Anon Asks:

Would it be possible for say a powerful merchant prince or pirate king to sweep away most of the pirates in the stepstones and establish a lsting kingdom there? The closest we see is Daemon Targaryen but he just got bored and gave it up, he had his dragon and the velaryon fleet but he also had to deal with the triarchy.
Also why are the free cities static, like no new city rises up and replaces an existing one, its just the nine and no new ones appear? Its mentioned that the flatlands are bare of villages because of the dothraki, but there are other non-free cities like the ghiscari or Elyria and such, why don’t we see any of them rising into greater prominence?

1. Probably not. If it took the Triarchy to sweep the Stepstones clean of pirates in the first place, you’re unlikely to see a single merchant prince or pirate king manage on their own. There is one caveat: Racallio Ryndoon did build a pirate kingdom in the Stepstones, but we don’t know whether he held the whole of them, and in any case the Oakenfist put paid to him rather quickly.

2. I mean, there are other significant cities in Essos:

“We speak of Nine Free Cities, though across the width of Essos one may find many other Valyrian towns, settlements, and outposts, some larger and more populous than Gulltown, White Harbor, or even Lannisport. The distinction that sets the Nine apart is not their size but their origins. At their height before the Doom, other cities, such as Mantarys, Volon Therys, Oros, Tyria, Draconys, Elyria, Mhysa Faer, Rhyos, and Aquos Dhaen were grand and glorious and rich, yet for all their pride and power, none ever ruled itself.”

And you can add on the Ghiscari cities and Qarth and so on and so forth. The Nine Free Cities are a historically and culturally derived term that specifically counts the self-governing cities that existed before the Doom.

To use a real world analogy: the Ivy League in the U.S consists of a particular subset of particularly old elite colleges and universities that have been sportsballing one another for a long time now. Stanford or MIT are still elite universities even though they’re not Ivies.

Poor Lorath always seemed to get too much of a bad rap in my opinion. Does the city have any redeeming qualities in your opinion?

Hey. Same anon that asked about Lorath before. I was reading through the WOIAF and it just kind of struck me that the fisherfolk and farmers overthrowing the Boashi is much more noteworthy than it gets in the text. Has there ever been another successful smallfolk revolution in Planetos? I get the feeling that Lorath is kind of like Haiti, the site of a momentously important people’s history that gets overshadowed by its poverty, probably caused by its satellite status to Braavosi capital

I always think of Lorath as akin to one of the post-industrial cities of the Northeast – not even one of the former greats in decline, but a scrappy woulda-been-a-contenda that never quite got its shot. It’s got some economic base – cod, whaling, sealskins and walrus tusks, velvet, trading for furs, ivory, and obsidian – but it’s kind of second-tier and it can’t exercise dominion over its own hinterland.

In terms of stuff that I find interesting about Lorath – the cult of Boash is an interesting ascetic egalitarian faith and I’m kind of sad it’s not around any more, the three princes is an interesting political system but it’s not around any more, but most of all the whole thing about the mazemakers and their connection to the Deep Ones.

OTHO, Qarlon the Great is pretty boring and doesn’t add anything, and there isn’t much else.

Maester Steven, Regarding the free cities; how do they feed their large populations? Do they have control over their marches (if so is it administered collectively by the city or controlled by several lords and administered feudally a-la westeros?) and/or do the free cities primarily import foodstuffs from the vale, north etc.? Mayhaps you’ve answered this before but I would really love your input! Keep up the interesting and entertaining work!

Well, Pentos has a large agricultural hinterland, with the Velvet Hills and the Flatlands, Braavos has the Braavosian Coastland, Norvos has its hill country, Qohor its forests, Volantis its riverrine empire.

But speaking specifically of the Three Daughters, it’s my belief that the Disputed Lands aren’t blasted wasteland as we are told. They don’t look barren on the maps, and realistically, the populations of Lys, Myr, and Tyrosh couldn’t feed themselves with imports alone. So I think that basically each grab a chunk of the Disputed Lands and get the bulk of their foodstuffs from there, and that the fighting is over an attempt to corner the market and dictate terms to their rivals.

As for how those hinterlands are administered, beyond the idea that the Archon of Tyrosh and the Council of Magisters for Lys and Myr assert overall political authority, I’m not sure. Given the commercial nature of the Free Cities, my guess is that the magisters divvied up the land amongst themselves and then farm it in vast latifundias.