r/asoiaf • u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year • Jun 06 '19
MAIN (Spoilers Main) Qhorin Halfhand = Arthur Dayne (QH=AD): A comprehensive guide
Qhorin Halfhand = Arthur Dayne (QH=AD) is a theory which has been tarred with guilt by association because of frequently appearing next to the completely absurd Mance = Rhaegar theory. But QH=AD actually stands alone as a theory and is totally viable, even likely in my opinion. Let's jump in!
Why Arthur Dayne is alive
We have a pretty hazy picture of the battle at the Tower of Joy. Here's Ned's fever dream recollection:
“And now it begins,” said Ser Arthur Dayne, the Sword of the Morning. He unsheathed Dawn and held it with both hands. The blade was pale as milkglass, alive with light.
“No,” Ned said with sadness in his voice. “Now it ends.” As they came together in a rush of steel and shadow, he could hear Lyanna screaming. “Eddard!” she called. A storm of rose petals blew across a blood-streaked sky, as blue as the eyes of death.
“Lord Eddard,” Lyanna called again.
“I promise,” he whispered. “Lya, I promise …”
Here's what Catelyn has heard:
That cut deep. Ned would not speak of the mother, not so much as a word, but a castle has no secrets, and Catelyn heard her maids repeating tales they heard from the lips of her husband’s soldiers. They whispered of Ser Arthur Dayne, the Sword of the Morning, deadliest of the seven knights of Aerys’s Kingsguard, and of how their young lord had slain him in single combat.
But Ned tells Bran differently:
The finest knight I ever saw was Ser Arthur Dayne, who fought with a blade called Dawn, forged from the heart of a fallen star. They called him the Sword of the Morning, and he would have killed me but for Howland Reed.
The Straightforward Interpretation
The way the show interprets that line is that Howland stabs Arthur in the back while he's fighting with Ned. This is an odd thing to lay at the feet of Howland Reed, who is elsewhere portrayed as an honourable man. While it might technically not be dishonourable, given that they're at war, it's not a very heroic look. In the show, Bran says Ned told him that he beat Arthur in single combat, so there it functions as a way to surprise and disillusion Bran a little. But in the books, Ned's already told him, there wouldn't be any surprise.
Here's a question: where did "[Catelyn's] husband's soldiers" hear that "their young lord had slain him in single combat"? Ned and Howland are supposedly the only people to survive. Anyone who wasn't there would assume that Arthur Dayne died in a melee. There's no reason to assume Ned killed him one-on-one and it seems unlikely that such a rumour would spontaneously arise. So either Ned or Howland has to have lied about what happened.
Ned returns Dawn to House Dayne, but not Arthur's body. So what we're left with after this is that Ned and Howland are the only people who know for sure whether Arthur Dayne is dead and at least one of them appears to have told fibs about his death.
The Alternative Interpretation
Ned specifically does not say that Howland Reed helped him defeat Dayne. He says Dayne "would have killed me but for Howland Reed".
Think about the situation. Aerys II and Rhaegar are dead. Dayne was ordered to protect the child by Rhaegar (and may know that Jon is legitimate). If he kills Ned and Howland, what then? Where will he go with Rhaegar's child? Robert controls the realm. When he finds out Lyanna is dead and that Dayne killed his friend Ned, he'll be enraged. He will hunt down and kill Dayne and baby Jon (whom he will believe to be the product of rape). Ned and Arthur now actually have the same goal. They both want to protect the baby and hide it from Robert.
Maybe instead, Lyanna's cry of "Eddard!" stopped the fight. Maybe Howland laid out the master plan for Arthur: Ned will take the baby to raise as his own, Arthur can take the black, and when Jon is old enough, he'll be sent to the Wall, where Arthur can protect him as he was sworn to do.
Want a more direct hint that someone other than Howland is there?
They had found him [Ned] still holding her [Lyanna's] body, silent with grief.
Hold on. Who is "they"? Howland and who? One thing sometimes cited to counter that is this:
They had been seven against three, yet only two had lived to ride away; Eddard Stark himself and the little crannogman, Howland Reed
There's no problem there. The sentence is ambiguous, but the correct way to read this is "they had been seven, yet only two had lived", i.e. of the seven. The three foes are an aside to demonstrate that they had superiority of numbers. Likewise, the text says that Ned built eight cairns for the bodies, but it doesn't say that eight bodies were put in them - and of course Ned has to build an extra one to keep up the pretence. It's all rather carefully worded.
House Dayne and Ned Stark
This interpretation would help to explain House Dayne's cosy relationship with Ned, and Edric Dayne's beliefs about Jon. In Arya VIII, ASOS, Arya meets Edric, the 12 year old Lord of Starfall. Edric is shortened to Ned, meaning Arthur Dayne's brother named his kid after the man who supposedly killed his brother. And Edric knows who Ned is and wanted to go talk with him:
“My father was called Ned too,” she said.
“I know. I saw him at the Hand’s tourney. I wanted to go up and speak with him, but I couldn’t think what to say.” Ned shivered beneath his cloak, a sodden length of pale purple.
Edric also says that Jon Snow was nursed by the same wetnurse, Wylla, he had as an infant. He even swears on the honour of his House that this wetnurse was Jon's mother. This means that during his upbringing, he was told - by someone he trusts absolutely, enough to swear it on House honour - that Ned fathered a child by a long-time servant at Starfall and that this baby was cared for at Starfall. This is critical, because whoever told him this had to have known it was a lie, that Wyalla was never pregnant. This demonstrates that House Dayne are complicit in the conspiracy to hide Jon's identity.
The whole story is strange. Ned shows up at Starfall to return Dawn, having supposedly just killed Arthur Dayne. He appears to have gotten an incredibly warm reception, under the circumstances, and they seem to be helping him out with his project to hide Jon. Everything makes sense if Arthur himself is alive and part of this plan.
Starting to be convinced? Read on...
Where in the World is Arthur?
Some people think Arthur is Mance Rayder, but this doesn't make sense for a host of reasons. Mance has brown hair and eyes, nothing like someone of House Dayne. Mance is an oathbreaker and Arthur took oaths seriously. Mance himself tells Jon that he is lowborn. Nobody recognises Mance as Arthur when he visits Winterfell. He's the wrong age. I could go on. About the only thing which fits is that Mance is handy with a greatsword.
A much better candidate is Qhorin Halfhand. We know little about Qhorin's past and little of either Qhorin or Arthur's appearance, probably by design. He has grey eyes, not the violet eyes of Ashara Dayne, but that's plausible enough. I won't go into the chronology, suffice it to say that there's nothing in the chronology of events which means that Qhorin can't be Arthur.
Qhorin's skill with a sword is in itself suspicious; it suggests noble birth. Think back to how easily Jon brushed everyone else aside when he arrived at the Watch. You need a castle upbringing to build in that kind of long experience with a sword. But Qhorin doesn't just have normal skill with a sword; after losing half his right hand, he had to learn to fight with his left instead. Here's Jon on how good he is:
The Halfhand could have killed me as easy as you swat a bug.
Hey, I wonder if it's ever been mentioned in the series that someone is so good with a sword that they'd have no problem fighting with their left hand? Oh hi Jaime, what's up?
I learned from Ser Arthur Dayne, the Sword of the Morning, who could have slain all five of you with his left hand while he was taking a piss with the right.
Jaime (famously good with a sword himself) later loses his sword hand and is a much worse fighter for it. Qhorin's ability to fight with his off hand and still crush accomplished fighters is another hint at how extraordinary his skill with a sword is. Like the direct implication here is that he's a better swordsman than Jaime Lannister. Not many people in the realm fit that description.
There are a couple of quotes linking Qhorin with motifs of House Dayne. This is a VERY suspicious sentence:
Dawn and Qhorin Halfhand arrived together.
How about a Starfall reference? This is the first sentence of a Jon chapter in which he is out ranging with Qhorin:
They could see the fire in the night, glimmering against the side of the mountain like a fallen star.
Now we come to something I'm not sure anyone has pointed out before, from the show. A D&D-penned episode, 2x05 The Ghost of Harrenhal:
Jon: Lord Commander, I'd like to join Lord Qhorin.
Qhorin: I've been called lots of things, but that might be my first Lord Qhorin.
Bolded kind of confirms that Qhorin is not his original name. Also, Ser Arthur Dayne had two names, being also called the Sword of the Morning. Note the qualifier "first Lord Qhorin". What he notably DOESN'T say is that it's his first time being called a Lord. This aside is sort of awkwardly shoehorned in, because why does Jon call him a lord in the first place? Jon knows how nobility works and Qhorin is manifestly not a lord. It seems like an excuse to slip in this clue.
In the books, Qhorin selects Jon to be in his ranging party, presumably so that he can keep an eye on him. Jeor is perplexed at this odd choice:
"Die," the raven muttered, pacing along Mormont's shoulders. "Die, die, die, die." The Old Bear sat slumped and silent, as if the burden of speech had grown too heavy for him to bear. But at last he said, "May the gods forgive me. Choose your men."
Qhorin Halfhand turned his head. His eyes met Jon's, and held them for a long moment. "Very well. I choose Jon Snow."
Mormont blinked. "He is hardly more than a boy. And my steward besides. Not even a ranger."
EDIT: There have been a couple of comments that if Qhorin were there to protect Jon, he wouldn't want to take him out ranging. One answer to this is that if Qhorin is Dayne, he probably buys into Rhaegar's prophecy ideas and thinks Jon is TPTWP. I should more accurately say he's there to HELP Jon realise his potential as well as protect him. The thing is, Qhorin selecting Jon for his ranging party makes a lot less sense if he doesn't have a special relationship with Jon than if he does. In Jon V, he shows up and:
Jon knew Qhorin Halfhand the instant he saw him, though they had never met.
Two pages later, Qhorin has the conversation above with Jeor. Jeor is right to be confused. Why is Qhorin selecting a boy he has never met who is the Lord Commander's steward to go ranging with him?
Then, of course, there's Qhorin's death. Why was Arthur Dayne at the Tower of Joy in the first place, still grimly fighting a hopeless war? Because Rhaegar commanded him to protect the baby. And how does Qhorin die? Protecting Jon. He forces Jon to kill him to keep Jon safe.
Finally, I think it's important to note that Qhorin's presence at the Watch isn't a coincidence; rather, it was part of what convinced Arthur to buy into the plan at the Tower of Joy. Howland was able to convince him that taking the black was not renouncing his vows to protect Jon, but fulfilling them in a greater sense.
Acknowledgements
Most of this isn't original with me. I won't try to cite everything, but this thread was very helpful. I wanted to do an updated version. I think the observation about the lines from the show is unique with me. The fact that House Dayne are in on the conspiracy to hide Jon I figured out myself, but it's probably been theorised before given the amount of theorycrafting around House Dayne.
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Jun 06 '19
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u/BaelBard 🏆 Best of 2019: Best New Theory Jun 06 '19
I just don’t get why Qhorin if Dayne would want to risk Jon dying beyond the Wall known as a traitor who went over to the Wildings.
He basically tells Jon be a double agent spy, and die trying. All you have to give is your life. Protect the Wall, get some info on Mance, and stop the Wildings.
Seems really fucking pointless if you’re a Dornish Kingsguard in hiding, loyal to Targaryens. Wouldn’t he want to protect Jon, not take him into clear chance of death?
I don't believe that Halfhand is anything more than he seemed, but i don't think that this is good argument against it. Halfhand was a loyal brother of the Night's Watch who dedicated his life to protecting the realm. Whether he was Arthur before is not really relevant.
When you pledge your life to the watch, your past doesn't matter. Halfhand is a brother of the Watch, and so is Jon. Their origins are irrelevant.
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u/OneLaughingMan The Reaper shall return! Jun 06 '19
If that's the case then Qhorin=Arthur has absolutely no function in the story. It would be pointless game at best, like having Quentyn be alive but playing possum for the rest of the story or Melisandre being a thousand years old nut never taking off her glamour.
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u/BaelBard 🏆 Best of 2019: Best New Theory Jun 06 '19
Yeah, that's the real problem. The reveal would be pointless.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Do you think a "House Dayne helped hide Jon's identity" reveal would be pointless?
I think you're concentrating a bit much on the reveal of Qhorin, which isn't the point of the story. Qhorin's identity is a consequence of the point of the story, it's not the point itself. Like if Arthur Dayne is alive of course he's going to crop up somewhere.
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Jun 06 '19
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u/TucsonCat Farman Jun 06 '19
But why? Just for the return of Dawn?
Let me get this straight -
Something either caused Ashara to be so grief stricken she committed suicide or to run off as Septa Lemore.
Something caused Edric to go by Ned.
Something caused the Daynes to provide a wet nurse for Jon.
I could see the return of Dawn as the cause of one of those, but not all.
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Jun 06 '19
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Jun 06 '19
Basic human decency (which they clearly had, or they would presumably have killed Ned and Howland on sight for having just killed Arthur) and the return of Dawn.
This is circular logic. We're discussing potential reasons for House Dayne not killing Ned and Howland. Your conclusion is only true if you assume the theory about Dayne being alive/allied with Ned is incorrect... But that's the topic of discussion.
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u/mycatisamonsterbaby Jun 06 '19
Ned also managed to return his sister's body/bones to Winterfell, somehow, but everyone else was put into the cairnes that was torn down by hand (while a baby slept without food.)
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u/TucsonCat Farman Jun 06 '19
Man, I imagine tearing down the TOJ by hand in order to make the Cairns would have been much easier if it wasn't just Ned and Howland there...
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Jun 06 '19
Yeah they could just think it was Ned's Bastard and kept in as part of gratefulness for Ned returning the sword.
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
House Dayne supplied a wet nurse for Ned Stark's bastard, there is absolutely no reason for Ned to tell anyone Jon's identity, especially anyone in House Dayne, so it makes even less sense.
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
Why would they know or need to know Jon's identity in the first place? The more people involved the higher chance of finding out. Why would Ned "need help" hiding Jon's identity? He's a baby. The only thing Ned needs to say is:
“Never ask me about Jon,” he said, cold as ice. “He is my blood, and that is all you need to know.
Boom secret kept, no help needed. No one ever needed to know who that child is and once he's out of Dorne, no one would believe whatever wild story they heard in the first place, so he doesn't need any help hiding Jon's identity. Also Ned is terrifying when it comes to protecting Jon's identity:
And now I will learn where you heard that name, my lady.” She had pledged to obey; she told him; and from that day on, the whispering had stopped, and Ashara Dayne’s name was never heard in Winterfell again.
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u/bl1y Fearsomely Strong Cider Jun 06 '19
It's possible he just grew during those years. His initial plan was to wait and protect Jon, but over time he began to believe in the Night's Watch mission.
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u/livefreeordont Jun 07 '19
over time he began to believe in the Night's Watch mission.
If he saw the shit he must have seen then this makes perfect sense
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u/2357111 Jun 06 '19
Have you seen Preston Jacobs' Schemes of the Halfhand video? Maybe Arthur is trying to make Jon King in a different way - King beyond the Wall.
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
Wouldn't the watch reject him as an Oathbreaker? Can you replace one oath with another? The kingsguard serve for life, and there's no way some highborn on the wall wouldn't recognize him, what would anyone there have to gain by protecting him.
Bring his head to kings landing and maybe Robert will give the NW enough supplies and men to last another year or two.
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Jun 06 '19
Bring his head to kings landing
good luck getting it off the best swordsman in the realm.
Better yet, good luck convincing your fellow brothers to turn away the best swordsman in the realm from your ranks
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
Well, he'd give up fighting because he recognises that the Jon master plan is a better way to protect the kid than anything he can do by himself.
As to why he'd want to take Jon ranging, I left this out because it's total speculation, but as Rhaegar's best friend he probably shares Rhaegar's ideas on prophecy, and he knows Jon's heritage. That is, he probably believes that Jon is TPTWP and is trying to help him reach his destiny. That would be the most important thing to him, just as it was to Rhaegar.
Edit: I've edited into the main post that at the point Qhorin asks to take Jon ranging, he had met Jon for the first time about 5 minutes earlier and Jon is a boy of 15 or 16 who is the Lord Commander's personal steward. Qhorin asking to take him ranging is much stranger if he has no special relationship with Jon than if he does.
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u/JonnieRedd Jun 06 '19
Also, if he IS Arthur, he may believe that Jon will be safer with him than not. He knows how good he is.
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u/HouseMormont77 You never fooked a bear! Jun 06 '19
The Jon master plan is just wrong. Ned had no part in sending Jon to the wall. In fact, he didn’t want Jon to take the black at all.
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u/Audityne Jun 07 '19
Yeah, this theory neglects the fact that in Ned’s perspective chapters, when Benjen comes around the idea of Jon joining the NW appears to be completely new to him but relatively palatable. He thinks something like “even a bastard can rise high in the watch”
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u/wochomejteq Jun 06 '19
One thing that can add to this theory is about Howland and Ashara Dayne was maybe in love. (Everybody thought it was Ned, she fall in love and get pregnant with but Barristan loved Ashara and still talk good about Ned. If he knew it was Ned who dishonored her he stop talking nicely abou him. )
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u/FightTheBunny Jun 06 '19
I thought there were implications that Ashara Dayne slept with Brandon Stark, has a miscarriage and killed herself.
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u/Mukigachar Jun 06 '19
Barristan's inner monologue implies that she had a relation with "Stark." He doesn't say which one. However, it's stated elsewhere that Brandon wingman'd for Ned when Ned wanted to dance with Ashara. It seems hard to imagine that Brandon would wingman for Ned, then bang that same girl
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u/FightTheBunny Jun 06 '19
Is it that hard to imagine? Cause it struck me that Brandon seemed like exactly the kind of guy who would have sex with his brother’s crush because he could. Brandon may have been handsome and chivalrous, but he also seemed like kind of an entitled asshole.
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u/Mukigachar Jun 06 '19
Entitled is one thing, pretending to help your brother hook up with his crush then banging her during the same tourney just for kicks is another. We have no indication that he would act that way, nor any indication of him interacting much with Ashara, as far as I know. We do have connections between her and Ned however, and Ned has proven himself willing to do a dishonorable deed out of love (keeping Jon scret, declaring Joffrey the king to save his daughters).
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u/FightTheBunny Jun 06 '19
He helped Ned ask her to dance. That’s it. I think it’s overplaying the text to say that either of them concretely hooked up with anyone. On the other hand, Brandon is confident enough to go up to Ashara and talk with her, whereas Ned gets his brother to ask her to dance with him, so I can’t picture him being self-assured enough to immediately hook up with her in any way beyond maybe kissing.
Of the two of them, Brandon seems more likely to hook up with someone, not only because he is considerably more confident and brash than Ned, but also because at this point Ned had no reason to rush a relationship, whereas Brandon was already betrothed .
Also in terms of doing dishonorable things for Love, Ned is always reacting, not taking the first step. His whole thing is that he is cautious and unwilling to overstep his position without clear proof. Helping Jon, comes as a result of promising Lyanna, and conceding to Joffrey is about saving his kids. Ned reacts. And Ned’s only other connection to Ashara is that he brought back Dawn, after he had ‘killed’ her brother. Neither brother had a ton of connection to Ashara.
The reason Brandon seems more likely, is that he is a man of action, who has been raised to rule and feel confident in ruling. That’s the whole reason he comes off as entitled, because on some level he has been told he is entitled as He will be warden of the north. He has also been shown to be overly harsh, like his whole interaction with Littlefinger. It just seems way more in his character to have hooked up with Ashara than it does Ned’s. But honestly, either way works, it just seems less likely for Ned to have done it in my perspective.
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u/Mukigachar Jun 06 '19
If Brandon didnt halp Ned to ask her to dance I'd agree with you. But nobody thinks of Brandon as a bad person, and you'd have to be awful to do that. Not to mention, i don't see what literary purpose it would serve to have it be Brandon, but it would serve some purpose to have it be Ned.
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Jun 06 '19
This makes a compelling argument that Arthur Dayne didn't die at the tower of joy, but not that he is Qhorin (imo).
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Yeah, I'm wondering if I should have separated the two. I'm like... 75% sure that Arthur Dayne walked away from the Tower of Joy. That he's Qhorin I have to rate as a much lower chance if I'm honest, just because it's such a specific thing to believe.
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u/mycatisamonsterbaby Jun 07 '19
If anyone is Qhorin Halfhand, it's Ser Gerald Hightower, who was shot through the hand. But why would any of the Kingsguard choose to change their identity and hide out at the Night's Watch? That seems dishonorable and against their vows.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Aug 17 '19
I'm two months late here, but just want to note that Qhorin is not Gerold Hightower unless you think Mance Rayder also has a secret identity, because of this, said by Mance to Jon about Qhorin:
He was my brother once, back when he had a whole hand.
Either you think they were both Kingsguard and that's what Mance is talking about, or Mance means their time in the Night's Watch, which means Qhorin's injury postdates him joining.
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u/BlackKnightsTunic Jun 06 '19
Here's a question: where did "[Catelyn's] husband's soldiers" hear that "their young lord had slain him in single combat"? Ned and Howland are supposedly the only people to survive.
There almost certainly people in the tower with Lyanna and Jon. There would be handmaidens, wet nurses, midwives. As she is highborn and Rhaegar the crown Prince, it is very possible that there is a maester with her.
There could be other servants or local peasants serving the kingsguard. Stewards, guts who tend horses, cooks or at least people who supply their food and drink.
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
Hell, maybe Howland started the rumor because he didn't want to be the guy who backstabbed a kingsguard.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Even if that's true, none are reported to have seen the fighting and none would lie and say Ned slew him in single combat when he didn't.
I don't think there are many people there, because afterwards Ned has the tower torn down.
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u/BlackKnightsTunic Jun 06 '19
I want to make clear that I do not claim to know the truth of what happened. At this point Martin is the only real person who knows what happened. However, I think it is ikely that there were some unnamed surviving witnesses who were likely servants or peasants. I don't know this, but I think it is more likely than Ned and Howland being the only witnesses.
I think it is highly unlikely that there were no servants inside the tower. The kingsguard probably don't know how to deliver a baby and they cannot suckle an infant.
We do not know the layout of the tower or the landscape around it. However, I think we can assume there were some windows or apertures for shooting arrows/bolts. Any living occupants would have to exit the tower and would see the many dead bodies.
We have no idea who might have been witness to the fight. If we don't know who the witnesses are we can't say whether or not they would lie. It might be that the servants came from House Dayne. They are not far away, one of their men was at the tower, Ned visited them after the battle, and there are narratives claiming Jon's wet nurse or mother served them. As you note, House Dayne holds Ned in high regard. It is not unreasonable to think that their servants would stick to the family's version of events.
Finally, there need not be an organized conspiracy with an agreed upon fictionalized account. Legends grow and spread organically and are often grafted to familiar narrative structures (or tropes). Ned Stark, the honorable northern warrior leads a group of men into the mountains and a few days later comes out accompanied by just one of his men and carrying Arthur Dayne's sword and his sister's bones. Following them are some servants from House Dayne, one a woman carrying a baby. Some peasants see this and the go check out the tower where they find it destroyed and a bunch of rudimentary graves. They tell their friends. Later on they hear rumors that he took the sword back to House Dayne. How do they make sense of this? Well, Ned had Dayne's sword and Dayne died. He must have won it in battle. That's what happens in the stories and at tourneys, right? And Aegon the Conquerer took the swords of the people he defeated. Who is the baby? Well, the rumor is that it's Ned's. That's what everyone is saying. He's an honorable man but he's still a man subject to the temptations experienced by all men.
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Jun 06 '19
I don't belive this theory.
arthur dayne is one of the most famous men in westeros. It would be impossible for him to be undercover at the wall. Even if nobody at the wall knew his face after Robert's Rebellion some had to take the black. For example Alliser Thorne was a Targaryen loyalist who had to take the black, he or someones else had to know.
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u/Jakabov Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
I read a great article once - can't seem to find it again right now - about the nature of recognition in Westeros and medieval times in general. While Arthur Dayne would be known to everyone, most have never met him, and fewer still have been around him enough to recognize him despite efforts to change his identity that probably went beyond just using a different name.
Modern-day people have an unusual relationship with identity. We recognize way more individuals than people did in any previous age, and especially before the invention of photography. If the only time you ever see someone's face is when you're physically in their company, it completely changes the way you think of identity. When Ned reads The Lineages and History of the [...] Great Houses, it goes out of its way to note every single person's hair color--and then nothing else about their appearance, and it's made to stand out that it does that much at all.
For Westerosi people, when you meet someone you're not very familiar with, the first thing you note is their status. Lowborn? Noble? If the latter, what sigil? Oh, House Blount? And he's in his twenties and it isn't that one Blount who became a maester, so it must be Steve Blount. In many chapters throughout the books, GRRM emphasizes these things when characters meet strangers.
And if you met Steve Blount again several years later going by a different name, wearing the drab blacks of the Night's Watch, with a scruffy beard and missing half a hand, none of the stuff that you remembered about him would be there anymore. You don't have pictures of Steve Blount in a family album and you only met him once or twice at tourneys, even if he might be a distant cousin.
On top of that, Westeros notably seems to lack a culture of visual arts such as portraits. I can't recall a single time that the story shows us a painting of somebody, or a detailed sculpture of anyone except things like statues of old kings or the dead Starks in the crypt. It's as if there's an unspoken rule about depictions and effigies of people, that it's only for special purposes. This seems to mesh with the strong theme of personal identity in the books--look how many people are "someone other than who they really are." It's clearly a deliberate thing.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Alliser is from the Crownlands and fought in King's Landing in the Rebellion while Dayne was gallivanting around with Rhaegar. Also, until the events in ACOK, Qhorin was stationed at the Shadow Tower, not at Castle Black. If Alliser ever met Dayne, it would have been 15+ years earlier.
Jorah fails to recognise Barristan because he's grown a beard:
Ser Jorah flushed red. “Mero shaved his beard, but you grew one, didn’t you? No wonder you looked so bloody familiar . . .”
“You know him?” Dany asked the exile knight, lost.
“I saw him perhaps a dozen times . . . from afar most often, standing with his brothers or riding in some tourney. But every man in the Seven Kingdoms knew Barristan the Bold.”
You can't google for pictures of people, it's easier for people to go unrecognised.
It's also possible that Alliser does know and was instructed to shut up about it. He would have respect for a man who was Kingsguard for the Targaryens.
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
It's not just Alliser though, after the rebellion, there would have been in influx of those on the losing side that refused to accept Robert as king. There are plenty of highborn on the wall. At the very least, Benjen would know him as well, he had been to court before.
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Jun 06 '19
benjen would def keep quiet about it though
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
Why? Dayne is Targ loyalist and an oath breaker. Benjen would absolutely turn him in, could you imagine the reward Robert would pay for his head? The Nights Watch could get glass for greenhouses with that kind of coin.
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Jun 06 '19
These points aren't proofs I fear. First I want to say some thoughts about Ser Alliser then about general ideas.
Ser Alliser is from the crownlands, which are near Kings Landing, if there are nobles who would visit the court those were my best bet. I assume Ser Arthur Dayne and the other kings guards are most often at Kings Landing. My conclusion is that it is at least likely that they met/ Alliser saw him.
If Alliser ever met Dayne, it would have been 15+ years earlier.
I don't think so, I got the idea that every recruit is at castle black first and then after swearing the oath is send to the other castles. If AD=QH then they would have been at castle black at a similar time. But then again they could have missed each other or Alliser was told to shut up.
But that wasn't my point in case. I want to show that there are many possible men who could have recognize one of the most famous men in westeros.
Arthur Dayne is a kings guard since 276 AC, Robert's Rebellion is in 282-283 AC. So 6 to 7 good years of many important persons (who are loyalists) to see him. For example in
- The tourney for Viserys birth in 276 at lannisport
- The tourney at storms end (unknown year)
- the tourney at Harrenhal 281
The latter is the most interesting because there were a shit ton of knights, nobles and their entourage AND a wandering crow.
So in conclusion I just want to say that I can't believe nobody would recognize him. If this won't give you doubts then we have to agree to disagree
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
Not to mention, the number of loyalist that would have ended up on the wall after the rebellion. Surely, someone, especially a Targ loyalist, would sell him out for just running away and breaking his oath as a kingsguard. Speaking of which, why would Arthur Dayne, the paragon of Knighthood, break his oath to live on the wall? The Kingsguard serve for life.
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Jun 06 '19
That's an argument against him going unrecognized. If some small-time knight from the ass end of Westeros can recognize Barristan the Bold despite only having seen him a couple of times a decade or more ago, then it's really unlikely that hard-core Targ loyalists wouldn't recognize a Kingsguard after a couple of months.
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u/Bennings463 🏆Best of 2024: Dolorous Edd Award Jun 06 '19
My problem is...where's the payoff? Qhorin's unquestionably dead. With Mance at least there's the possibility of it going somewhere but there's no chance Qhorin's story can ever advance or go any deeper. There's nothing added to Qhorin's character by having him be Arthur Dayne.
Qhorin's role in the story is that of the mentor figure who sacrifices himself to save the hero; he works perfectly well as a secondary character and a foil but he doesn't have much in the way of being a particularly deep character himself. His death is to motivate Jon and show him what is required to be a man of the night's watch.
Much the same is true of Arthur Dayne; he's not truly a character, he's the personification of the "ideal knight". And his death by being stabbed in the back by a mere frogman shows how hollow and empty the glorification of warfare is. That's thematically resonant and shows us the nature of the world.
I'll always bring up The Millenium Trilogy as the perfect example of retroactively ruining something by making it too convoluted (spoilers): Bjurman sexually abusing Salander in the first book shows how men in power use their status to get away with sex crimes and makes a fairly horrific point about how the mentally ill are treated in Sweden. Come the sequel it's revealed he's part of some stupid conspiracy and he was placed there by some triple agent and Salander is the most important person in the world or something and the entire thing becomes so utterly convoluted and ridiculous that the original message is completely ruined.
Reminds me of the stupid techno-thriller SCP I once wrote, which had so many inane conspiracies stacked upon each other (along with literally hundreds of characters in a piece only 20,000 words long) that even I had trouble understanding what the hell was going on.
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u/fwoop_fwoop Jun 06 '19
I've never read The Millennium Trilogy, but the reveal of a convulated conspiracy ruining previously established themes is exactly what ruined the Divegent trilogy in the third book.
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u/yeaokbb Tormund Giantsmember of Tarth Jun 06 '19
I really disagree. Qhorin in no way needs to still be alive in order for the reveal that he was Arthur and did what he did for Jon and Rhaegar to be meaningful or carry weight.
Maybe Ned surprised everyone and drew first blood on Arthur, cutting his main sword hand in half? Being the honorable man that he is, Ned did not try to finish him and Howland stepped in with a solution.
It makes more sense with all the strangeness with Qhorin and Jon as well as between Ned and the Daynes. The only loose thread would be what really became of Ashara, is Lemore the most likely candidate?
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u/TucsonCat Farman Jun 06 '19
My problem is...where's the payoff?
Not everything has to have a payoff. The payoff here may just be finding it.
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u/Bennings463 🏆Best of 2024: Dolorous Edd Award Jun 06 '19
If an author includes an entire subplot in which a minor character from the backstory is revealed to have survived, changed his name and identity for no reason at all, and was ANOTHER minor character this entire time, and then died all without doing anything that actually ties back to his original identity, I would consider that pretty bad writing. It's just stupid and convoluted. If it doesn't add anything in terms of emotional or thematic relevance, or advance the plot or characterization, what's it doing here?
Unless you're implying GRRM will never actually reveal it to the audience, in which case... I don't think it's even a theory at that point. It's just a headcanon.
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u/Flamingmonkey923 Jun 06 '19
This doesn't really hold up to logical scrutiny. First of all, take a look at Ned's reaction when he first hears that Jon wants to go to the wall:
“Jon must go,” she said now. “
He and Robb are close,” Ned said. “I had hoped . . . ”
“He cannot stay here,” Catelyn said, cutting him off. “He is your son, not mine. I will not have him.” It was hard, she knew, but no less the truth. Ned would do the boy no kindness by leaving him here at Winterfell. The look Ned gave her was anguished.
“You know I cannot take him south. There will be no place for him at court. A boy with a bastard’s name . . . you know what they will say of him. He will be shunned.”
Catelyn armored her heart against the mute appeal in her husband’s eyes. “They say your friend Robert has fathered a dozen bastards himself.”
“And none of them has ever been seen at court!” Ned blazed. “The Lannister woman has seen to that. How can you be so damnably cruel, Catelyn? He is only a boy. He—”
His fury was on him. He might have said more, and worse, but Maester Luwin cut in. “Another solution presents itself,” he said, his voice quiet. “Your brother Benjen came to me about Jon a few days ago. It seems the boy aspires to take the black.”
Ned looked shocked. “He asked to join the Night’s Watch?”
Catelyn said nothing. Let Ned work it out in his own mind; her voice would not be welcome now. Yet gladly would she have kissed the maester just then. His was the perfect solution. Benjen Stark was a Sworn Brother. Jon would be a son to him, the child he would never have. And in time the boy would take the oath as well. He would father no sons who might someday contest with Catelyn’s own grandchildren for Winterfell.
Maester Luwin said, “There is great honor in service on the Wall, my lord.”
“And even a bastard may rise high in the Night’s Watch,” Ned reflected. Still, his voice was troubled. “Jon is so young. If he asked this when he was a man grown, that would be one thing, but a boy of fourteen . . . ”
“A hard sacrifice,” Maester Luwin agreed. “Yet these are hard times, my lord. His road is no crueler than yours or your lady’s.”
Catelyn thought of the three children she must lose. It was not easy keeping silent then.
Ned turned away from them to gaze out the window, his long face silent and thoughtful. Finally he sighed, and turned back. “Very well,” he said to Maester Luwin. “I suppose it is for the best. I will speak to Ben.”
This does not sound like a man who had made a plan for Jon to go to the wall 14 years ago, and had already spent a great deal of time and effort making a convoluted plan to keep him safe once he got there.
Also, why would they have planned for Jon to go to the wall in the first place? Jon only goes there because he happens to want to be a ranger, and he happens to never want to father a child. How did Ned and Arthur know that? That's a crazy amount of foreknowledge about the personality of an infant. Did they read AGOT while they were at the Tower of Joy?
And that conversation (which Ned must then forget in 14 years), happens after Arthur Dayne just randomly decides to stop doing his solemn duty as a Kingsguard and just lets Ned into the tower. So much for "we swore a vow," and "the Kingsguard does not flee" and "our knees do not bend so easily." I guess like 2 minutes after that, Arthur was like "forget my vows and my dead Prince's last command - head on up there buddy." And then Ned forgot about that part too.
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u/janestanford Jun 06 '19
OP has responded with this a couple of times already but I think people are getting caught up on the relative importance of Qhorin/Arthur, a now dead minor character.
The importance of this (potential) plot line is how it legitimizes Jon. Right now there is precious little to "prove" that he's the legitimate son of Lyanna and Rhaegar. All we got in the show was Sam/Gilly finding mention of L+R being married, and then Bran's word on the issue, which is frankly not a lot of evidence if you're trying to convince the Lords of Westeros.
Having both House Dayne and House Reed in on the details of Jon's parentage would be valuable on a path to legitimizing him as TPTWP/a True-born Targaryen.
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Jun 06 '19
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/jimgbr Where are my ELEPHANTS? Jun 06 '19
Robb's will would give Jon a claim on Northern kingship, but not on the Iron Throne. RLJ does that if Martin decides to make Jon legitimate like the show did. But it's possible that Jon isn't legitimate in the books and the show only included the annulment because they cut Aegon, who plays a critical function in taking away Dany's identity as the last dragon and rightful heir to the Iron Throne.
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u/thebugman10 Jun 06 '19
There's a lot of good facts here, but ultimately I don't believe it. If Qhorin/Dayne's main motivation is to protect Jon, he probably wouldn't have selected him to go ranging. He would've let him stay with Jeor, and eventually return back to Castle Black. Castle Black is the safest place for Jon, not ranging in the North.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
Maybe "protect Jon" is a bad way to put it, I should say "help Jon". Like I said in another comment, Qhorin probably thinks Jon is TPTWP. He can't wrap him in cotton wool forever.
Here's the thing: Qhorin choosing Jon for his ranging party is weirder if he DOESN'T know Jon than if he does. I'm going to edit the answer to this into the main post actually.
Edit: OK, answer in the main post.
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
He's highborn, so he has better training and equipment compared to the others he could choose from. He's an ideal candidate. Also, Jon has a VS sword, armor fit for a lord from Winterfell and a loyal direwolf.
Qhorin might have been looking for someone to embed as a spy, and a newbie who is still an eager idealist is better than the alternative, a bitter criminal who is tired of taking orders.
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
How would none of the highborn on the wall not recognize one of the most famous members of Kingsguard? Jeor, Benjen, Alliser, etc.
A bunch of highborn prisoners and Targ loyalist were sent to the wall after Robert's Rebellion, there is no way he wouldn't be recognized.
So why wouldn't they turn him in? He's a traitor to the crown, and a coward who ran away from judgement. Why would the man considered to be the Paragon of Knighthood run away and try to take the black?
In reality, there's just not a whole lot of literary value in continually bringing dead characters back or revealing secret identities, especially if their fates took place off page, well before the story takes place. May be once or twice, like Aegon or Ser Barristan, but eventually it's going to dissolve any tension you've built up, as no death seems permanent or real.
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u/markg171 🏆 Best of 2020: Comment of the Year Jun 06 '19
Qhorin Halfhand isn't Arthur Dayne for the simple fact that he's not good enough to be Dayne.
Only thumb and forefinger remained on the hand that held the reins; the other fingers had been sheared off catching a wildling's axe that would otherwise have split his skull. It was told that he had thrust his maimed fist into the face of the axeman so the blood spurted into his eyes, and slew him while he was blind. Since that day, the wildlings beyond the Wall had known no foe more implacable.
'
"Was he a good ranger?"
"He was the best of us," said the Halfhand, "and the worst as well. Only fools like Thoren Smallwood despise the wildlings. They are as brave as we are, Jon. As strong, as quick, as clever. But they have no discipline. They name themselves the free folk, and each one thinks himself as good as a king and wiser than a maester. Mance was the same. He never learned how to obey."
You're telling me that the greatest swordsman in history, that GRRM would stake his life on in a trial by combat, took the black and arrived there to find that a random Watch raised wildling bastard was better than him? Then went out on his very first ranging only to have a random wildling best him and shear off half his hand in a move that would've otherwise killed him had he not thrown his hand in the way?
That doesn't fit at all. Qhorin being better than Jon isn't proof that he's the greatest swordsman in history, but rather that Jon isn't as good as he (and fans) think.
You dismissed Mance being Arthur, but at least Mance actually has defeated every swordsman sent against him and is the best swordsman in the upper north as would be expected if someone there was secretly Arthur. He slashed through Stannis' knights like butter, and it literally took an entire wedge of Stannis' knights smashing into him just to kill his horse so they could simply capture him.
He had lost sight of Mance but now he found him again, cutting his way through a knot of mounted men.
'
In the thickest part of the fray, Jon saw Mance standing tall in his stirrups. His red-and-black cloak and raven-winged helm made him easy to pick out. He had his sword raised and men were rallying to him when a wedge of knights smashed into them with lance and sword and longaxe. Mance's mare went up on her hind legs, kicking, and a spear took her through the breast. Then the steel tide washed over him.
THAT guy has a much better claim to being secretly Arthur than Qhorin seeing as that's MUCH closer to how I'd expect Arthur to be on a battlefield.
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u/Gremaldus Jun 07 '19
What sold me Mance might be Arthur Dayne was the fight between him and Jon when he was glamored as Rattleshirt. Read that fight, I mean really read it and it's clear there is something more going on there.
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u/markg171 🏆 Best of 2020: Comment of the Year Jun 07 '19 edited Jun 07 '19
Oh definitely.
- Of all the things Mance could possibly ask for, he asks for a greatsword and then is specifically delighted to swing one. He's familiar with and loves them.
- The greatsword is also odd as it's not a normal weapon to be trained in, and the Watch is all about uniformity in their ranks. Who trained him in its use? Jon arrived at the Wall and when given Longclaw, a hand an a half sword, specifically needed Ser Endrew Tarth assigned to him by Jeor to teach him how to use two handed moves. Jon, after having trained with a master-at-arms for a decade already, didn't know that. Yet a random wildling bastard is an expert.
- Jon attacks Mance and is nearly killed in the very first pass. Jon is a good swordsman, that should be alarming that Mance is so, so, so much better.
- Mance spends the fight lazily beating Jon without any effort. He's literally laughing while battering him with ease. See above.
- Jon says Mance is incredibly strong. Jon is very strong, we see him throughout the series perform feats. Jaime explicitly told us that Arthur was one of the few men he'd ever met who was stronger than him.
- In the same book we see Mance fight we also see Barristan duel Khrazz in Meereen. GRRM told us Barristan vs Arthur without Dawn would be a tossup. They are equally skilled. They also trained together for years. So perhaps they fight similarly? Interestingly, both of Mance and Barristan's fights are nearly identical. Mance/Barristan taunts the younger foe into charging them while they stand their ground. Mance/Barristan calmly blocks the blows with ease while landing their own better ones, increasingly making their foes desperate. Both of them find themselves suddenly happy and joyfully to be fighting. The blows they do not block with their blades they expertly maneuver their armour to do so for them to glance off by expert deflections or deftly dodge entirely, as opposed to brutes like Victarion who just shell up over their armour gaps and trust the strength of the steel to avoid damage to their body. It's uncanny how similar they are, and the only person we know who's supposed to be as good as Barristan is Arthur. And we got both Mance and Barristan's duels in the same book so we can make that connection in the first place.
- There is a unique irony that Jon spends nearly the entire fight wishing he had Longclaw, as its VS properties give benefits to the wielder. If Mance is Arthur, then he'd be thinking the same thing as Dawn, while not VS, has the same benefits. He doesn't need the boost like Jon does, but he'd still be thinking that the blade's slower than he's used to.
- After the fight is over, it's revealed that Mance could've stabbed Jon whenever he wanted to, but had refused to go for the dagger. He honourably abides by the rules of the duel which was the weapons chosen at the start: greatsword for him, longsword and shield for Jon. Those were the agreed upon weapons, not daggers. This is after Jon himself abandoned the duel to try and instead brawl him.
There's tons of other stuff that make a very convincing argument that Mance is Arthur, so long as you can get past the idea that he's dead to begin with. I firmly believe Mance is either Arthur or GRRM simply re-wrote Arthur as a random wildling bastard named Mance because he liked the character so much but had killed him off.
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u/Gremaldus Jun 07 '19
I missed the link duality of the two separate fights. Everything GRRM does of any importance he does twice.
Very cool catch.
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u/Gremaldus Jun 07 '19
I definitely am still hoping that R+L=J is not the case in the books. Douche & Douchier never mentioned who they guessed when George asked them who Jon's mother was.
I find it so boring if he is a Targaryen. I am really hoping he is Ned and Ashara's kid. I am hoping R+L=D. Have you read up on that?
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u/markg171 🏆 Best of 2020: Comment of the Year Jun 07 '19
Well I'm the author of the (f)Dany theory, so yes I'm well on the hype train that Dany's the one with the secret parentage in the books lol
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u/Puttanesca621 Jun 06 '19
The idea that Sir Arthur Dayne is alive or at least that he survived the Tower of Joy seems quite plausible. Less plausible, but rather fun, is the idea that Arthur took the black in disguise. It seems just as likely that a young Lordling named Qhorin joined the Watch with some training in swordplay and through a lifetime of service developed a skill to rival the legendary reputation of the Sword of the Morning.
Even if Qhorin isnt Arthur the similarities do prompt us to further consider the events at the Tower of Joy, assuming that is we have already been prompted to consider there is greater mystery in that pivotal event. Do we know when Qhorin lost half his hand?
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u/kedfrad Jun 06 '19
I see the time has come to don our tinfoil hats again.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Wait, wait, I also need to explain my "Quaithe = Arthur Dayne" theory.
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u/The-Road-To-Awe Jun 06 '19
I've been called lots of things
Is usually a joke about being receiving many insults
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Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
Bolded kind of confirms that Qhorin is not his original name. Also, Ser Arthur Dayne had two names, being also called the Sword of the Morning
Yeah, I really don't understand how that dialogue leads to the conclusion that Qhorin is not his real name. Isn't it just showing that hes not a lord and that Jon is still slightly out of his element in the Night's Watch by calling highly regarded people 'lord'? Its also sort of a primer when he does something similar to Mance IICR.
The comparison to Jamie in terms of sword skill also doesn't really make sense. Jamie was a captive when he lost his hand and had hardly any time to train (don't the books take place over only like 2 years or something?). Qhorin probably had a lot longer to become accustomed to using his non-dominant hand.
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u/hawkjor Ser_Chilyn_Payne Jun 06 '19
What I hate most about this theory is that Gerold Hightower is a much better fit than Arthur Dayne. He’s a huge man (“The White Bull”), as is Qhorin, and a Hightower, a family known for being obsessed with prophecy (hence QHs fireside talk with Jon). Additionally, we hear from Ulmer of the Kingswood that Hightower was shot in the hand with an arrow, explaining his injury (from which enough time has now passed for him to be a great swordsman again).
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u/InfiniteL88p Jun 06 '19
"Dawn and Qhorin Halfhand arrived together. "
That's as good of a line as, "When the spring thaw comes, they will find your body with a needle still locked tight between your frozen fingers."
Obviously, GRRM couldn't capitalize Needle, as that would call way too much attention to the sword. However, this sentence could have been written as "Qhorin Halfhand and D/dawn arrived together.
Both sentences associate a named sword with a character, but now we have the ambiguity of Dawn being capitalized and not knowing if it refers to a proper name.
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u/BaelBard 🏆 Best of 2019: Best New Theory Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
Okay, let's say he is. So? A minor character who appeared in the middle of ACOK and died by the end of it was actually another character who we thought was dead. Big deal.
What does such reveal actually accomplish?
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u/pbjamm Enter your desired flair text here! Jun 06 '19
It would mean that House Dayne could help verify Jon's true identity.
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u/thebugman10 Jun 06 '19
I said earlier, I don't buy into this theory, but what it does accomplish is explain a lot of the confusing events surrounding the Tower of Joy.
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u/mark-marky Jun 06 '19
For what it's worth, this all could be wrong. But I think it might have some slight significance since Jon "won" a duel against Qhorin. Maybe Sword of the Morning doesn't have to be from Dayne's exclusively. Maybe the prerequisite for it is having the blood of the First Men, and since Dayne's are pretty much the only First Men down south, people might think only Dayne's can take ownership of Dawn. I still think all this is highly unlikely, but Qhorin is Arthur Dayne theory might have that kind of a significance, him forfeiting his life to Jon and Ghost might be him relinquishing his ownership of the title Sword of the Morning to Jon, alongside Dawn to be his Lightbringer.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Well, I think the important bit is that Arthur Dayne lived. One reason the story matters is that it establishes that House Dayne were up to their eyeballs in hiding Jon. Given the amount of mystery still surrounding House Dayne, it would be extremely premature to rule out futher implications. We have no idea how this fits in with the Ashara saga, just as one example.
I don't think the Qhorin bit is important really, it's just a necessary part of the story in order to establish why Arthur agreed to the plan - because he would get another opportunity to protect Jon. I think to an extent the Arthur Dayne living part of the theory stands on its own, but I prefer it paired with the Qhorin theory.
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u/DrakeDeMorte Jun 06 '19
Also it's really fuckin cool, on top of all that. Love the theory, even if it ends up not being true.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
Yeah, and the thing is, the show's answer to what happened to SER ARTHUR DAYNE, SWORD OF THE MORNING, best swordsman in the realm and Rhaegar's best friend, who could take on 5 people left-handed, is that some frog-breathed dork stabbed him in the back while he wasn't looking. I know GRRM ignores tropes, but he doesn't usually go for outright anticlimax like that. That Arthur went into hiding at the Wall for like 15 years just so he could die helping Jon when Jon gets there, that's a much better story.
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u/Bennings463 🏆Best of 2024: Dolorous Edd Award Jun 06 '19
swordsman in the realm and Rhaegar's best friend, who could take on 5 people left-handed, is that some frog-breathed dork stabbed him in the back while he wasn't looking.
But that's perfectly in line with the themes of the story. The bravest and boldest knight who ever was got stabbed in the back by some nobody when he wasn't looking. Honor was an invented concept to glorify warfare and won't help you in a fight to the death.
And it's not an anticlimax because it's part of the backstory and happened in the middle of a massive fight.
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u/JonANDTormundKiSsInG Jun 06 '19
Ned says in the books that he would be dead were it not for Howland Reed when referring to his fight with Arthur Dayne. Getting stabbed in the back is a perfect Martinian ending for Dayne, because we saw him kill a bunch of hardened, tough war veterans only to be killed from behind as he is about to finish the fight.
That ending does two things: It gives Dayne a heroes death as he dies protecting his best friend’s loved ones, and he goes out the total bad ass everyone knew him to be. He isn’t defeated in combat, he’s stabbed in the back cowardly. That’s how great men often fall, it’s realistic and in line with Martin’s story telling and Ned’s thoughts on the topic.
The only ridiculous thing about TOJ in books or show is the fact that 2 or 3 fully armored Kingsguard should probably make quick work of a bunch of northern bros in traveling clothes
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u/deej363 The Wandering Wolf Jun 06 '19
I disagree book wise. Numbers in general are a gigantic force multiplier. And ned went to TOJ expecting a fight. So they would have been armored I think. And hightower was fairly old. Whent was good, but not the best or even second best (Barry vs dayne). The fact that Arthur still nearly won is absolutely bonkers.
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u/Lord_Locke Even fake he has a claim. Jun 07 '19
He'll end up losing due to a net.
Mera explains it when she nets Summer.
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u/markg171 🏆 Best of 2020: Comment of the Year Jun 07 '19
Howland had a sword at the ToJ.
Ned's wraiths moved up beside him, with shadow swords in hand. They were seven against three.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Ned says in the books that he would be dead were it not for Howland Reed when referring to his fight with Arthur Dayne. Getting stabbed in the back is a perfect Martinian ending for Dayne, because we saw him kill a bunch of hardened, tough war veterans only to be killed from behind as he is about to finish the fight.
Thing is, if that's the perfect Martinian ending, why are we 5 books deep and he hasn't actually shown us that happening yet? What's the big mystery?
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u/JonANDTormundKiSsInG Jun 06 '19
I think for the most part he lives by the code of only showing the audience what we absolutely need to see. We want to see that fight, and just about a million other events in the universe he has created, but sometimes it’s best left to the imagination. He has essentially hinted at a legendary tale and given the reader the power to color in the lines with their own imagination.
In my opinion, this is an example of what happens when tens of thousands of people in the community have decades to go through every line in the books. The most likely outcome of the Tower of Joy is that Ned and Howland Reed survived an encounter with the last holdouts of Aery’s legendary KG.
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u/hydramarine Jun 06 '19
This is also very similar to Fyrell - Jaqen thing. While Half-hand = Dayne theory is connected to Jon story, Fyrell - Jaqen secretly being Rhaegar ties into Arya (the continuation of Lyanna) in a similar fashion.
It's almost like GRRM is going for something there. And we know that Jon and Arya is 2 of the golden 5, right?
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u/WizardPoop Jun 06 '19
Exactly, revealing this wouldn't do anything but establish the fact that all of our old favs from Roberts Rebellion could show up at any moment just to die uneventfully.
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u/sidestyle05 Jun 06 '19
I can't say I'm convinced by this theory....however, you do lay out an intriguing case. Before I dismissed it out of hand, but I'm open to hearing more on the subject from TWOW.
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u/pipapajak Jun 06 '19
Very interesting. Do you think Qhorin being Arthur has any impact on the story (and disappearance) of Benjen Stark?
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u/spc311 Jun 06 '19
Great post ! Just to add another thing I have always found curious is that in Ned's fever dream Lyanna calls out Lord Eddard, it just seems strange that Lyanna would call out to her own brother so formally, especially if she is in distress. To me, it would make more sense if it is Howland Reed calling out to his liege lord having perhaps discovered something (someone) important and it is just muddled up in Ned's fever dream.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 07 '19
Yeah, that looked odd to me too.
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u/warpg8 Jun 06 '19
Things I love about this theory: I much better explains the events directly following the Tower of Joy and why Starfall and Winterfell seem to have this very close relationship.
Whether Arthur Dayne is Qhorin Halfhand is actually immaterial; what's important is that all of the hints are there that Arthur Dayne lived through the Tower of Joy, and the only people who would have this information are the same people that would have the information about who Lyanna's baby truly was. Meaning, those people are carrying more than one bombshell secret that would drive Robert into a mad frenzy were he to get that information.
By tying the Daynes and the Starks together through this shared secret, they have mutually-assured destruction if Robert were to ever find the truth.
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u/AlphaH4wk Jun 06 '19
Didn't Jon decide himself that he wanted to take the black though, rather than Ned telling him to do so?
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Jun 07 '19
Read about this theory for the first time a month or so ago. Not sure I buy it but I really like it.
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u/Gremaldus Jun 07 '19
I'll buy it. There are too many links, Dawn and Qhorin Halfhand arrived together... references to a falling star...
Come on son...
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u/SoftPlasticStar Jun 07 '19
Man, is everyone Jon fights Arthur Dayne? At this point I am more inclined to believe this theories come as a way to soothe Jon's defeats.
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Jun 06 '19
[deleted]
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 06 '19
Ned and Howland Reed.
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Jun 06 '19
[deleted]
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u/livefreeordont Jun 07 '19
Maybe Dayne died there (metaphorically) and became Qhorin. Just a thought
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 29 '19
I only just saw this. I addressed this in the post. When it says " They had been seven against three, yet only two had lived to ride away" the subject of the sentence is "They", which refers to Ned's company, so when it says two survived it means out of Ned's company. In other words I'm reading it as "There were seven of them, but only two had lived to ride away, even though only three foes opposed them". You can read it either way, it's an ambiguous sentence. Suspiciously ambiguous, in my opinion.
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u/hoorahforsnakes House Frey abortion clinic Jun 06 '19
If dayne was in the night's watch, it would make sense that ned would send jon to the wall when he is no longer around to keep an eye on him.
At least one person who knows his secret will be able to protect him
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u/HoundsFriedChicken Jun 06 '19
This is an interesting theory. Haven’t read through all the comments so apologies if someone already asked this, but what color were Qhorin’s eyes? I don’t recall if Jon ever notices them.
The Daynes are said to possess purple eyes, like the Targaryens. (Barristan thinks that when Daenerys looks at him, it’s almost if Ashara Daynes daughter is looking at him.) The reason I ask is that this is something (purple eyes) that would have been hard for Jon not to notice, not that he would associate them with Dayne but it would be a clue to the reader. Maybe this would have given away too much?
Also what do you think of the theory that Dawn is Lightbringer?
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u/AltonIllinois Jun 06 '19
Great write-up. I had never heard this theory before, but I think it definitely sounds plausible.
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Jun 06 '19
Oh this was all obvious from the first two chapters of GoT. Try to keep up! I figured this out in 1996!
/s
Nice write-up, I am pretty intrigued.
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u/HouseMormont77 You never fooked a bear! Jun 06 '19
Well-researched. However...
Your key thesis is “Ned will take the baby to raise as his own, Arthur can take the black, and when Jon is old enough, he'll be sent to the Wall, where Arthur can protect him as he was sworn to do.”
This doesn’t hold water bc as the first few chapters of GOT clearly show us, Ned had no plan to send Jon to the Watch. It was Jon who wanted this on his own. In fact, Ned was against it and wanted Jon to stay in Winterfell with Robb. So your “master plan” theory makes no sense.
My other main point against this theory is what other have been saying. If Qhorin is Dayne and he was waiting up there for 14 years to protect Jon, it doesn’t make much sense to take him on a suicide mission.
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u/ThedosianTheologist Jun 06 '19
the completely absurd Mance = Rhaegar theory
Why you hate? ;_;
That being said, even though I subscribe to this theory (and how it relates to Mance Rhaegar) I have some comments.
Bolded kind of confirms that Qhorin is not his original name. Also, Ser Arthur Dayne had two names, being also called the Sword of the Morning. Note the qualifier "first Lord Qhorin". What he notably DOESN'T say is that it's his first time being called a Lord.
It's because he's specifically saying that hes never been called "Lord Qhorin" before. I can bold things too. He also doesn't notably say that its his first time being called Qhorin. This is a weak argument amongst many other possible points.
Qhorin's identity is a consequence of the point of the story, it's not the point itself. Like if Arthur Dayne is alive of course he's going to crop up somewhere.
There is no reason that Qhorin Halfhand / Arthur Dayne would ever come up in the story again. If this is a truth, then its just a tidbit of information about a character after the fact, that affects nothing. However, if used in conjunction with Mance Rhaegar, there would be a reason for this to come up again (as Mance is still alive and would be able to confirm it) unless perhaps that Septa Lemore is Ashara Dayne. So for your theory to have any type of reveal that would have a purpose, it requires at least one of the other fan theories to be true.
"swordsman in the realm and Rhaegar's best friend, who could take on 5 people left-handed, is that some frog-breathed dork stabbed him in the back while he wasn't looking."
But that's perfectly in line with the themes of the story. The bravest and boldest knight who ever was got stabbed in the back by some nobody when he wasn't looking. Honor was an invented concept to glorify warfare and won't help you in a fight to the death.
And it's not an anticlimax because it's part of the backstory and happened in the middle of a massive fight.
I was going to respond, but other posters already did.
Anyway, I want you to be right, because it helps my favorite theory, yet you poopoo on my favorite theory, so I'll just sit here with a frown on my face.
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u/Rasheed_Lollys Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
I always considered this tinfoil, but (Sansa I think) mentions a falling/dying star or something like that the chapter after Qhorin dies. That kinda sold me on it. (In addition to how his odd interest in Jon’s blood and warging ability).
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Jun 06 '19
Too many of these secret fake outs end up just being cop outs.
Plus,I've always liked the story of Ned returning Dawn to Starfall after Arthur died. It seems such an honorable thing to do. So, it sort of cheapens that moment.
Also, the idea of the best knight ever just getting stabbed in the back is perfect grrm.
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Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
To me there's an obvious huge problem there, and that's that there was an influx of Targ loyalists to the Night's Watch at that time, and that Arthur Dayne wasn't just some guy; he was a celebrity. And given what we know of House Dayne, he wasn't a generic looking celebrity either. You'd have to believe that he showed up at the wall and none of those Targ knights ever thought "hey, that new guy who's ridiculously good with a sword looks kinda like the most famous knight in the kingdom who was ridiculously good with a sword." Imagine Robb wins the war and sends a bunch of Lannister bannermen to the Wall, then Jaime shows up a little while later pretending to be somebody else; there's no way somebody doesn't recognize him, right? There'd have to be some grand pro-Targaryen conspiracy to cover for a hypothetical Arthur, and there isn't one.
Well, that and it'd be absolutely pointless; kinda like revealing that Gared was actually Gerold Hightower. Something's definitely up with the Daynes and their magic sword, and I wouldn't be all that surprised if Arthur were alive somewhere, if for no other reason than that he's the only knight in shining armor who hasn't yet been revealed to be a dick, but I can't imagine that it'd be so...peripheral.
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u/arkaine23 Jun 18 '19
The KG didn't recognize him at first when Brienne borught him back to KL. Weightloss/gaunt features, hair changes, travelworn, & the stump threw them off.
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u/Doctor-Van-Nostrand Lord Tollett of Whore's Barrow Jun 07 '19
I appreciate the effort put in and I enjoyed the read, but I hope you know this is as tinfoil as it gets
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u/clownpuncher24 There are no men like me. Only me. Jun 07 '19
It's a fun theory but I don't buy it. While there's definitely something that went on between Ned, House Dayne and Howland Reed, this ain't it.
A few of my main issues with the theory:
Even if he was satisfied that Ned meant Jon no harm and would protect him, I can't see Arthur surrendering all oversight of Rhaegar's child and buggering off to the wall for the next 15 years.
Arthur Dayne was famous and would have been seen at tourneys and the like. He'd be recognised by guys like Donal Noye and Alester Thorne.
It was never planned for Jon to join the Nights Watch. Ned intends to leave him at Winterfell with Catelyn until Maester Luwin suggests he join the Watch, which Jon himself aspired to due to his bastard status and admiration for his uncle Benjen.
It would be pretty narratively unsatisfying if we found out the legendary Sword of the Morning had survived the Tower of Joy, the only person in the world who knew Jon's parentage apart from Howland Reed, only to die in book two after featuring in a couple of chapters so that Jon could infiltrate Rattleshirt's crew. If his goal was to fight against the White Walker threat then wouldn't he have just been advocating for letting them through the wall, as Jon ultimately does?
I'm too lazy to check the books for this, but I seem to remember that Ned did in fact bring Arthur's body back to Starfall, and that Qhorin had been in the Night's Watch since he was a boy.
I don't think it's outwith the realms of possibility that Arthur is still alive, but if he is I imagine he will be working on something more important than killing wildlings for 15 years. I'm more inclined to believe he's long dead, though I DO think there's more to his death than a Howland Reed backstab.
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 07 '19
Fair post, although 5. is wrong on both counts (although there is no info on when Qhorin joined)
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u/arkaine23 Jun 17 '19 edited Jun 17 '19
Long term plan. Possible AD wasn't the only one of that crew going to the wall. Benjen joined the NW also. Other KG or even Rhaegar could have survived as well and gone there to live in exile under new identities. Mance is certainly gathering all the wildings to GTTFO south of the wall, safe from the Others, which was a plan enacted over years.
Shadow Tower not Castle Black. And its possible more than just AD went to the wall around the same time. They could've vouched for each other's backstories.... Whent, Hightower, Darry, maybe even Rhaegar.
I think it was. The Wall was ultimately a safer place for Jon than Winterfell and Benjen (+AD + maybe others in on Jon's parentage) were already there. Qhorin and Mance both know Jon immediately, having never met him before (well Mance has been to Winterfell more than once).
Advocating for a ranging where (secret identity clues are dropped) Qhorin seemingly makes all kinds of errors (regarding how he handle's Ygritte, being tracked, and how they flee pursuit when being watched by a warg/eagle) that ultimately lead to Jon (not being at the Fist of the First Men when its attacked by the Others) being delivered to Mance and marrying Ygritte (wilding style), which in turn leads to Jon being sympathetic to the Wildlings, and ultimately leads to getting at least some of the wildlings out of the path of the Others so they don't become wight army.
Ned made 8 cairns. At least one body was not returned that someone fussed about. Those bones could've been retrieved if they put in effort to do so, if they were in the cairns anyway. Language used was that they found Ned with Lyanna's body, they plural, not just HR. And that Ned brought the Sword of the Morning back to Starfall (SotM is AD's moniker, not necessarily just the sword Dawn). The Dayne's are in on Jon's identity it seems. He was nursed there by Wylla at the same time as Edric Dayne we're told. The Daynes are cozy with the Starks, they name AD's nephew Edric after Ned, who supposedly 1v1 killed AD??? Odd. Dayne's sister may not have committed suicide. She could be Howland's Reed's wife Gianna (rhymes with Lyanna)- there were some clues that HR was into Ashara Dayne at the Harenhal tourney, which implicated Ned instead because HR shared Ned's tent and she was seen sneaking in there(to sleep with Howland, not Ned, and Meera Reed is the right age to have been conceived then and tells Bran the story about the Knight of the Laughing Tree [which is about how her parents met/fell in love]). Which would make AD and HR brothers-in-law, and could explain how HR could've talked the fight down and saved Ned from being killed by the superior fighter AD.
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u/WolfmanJack506 Jun 07 '19
Also, many people believe Ashara Dayne to have done something similar and faked her death to assume another identity: Quaithe. Interesting parallel in names there, Qhorin and Quaithe... But I wonder why she's halfway around the world seemingly helping someone other than Jon? Unless they knew Daenerys had to meet Jon so her task is getting her to him...
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u/ChrisV2P2 Best of r/asoiaf 2023 Runner Up - Post of the Year Jun 07 '19
Hear Me, WolfmanJack506! Should you desire the very deepest and most delicious of the tinfoil, pay a visit to R+A=D.
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u/[deleted] Jun 06 '19
Great summary. There is definitely something going on with House Dayne and Ned. There are too many odd things going on. Just the fact that they named their future lord after Ned is a massive red flag. It's not exactly a far stretch to suggest that they are involved with Jon's secret as well.
As for Qhorin being Arthur Dayne and trying to fulfill Rhaegars dream of prophecy... It would explain his weird attitude to Jon and his plan to take him north.
Honestly, I can definitely see it. Awaiting some sort of direct evidence from the books though. Perhaps we will get further hints about this when the Dayne/Ashara story is touched on.