Radio Westeros E78 - Children of the Forest, Weirwoods & Greenseers

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In part three of our series on magical species of ASOIAF we explore Westeros' indigenous people known as the children of the forest, their relationship with the Old Gods and the weirwood trees, and the magical abilities commonly associated with them -- skinchanging, greenseeing and greendreams.
*Introducing Those who Sing the Song of the Earth
*Children of the Forest in the Dawn Age
*The First Men and Age of Heroes
*Magical Bloodlines
*Weirwoods and Greenseers
*Conclusion: ASoIaF and Looking Ahead

[@lili46038]

I had a ton of chores to do, and then just before starting, your episode apeared on my feed. You really made my day, i love your voices and your insight!

[@RadioWesteros]

Hope you enjoyed the ep, and got through all those chores!

[@uriustosh]

Dinner & a Radio Westeros ain't the worst way to wind down a Monday evening.

[@t-rexcellentreviews1663]

Agreed.

[@Lawa_kun]

best ASOIAF podcast out there

[@amartinez016]

hard second!!

[@annadavis1292]

Fellow Bostonian who audibly gasped when I saw a new episode 😍

[@julieloucalcote1368]

What a happy day!!

[@jxun4l3ht10]

Ooh, this one is going to be fresh and organic episode!

[@eldric.stoneskin]

Another amazing video guys! This line regarding the magic of the CotF has always confused me and would love to hear your thoughts “Some said the children of the forest helped him build it, shaping the stones with magic” Knowing they worship gods of forest, stream and stone, and the trees they worship turn to stone as well, maybe they have stone powers too?

[@RadioWesteros]

Great catch! Lots of interesting implications too!

[@disclaimin]

Wonderful episode as always. Somehow I'd never heard that Leaf theory before! Very interesting.

[@ApplesandDragons]

24:34 "Legend further holds that the greenseers could also delve into the past and see far into the future." -Maester Yandel Delving into the past to see into the future is what the reader is doing as he's reading this line in this book. TWOIAF is a history book. So greensight is symbolic of story interpretation. And a greenseer is symbolic of a reader who's good at story interpretation. As we read about the histories of, say, Aegon the Unworthy and Aemon the Dragonknight, a spark of recognition will have us saying 'Ah! Aemon and Naerys from the past are mirrors of Jaime and Cersei in the present.' Kingsguard Brother and Queen Sister. And of course, the present is the future of both a moment and a decade ago, so the recognition is an instance of somebody between the past and the future "delving into the past and seeing far into the future." And somebody between the past and the future was you, a moment and a decade ago. With this, the story's or author's implied promise is that if you delve deeper into the past you will see even further into the future. But what does delving deeper mean? With a mirror identified, we can identify another, and perhaps another. If Aemon and Naerys represent Jaime and Cersei, Aegon the Unworthy represents a combination of Tyrion and Robert - Brother and King Husband. Viserys is Tywin - Hand Father. Joffrey is Daeron the Good - King Son. What's the next step? Seeing your reflection in the story, as we did in the first sentence. These mirrors share a theme: _They all make the audience debate about Daeron's legitimacy easier for opponents of it and harder for proponents of it._ If Cersei and Jaime are incestuous, how not Aemon and Naerys? If Joffrey is the son of Jaime, how not Daeron of Aemon? If Aegon got a son on Naerys, how not Robert on Cersei? The reader who clings to Daeron's legitimacy refuses to learn from history. One vision of the future we're left with is: _Daeron is a bastard, and therefore the Blackfyre line is the more legitimate Targaryen line._

[@Jimabair]

I can't wait to see y'all after winds gets released!! You'll have so much to talk about

[@leannepowell8709]

Homemade burger and radio Westeros! Today's a good day!

[@catherinemorgan6011]

Awesome episode! Thank you!

[@roddammit5510]

Thanks a million for all the hard work.

[@msanders777]

Great job, as always.

[@tylerbarrett6652]

So what was traditionally referred to as the 4 elements, earth, wind, fire, water... we see the children represent earth, the dragons represent fire, the "others" representing water... or frozen water... but who represent the wind? the storm gods? Then again... the children seem to represent a mixture of earth and water... and the dragons a mixture of fire and wind... Curious and confusing.

[@ohhhmindy4380]

Words are wind 😉

[@danlapointe5140]

The watchers that seemed to butcher Waymar (This happen’s only in Will’s head) were in fact scrying, meditating, using the “great rock” in the Prologue.

[@Kienn.JoIaF2020]

Nitpick: George never uses warg as a verb.

[@RadioWesteros]

Yeah we’re aware. And yet repeatedly saying skinchanging, or worse describing the process (slipping into the wolf’s skin, entering its mind, etc.), is awkward and there doesn’t seem to be another great single word option to communicate the process. So warging it is. Bonus- it *does* differentiate between types of skinchanging (wolves vs. other) 😉

[@amartinez016]

Excellent, as always RW! Thank you LW and yb :) As I was listening to this episode it struck me: if prophetic dreams and visions are associated with dragon dreams and green dreams, could it stand to reason that the Others (who as far as we "know" could be their own race with their own culture) have something similar? I know there is no evidence out there to confirm or even suggest this is the case, but if fire and earth magicks can give their users prophetic dreams, why not ice magic?

[@RadioWesteros]

You’re right that there’s no suggestion of this, but WHAT IF that were the explanation for why the Others started focusing on humankind in the late 3rd century AC after so many years of keeping to the far far north? More info please George!

[@amartinez016]

And like you all have theorized before, it'd be very Martinian to have someone's efforts to try to prevent a prophecy be the very reason it "comes true" Thanks again, RW! Keep up the PHENOMENAL work and can't wait for the next episode 🌳

[@cbirnbaum2]

Those who sing the song of the earth

[@thisguy8106]

🔥🔥🔥🔥

[@amartinez016]

No! No fire 🔥 -- the Singers speak for the trees for the trees have no tongues. Just eyes 👀

[@xxfaerietalesxx]

So could the faceless men be training arya to essentially be the one to kill the NK (Jon?) because she can communicate between westeros and essos? So if she is killing by warg the Nk Can’t know that b/c they can’t, presumably, communicate to essos. Between she and bran, they could communicate. And there seems to be a reason as to why we now know thru varymer that multiple animals can be warged at once and that kicking someone from their animal is the worst, so i feel like that will come into play with the starks down the road

[@conniesuper9892]

Snowy locks and Highheart Ghost Targaryens?...Maybe Daemon never died and ended up on Isle of Faces.

[@bruceswayn9628]

The wings of the "Chained winged wolf" are never described. Jojen believes it's Bran, but a lot of the time, a characters assumption is wrong when stated. I wonder if the wings were more dragon than bird. A dragon-wolf cross, bound to the earth in stone. And the dragon must be woken from stone by fire.

[@saelind73]

Nobody wants a "big brother" around. No wonder they cut those trees. lol And I'm saying this as a lover of trees, including weeirwood trees. If I lived in Westeros, I would probably worship the Old Gods. The Seven does nothing for me. But it's not difficult to imagine that having them around would've been very creepy and scary as hell to men. Being watched the whole time. Which is why the idea of Bran becoming King of Westeros is horrible. The personification of the "big brother". Pray the old gods that's not what George intends to do. Not exactly at least.

[@shobhitkaul8076]

The tree dwelling seems to be like lothlorian elves

[@geoninja3631]

💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚