#vargo hoat

[greenbloods]

the black goat at harrenhal the symbol of qohor 150 years later the Goat will take harrenhal the visions show what will come to pass and the shadows dance backwards in time

[gotham-at-nightfall]

Jaime loses his sword hand

They mean to scare me. The fool hopped on Jaime’s back, giggling, as the Dothraki swaggered toward him. The goat wants me to piss my breeches and beg his mercy, but he’ll never have that pleasure. He was a Lannister of Casterly Rock, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard; no sellsword would make him scream. Sunlight ran silver along the edge of the arakh as it came shivering down, almost too fast to see. And Jaime screamed. ~A Storm of Swords (Jaime III)

By Hed-ush

[slymreddwyne]

Howd it take me so long to realize "The Bear and the Maiden Fair" is about Jaime and Brienne at Harrenhal?

Brienne is the Dancing Bear

Jaime is the Maiden Fair

Harrenhal (site of a significant tourney/fair) is the Fair

Vargo Hoat is the Goat

And the Bloody Mummers with him were the Three Boys

[thewatcher0nthewall]

[wpmorse]

The beast turned clumsily, too far and too fast. Quick as a cat, Brienne changed direction. There's the wench I remember. She leapt in to land a cut across the bear's back. Roaring, the beast went up on his hind legs again. Brienne scrambled back away. Where's the blood? Then suddenly he understood. Jaime rounded on Hoat. "You gave her a tourney sword."

Jamie VI - 617

Brienne is made to fight the bear the Bloody Mummers caught in the last book. Here we see her getting a shot in, giving her a moment of relief before she realizes how useless it is. It was nice showing how badass Brienne is even in a rigged game. Though, I am embarrassed about how this bear turned out. It looks good, now that I fixed it in post. But considering how often I draw the ones in the zoo it should have been better.

[zetaaa]

Still mad about it.

No, my dear Jaime, you don't leave a girl wench behind after Roose "Skinner" Bolton tells her she has to worry about herself, and a lot. You don't do that. What the hell were you thinking?!??

(⬆ definitely not me dealing with the disappointment by making a bear pit GIF without Jaime)

(If there is any good in this GIF, it is thanks to Magali Villeneuve's amazing artwork, which inspired me. You can find it also here ⬇)

[death-of-cats]

GRRM writing ASOIAF like:

Cannibalism: 😀

Forced cannibalism: 😃🥰🔥

Forced self-cannibalism: 🔥🔥😄😘🔥🔥💯‼️❤️

[someasoiafart]

The Brave Companions by Caterina Gerbasi

[asoiafandotherbooks]

Watch "Was the Red Wedding Foreshadowed?" on YouTube

[thaliajoy-blog]

Honestly becoming a bit obsessed with the secondary animal association of some ASOIAF girls this Brienne symbolism has made me spiral...

Like level one you've got Sansa who's associated to several bird species - she's a little bird (evoking a sparrow or a dove), she's compared to an exotic talking bird (so a parrot or a parakeet), her false father Littlefinger has a mockingbird as a symbol, & she takes refuge in the Vale, home of the Arryn falcon. Bran wishes he was associated to so many birds...

Then you've got Brienne, who is associated to the bear and to the lion indirectly with Jaime. From there there's the whole maiden & the wild beasts dynamic to consider, this magical connection virgin women have to nature & wild animals (like the unicorn for one), how they "tame" them with their innocence and purity. Brienne "tames" Jaime physically, same with the bear, but she also most importantly does with her purity of heart & dedication to knightly values (and once "tamed" he fights to protect her). You could say Brienne has to deal with a lot of human beasts - like Vargo Hoat, "the Goat", or Rorge & Biter, who are each acting or described as animalistic men, & she fights or kill most of them.

And then you've got Arya - I found it interesting that outside of her wolf self she's associated with either much smaller & tamer animals. She's a grey mouse in Harrenhal, or a weasel & a squirrel... she's also a horse as Arya Horseface (plus association to her aunt Lyanna, the "centaur"), and a cat as Cat of the Cannals.

[pandolfo-malatesta]

Two observations: 1. Brienne knows Jaime.

He is probably the man she knows best, of all the men she knows--better than Renly, much as she may have wished otherwise, and likely better than her father.  Jaime even remarks upon how well they know each other; the feat is greater on her part, since he is the better at hiding his true nature from the world.

She learns that his reputation as a great swordsman is not exaggerated. Even weak and in chains he's nearly able to beat her. It's one of the things that she can't help but admire about him, no matter how poorly she at first thinks of him.

They’re quite literally forced into proximity, where she must clean him and care for him. She is with him at his lowest, when he's lost that which he thinks defines him and gives him purpose, and she keeps him from succumbing to despair. She's able to say the thing he needs to hear to keep him fighting.

She’s the only person who knows the truth about why he killed Aerys. It is the secret he was never supposed to reveal and he entrusts it to her. She carries that knowledge with her, and it changes her, as knowledge is wont to do.

Brienne knows Jaime, and he’s still the one she cries out for in the delirium of her most grievous injury.  She knows him, and she still refuses to condemn him until the threat of a truly terrible injustice forces her to.

2. Jaime chooses Brienne.

True, in some cases he acts merely as any decent human would to another: he uses the oar to help her back into the boat, rather than clubbing her over the head and leaving her to drown, as he thinks he should; he counsels and lies and shouts and is beaten to protect her body and mind and honor from assault.  And early on in their acquaintance he claims no control over the way his body reacts to hers, and over the way his thoughts turn to her.

But time and again he acts to aid her.  He thinks that she is stupid and stubborn and that she deserves whatever happens to her; and he does all he can to prevent it.

It's not enough that he merely returns to Harrenhal for her. He offers Vargo Hoat gold and sapphires in exchange for her safety; when that fails Jaime jumps into the pit to protect her, with no plan and no thought for his own safety. Acting in her defense and protecting her good name becomes a habit.

He gives her what she's always wanted: a sword. But it's not just a sword; it's a priceless weapon and a quest and a chance to do what's right and good and honorable. It's his belief in her.

When Cersei pleads for his help, he burns the letter.  When Brienne tells him she knows where Sansa is, he follows her without question.

[mattyalwayssmokesweed]

“Arya wouldn’t have survived what Sansa went through at the Red Keep” And exactly why? Because she’s an angry girl that can’t shut her mouth and that would’ve gotten her killed? Bullshit

Are we talking about the same girl who managed to escape the Red Keep and lived undercover for days while her father was imprisoned, without reveling her identity to any of the guards that were constantly searching for her? The same girl who managed to keep her identity hidden and traveled with criminals for weeks? The same girl who survived being one of The Mountain’s captives? The same girl who then survived Harrenhal, where she was smart enough to keep her identity hidden from Roose Bolton (who at that time was believed to be one of Robb’s allies) because she couldn’t be sure she would be taken to her family if he knew who she was? The same girl who helped Hot Pie and Gendry escape Harrenhal, the largest castle in the Seven Kingdoms, when she heard Vargo Hoat would take over, and freed the Northmen as well? The same girl who then was taken by the Brotherhood without Banners, and then kidnapped by Sandor Clegane? The same girl that had to watch the body of her older brother, a man she admired, being paraded around as his “allies” cheered on? The same girl that escaped Westeros and managed to get to Braavos (granted she got a free trip to Essos because of Jaqen’s coin, but up until she got to the ship she didn’t have any help)? The same girl who was then taken in and forced to give up everything she had and was? The same girl who was treated almost like a slave there? The same girl that was beaten and belittled? The same girl that was blinded and was forced to get used to life without vision? The same girl that, somehow, survived and endured until that point, outsmarting grown ups and finding “shortcuts” to ensure her survival?

You’re telling me that same girl wouldn’t have been smart enough to survive Cersei and Joffrey, people who she had figured out shortly after meeting them and knew what to do or not do to push their buttons, because she’s good at reading people? She wouldn’t have survived what Sansa survived?

At least Sansa was safe until Robb’s death, because she was a hostage and if something bad where to had happened to her, it would’ve caused outrage on the North. She was the Lannisters’ safety net, of course she wouldn’t have been killed, no matter how crazy Joffrey was —even he was aware of it, and it’s clear when you read her chapters. I’m obviously not trying to take away Sansa’s trauma because she was abused and humiliated in the Red Keep by Joffrey, but there was always someone who intervened (especially after Tyrion married her); that’s a sense of security that Arya never have because no one knew who she was— if she somehow made the wrong move she would’ve been killed, no time to get help from someone or try to prove who she actually was because people wouldn’t have believed her. She was in constant danger and not even being Ned Stark’s daughter was of any help, if anything it put an even bigger target on her back.

So yes, Arya would’ve one hundred percent survived what Sansa went through, because she went through so much worse without having the “privilege” of her parentage to protect her. Stop watering down Arya’s intelligence just because you know Sansa would’ve died on day one if she had been on Arya’s shoes without the privilege of being a lady.

[baelontargaryen]

BOOK ARYA STARK || Family ➸ Catelyn Stark

“Lady Catelyn held a sword to my throat and made me swear to return her daughters. This was your goat’s work. Vargo Hoat, the Lord of Harrenhal!” (Jaime VI, AFFC)

[wpmorse]

Lord Tywin looked away, disgusted. "No longer. Ser Gregor's taken the castle. The sellswords deserted their erstwhile captain almost to a man, and some of Lady Whent's old people opened a postern gate. Clegane found Hoat sitting alone in the Hall of a Hundred Hearths, half-mad with pain and fever from a wound that festered. His ear, I'm told."

Jamie Page 853

The Mountain arrives at Harrenhal to provide payback to Vargo maiming Jamie Lannister. It turns out to be quite anticlimactic.

This is the only time you can come close to rooting for Gregor Clegane.

I first imagined having Vargo Hoat sitting on a throne but I couldn't find any evidence that there was a throne in the Hall of a Hundred Hearts. Besides, I thought Hoat would come off as more pathetic sitting alone and abandoned in the middle of the Hall.

You can see everything a week early on my Patreon Page.

[dontbotherwiththepronunciation]

"It is Arya of House Stark who chews on her lip whenever she is thinking. Are you Arya of House Stark?" - Cat of the Canals, AFFC

She bit her lip. "You may not recall, my lord, as I was littler then . . . but I had the honor to meet you at Winterfell when King Robert came to visit my father Lord Eddard." She lowered her big brown eyes and mumbled, "I'm Arya Stark." - Jaime IX, ASOS

"It won't be no beating, oh, no. I won't lay a finger on you. I'll just save you for the Qohorik, yes I will, I'll save you for the Crippler. Vargo Hoat his name is, and when he gets back he'll cut off your feet."  - Arya VIII, ACOK

"Tell him, you tell him. I'll do what he wants … whatever he wants … with him or … or with the dog or … please … he doesn't need to cut my feet off, I won't try to run away, not ever, I'll give him sons, I swear it, I swear it …" - Theon, ADWD

The direwolf was the sigil of the Starks, but Arya felt more a lamb, surrounded by a herd of other sheep. She hated the villagers for their sheepishness, almost as much as she hated herself. - Arya VI, ACOK

It was the girl who held them here, Lord Eddard's blood, but the girl was just a mummer's ploy, a lamb in a direwolf's skin.  - A Ghost in Winterfell, ADWD

'Why did you make your people lambs, when the world is full of wolves?' - Barristan I, TWOW

[ilynpilled]

ive been thinking about this a bit and i feel like i have some very different feelings towards certain things and strongly disagree with the implications present in the ways i see them discussed. i do not like to simplify these themes to “vengeance/punishment bad wahh”, because it does not at all feel complete enough to convey my true feelings, or the themes of the text itself for that matter imo, but like… ofc i personally cant read things like cersei’s walk of shame, where she is punished, humiliated, and dehumanized through the one thing she was unfairly condemned for her entire life— jaime’s brutal maiming and torture where he is humiliated, fed things like horse piss which he forces down because he is so thirsty before vomiting it back up, gets repeatedly beaten unconscious, and is nearly driven to passive suicide— theon’s excessive physical and mental torment that would take too long to list that breaks him entirely— and even a man as deeply evil as vargo hoat (who is not at all three dimensional) having his hands and feet and arms and legs cut off, be cannibalized, and even be forced to eat parts of himself, causing the pov character that swore to enact brutal vengeance on him to feel ill and repulsed once he finds out— and experience much, if any, catharsis, personal feelings about these characters aside. asoiaf is a series where the author pretty often deliberately places us inside the heads of bad people that have done terrible things, who some readers may feel a certain hatred for, as they are put through torment. not to make the reader feel good and satisfied about it, but to present it as something that should not really be a thing that we revel in, and encourage us to be critical about what is even gained through what they are going through. even a morally dark antagonist without a pov like joffrey and his death was meant to have elements of tragedy. during, tyrion notes that he is a young boy with fear in his eyes that he had never seen in the eyes of his father. whether you feel a certain way about it (and i am not arguing that you are morally flawed for not sympathizing with a fictional character, this isn’t real life, i am just discussing themes that i am identifying), the goal was not really to provide us with a feel-good “justice at last!” emotion through the brutally violent death of a 13 year old boy. it makes me genuinely wonder how some ppl come away with the idea that this series is intended to be a celebration and glorification of punitive justice. i am not saying justice in general is not a huge theme, and some catharsis, especially for victims, over the death/defeat of their abusers & tormenters is present in the text as well, understandably so, because it can mean safety. take pia smiling through broken teeth when jaime has her rapist executed and presents his head to her while setting a precedent with gregor’s men. some people need to die, and deserve it, but what does that look like? who decides it? why? by contrast, the instance of jaime actually feeling good when he hangs a bunch of random outlaws reads as something more tied to his current relationship to the self and certain selfish desires at this point in his story than real justice, and it is further elaborated upon and taken apart in the book. anyway, all these questions are present and the answers are not near as simple as i often see them made out to be.

it doesn’t feel like to me that most things that can be interpreted as enactments of punitive justice or moments of karma are these epic events that should just make the reader blindly cheer and applaud, or even feel good about. there is a reason that some things go awry (like with oberyn), and it isn’t cynicism. there is nuance, and not in a way where victims are condemned for fighting back, or a pacifist ideology is idealized. there just really isn’t a glorification of brutal punishment, ‘eye for an eye’ vengeance, and the needless causing of suffering. same with a blind upholding of duty and law based around flawed feudalistic constructs. and all these things should not even be conflated. not to mention that punitive justice exists also in a way where it is connected to institutions. take the faith and organized religion for example. the whole process is interrogated: what is sin? what sins are being punished? how? why? and what are the actual effects? be it jaime’s and brienne’s conversations/interactions with a bunch of different tertiary characters in affc, or cersei’s punishment in adwd. at the end of the day, she is punished for her body, for being a woman. she does not suffer “consequences” for her actual wrongs and the suffering she causes. she doesn’t really learn anything, and it will all just make her spiral more. the whole concept of punitive justice gets focused on especially with theon’s entire identity being withered away through torture. he experiences so much torment that there comes a point where he is robbed of his mind and agency. what does the “criminal” learn? how can a person change in these circumstances? what is the point, and why should we feel good about this? he is not even really “punished” for his crimes, and certainly not by people with any moral high ground over him, he is just being brutalized. same is the case with jaime in asos: it is a bad person being brutalized by men even more vile than he is, and they are not doing it because they want to deliver any justice to his victims. also, though the maiming does kickstart crisis with him specifically, it is not the determining factor when it comes to his reformation. this story is not actually saying that people can be, and should be, tortured into becoming better people, and if they can’t the solution is to just axe them. there is nuance, sure, mercy is not something everyone is entitled to in all circumstances. sometimes “mercy” towards certain evil people will lead to the enablement of the suffering of others, even entire populations. there are certainly circumstances where compromise isn’t an option. but, again, i dont think george is ever holding back on actually interrogating the moral quandaries when it comes to identifying cycles and ending them, and he is for sure not treating every single aspect of these conflicts as black and white. even tyrion murdering his father, who purposefully does have a very ironic and humiliating death scene, which is important thematically, doesn’t end in easy and feel-good catharsis, especially for tyrion, which doesn’t equal “oh, tywin should be forgiven and spared”.

all of this is also why i do not really see how events like the fall of house lannister (first of all, we know it is gonna include the likely very brutal deaths of two innocent small children), red wedding 2.0, valonqar etc would be these grand and glorious moments of justice and pay-off, treated as just the good guys finally getting an epic W. they will very likely be filled with tragedy, so i am genuinely curious about where these expectations for this kind of catharsis come from