Westerlands or from the Westerlands and even parts of the Reach to the same, it’s faster to go through Seagard and trans-ship down the Blue Fork or portage over to the Kingsroad and then over to White Harbor than to sail all the way around the continent or to take it overland. Not safer, but faster, and since time literally is money when you’re talking about transportation costs and their relationship to profit margins, a lot of folks will go with the faster option.

What is the likely number for Knights in each of the main regions ? We know either North or the Iron Islands have the least… and Reach the highest.. but what would the numbers be around ?

WARNING: A HISTORIAN IS DOING MATH.

So back in the day, I tried to figure this out by working out the ratio of cavalry to foot in the armies where we have good figures. Here’s what we know:

Taking Robb’s army at the Twins as our example, we see that 27% of the North’s army was cavalry (6 out of 22k) and 73% was infantry. (You can even go pre-Twins to cancel out the effect of the Freys, as 500 was 10% of the Stark cavalry, meaning that Robb had 5,000 cavalry and 13,000 infantry when he arrived at the Twins).
Combining Tywin and Jaime’s armies together, we see that the Lannisters had ~10,500 cavalry out of a total Lannister force of 35,000, which gives us a ratio of 30%.
Renly’s army at Bitterbridge was 80,000 strong and 20,000 of them were cavalry, which gives us a ratio of 25%. This is part of what started to make me suspicious about Renly’s numbers, because the Reach being the center of chivalry should have a higher percentage than the North, and even if we took 25% as our figure, should have more than 20,000 by itself, and then you have the Stormlands, which should have at least 6,000 cavalry by itself. This is why I’ve come to suspect that a lot of the Reacher lords and Stormlords did not answer the call (at least a third, depending on how much credence you put on Renly’s claim to have 10,000 at Highgarden) and that Renly was, characteristically, overstating his support when talking with Catelyn and Stannis.

So I would put the ratio of cavalry to infantry at ~27-30%. This would suggest that the numbers look like this:

The North: 9,450-10,500.
The Vale: 8,000-10,000.*
The Westerlands: 12,000-13,500.
The Crownlands: 4,000-4,500.
The Riverlands: 5,400-6,000.
The Reach: 27,000-30,000.
The Stormlands: 6,750-7,500.
Dorne:
6,750-7,500.
Ironborn: none.*

* – The Vale might be a special case, in that its army is described pretty much always as just “the knights of the Vale.” So it’s possible they have a higher ratio than normal, which would explain why all these noble houses are in debt. Likewise, the Ironborn have almost no cavalry due to the vagaries of geography, although things were different back when they ruled the Riverlands.

Now, granted, not all cavalry are knights. Northern heavy cavalry are essentially knights when it comes to social class, equipment, training, etc.

even if most of them aren’t given the title.

Squires aren’t knights, but they do fight as knights do on the battlefield, many if not most of them will become knights or are of the social class who become knights. But what about the people who don’t fit that mold?

If we look at Tywin’s army at the Green Fork, we can get a decent picture of how many are which:

The right wing was all cavalry, some four thousand men, heavy with the weight of their armor. More than three quarters of the knights were there, massed together like a great steel fist. Ser Addam Marbrand had the command…

This wing too was all cavalry, but where the right was a mailed fist of knights and heavy lancers, the vanguard was made up of the sweepings of the west: mounted archers in leather jerkins, a swarming mass of undisciplined freeriders and sellswords, fieldhands on plow horses armed with scythes and their fathers’ rusted swords, half-trained boys from the stews of Lannisport … and Tyrion and his mountain clansmen.

So Marbrand’s 4,000 men make up more than 75% of the Westerlander chivalry, which means that Tywin has around 5,333 knights out of 7,500 cavalry – making knights ~70% of his cavalry. If we extrapolate the same percentage across all of Westeros, we would see something like:

The North: 6,615- 7,350 “sworn swords.”
The Vale: 5,600-7,000.*
The Westerlands: 8,400-9,450.
The Crownlands: 2,800-3,150.
The Riverlands: 3,780-4,200.
The Reach: 18,900-21,000.
The Stormlands: 4,725-5,250.
Dorne: 4,725-5,250.
Ironborn: none.*

how strong exactly is the reach at full power? i know that its considerably stronger than the other kingdoms, but nothing ive seen from the franchise seem to suggest that the reach alone is capable of raising 100k men all by itself which some fans seems to believe. its at least 60k as proven during the war of the five kings, but how strong would you say it is?

I think they’ve got 100,000 men.

In ACOK, Renly’s army numbers and dispositions are a giant mess, but if you look at which houses are actually present and not which houses Renly claims, he doesn’t have the whole of the Reach behind him (nor does he have the whole of the Stormlands either). Which means the Reach has more manpower than we’ve seen so far.

Matt Asks: House Guardsmen

This may have been asked before, but the Great Houses at least (Stark, Lannister, Baratheon, Arryn, ect) all have large bodies of Guardsmen (who I assume are the equivalent of men-at-arms at least) who seem a separate class from household knights.

Would these be the equivalents of personal retainers for these Houses, and do any ‘lesser’ Houses have them?

Pretty much all noble houses above the lowly position of Ser Eustace Osgrey have guardsmen – in fact, they’re obligated to have them, as part of their feudal contract to supply fighting men to their liege lord.

Take Rohanne Webber, for example. House Webber is a minor house, a vassal to a Lesser (though principal) House, with one modest castle and ~60 tiny villages worth of peasants. And yet Lady Webber can assemble 33 fighting men, including six knights and six squires (plus Longinch), a dozen mounted crossbowmen, and nine men-at-arms, without calling a general levy.

If I get this right, after Renly’s assassination, Randyll Tarly rides back to Bitterbridge and puts to death any foot there who were sworn to a house now aligned with Stannis. Considering that Renly had about 100K men at Bitterbridge, and brought 20,000 cavalry to Storm’s End, that implies that Randyll had a significant portion of the remaining 80,000 men to death. Isn’t that a worse massacre than anything else in the books?

This is something that happens almost completely off-page, but it’s really really unclear what exactly happens and I’ll be following up on this in Tyrion X of ACOK.

There’s a big bit of confusion in that Renly claims to have 80,000 men at Bitterbridge when Catelyn meets him there (60,000 foot and 20,000 cavalry), but in the next Catelyn chapter has him claiming to have 100,000 foot in addition to his 20,000 cavalry.

Then Randyll Tarly rides for Bitterbridge. The next time we see the Tyrell army after Blackwater, they have somewhere between 50-70,000 men, with most estimates coming out to 60,000.

Now, given these wildly varying possibilities, it could be that almost no-one died at Bitterbridge – if Renly had 60,000 foot and Tarly grabbed the lot and just killed some officers. If Renly had 100,000 foot, then Tarly must have killed 40,000 men, which would be the largest single death total in any battle in ASOIAF world history.

Even for a massacre, 40,000 is improbable, so let’s see if we can firm some things up. Given that we know Mace brings up his 10,000 from Highgarden, that would suggest that only 50,000 of the Tarly army at Blackwater came from Bitterbridge. To me, this suggests that Renly was full of shit, and had 80k rather than 100k men, 60k men were left at Bitterbridge, and Tarly had 10,000 men – mostly Florents, but also Fossoways, Cranes, etc. – killed. Which would put the massacre up there with Oxcross, but not way ahead of it.

However, this leaves some open questions:

given that the Reach has 100,000 men on its own, and the Stormlands at least 25,000, if Renly only had 80-90,000 men tops, where are the remaining 35,000?
How many of them were Stormlanders? Given that the Stormlords divided on whether to support Renly, I think only 12,500 men fought for Renly from the Stormlands, which would suggest that there’s another 12,500 who might fight for or against Aegon.
If that estimate is right, then 77,500 men of the Reach fought with Renly, which would mean there’s another 22,5000 men in the Reach going toe-to-toe with Euron in addition to Garlan’s 30,000. (which makes Euron’s crusade absolutely insane – even with one hand tied behind it’s back, the Reach can field 50,000 men against him)
What’s going on with the cavalry? The Reach should have 27,000 cavalry by itself, and the Stormlands another 6,750. Now, even with only half of the latter backing Renly, that’s 30,0375 cavalry – but Renly only had 20,000? Why did 10,000 “knights of summer” agree to hang back with Mace?

ikoke submitted:

Continuing with the numbers issue in the South, Tarly,Rowan & Loras salvaged 5000 from Renly’s 20000 horse at Storm’s End. So that likely represents the mounted strength of Horn Hill, Goldengrove & a few other Reacher houses. The Florents,Cranes,Varners, Fossoways, Mullendores, Willums & Meadowes switched to Stannis. Combined their mounted strength should amount to at least 5-6000. Of Mace’s 10000 reserve, around 3-4000 should be knights/squires. We know that 2 of the richest & most powerful houses-the Hightowers & their vassals(Beesburys, Costaynes) & the Redwynes had stayed away from Renly’s host.These houses should be able to field around 3-5000 cavalry at least. Add to it the houses Renly names as his supporters but never show up(Shermer, Dunn,Footley, Blackbar, etc.) and the ones he never named (Peakes, Vyrwells, Ball, Roxton, Leygood, Ambrose, Ashford etc.) , and we can account for another 5-7000 cavalry at least. So all in around 25-27000 Reacher horsemen accounted for.at least . Some other forces would have been left to guard the castles.
So if we assume that at least 5-6000 Reachers switched over to Stannis, that would mean that at most 9-10000 Stormlanders joined his cause at Storm’s End. Whatever infantry Caron, Errol, Morrigen, Penrose and others mobilised would have been left behind at Bitterbridge when Renly sped off to Storm’s End, meaning the Stormlander foot had no choice but to serve under Randyll Tarly when he returned and seized control at Bitterbridge. A good % of these men are probably in the Riverlands & KL even now. So that leaves around 10000 of Stormlander military strength unmobilized (assuming that 9-10000 SL horse was matched by at least 10-15000 SL foot in Renly’s force, and that the SLs can field 30-35000 men all in all).

Let’s work through this, with Anonymous’ correction re: the Stormlands taken into account.

If Renly had the full support of both the Reach and Stormlands, his army should have been 140,000 strong, with 38,000 cavalry. As it stands, Renly seems to have around 80,000 (with 10k at Highgarden, so 90,000 or 65% support) with 20,000 cavalry (which roughly fits the ratio) – although he’ll claim to have 120,000 with 20,000 cavalry (which is way below the ratio).

Now, we know that Loras and Tarly grabbed 4,000 cavalry from Storm’s End, which includes House Tarly, House Rowan, and House Tyrell. Can’t forget this last part – the Tyrells brought a lot of manpower to Bitterbridge and Storm’s End, which is reflected by the ubiquity of their banners.

I’m going to use a rough estimate that the Houses have an average of 2,000 soldiers each, with ~540 being cavalry. So the seven Reach Houses (Florents, Cranes, Varners, Fossoways, Mullendores, Willums, Meadows) who see service with Stannis should equal roughly 3,780 cavalry. We know that 13 Stormlander Houses (Morringens, Estermonts, Carons, Conningtons, Errols, Hastys, Bollings, Horpes, Peaseburys, Fells, Wyldes, Grandisons, and Wensingtons) see action with Stannis. That’s roughly 7,020 men.

Together, that accounts for 10,800 of the 16,000 who join Stannis at Storm’s End. Now, there are a couple of possible explanations here:

Some of the Reacher Houses mentioned by Renly but who we never got verification of being present or having switched sides (Bulwer, Costayne, Hightower, Cuy, Blackbar, Shermer, Dunn, Footly) were actually present and switched sides. Most of these I’m pretty skeptical of, but I’ve actually changed my mind on the Cuys, especially after Loras killed Ser Emmon the Yellow, it might make sense that they flipped to Stannis. That would add another 4,320, although I’m thinking more like 540.
Some of the Stormlander Houses mentioned here but who don’t show up later with Stannis (Tarth, Penrose, Morrigen, Selmy) did fight with Stannis but just didn’t get mentioned. That would add another 2160 men.
My estimates for House size might be off. Some of these houses are clearly bigger than 2,000: the Fossoways are actually two separate Houses and are clearly pretty numerous given Lothor Brune’s accomplishments at Blackwater Bay, the Carons as the leading Marcher House are probably pretty big (especially if Renly gave them a seat on the Rainbow Guard), ditto House Crane. So if they’re more like the Freys than the Florents, that might add another 1,620 men.

That gets us pretty close, up to 15,000 men.

So….if around 4,000 Reachermen joined Stannis, that suggests that there’s another 23,000 Reach cavalry around. 4,000 of them went with Loras and Randall, so that leaves us with 19,000 to account for. Using the same 27% rule, around 2,700 of them were with Mace, leaving 16,300 unaccounted for.

If we look at the Reach houses that are either mentioned by Renly and don’t seem to have been there (Bulwer, Costayne, Hightower, Blackbar, Shermer, Dunn, Footly, Caswell), or the significant houses that seem to have been left out (Vrywel, Redwyne, Appleton, Ashford, Chester, Serry, Grimm, and Hewett of the Shield Islands, Cordwayner, Graceford, Merryweather, Peake, Roxton), that gives us 11,340.

So really there’s only around 5,000 unaccounted for, and House size could easily explain that.