ASOIAF/GOT The 'Realism' of the World of ASOIAF/GOT

[Emperor Tippy]

Look at their behaviour in greater context: Tywin's realpolitik especially is a modernist/postmodernist element. Also, none of his characters pay nearly enough attention to religion as they should: there are no religious wars between North and South, North and Riverlands form a very strong alliance just due to marriage ties, Ned makes no effort to convert Catelyn, nor does Catelyn to convert Ned - and latter especially is extremely problematic, since Faith of the Seven is a pseudo-Christianity, meaning that she is willing to doom her husband's soul to eternal damnation simply for the sake of their worldly happiness.

I'm sure I'd be able to find more stuff, but I don't have time right now.

There actually is a history of religious wars between the Old Gods and the Seven. What brought them to an end is the Dragons coming to Westeros and absolutely breaking the power of the Faith of the Seven. Before Aegon, the Faith was a Big Deal but the Dragons were absolutely not willing to put up with a threat to their rule and were willing to burn cities to ash if that is what it took to win. So the leadership of the Faith bent the knee and the Targaryens worked hard over the centuries to ensure the Faith was both co-opted and corrupted.

As for the North and Riverlands having a strong alliance, that wasn't due to marriage ties. The marriage cemented the alliance but they had the alliance because of geography and politics. The Riverlands is the "kingdom of leftovers" and exists largely as the chosen battleground for the Westlands, Vale, North, Crownlands/Stormlands to iron out their differences in.

For the Riverlands, alliance with the North and the Vale brought them security. They could bottle up the Westlands in the mountains and then be safe to basically anything short of a Tyrell/Lannister alliance. For the North it gave them a direct route straight to the capital and fertile ground to buy food from.

 

[Bear Ribs]

There actually is a history of religious wars between the Old Gods and the Seven. What brought them to an end is the Dragons coming to Westeros and absolutely breaking the power of the Faith of the Seven. Before Aegon, the Faith was a Big Deal but the Dragons were absolutely not willing to put up with a threat to their rule and were willing to burn cities to ash if that is what it took to win. So the leadership of the Faith bent the knee and the Targaryens worked hard over the centuries to ensure the Faith was both co-opted and corrupted.

As for the North and Riverlands having a strong alliance, that wasn't due to marriage ties. The marriage cemented the alliance but they had the alliance because of geography and politics. The Riverlands is the "kingdom of leftovers" and exists largely as the chosen battleground for the Westlands, Vale, North, Crownlands/Stormlands to iron out their differences in.

For the Riverlands, alliance with the North and the Vale brought them security. They could bottle up the Westlands in the mountains and then be safe to basically anything short of a Tyrell/Lannister alliance. For the North it gave them a direct route straight to the capital and fertile ground to buy food from.

Say it again with me: Modern day sensibilities with a medieval paintjob. The idea of "Government vs. Religion" rather than the two being intertwined is very modern, coming from Karl Marx primarily. From Roman Emperors to Egyptian Pharoahs to the Monarch of England being the leader of the Church of England, Kings were generally a significant part of the religion and took on certain priestly roles. Divine Right of Kings is a thing for a reason. Having the government want to crack down on religion and remove it, rather than be a part of it, is a very modern thing.

 

[Emperor Tippy]

Say it again with me: Modern day sensibilities with a medieval paintjob. The idea of "Government vs. Religion" rather than the two being intertwined is very modern, coming from Karl Marx primarily. From Roman Emperors to Egyptian Pharoahs to the Monarch of England being the leader of the Church of England, Kings were generally a significant part of the religion and took on certain priestly roles. Divine Right of Kings is a thing for a reason. Having the government want to crack down on religion and remove it, rather than be a part of it, is a very modern thing.

And say it with me.

The Targaryens were not part of the Faith. They cared about it exactly to the extent that it impacted their ability to rule the Seven Kingdoms. They had Dragons.

The Faith had two choices. They could either bend the knee and cease to be an issue for the Targaryens or they could all go to their gods in pyres of dragon flame. When the Most Devout bent the knee (the alternative was Aegon burning Old Town to slag), his actions were largely seen as a betrayal of the Faith as Aegon didn't even pay lip service to respecting the Faith's beliefs.

When the Faith rose up in revolt after Aegon's death, Maegor made piles of Septon skulls and again was a hairs breath from burning cities to deal with the revolt.

It turns out that nobles and even priests are a lot less willing to see their entire castle burned down around them in the name of religious principle than they might have professed. And when the nobility and Septon's bent the knee (and kept it bent, which the Throne had dragons to enforce for like 150 years), the small folk were left with no real means of organizing any kind of serious revolt.

The Targaryens spent most of their reign co-opting, degrading, and breaking the Faith of the Seven in ways both overt and covert. They deliberately corrupted the upper leadership of the Faith and ensured that it was fairly well known how corrupt they were (hard to lead a religious war when your own supporters think you a heretic). They deliberately co-opted the Faith into the structures of power.

And they always had the North and the Old Gods as the boogyman. When the Andals got uppity, the North would ride south and they took a positive glee in draping the guts of Andals over trees. So long as the Targaryens had Dragons and the loyalty of the North, they had a truly secure throne as they could play the First Men against the Andals and their Dragons could burn Andal castles and Knight heavy armies with relative ease.

The Valyrians had no real religion (especially not a proselytizing one out to convert the lesser races) and had ruled a multi-religion empire for thousands of years.

 

[CarlManvers2019]

You know, one thing I wonder is, WHY does the religion of the Old Gods have little to no practices, ritual or myth?

All we have is that they’re nature gods of a sort

Ehlnofey

Ehlnofey, also known as the Earth Bones, are the faded descendants of the Aedra who walked on Nirn, as well as the ancestors of men and mer. A large fragment of the Ehlnofey world landed on Nirn relatively intact, and the Ehlnofey living there were the ancestors of the Mer. These Ehlnofey...

elderscrolls.fandom.com

Honestly, bet the closest thing they would have to a creation myth, given the Lovecraftian nature of the setting, would be that they’re a sort of psychic being or beings that descended unto the Planetos or part of Westeros and proceeded to either create plantlife or merge with it

 

[Terthna]

Writers Cannot Do Math, and the Dunning–Kruger effect is a thing that exists. George R. R. Martin's fantasy world does not hold up to scrutiny, but most fiction in general doesn't.

 

[Jouaint]

Writers Cannot Do Math, and the Dunning–Kruger effect is a thing that exists. George R. R. Martin's fantasy world does not hold up to scrutiny, but most fiction in general doesn't.

I mean I remember hearing that when he first saw the Wall in Game of Thrones Martin told the showrunners that they made it to big only to be informed that it was actually smaller than how he described it in the books.

 

[ATP]

Writers Cannot Do Math, and the Dunning–Kruger effect is a thing that exists. George R. R. Martin's fantasy world does not hold up to scrutiny, but most fiction in general doesn't.

Not all writers could be Tolkien.But even lesser writers could made plausible works,if they cared.But since book would sell,then why made it better if you could start writing another unplausible book,which would sell,too ?

 

[Deleted member 88]

Martin is writing a very character centered story. Everything else is just prop for that.

 

[Bear Ribs]

Let me point out there's a difference between "Realistic" and "Quality." I don't accuse ASoIaF of being poor quality, I just don't like it being called realistic due to it not being remotely so.

Many fantastic things are good quality and absurdly unrealistic*. I regard Martin's work as essentially the Anti-Star Trek where instead of people mysteriously becoming socially evolved and morally superior, humans in ASoIaF are mysteriously extremely evil compared to baseline humans. Both have severe problems with numbers and facts but this shouldn't get in the way of a good story, only a realistic story.

*The Roadrunner f'rex.

 

[Aldarion]

Let me point out there's a difference between "Realistic" and "Quality." I don't accuse ASoIaF of being poor quality, I just don't like it being called realistic due to it not being remotely so.

Many fantastic things are good quality and absurdly unrealistic*. I regard Martin's work as essentially the Anti-Star Trek where instead of people mysteriously becoming socially evolved and morally superior, humans in ASoIaF are mysteriously extremely evil compared to baseline humans. Both have severe problems with numbers and facts but this shouldn't get in the way of a good story, only a realistic story.

*The Roadrunner f'rex.

Exactly. But problem with ASoIaF is that many people appear to praise it for its realism (example 1), when in fact it is lot less realistic than Tolkien's Middle Earth. And being a history nerd (and even possibly somewhat of an amateur historian), this is rather problematic for me as ASoIaF is a very popular series, and a reputation for realism - regardless of author's intent - can be very damaging to popular understanding of history. Especially the issue which you noted - that humans in ASoIaF are extremely evil compared to baseline humans - creates extremely warped understanding of history. We see nobles as being those backstabbing arseholes, but in reality feudalism - especially in its more primitive forms - was all about honour. Vassals followed the senior because senior could be counted upon to provide protection, and senior provided protection because a) it was his duty and b) his power depended on his vassals. And this was true throughout the entire feudal chain, from serf to the king. The kind of backstabbing we see in ASoIaF was so completely self-defeating that it did not really exist until feudalism has largely fallen apart, yet we see absolutely none of the things which appeared as a result of feudalism falling apart: no royal standing army, no armies comprised of mercenaries fighting for the king and the major nobles alike in lieu of normal feudal retinue-armies... we have moral degeneracy but none of the things which made it possible.

 

[Deleted member 88]

Let's give some IU context for the situation.

The Targaryen monarchy was gravely weakened by the Dance of the Dragons. It no longer had the prestige of fire breathing magical lizards to rule absolutely. So it relied heavily on cultivating ties with the Lord's Paramount who became more powerful and important. The Blackfyre rebellions also further weakened loyalty to the dynasty. It endured, but Bloodraven's magical police state, no doubt weakened its prestige, as did Aegon V's children not doing as they were told. It was further weakened by Summerhall.

Before that, the faith of the seven was basically crushed and neutered. Its leadership obedient dogs of the Targaryen monarchy. Maegor saw its temporal authority destroyed in Fire and Blood. So in some sense, you could argue its authority was spiritually hollow-in a way that never happened in the RL medieval ages.

You have Aerys and Rhaegar serve to wildly discredit the Targaryen monarchy before and during RR. And Robert's regime is built on pillars-some consciously intended to collapse.

LF-out for himself, has his own backstory of grudges and ambition.
Varys-Targ loyalist, too useful for the nobles to dispose of.
Tywin-man with his own deep psychological and emotional insecurities, makes enemies.
Jaimie and Cersei-incest and mutually destructive behavior.
Robert-drunk empty hedonist.
Stannis: Bitter man with grudges and familial biases.
Ned: Traumatized emotionally after the loss of most of his family, angry with Robert for making an alliance with the perfidious Lannisters.
Hoster Tully-ambitious man who forged the key chains of BLAST. Lysa was screwed up by the Tansy and her own delusions. Unable to centralize the Riverlands, Walder Frey hates him. Lysa used by LF.
Dornish-want revenge on House Lannister.

We have most of the great nobility and notables in the capital all either being psychologically, emotionally, and spiritually screwed up in mutually reinforcing ways. The power of the Lord's paramount at its height, with the monarchy needing a coalition of marriage alliances to hold the realm together.

So in some ways, you could say Westeros is a stack of dominoes-both institutionally and in terms of its leading elites. All screwed up, compromised, disloyal, or rotting.

The back reason for this institutional and political weakness going back to the Dance, or the Faith militant revolt, or perhaps even the Conquest.

When Robert dies, the dominoes all lined up fall over. The system collapses, both due to its institutional failings and its leading elites being deeply damaged souls, sociopaths, or some combination of the above.

There was never a situation in RL Medieval times, to the best of my knowledge when the leading elites were as psychologically and emotionally damaged as they are in Westeros, with Westeros peculiar political economy-that is pretty much no merchant/burgher class, Lords Paramount that are basically kings of their own domains, inter house hatreds that go beyond usual ambition and into deeply personal desires for total destruction.

That is one thing Martin does well-all the elements of his characters reflect geopolitical considerations but are driven by their personal ambitions, demons, or own psyche's.

I would outright argue Westeros political class at the beginning of the series ought be in intensive therapy, if they were in modern times-Robert, Cersei, Tywin, LF, just about all of them. Because they're all fucked up in some way or another.

At the same time, betrayals do have consequences.

The Freys and Boltons are finding that no, they didn't kill all the wolves or crush the spirit's of Robb's loyalists, Cersei and the Lannisters are self destructing due to their own toxic relationships, psychological hang ups, and less than gentle style of rule.

The succession war in the books is the culmination of a thousand explosives going off, and thus we see the unprecedented collapse of the whole order.

Or more poetically-its a tapestry where one act leads to another, which then another which spirals into more consequences and those consequences' consequences.

 

[Aldarion]

@Lord Invictus Problem here is that functional feudalism would prevent that situation from happening in the first place. The very fact that Targaryens no longer had the dragons to rule absolutely would mean that nobility would take back the importance, and process of centralization would be gradually reversed. If monarchy as such had been so thoroughly discredited, Robert would have found it impossible to rule, as he did not have administrative apparatus of, say, Byzantine Empire (and even there ruling would have been impossible, just for different reasons). Same goes for Lords Paramount.

 

[Bear Ribs]

So, got pointed at a Blog by Unmitigated Pedantry that actually covers a lot of my points and makes for a decent read, but with more details and historical references to how things have to actually work in feudal societies.

New Acquisitions: How It Wasn’t: Game of Thrones and the Middle Ages, Part I

This series is now available in an audio format; the entire playlist can be listened to here. The following post is the first part of a three part series where we look at the question “how me…

acoup.blog

 

[Firebat]

If you were excommunicated, the people believed that working with you meant they would be going to hell with you later, and they believed it. People had Faith.
When Emperor Henry the IVth was accused of simony and got excommunicated, he came within a hair's breadth of losing his position because none of his people would obey him and he wound up kneeling in the snow for three days for a chance to beg Pope Gregory VII to lift his excommunication. That's what having an actual religion does

No, that's what having a loose feudal state with a bunch of noble gentlemen ready to pounce the leader at first opportunity does.

Henry's position was weakened by conflicts in the empire. To claim that the Pope just disabled Henry's ability to command with his excommunication would be a gross misrepresentation of events. Emperor Henry continued struggle for power, remained a major player and engaged in active conflict with the Pope despite being excommunicated (repeatedly). In fact, a few years after Canossa Henry took Rome, installed his own guy as Pope and was officially crowned as Emperor.

In short, one should be very careful about making grand claims about People Having Faith in the good old days. Sure, they did have faith. Most people besieging the Pope by the command of excommunicated Henry IV would probably call themselves good Christians.

They just didn't let it interfere with their decision making.

ASOIAF Catholic rip offs simply played politics worse than their RL counterparts. It happens.

The kind of backstabbing we see in ASoIaF was so completely self-defeating that it did not really exist until feudalism has largely fallen apart

When compared to the history of Carolingian Empire, the kind of backstabbing that we see in ASOIAF is positively tame.
If anything, GRRM overemphasizes conflict between noble families, while neglecting intra-family warfare. In the gentle and idealistic Westeros, if you have a son/brother, you can generally count on his loyalty. Don't be a complete asshole and family will stick to you. In the childish grim darkness of Carolingian dynasty, Carloman did not endure Chalemagne's brotherly love, Louis spent his life being stabbed in the back by his boys, Lothair had to fight his brothers and there wasn't a lot of familial feeling down the line either.

And it wasn't a European problem. In three kingdoms epoch Cao dynasty fell because they overemphasized politically castrating potentially rebellious family members of the monarch. So the Emperor was left isolated and vulnerable to coup. Simas toppled Caos and over-corrected, making royal family members too powerful - and then collapsed due to various royal family members backstabbing each other into oblivion.

It was a balancing act.

 

[Aldarion]

When compared to the history of Carolingian Empire, the kind of backstabbing that we see in ASOIAF is positively tame.
If anything, GRRM overemphasizes conflict between noble families, while neglecting intra-family warfare. In the gentle and idealistic Westeros, if you have a son/brother, you can generally count on his loyalty. Don't be a complete asshole and family will stick to you. In the childish grim darkness of Carolingian dynasty, Carloman did not endure Chalemagne's brotherly love, Louis spent his life being stabbed in the back by his boys, Lothair had to fight his brothers and there wasn't a lot of familial feeling down the line either.

I am aware of that. But here is the thing: these were intra-dynastic issues, which therefore much of the time did not translate into open warfare, and when they did, it was on a smaller scale (due to involving single family). Poisons and stuff were order of the day, for the most part, though there were a lot of rebellions too.

 

[Typhonis]

Here's a question about GOT. Have we seen any mutations in crops and animals because of the years long winters the planet has? I mean shaggier cows and sheep. Plants people grow for food in winter? How do you feed people when you have snow drifts feet high?

 

[Deleted member 88]

Westeros appears to have far stricter taboos against kinslaying than RL earth.

At the same time intradynastic struggles do happen, Jason Lannister IIRC is strongly alleged to have murdered his young niece to become lord of the rock, Visenya schemed against Rhaenys’ children, and stark mothers fought for their son’s claims to Winterfell. With people ending up at the wall or pushed down the stairs.

Also Renly and Stannis nearly fight an intra Baratheon battle. There is also the dance of course. A struggle between Viserys’ daughter and his grandchildren.

So conflict within families does happen in ASOIAF, it’s usually of the pushing down the stairs/smothering with pillows/discrete exile to the wall variety instead of the open conflict variety with a few exceptions.

 

[ATP]

I am aware of that. But here is the thing: these were intra-dynastic issues, which therefore much of the time did not translate into open warfare, and when they did, it was on a smaller scale (due to involving single family). Poisons and stuff were order of the day, for the most part, though there were a lot of rebellions too.

Maybe becouse GRRM was allured with Borgia family methods ?

 

[The Immortal Watch Dog]

But in a situation he was in, in society he was purportedly living in, there is no way a betrayal of guest right and a massacre of erstwhile allies could have been justified.

Adding to this, the existence of house Clegane in and of itself is an absurdity, Tywin should have faced region wide rebellions by his vassals, especially considering there's another equally prosperous but less disturbed house Lannister what? A lazy afternoon's ride from the Rock? and another two dozen cadet branches everywhere? The manner in which the Reynes and the Tarbeks were destroyed is shit the Assyrians got up too and there's a reason why those guys were habitually skinning babies alive and shit..the moment they let up on the terror, they'd have been swamped.

You don't do that then elevate a clan of gigantic, mentally unstable serial killers as your premier ranging force..

House Lannister should have been taken out by Stannis in book 2 it's the only realistic end to them.

I never read the books myself but the wiki entry seems fairly extensive.

Dothraki

The Dothraki people are a culture of nomadic warriors in Essos who range across the vast grasslands of the Dothraki sea in hordes known as khalasars. People of the Seven Kingdoms and the Free Cities also refer to the Dothraki as horselords.[1][2]

awoiaf.westeros.org

I can see certain i aspirations coming from certain groups but GRRM obviously changed things up... And added his own stuff as one should do... Being a fantasy author.

Honestly always thought the Dothraki were based more on the Comanche than the Mongols, right down to their irreverence and propensity to make atrocity in some kind of terrible in joke.

*ahem*

The Faith Militant in the show did literally not a single thing wrong and was well on it's way to transforming the setting into one more realistically medieval, which would have benefited everyone except the child eating lunatics.

The fact that the Faith Militant repeatedly seems to be one of the more constructive insurrectionist forces in Westeros and tends to have rather legitimate grievances every time they rise up, is one of the more amusingly realistic aspects of the story. Albeit, I doubt Martin meant for it to be that way.

You know what, I think GRRM kinda made the in-universe cultures really simplified AF....realistic my ass

The political intrigue, especially that of Varys and Little Finger..honestly really isn't that impressive compared to your average middle age court..to say nothing of the shit that went down in Italy, England, France and Spain during the Renaissance for which they often get compared too..erroneously.

Hell, Japan from the same period as well... The Ashikaga even out brutalized them with it not being uncommon for the Ashikaga Shoguns to boil priests alive when they were critical of the Bafuku...And then you get into the jolly fat man and his "I cucked everyone Scorpius style and emerged from the Warring States as Emperor in all but name"


Or the Julio-Cluadian dynasty..which..again..people compare Westeros under Bobby B too.

Toned things down?

What exactly did they do? Think really hard about what we see them do. Not "implications of stuff they said" not "logical conclusions of threats they made to their enemies" think about what we actually see them do.


They werent beating gays in the street, they were beating baby eating nobles in the street and saying "this is because you're gay" while leaving the smallfolk completely untouched.

The image could not have been clearer when they attacked the whorehouse: The whores they just pushed out of the way, the nobles and pimps (who, remember, own the whores like slaves and routinely sell/buy them to be butchered) they kicked the shit out of and ransacked.

Honestly? As far as fanatics go, that sparrow dude and his extremists are...not so extreme

I'm not even looking at it from a modern standpoint..the average medieval dude would look at them and marvel at their restraint and moderation when faced with the kind of gross ineptitude and cartoonish evil.

 

[Shipmaster Sane]

Honestly? As far as fanatics go, that sparrow dude and his extremists are...not so extreme View attachment 290

I'm not even looking at it from a modern standpoint..the average medieval dude would look at them and marvel at their restraint and moderation when faced with the kind of gross ineptitude and cartoonish evil.

"Nooooooo you cant just kill hitler and say it's because he's gay even if you're not killing anyone else for being gay!!!"
"Hahahaha Cothlik Mace go B O N K."