#history!!!

[humanpurposes]

I read something about GRRM being inspired by The Wars of the Roses/British history and it’s common for women of that time period to have been accused by men of bewitching people or being sorceresses (not really surprising but that usually stemmed from deep misogyny/envy). So it is a bit funny when people take the accounts of the maesters at face value when f&b plays around with people’s perceptions and builds a very narrow view of who these figures are.

I'm about to jump on this ask as an excuse for a fun lil history rant :) (apologies if that's not what you were signing up for but what else am I meant to do with my degree??) But I'll be merciful and put it under a read more.

Yeah! So GRRMs influences from English medieval history are evident, asoiaf is meant to be inspired by the Wars of the Roses and he has said the Anarchy was the inspiration behind the Dance of the Dragons. But you could draw similarities between the Wars of the Roses and the Dance as well.

What we see a lot of the time with medieval Queens and female figures around the middle ages is that they have been villainaised by their contemporaries, historians, and in the public memory in general. Helen Castor explains the stories of several Queens in She Wolves, which also has a documentary, so would highly recommend that. Essentially, women have traditionally been held to much harsher scrutiny for displaying any kind of ambition or agency when compared to men.

In the Wars of the Roses specifically, Elizabeth of York and her mother Jacquetta of Luxembourg were rumoured to practice witchcraft after Elizabeth unexpectedly married Edward IV and their family rose to prominence. On the Lancaster side, Margaret of Anjou, wife of Henry VI is remembered by Shakespeare as the "She-Wolf of France" for attempting to assert her own power as Queen when her husband was incapable of ruling, and for defending her son's claim to the throne. And then we have Margaret Beaufort, the mother of Henry VII, who orchestrated her son's rise to power and is also portrayed quite negatively in various historical fiction novels and TV shows.

It's only recently that we've begun to question these interpretations of female historical figures, and we see similar patterns in Fire and Blood, not just with Alys but also with Rhaenyra and Alicent. And this is because patriarchy loves to condemn women who step outside of traditional gender roles. This is why, historically, a woman's right to rule has been so contested, because in a system of personal monarchy, it matters what kind of person the monarch is. They have to be able to lead, to fight and defend their realm, they have to be intelligent and commanding, all attributes a medieval society believes women incapable of possessing. I've gone really off topic but my point it, it's important to understand the universe these characters are operating in. If they act in an unconventional way, they will be scrutinised for it, by their enemies, by those recounting the narrative in F&B, and apparently, by fans as well. Why do we think GRRM wrote F&B as a fictional history? The book itself is a comment on historical biases and unreliable narrators.

And to be fair, I'm not saying all these women are saints who are incapable of wrongdoing, fictional or historical, but I think it's incredibly reductive to blindly idolise or vallainise female characters and political players. We all know who the real enemy is that is MEN :) (not my man Aemond though, he's a feminist prrrr)

[whimsifae]

the most fun a girl can have is finding parallels, noticing patterns, making connections, contemplating

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

now that trump has tiktok, twitter, facebook and insta in his pocket, get ready for a massive wave of internet censorship. one of trump's greatest weapons has always been misinformation; it's going to become harder and harder to spread facts and criticism going forward. posts that aren't made invisible will be magically ignored by the algorithm. dissidents will have their accounts deleted and voices erased.

this is a suppression tactic. this is another stage of fascism.

[cinamun]

What a time to be alive.

Happy Black History Month to all and to all a good night ❤️🖤💚

[rvllybllply2014]

The fact that this is 80 fucking years ago but still just as relevant is terrifying.

[szczekaczz]

Henriëtte Ronner-Knip, A dog and her puppies

[blumineck]

Huge thanks to Richard of the Order of the Blade for throwing me around!

(If you’re in the UK, consider checking them out! The order are a combat school with a really fun and welcoming ethos)

And as always, more bows, swords, and nonesense on Patreon

[deathtokillian]

As a kid learning about the holocaust, I never understood how people could let Nazis rise to power. But now I’m watching it happen in real time.

[thehmn]

Foxes disguised as monks. On the left from Japan and on the right from Denmark.

[murderouswidowsmatter]

The problem with “senseless violence” narrative around the UnitedHealthcare CEO is that it ignores the inherent violence of the insurance industry. Denying someone lifesaving care is violence. Subjecting someone to drawn out periods of pain before treatment is violent. The industry is made up of millions of acts of violence everyday, with the CEO at the helm guiding it all. This is not unprovoked and it’s not an overreaction; it is just harder to ignore

[a-meh]

[prokopetz]

I understand why a lot of fantasy settings with Ambiguously Catholic organised religions go the old "the Church officially forbids magic while practising it in secret in order to monopolise its power" route, but it's almost a shame because the reality of the situation was much funnier.

Like, yes, a lot of Catholic clergy during the Middle Ages did practice magic in secret, but they weren't keeping it secret as some sort of sinister top-down conspiracy to deny magic to the Common People: they were mostly keeping it secret from their own superiors. It wasn't one of those "well, it's okay when we do it" deals: the Church very much did not want its local priests doing wizard shit. We have official records of local priests being disciplined for getting caught doing wizard shit. And the preponderance of evidence is that most of them would take their lumps, promise to stop doing wizard shit, then go right back to doing wizard shit.

It turns out that if you give a bunch of dudes education, literacy, and a lot of time on their hands, some non-zero percentage of them are going to decide to be wizards, no matter how hard you try to stop them from being wizards.

[young-american]

ᴇᴢʀᴀ ᴊᴀᴄᴋ ᴋᴇᴀᴛs Artwork from his 1962 book The Snowy Day.

[shamebats]

[autisticmysticsarah]

The legend of King Arthur predates thinking