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I will admit I'm a little confused.....on the one hand i hear about a summer that lasts 10 years.....you hear about winters that last 10 years...and snow drifts 100 feet deep.
And you hear of "late summer snows"......as the first book opens, there is snow on the ground?
At the end of Feast of Crows, i seem to remember
so whats up with the seasons? thanks
oh and the gamer in me wants to know how people and society endures these 10 year winters. thoughts?
Heck i dont think we could survive a 1 year winter with all of our modern stuff.
We were talking about this on the George RR martin thread.
Its my crackpot theory that the planet has an erratic tilt to it. Maesters declare the official start of winter, and i vaguely recall them saying something about using telescopes to do so. The only thing it makes sense for them to keep track of is the change from whatever the "north" star is on their planet/world.
Seasons are determined not by the distance from the sun to the earth (the northern hemesphere is closer to the sun in winter) so much as by the tilt of the planet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effect_of_sun_angle_on_climate
our planet rather evenly wobles as it goes around the sun, although over 24,000 years or so it also shifts. Draco was the north star when the pyramids were built for example. If Martinland is shifting rapidly it would explain the uneven length in seasons.
Such a wobble would be hard to explain. Could be an asteroid , valaria's explosive doom could have been just THAT big, a lack of uniformity with the magma mass under the planet, the moon and the planet getting into a bad synch, the loss of a moon...
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Martin has discussed this in the past and attributes it not to any odd axial tilt, orbital wobble, star variance, or any other plausible scientific explanation (though he is gratified to hear fans BS about it -- he's a Big Geek too).
Martin says:
1) It's due to "magic"; and
2) It will be made more clear before series' end
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Thank you both for your responses.
The axial tilt theory is interesting.
I can understand why Martin said its due to magic. THen its well inexplicable. And the author isn't tied down by anything, least of all, a scientists knowledge of how mass, gravity, etc work.
with an Magical solution, Martin is free to provide whatever explaination that he wants to. this way he isn't also tied down by something he said earlier.
I am listening to the Game on thrones on CD, and i just got through Bran's dream...his dream hinted at something frightening dwelling in the northern ice wastes.
Well thanks.....its an interesting concept shifting seasons and all that.
It seems that everything must have a season in which it waxes and wanes....even magic in his world.
The axil tilt might be due to magic, but unless the magic is demons standing above the sky with a with umbrellas , the only way to explain the shorter days is by the planet tilting.
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This of course assumes a helio centric system.
Martins world could be anything...it could be earth centric, it could be flat......
who knows.
I think one big difference between how an author looks at a story, or his story, and how a gamer looks at it is emphasis.
an author usually is much more interested in his/her characters and how they grow what tribulations they go through, how they change....the story etc.
The world, is usually a back drop.
We gamers of course are very interested in how things work.....Ie the seasons, magic, the feudal system etc....because we can lift the stuff for our own games.
example: I think lucas decided as he was making attack of the clones, that Jedi couldn't marry. It created dramatic "tension" among other things ( bad acting) between Aniken and Padme. i think for Lucas, the world was the backdrop for his characters.
We gamers would be interested in wether the Jedi can marry, because we want to know how th order fits into society so we can better run say a "star wars "game if we want to.
well this is interesting to chew over..any hints on how people survived winter?
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well this is interesting to chew over..any hints on how people survived winter?
Winters in Westeros are 'normally' (i.e. between the Long Night and the presumably huge winter that will fall during this series) only really severe north of the Neck, or at high altitudes. The Reach and Dorne are far enough south that apparently growing and sowing is still possible in winter (neither normally sees snow, which rarely gets further south than the Riverlands and King's Landing in a bad season).
So, for the purposes of speaking generally, only the North itself really gets hammered during the bad winters, which limits how much of Westeros is badly affected.
The normal turn of events is that during summer, wise lords will set aside non-perishables and long-lasting foodstuffs to one side against the next winter. Once summer has turned, it becomes law that everyone - from lords to peasants - must set aside 25% of their harvest against the coming winter. Based on research, 'real' medieval curing and storage technology could keep some meats and foodstuffs edible for as long as 3 years. Necessity being the mother of invention, it's likely that people in Westeros will have developed additional techniques to store food for longer. For example, we learn in one of the books that the Wall acts as an effective, overpowered freezer, so the Night's Watch can store food in its base for very long periods of time.
When winter actually kicks in and growing and reaping is impossible, then the farmers abandon their farms and retreat to the winter towns (usually located around the major castles or cities; Winterfell's winter town is empty most of the time but during winter is full to bursting with farmers from dozens of miles all around) with their saved food and supplies.
If winter in the North lasts for more than 3-4 years, then there are other measures that come into play. Ice fishing on the lakes and rivers is still possible, and shipping food in by sea or (a much harder journey) overland from the Reach and Dorne, or even the Free Cities, is also possible, though arduous. Several castles have natural resources that can be used: Winterfell is built on hot springs and the Dreadfort on volcanic vents, and both have glasshouses and other food-growing areas which remain effective even in winter.
If winter lasts longer than that, then there is mass famine and tens or hundreds of thousands of people in the North die. This is why the North, despite being many times larger than any other region in Westeros, has a comparatively small population.
Also for increasing the length of time you can preserve something nothing beats a permanent deep freeze. Modern dogs have eaten MAMMOTH... 10,000 year dead mammoth flesh.
Also for increasing the length of time you can preserve something nothing beats a permanent deep freeze. Modern dogs have eaten MAMMOTH... 10,000 year dead mammoth flesh.
I wouldn't call that very modern of them.
Werhed thank you for your detailed explanation, it makes allot of sense. From looking at the Map shown in the begining trailers of the TV series the eastern continent seems to be either at the equator or in the southern hemisphere.
The equator seems to be a couple of thousand miles south of Dorne; if the Wall is on the North Cape of Norway (inside the Arctic Circle), that would put Dorne in southern Morocco, and the equator is further south than that. Essos, the eastern continent, apparently extends in an arc-like shape from just east of Westeros much further south. I wouldn't be surprised if Asshai was on the equator or southern hemisphere, or if Qarth was close to the equator, but the rest of the continent (including Slaver's Bay and the Free Cities) seems to be in the northern hemisphere, just slightly further south than Westeros.
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Werthead, again thank you. I am still reading through Dance of Dragons, and I am enjoying the book.
I am impressed with the amount of detail you have gleaned concerning GRR Martin's world. does this come from a close reading of the books or are there other online resources to draw on? a wiki?
I have just purchased and have been enjoying "the game of thrones" on CD. Its unabridged. Its amazing all of the little details that are put in. My first reading i didn't notice any of it. as i listen to the book, there are all sorts of little hints here and there.
One other thing i have been trying to figure out, is, with the seasons of variable severity and length how do people keep track of the passage of a year? when their name day is?
in one of Mormont's (comander of the night watch) conversations with Tyrion, he asks him how many winters he has seen. I think Tyrion mentions 8. IF Tyrion is say 24, then this might suggest an average of a "three year" season, three for winter, spring, summer and autumn. I suppose that would be the average duration of a season, with variations on either side.
I suppose the Maesters and other religious figures use astronomical measurements?
Over the course of A game of Thrones, A clash of Kings, A storm of Swords and now A feast of crows and Dance of dragons, which from what i gather are happening roughly at the same time, how much time has passed? one year? two years? three or four years?
thanks
If I remember correctly, the wildly irregular seasons apply only on the continent of Westeros, implying highly focused magic or something functionally indistinguishable from it.
I wouldn't call that very modern of them.
.... the mammoth was 10,000 years old. the dogs were in the 1980's?
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hmm interesting, if the fluctuating seasons are only on Westeros, and focused only in the north hmm magic.
Well it may be that, with the other continent, at the same latitude of kings landing and arching to the south, it may be, that if "ice sheets" or artic conditions, cover the north of Westros, if you go due east from the neck, barring some unknown land mass, all of that wintery nastiness would be out at sea. Perhaps the northern regions of that world, are a little like our "antartica" surrounded by ocean, except for the sole land mass of Westros.
well I'm sure more will be revealed as i read Dance of Dragons....and hopefuly Mr Martin will keep "quill to Vellum" and get another book out soon. Winter is coming; and i want something to read by the fire.
If I remember correctly, the wildly irregular seasons apply only on the continent of Westeros, implying highly focused magic or something functionally indistinguishable from it.
Any idea where this is comming from? I don't recall seeing it in the books.
I am impressed with the amount of detail you have gleaned concerning GRR Martin's world. does this come from a close reading of the books or are there other online resources to draw on? a wiki?
I've been a moderator on the Westeros.org forum for 6 years, where these discussions are common :-)
One other thing i have been trying to figure out, is, with the seasons of variable severity and length how do people keep track of the passage of a year? when their name day is?
By studying the passage of the planet's moon. 12 turns of the moon are a year. Why 12? The theory is (backed up by the old cover blurb for AGoT) that the seasons were 'normal' (i.e. like ours) before the Long Night and the War for the Dawn, and were thrown out of whack by the Others. The 12-months-are-1-year thing is a historical hold-over from there.
Incidentally, because of the variance between 12 turns of the moon and the astronomical year, and because moon-watching is not as reliable as studying the passing of the seasons, some fans theorise that these have contributed to historians losing count of the years, explaining the bonkers amounts of time that have allegedly passed since some events (highlighted in the books when someone points out that the Andal Invasion is historically supposed to have happened 6,000 years ago, but 4,000 years is more likely and even 2,000 years ago is possible).
I suppose the Maesters and other religious figures use astronomical measurements?
Yes. They study the passages of the moon and keep careful count of the passing days and weeks.
Over the course of A game of Thrones, A clash of Kings, A storm of Swords and now A feast of crows and Dance of dragons, which from what i gather are happening roughly at the same time, how much time has passed? one year? two years? three or four years?
A GAME OF THRONES opens in mid-to-late 298 AL (After the Landing). According to our best estimates, A DANCE WITH DRAGONS concludes in early-to-mid 301 AL, so about three years have passed.
If I remember correctly, the wildly irregular seasons apply only on the continent of Westeros, implying highly focused magic or something functionally indistinguishable from it.
Definitely not. Winter is falling on Essos as well: the canals of Braavos are freezing over in A FEAST FOR CROWS and in A DANCE WITH DRAGONS:
Because Essos does not connect to the northern polar icecap (like Westeros does), winters are not as severe there (conversely, as Essos extends to the equator, it appears that summers are worse than in Westeros). But they still happen.
Well it may be that, with the other continent, at the same latitude of kings landing and arching to the south, it may be, that if "ice sheets" or artic conditions, cover the north of Westros, if you go due east from the neck, barring some unknown land mass, all of that wintery nastiness would be out at sea. Perhaps the northern regions of that world, are a little like our "antartica" surrounded by ocean, except for the sole land mass of Westros.
Correct. The northern polar icecap is surrounded by the Shivering Sea, a circumpolar ocean. Only the northernmost tip of Westeros - the Lands of Always Winter, a thousand or so miles north of the Wall - extends under the icecap. The Shivering Sea separated Essos from the northern icecap.