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Post by Melifeather on Jul 30, 2016 23:07:22 GMT
INVERSIONS I want to know more about this.
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Post by Ser Duncan on Jul 30, 2016 23:12:16 GMT
Ditto. I don't know what that means, but a hollow earth is intriguing.
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Post by min on Jul 30, 2016 23:20:56 GMT
God! This is fantastic. It's like a rif off of Larry Niven's Ringworld Trilogy with a world built around a sun. This has to tie in with the faceless men origin story and the World Book reference to the maze builders.
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Jul 30, 2016 23:22:51 GMT
Hollow Earth is a quite old and debunked theory that is nonetheless a favorite of many sci-fi authors - Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth is probably the most famous one that utilizes the concept.
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Post by Weasel Pie on Jul 31, 2016 0:24:22 GMT
ok so... the topic of volcanic activity made me think of calderas, which are essentially big-ass craters resulting from a volcanic explosion. Yellowstone famously has one. Most on earth are filled with water. Anyway this is one without so much water: Point being that calderas are sort of inverted mountains. Which ties into MMR prattling on about mountains, and also ties into time running backwards. I think you guys also know I'm obsessed with Carcosa since GRRM threw it as a name-place on the map of Essos. Carcosa in Essos happens to be near some very suspicious formations like the Dry Deep and the Hidden Sea, both of which I suspect are caldera-type... things. They further tie into my chunnelled Planetos obsession, that everything is connected underground. What if everything was connected above ground?Anyway Carcosa ties into a discussion PPBB and I had about White Cities, which IMO are dead cities that retain imprints of the past, sort of an alternate dimension. It's a cursed place. I have links to the full "king in yellow" somewhere but this is just from the wiki Along the shore the cloud waves break, The twin suns sink behind the lake, The shadows lengthen In Carcosa. Strange is the night where black stars rise, And strange moons circle through the skies, But stranger still is Lost Carcosa. Songs that the Hyades shall sing, Where flap the tatters of the King, Must die unheard in Dim Carcosa. Song of my soul, my voice is dead, Die thou, unsung, as tears unshed Shall dry and die in Lost Carcosa.So yeah this is a HUGE topic. More when I can get my brain on. There is a hollow-earth story out there that describes strange light at the pole which is eerily similar to Bran talking about the heart of winter. (need to find, sorry) Anyway, blown away (as usual) at Some Pig No Doubt's connections here, particularly the glorious clues in Melisandre's clothing. Just a stunning revelation really! Throw in the tectonics and inverted mountains and I am so there.
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Post by Weasel Pie on Jul 31, 2016 0:25:33 GMT
Did you see the tattered king reference?
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Post by Weasel Pie on Jul 31, 2016 0:30:38 GMT
Randon hollow earth graphics, lots of stuff about these. This one shows how the entry would be at the poles (North Pole - Heart of Winter) Universe inside
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Jul 31, 2016 0:31:51 GMT
Word vomit.
Dragonbinder/dragon horn that Euron gives to Victarion:
Made of black dragonbone, banded with red gold and Valyrian steel. The bands are inscribed with Valyrian glyphs which say “blood for fire, fire for blood.” When the horn sounds, the glyphs glow red-hot and then white-hot.
Once again, red markings glow on a black/dark surface....once again, resembling lava.
Crackpot: Inscription references a transmutation ceremony, one involving sacrifice - blood for fire; a gift to the vulcan god. **Melisandre references "the price she paid" to become a shadowbinder. Price = her life?** In return, someone (the sacrificial person?) becomes an agent/servant of the god - fire for blood. **Melisandre's blood = black and smoking, tears of flame, etc. She is now literally made of fire.**
ETA: Victarion is healed by Moqorro, afterwards his arm is burned and charred and cracked - like cooling volcanic rock. Will he now be able to blow the horn without dying because he is already transforming into fire?
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Jul 31, 2016 1:13:41 GMT
Carcosa in Essos happens to be near some very suspicious formations like the Dry Deep and the Hidden Sea, both of which I suspect are caldera-type... things. Yiiiissssss! Not to mention being neighbors with the City of Winged Men!! Men with leathery wings that can fly! I'm now leaning toward the idea that there was, in very ancient times, a race of men/humanoids/whatever that populated Essos and perhaps parts of Westeros...and that race, be it proto-First Men or proto-Valyrians or whatever you want to call them was nearly wiped out by some massive extinction event related to volcanoes and/or a meteor impact (or both). Think the K-T event plus Pompeii. The CotF/Ifeqevron and maybe some of the other races took the the underground tunnels - and perhaps saved some of the surviving humans, such as the Last Hero. This is a fledgling thought so I'm gonna have to ponder a bit more. But, I'm considering all of the similar legends thousands of miles apart, the greasy black stone scattered around, Asshai being basically a city in a perpetual state of volcanic winter, Dothraki myth of man (re)emerging from the Womb of the World, stuff like that.
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Post by Weasel Pie on Jul 31, 2016 1:24:50 GMT
Not to mention being neighbors with the City of Winged Men!! Men with leathery wings that can fly! And all those old forts out in the middle of nowhere. Old forts aren't noteworthy... except when GRRM notes that they exist where they exist... right in line with the Bleeding Sea to boot. I'm now leaning toward the idea that there was, in very ancient times, a race of men/humanoids/whatever that populated Essos and perhaps parts of Westeros...and that race, be it proto-First Men or proto-Valyrians or whatever you want to call them was nearly wiped out by some massive extinction event related to volcanoes and/or a meteor impact (or both). Think the K-T event plus Pompeii. The CotF/Ifeqevron and maybe some of the other races took the the underground tunnels - and perhaps saved some of the surviving humans, such as the Last Hero. This is a fledgling thought so I'm gonna have to ponder a bit more. But, I'm considering all of the similar legends thousands of miles apart, the greasy black stone scattered around, Asshai being basically a city in a perpetual state of volcanic winter, Dothraki myth of man (re)emerging from the Womb of the World, stuff like that. Like. Add in the Seastone Chair just because. And the Wolf's Den in White Harbor. And wherever it is Patchface was when he was under the sea. /sandwiches
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Jul 31, 2016 1:43:22 GMT
Someone stop me, seriously.
“The colors are strange,” he commented as he turned the blade in the sunlight. Most Valyrian steel was a grey so dark it looked almost black, as was true here as well. But blended into the folds was a red as deep as the grey. The two colors lapped over one another without ever touching, each ripple distinct, like waves of night and blood upon some steely shore. “How did you get this patterning? I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Nor I, my lord,” said the armorer. “I confess, these colors were not what I intended, and I do not know that I could duplicate them. Your lord father had asked for the crimson of your House, and it was that color I set out to infuse into the metal. But Valyrian steel is stubborn. These old swords remember, it is said, and they do not change easily. I worked half a hundred spells and brightened the red time and time again, but always the color would darken, as if the blade was drinking the sun from it. And some folds would not take the red at all, as you can see."
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Jul 31, 2016 2:57:39 GMT
Of note: I find this interesting because the two people in the story who would be/are most familiar with ancient lore do not seem to view the comet itself as the destructive or evil force. This somewhat contradicts, err, more popular theories that the comet itself as the agent of destruction, i.e. crashing into moons and what have you. Osha and Old Nan see the comet as a harbinger of something else, some other destructive force - the return of dragons, blood and fire. Something about comets: "The first observations of comets originate from the third millennium before Christ. In ancient cultures, their sudden appearance was considered to a sign from the gods. And because they disturbed the harmony of the starry sky, they were soon deemed to be a bad omen. In ancient Greece the natural philosophers attempted to find an explanation for the phenomenon. Aristotle (384 to 322 B.C.), whose views were to dominate the astronomical and physical worldview in the West for more than one-and-a-half millennia, believed they were emanations of the Earth’s atmosphere. In the Middle Ages, the fear of this “heavy hand of God” reached its pinnacle; comets were thought to portend terrible natural phenomena, such as floods or earthquakes. In the 16th and early 17 centuries, they became a favourite subject for broadsheets, the forerunners of newspapers. A poem from the 15th century provides an impressive description of the nature of comets: “ They bring fever, illness, pestilence and death, difficult times, shortages and times of great famine.”" Terrible natural phenomena...like volcanic eruptions. A thousand dragons pouring forth. Blood and fire. There's also THIS fascinating article that denotes the ways that comets were historically linked to widespread death and disease. What's really interesting here is that some of the diseases may have been introduced by the passing of the comet itself. "Comets are an ideal vehicle for sustaining and transporting a variety of microbes, including viruses, from planet to planet and even from solar system to solar system. In consequence, when these organisms are deposited on a world already thriving with life, genes may be exchanged, the evolution of new species may ensue, or conversely contagion may be unleashed, and disease, death, and plague may spread throughout the land." Greyscale, anyone?
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Post by Ser Duncan on Jul 31, 2016 3:45:15 GMT
There's also THIS fascinating article that denotes the ways that comets were historically linked to widespread death and disease. What's really interesting here is that some of the diseases may have been introduced by the passing of the comet itself. "Comets are an ideal vehicle for sustaining and transporting a variety of microbes, including viruses, from planet to planet and even from solar system to solar system. In consequence, when these organisms are deposited on a world already thriving with life, genes may be exchanged, the evolution of new species may ensue, or conversely contagion may be unleashed, and disease, death, and plague may spread throughout the land." Psh, Martin already did a story about that called Tuff Voyages. It is exactly what you're describing here on an intergalactic level. Possibly. We have no real origin for greyscale in the story, just that it is more common in damp environments. And if you guys would spot being so bloody interesting for 5 minutes maybe I'll finally finish my greyscale theory and we can discuss it too. But how the hell can I concentrate when you all have these great ideas flowing?
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Jul 31, 2016 3:46:03 GMT
Dany - transforming into fire. She raced, her feet melting the stone wherever they touched. “Faster!” the ghosts cried as one, and she screamed and threw herself forward. A great knife of pain ripped down her back, and she felt her skin tear open and smelled the stench of burning blood and saw the shadow of wings. And Daenerys Targaryen flew. “… wake the dragon …” The door loomed before her, the red door, so close, so close, the hall was a blur around her, the cold receding behind. And now the stone was gone and she flew across the Dothraki sea, high and higher, the green rippling beneath, and all that lived and breathed fled in terror from the shadow of her wings." Is "shadow of her wings" metaphorical for something else? "Yet when she slept that night, she dreamt the dragon dream again. Viserys was not in it this time. There was only her and the dragon. Its scales were black as night, wet and slick with blood. Her blood, Dany sensed. Its eyes were pools of molten magma, and when it opened its mouth, the flame came roaring out in a hot jet. She could hear it singing to her. She opened her arms to the fire, embraced it, let it swallow her whole, let it cleanse her and temper her and scour her clean. She could feel her flesh sear and blacken and slough away, could feel her blood boil and turn to steam, and yet there was no pain. She felt strong and new and fierce." Is it just me or does this sound ritualistic...like being fed to a volcano to transform into...whatever? And then there's Drogon's dragon egg: "She touched one, the largest of the three, running her hand lightly over the shell. Black-and-scarlet, she thought, like the dragon in my dream." Black as the midnight sea, yet alive with scarlet ripples and swirls. More lava flow imagery here. min or Melifeather , I can't remember which one, suggested that Dany may have been the original mother of dragons...I think you are on to something here, and wonder if perhaps she is supposed to be some reincarnated version of the vulcan god's wife. Bride of fire. The Undying have been waiting a thousand years for her return, and they sent the comet to show her the way. If a comet is intended to be a harbinger of a volcanic event, she needed to prepare herself to become The Bride - and when she lit that funeral pyre, she sacrificed herself to the fire. She passed the test; she is worthy to be given - or remarried - to the Red God. "Remember who you are, Daenerys Targaryen. The dragons know...do you?" As MMD burns on the pyre: "She heard a crack, the sound of shattering stone. The platform of wood and brush and grass began to shift and collapse in upon itself. Bits of burning wood slid down at her, and Dany was showered with ash and cinders. And something else came crashing down, bouncing and rolling, to land at her feet; a chunk of curved rock, pale and veined with gold, broken and smoking. The roaring filled the world, yet dimly through the firefall Dany heard women shriek and children cry out in wonder. Only death can pay for life.
And there came a second crack, loud and sharp as thunder, and the smoke stirred and whirled around her and the pyre shifted, the logs exploding as the fire touched their secret hearts. She heard the screams of frightened horses, and the voices of the Dothraki raised in shouts of fear and terror, and Ser Jorah calling her name and cursing. No, she wanted to shout to him, no, my good knight, do not fear for me. The fire is mine. I am Daenerys Stormborn, daughter of dragons, bride of dragons, mother of dragons, don’t you see? Don’t you SEE? With a belch of flame and smoke that reached thirty feet into the sky, the pyre collapsed and came down around her. Unafraid, Dany stepped forward into the firestorm, calling to her children. The third crack was as loud and sharp as the breaking of the world." I swear this is a reinvention of the whole sacrificial virgin thing, put on a platform and lowered into the mouth to be consumed by the volcano god.
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Post by Some Pig No Doubt on Jul 31, 2016 3:47:35 GMT
Psh, Martin already did a story about that called Tuff Voyages. It is exactly what you're describing here on an intergalactic level. No kidding? Guess I should take the time to read some of his other work! lol Ok, so, at least I know I'm on the right path and not pulling ideas out of my duff!
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