#yorrick royce

[lya-dustin]

tbh if she wasn't paired with Gwayne(or Jasper Wylde in the og fic she appears in) she would've snapped up Yorrick and become his very own Lady Macbeth and made herself queen consort of westeros

i feel if my oc Jena and Yorrick would team up to kill Daemon if they met (Jena poisoned her dad when she was 16 to take Mistwood for herself after his gambling addiction and alcoholism led him to sell her to his debtors )

---@lya-dustin

POV, you are Aemon Royce getting picked up from your 8 year long fostering by your older siblings & the random Stormlander they picked up in order to go commit patricide

[branwendaughterofllyr]

*cracks knuckles* Alright, as a lifelong Stark and North stan, as well as someone who has spent ungodly amounts of time on the Westeroscraft server and forums, I have SPENT a lot of time thinking about Weirwood Logisticstm

First things first, the religion of the Old Gods is, well, barely a religion. It has no priests, no rites, no prayers, just these funky trees. The “nameless, faceless gods of the Greenwood” is one thing, no rituals/theology is quite another. I love you, George, and I understand that you have this ~mystic~ vibe going on for the old gods, but vibes alone do not a religion make. To quote Sansa: “there are no devotions, my lord. No priests or songs or candles. Only trees, and silent prayer.” FINE, George. You’re lucky I love how cool “Their gods were the gods of the forest, stream, and stone, the old gods whose names are secret.” sounds. But you are thin ice!!!!

However, I am willing to cut SOME slack, as it is likely that many of the ancient rites of the CotF and the First Men have been lost over time, including the various blood and human sacrifices. 

The blood sacrifices ARE canon, both as seen by Bran when he taps into the weirwood.net, and according to semi-canon sources like TWOIAF

“Then, as he watched, a bearded man forced a captive down onto his knees before the heart tree. A white-haired woman stepped toward them through a drift of dark red leaves, a bronze sickle in her hand."No," said Bran, "no, don't," but they could not hear him, no more than his father had. The woman grabbed the captive by the hair, hooked the sickle round his throat, and slashed. And through the mist of centuries the broken boy could only watch as the man's feet drummed against the earth … but as his life flowed out of him in a red tide, Brandon Stark could taste the blood.” - Bran III, ADWD

“the First Men were less learned than we are now, and credited things that their descendants today do not; consider Maester Yorrick's Wed to the Sea, Being an Account of the History of White Harbor from Its Earliest Days, which recounts the practice of blood sacrifice to the old gods. Such sacrifices persisted as recently as five centuries ago, according to accounts from Maester Yorrick's predecessors at White Harbor.” TWOIAF

This puts the cessation of blood sacrifices some two hundred years before the Conquest, but well after the arrival of the Andals and the Faith, and it likely slowly disappeared over the centuries until stopping completely. 

Now, we don't know that much about how weirwoods come to be, but it is likely that they have to be created or awoken through some kind of human sacrifice. It is implied that weirwoods can be planted though, given that the builders of the Eyrie tried.

The builders had intended it as a godswood, but the Eyrie rested on the hard stone of the mountain, and no matter how much soil was hauled up from the Vale, they could not get a weirwood to take root here. - Catelyn VII, AGOT

The requirement of a human sacrifice to create a weirwood would explain why they don’t get planted anymore. The Eyrie was also built by the Andal descended Arryns, so while I question why they would be planting a weirwood in the first place, they probably just didn't know how to do it. (Maybe it was to please a Royce bride, idk.)

(Harrenhal also has a weirwood, despite being built by the Ironborn, but who KNOWS what’s going on with Harrenhal. The weirwood might just have been there first and gotten swallowed up by the castle, idk. I’m not concerned with it’s welfare, I’m sure it gets plenty of yummy blood sacrifices on the regular what with the curse and all)

There is a constant theme of “dark magics” around the old gods, mentioned both by followers of the seven and by followers of the old gods, it’s just accepted that it s a pretty hardcore and strange religion, and people get on with it. This does make the context for why the Andals and the First Men fought so viciously over religion interesting, since beyond missionary efforts and wanting to impose religious dominance, the Andals likely found the weirwoods and their worship via sacrifice really disturbing. (and fair enough.)

The Red Keep in ASOIAF has a godswood, which is per the norm for all castles in Westeros, as Catelyn describes the one in Riverrun being a place for contemplation, and the Red Keep’s is dominated by ancient oak heart tree. The Red Keep is also a really new castle by Westerosi standards, considering that they have some that are thousands of years old, so there wouldn't be a pre-existing weirwood and godswood. The castles that do have weirwoods in the South even if they aren't followers of the old gods (like the Royces and the Blackwoods) tend to be REALLY old, like Highgarden and Casterly Rock, and they probably didn't want to have the problems that destroying what might be a god would entail. (There’s a whole thing about how High Heart used to be against grove of weirwoods and how cutting them down went OVER great) The Red Keep was constructed over the lifetimes of several kings, none of whom followed the old gods, it’s likely that planting a weirwood was never even a consideration. Especially when those kings were often in conflict with the Faith of the Seven over various issues, including (but not limited to) incest. 

WHY IS THERE A WEIRWOOD IN THE RED KEEP I AM GOING TO GNAW SOMEONE’S LEG OFF

And any the political power that the religion of the old gods might have is pretty much entirely concentrated in the North. There are a few houses of the First Men scattered around the south, but the old gods and any political clout you gain from following them is pretty much a North only issue. 

Meanwhile, the Faith of the Seven is not only an organized religion, but an immensely powerful one. It’s very much on the opposite end of the spectrum from the old gods (which is why I have to put aside my anger at the old gods not really being a religion because George probably did it for thematic reasons)

It’s easy to make the joking comparison between the Faith and medieval Christianity, but it is a valid though not always accurate comparison. The Seven being different faces of one true god maps easily onto the holy trinity, the High Septon elected by a council of the Most Devout is similar to the college of cardinals electing the pope, the Seven-Pointed Star being the Bible and so on. The actual theology of the Faith is more than a little murky, and it actually seems to be very different from medieval christianity in some ways. Their hero/savior figure is actually the pretty prosaic Hugor of the Hill, a destined king of the Andals crowned and blessed by the Seven, and doesn't seem to have that much resemblance to Christ. There is the concept of sin and repentance, but we don’t know too much about the theological reasoning behind it or anything. 

From a more practical stand point, the Faith prior to the Conquest was probably the most powerful and widespread institution in Westeros, able to command it’s own military, hold its own trials for the faithful, and being tax-exempt in many kingdoms. The Faith is clearly playing the socio-political role that religions played in real world pre-modern societies, and is obviously modeled on the Church in medieval and early modern Europe. So the legitimacy of any king in regions dominated by the Faith is incredibly tied to how his relationship to the most powerful religion is handled. 

For the Targaryen dynasty and its kings, the Faith was a constant flashpoint of conflict and an extremely dangerous one, especially before they solidified themselves as the status quo. The Old Gods, as much as I love the Starks and the North, were pretty much irrelevant to the Targaryens in the face of how much more important the Faith of the Seven was (this isn't to say that there weren't potential issues there, just that we never hear about them. I have a pet theory that Viserra was supposed to marry Theodore Manderly because it would have signified that the Targaryens were aligned with the Faith in all ways, including in the North, especially during a period where the Starks were annoyed, but this is just a theory and probably not even true because Jaehaerys and Alysanne’s daughters’ marriages are the dumbest thing I have EVER seen and I doubt George spent more than five seconds thinking about it.)

The fanon interpretation of Targaryens being into the Old Gods just ‘cause (I mean, if they have something going on with a follower of the old gods, that's another thing entirely) drives me batty, because there’s no reason why the Targaryens would be inclined to the old gods. In fact, some of them were downright disrespectful, including the Valyrian edge lord himself, lol.

“No banners flew above the blackened towers and ruined keeps of Harrenhal when Prince Daemon descended from the sky to take up the castle for his own. A few squatters had found shelter in the castle’s deep vaults and undercellars, but the sound of Caraxes’s wings sent them fleeing. When the last of them was gone, Daemon Targaryen walked the cavernous halls of Harren’s seat alone, with no companion but his dragon. Each night at dusk he slashed the heart tree in the godswood to mark the passing of another day. Thirteen marks can be seen upon that weirwood still; old wounds, deep and dark, yet the lords who have ruled Harrenhal since Daemon’s day say they bleed afresh every spring.” - The Princess and the Queen 

Hey, maybe the weirwood in Harrenhal ate Daemon! They never did find the body!

My all time favorite angle of the Valyrian gods versus the Faith debate, is that a lot of the fics/takes around it by Team Black seem to like the Old Gods (which fair enough, I too like the creepy trees. team stark 5ever) or at least play lip service to it to make the Faith of Seven seem less cool (no one has the vision for how insane fantasy Catholicism can be except for GRRM himself) but also including Targaryen characters being respectful/kinda into the Old Gods, which KILLS me. I blame the wildly non-canonical weirwood in the Red Keep’s godswood in the show. It drives me INSANE. What is that doing there!!!!!! The Red Keep has no weirwood!!! Who planted it there???? You telling me that Maegor or Jaehaerys took the time to plant a weirwood for the Old Gods???? If I see one more fic where a Targaryen marries someone not of the old gods under a weirwood tree I’m going to kill someone.

I’m SO defensive of the weirwoods because I know none of them have delved into the fucked up human sacrifices that likely created weirwoods plus the rich symbolism that they create (hello Sansa in the Eyrie, I love you), the erasure of the North-South religious and cultural divide, and acting like the Targs would be so cool with the Old Gods for no reason is driving me nuts.

I just hate the show’s weirwood tree, it makes no sense. I will never find peace as long as I keep seeing scenes from the show set under it.

(Sorry for being insane in your inbox again )

Don't worry about it, your inbox drops lead to interesting discussions! 💚

Totally agree with you on the Old Gods & the unsavory blood ritualistic imagery (like hanging entrails from the branches of weirwood trees). I mean, it may sound heavy metal, but if we're supposed to be critical about religion,* this should definitely come under the magnifying glass, too. As is the super creepy idea that Bloodraven is spying on everyone using the weirwoodnet and manipulating historical events like that.

I also don't see why Targaryens should be Old Gods fanboys either - what could they possibly gain from this? It's such a fanon interpretation, because the old religion doesn't have any organized structure that could act as a political actor. There's this projection happening, because Christianity has flaws IRL and a fraught history, when people encounter its fantasy equivalent, they automatically think any other religion is better. I'm waiting for Cult of Starry Wisdom acolytes to come out of the woodwork and preach how much better Nyarlathotep is than the Seven Gods puts together.

As for the godswood in the Red Keep - Ned tells us it has an ancient, huge oak. That kind of tree can only grow like that over a very long period of time. There's no mention of a weirwood in KL that could have been cut down; also I don't think you can plant weirwood trees? Else I think people would do it more often in the North. I honestly think it's there just for nostalgia reasons for the audience. Though I wonder if George agreed with this addition and why. Maybe the lack of a weirwood in KL was an in-universe limitation he imposed on Bloodraven's power?

*at least that's what they think they're doing, by writing all these critical essays on how problematic the Faith is, but they never bother to do a comparative analysis with the other religions available in-universe. Or they peddle their own headcanons as fact, like how supposedly Valyrian society would have been so much less sexist than Faith-worshippers, ergo their religion should reflect that.