Doesn’t Weirwood turn to “stone” rather than rot? Maybe these statues are, or were originally, carved from petrified Weirwood, so that these elder Starks of yore have actually gone into these trees.
@@micp4130 We see examples of all kinds of different warging throughout the novels. Some even backwards through time. However what we've seen is the living warging into other versions of the living. Humans to Humans. To animals. Even to trees. Who's to say the Living Dead don't possess the same power? Dead warging through Dead is very easily done. Just like Living to Living. This is where the whites come in underneath the higher captains of the others. However. Going from Dead to Living would bear consequences. That's where the symptoms of Grayscale come in. It's the Dead fighting to possess the body of the living until completing the transformation into Stone Men. I believe we will see a magical connection arise from Marwyn the Mage using forgotten methods to fight off this so called disease.
@@micp4130 Of course this is just what I've come to speculate over the years. Reading through the five novels multiple times now, and drawing deeper conclusions each time
One theory is that the crypts of Winterfell were natural caves, connecting to the underground tunnel systems of Westeros. This is why the ground wasn't leveled when Winterfell was built on top of it. The natural caves and tunnels were carved to become the crypts, meaning that the lower levels were always there. Perhaps in the deepest level, there was some important feature, such as a source of magic, which is why Bran the Builder was buried there. From there, each following King of Winter was buried in the next tomb, creating the tradition of burying them from the deepest level to the one above it. Hence, the oldest kings are buried the deepest. At some point, the secret of Bran the Builder had to be kept, so the lowest levels were intentionally made to collapse, to bury the secret. The foundations were too strong for such a thing to occur naturally, especially since the cryps were most probably carved under Bran the Builder's supervision.
Thematically your theory hits all of the mark. If George favorite subject is about the conflict within human heart. This eon long conflict within bran or brans heart fits well. On another point George does like to give us various hints into the magic system of asoiaf the prolong of in the dance he give us the clue about the second life, which immediately reminds of the dream Bran and Rickon had right after Ned died. Maybe Ned’s second life was pull back to the crypt and into the stones. There clues that all of the stark children have warging abilities, maybe it’s something passed down the line.
Winterfell has veins that somehow move water about through its walls. What else do we know that has veins that move water through its walls? Winterfell could be a giant stone weirwood with Brandon’s face at its base? Could it have a weirwood growing through it slowly building it like the Seawing summer palace? What if all the major seats work the same in some way? We know the Targs go to the fire, Starks to stone, Tully to the stream, but the others give themselves to the seven. Though all were once First Men and so where were their dead brought, knowing the Casterly and Lannisters I’d assume Casterly rock has a tomb somewhere, the others probably do as well.
I think Winterfell just has piped heating lol. "Veins" in Winterfell is a metaphor for the civilizational regress in Westeros. "Modern" westerosi can't even grasp the concept of pipes, so they call it "veins".
Like a magpie I was drawn to what I thought was the glimmer of tinfoil, but it seems I luckily uncovered an entire gold hoard instead. Brilliant video, will subscribe and watch more!
Stark means strong in German. Martin has always talked about how important his names are. Always love seeing new videos from you! Keep up the incredible work!
That's a cool take. I was thinking the Kings of Winter would rise as wights like Coldhands and help fight the Others but the statues get the characterization. There's a cave similar to Bloodraven's in the Rainwood in one of TWoW's Arianne chapters, she sees petrified columns and faces with sad eyes carved into stone. I've wondered if there's something to how the Ghiscari and the Starks keeping crypts.
Taking the AA Weirwoodnet-invasion idea (from LML, I think?), could we land on Bran the Builder being behind the Others? Could the Others be the securitrons somehow?
I think the reason winterfells oldest crypts are the deepest is bc it was covered in a landslide. I think once the magical wall went up and the seasons got messed up, there was probably a mass defrost of everything south of the wall. So the original winter fell and its crypts were buried and they just kept building on it.
Fun Fact: Michael is literally real in real life, literally. I LOVE all the crypt lore theories. Between you, Robert(@InDeepGeek) and @EldricStonskin are on to something. The motif of having "Life" be powered from a place of "Death", like a crypt (i.e. the "Tomb as Womb") motif is found in many mythologies and is a very GRRMY sort of thing do do. "Only Death can pay for Life."; "What is Dead, may never Die."; "stone giants rising from the Earth("Living Rock of Winterfell" used to make the "Living Stark Eulogy Statues"), the living "Stonemen" in Essos, Petrified Weirwood/Yronwood(IRL Iron is made from stone-ore), the Stone Fist sigils/armor decorations, even Oily Black Stone suggests stone can be more than "just rock", etc....There are zillions of examples, once you start looking for them. I'm off to put up a ceiling. Wish me luck. Cheers!
for what it is worth I have always wondered about the Night's Queen because she is always described in a similar way to the white walkers she is also something different. Also, the crypts are often described as having the cold come rolling up and out of the crypts as if some force was generating cold, what if the Night's Queen is at the heart of the crypts strapped to a wyrwood tree and that is why the weirwood magic has now become ice based powered by something parallel to a fire based burning candle but ice based?
I think the Winterfell Crypts are a cavesystem akin to that of bloodravens, Just masoned it had work done on it, and with the natural springs all around that also run up into the walls of the castle, it would be sensable that some cannal, aqueduct and irrigation systems must have been also built to allow the waters to flow. the construction of the crypts could have started as a creation of the hot-waterways
The stonescale got me thinking about Hodor, Valyria, Azor Ahai and Shireen. What if the magic runs on a typical body and spirit currency system? You shouldn't warg into a human because their spirit already exists in that body and so as seen with Hodor you risk turning that person to stone but not in the sense of stoneskin in the sense that you petrify their spirit within the time stream. Azor Ahai supposedly forged Lightbringer using the spirit, the blood sacrifice of his love. The Valyrian steel could then logically be thought of as blood or shadow magic, the spirit of a human reforged into the earth, the stone, the body of the metal. We haven't been able to forge Valyrian steel since because after the Doom of Valyria the art of binding a soul to a blade was lost. Until recents times when Melisandre attempted to rediscover the technique by hoping to place the soul of Shireen (the love of Stannis, supposed Azor Ahai) into his blade (supposed Lightbringer). The shadowbinders of Asshai come to mind too. All around the world people were binding souls, spirits to bodies through various methods; blood, ice, fire, shadow but ultimately all containing two alchemical bases - a body and a spirit. Which one was which is how you defined one parameter of the magic. If you placed an spirit of the earth, obsidian, into the body of a man? Well I think you get the antithesis. You get a spiritual alchemical reaction and temporal ice is birthed. Why does Valyrian Steel destroy the others? Because it attempts to place a human soul back into the body of something that is now void of human spirit, an ice wraith and the temporary bargain that was struck is cancelled. The sword 'wargs' the energy of the ice wraith and the alchemical circle completes. And maybe one final step further of rabbit hole random What if as legend says Joramun was the right-hand man of Bran the Builder after the fight versus the Night's King OR Joramun was the great king of the Children and worked with Bran to build the wall. He anchored himself to his horn through magic binding his spirit in a pact with Bran perhaps even being the central sacrifice to the weirwood wall. His spirit temporally stuck inside the horn but body inside the wall fueled by blood with an eternal ice spirit. The Valyrian Steel equivalent to warging an other would be blowing the horn to warg Joramun's spirit back into his body and ending the weir-wall magic. "Qhorin Halfhand lists Joramun among Kings-Beyond-the-Wall who either broke their strength on the Wall, or had their strength broken by the power of Winterfell on the far side." Bran 'broke' Joramun's 'strength' on the wall. Bran split Joramun's body and spirit and placed them like a 1-step Horcrux. Also, Joramun... Jörmungandr..
There’s a common hypothesis that the crypts are built into a huge weirwood cave. That’s how the oldest graves are at the bottom. The crypts are built from the bottom up. The closed off part at the very bottom of the crypts is still a weirwood cave. Could be all kinds of stuff going in there.
This video has ideas that are kinda out there tbh. But you might be close with the idea that there is something in the winterfell crypts. What is causing hot springs? I waved them off as general thermal activity but could it be some kind of fire wight strapped to a tree? Some kind of opposite to the ice wights that may be strapped to trees in the wall?
“night king may actually be alive if bran the builder is” reminded me of a vid preston jacobs did on one of grrms old stories where two chess masters are playing each other but it’s actually also across different timeline outcomes of their lives - like a timeline battle, seems significant given the numerous dualistic religions in the book - any evidence that the night king is also a player? from the house of the undying maybe
I think I have commented here that the 3 Eyed Raven is Bran the Builder. He made the Pact with the Children of the Forest and he has been living since the beginning of multiple consecutive 2nd Lives hosted in the bodies of Green Seer Children on the Forest (that are still in the cave) until he ran out and then lured BloodRaven to his cave. Later years the cave was surrounded by the Night King's wights. They couldn't go in but the Children also could not get out. The many levels of the crypt are a HUGE clue regarding the timeline. It foretells when the timeline will END. Here is what I think is really going on. Although this story is told over several books the same story is told over and over again with some variations. The system of primogeniture instead of a meritocracy is the basis of all discontent. Example: Samwell Tarly was almost killed because he was thought not to be up to the standard of taking over his family's house. I also suspect that Varys's castration was really due to someone not wanting to commit kin slaying. The "legal" ways to get rid of a pesky brother is to send him to the Wall or castration (yes, I think Reek's castration was deliberate, and side eye why Benjen is at the Wall) This is a story of the fight between two brothers Bran the "heir" and Jon Snow the Bastard. This fight has been fought since the building of the wall. Bran created a Pact with the Children to destroy his brother Jon. The scene in the show is a lie, I think eventually we see that it was Jon Snow being impaled by the Children. But there was a problem, the Children accidentally made Jon Snow/ Night King immortal. (Because there is power in kin's blood). To remedy this Bran (the Builder) built the Winterfell crypts to entomb his brother. I think the collapse in the bottom crypt was due to the Night King escaping into the tunnels and roots of the Weirwoods until he finally escapes at Hardhome. The brothers on the wall said that the flames were so bright that it looked like the Sun/son was rising in the North. That was the "resurrection" of Jon Snow. So there are these two entities that have been playing an extremely slow pace game of chess. In the with season we saw how they work. When Bran strategically timed telling Sam about Jon's birth that directly lead to Jon killing Dany. It is the butterfly wings that create hurricanes. That is how they work small whispers etc. I like your idea of sentinels because I think that Bran the Builder and Night King do have sentinels. Like Bran could skin change into Hodor the Night King also skin changes but in the the dead. I think that all the people who should have died but mysteriously survived are the Night King's sentinels ie Little Finger, Syria Forel, Beric Donarion, Arya, Cold Hands, The faceless men. I think that Bran the Builder take over people just for small moments ie Catelyn in a daze for days not leaving Bran's bedside. But the big reveal is that present-day Bran and Jon are physical replicas of their predecessors. Bran is lame like Bran the Builder and Jon has been stabbed in the heart and is un-dead. Another clue in the 8th season was the constellation pictures in the caves. I think what Bran has been waiting for is the rebirth of his original body in Bran and a constellation of a particular eclipse that signifies the rebirth of the planet. At that time Bran the builder can take over Bran's body permanently. Here is where disagree with you. Bran is the baddie because he is in a pact with the children. When the 3 eyed raven said he would fly, I think that meant he would become the Stallion that mounts the world. Bran the Builder had hundreds of years head start in this fight/game and in that time he created legends, lores, and prophecies about the night king being the baddie. Hundreds of years of negative propaganda. But the Night King is coming in strong. His main disadvantage is that Bran the Builder downloaded everything from the weirwood net which makes it impossible for him to hide. To make a long story short I believe that the Night King in the show orchestrated his own death and had been training Arya to "kill" him. I think in the end he slipped into the dead body of Tormund Giantsbane and melted in the the roots of the Winterfell Hear tree. (Side note: I think that the Starks are buried in stone so that their memories are NOT downloaded into the weirwood networks. This is why Ned put Leanna in the crypt's. Instead, he supposedly brought her dead body and her baby all the way from Doran to Winterfell. Something he did not want known in the weirwood net - hint IMHO , Ned killed Lyanna and he want to hide the parentage of Jon : B+L=J)
What if there was a forgotten magical process to actually turn the bodies into stone for longevity or reanimation at a later date? I say this because I think Greyscale might be a corrupt and uncontrolled version of this process. I also suspect that the same thing happened to the dragon statues on Dragonstone. The ancient Valyrians turned them to stone for later reanimation when needed. After the Doom, the knowledge was lost, but Greyscale is spreading where Valyria once was...
I was just listening to an In Deep Geek livestream from several years ago and it came up that inne of the prerelease chapters for the winds of winter, a person is in a cave and come across carved stone columns with face and sad eyes. Her companion comes up beside her and say “This place belongs to the children of the forest.” This immediately made me think of the crypts of Winterfell. What if the crypts were not dug out but are part of a pre-existing cave system that originally belonged to the children of the forest? It would explain a lot.
Bran's character feels like a mix of paul atreides, leto the second and Frodo. Bran's warging abilities and green seeing is very similar to paul's visions and dreams and maybe if bran becomes king in the books like he does in the show, then maybe his reign will be similar to paul atreides and leto the 2nd's reigns as emperor, and also skin changing and warging into other people is similar to how the bene geserit & paul and leto can access all the memories of their ancestors and also bran's personality just feels very similar to Paul's and frodo's. Also the Bolton's being the ancestral enemies of the starks and being extremely cruel and violent is very similar to the harkonnens being the ancestral enemies of the atreides and the harkonnens are also extremely cruel and violent. tywin lannister conspiring with the boltons and the freys to wipe out the starks is very similar to the emperor conspiring with the harkonnens to wipe out the atreides. the golden lion throne is the seat of power for house corrino and the lannister sigil is a golden lion
Interesting idea but I think I side more with Crowfood’s Daughter in the idea that Bloodraven is the Three Eyed Crow but was confused about the name because he doesn’t see himself like that in the astral realm just like Bran would probably be confused if Jon ever told him he was a direwolf in his dreams. Things in the dreamscape and prophecy are symbolic and hard to decipher while you’re in it. Only the readers can get a clearer picture because we’re somewhat removed.
If this theory is correct or most of it turns out to be true, perhaps Bran the Builder is more malicious than we think, and he wants Bran to continue where he left off.
Loving this theory .. I've only recently discovered you but now I'm worried that if we do ever get the remaining two books they won't be as good as your theories 😂
The statues of the Starks get carved into their likeness, but is there any word on the relationship? I always thought the dead were buried beneath the sitting statue, but does it say anywhere that the stark bones are ground up and used in the concrete used to make the statue? I don't remember that or anything like that being said. If they do then absolutely they could be reanimated as the Stark they represent. If they do not then the best that might happen is that the form is animated by somehow warging into it.
A huge clue in this is in the Arianne sample chapter. There were stones with faces deep in a cave, carved by the children. Seems "into the trees and into the stones" is actually pretty much literal and direct. Maybe the oldest and deepest sections won't be statues of starks, but stones carved by the children, and the stark statues are a human imitation
What if all the souls of the dead humans of westeros are powering the wall and that's why both the trees and the wall are Always described as weeping: the souls of the dead are suffering to keep the song of ice at bay
Is there also a fire & ice bran the builder somewhere too? Is bran just the green magic version? Rhlor in asshai and the heart of winter could be possibles for that. It feels unbalanced if it's just all btb. And talking of going into stone in the crypts that always makes me think of the seastone chair too, maybe a big lovecraftian twist in there somewhere in the future!
Expanding the size of the crypts could work when the cave is made of stone from weirwood. They can move their roots as they wish Like in bran’s cave, and the undying tower that keeps changing passages and is made of oily black stone (petrified blue weirwood of essos )
The general vibe and course you are taking seems to set off bells of recognition in my mind, from someone who has read and re-read the books countless times. Some kind of magical harvesting of souls in connection with the ‘corrupted’ as you say weirwoods. I find it a shame ASOIAF couldn’t have been made into an animated series, as there would be no budget and live action constraints. All of this undercurrent of hinted magic could have been included. I appreciate the show until series 5, but it felt like sitting down at a fancy restaurant and only being served half of your meal when a whole tasting menu was advertised.
What if since wintefell is the where winter fell the crypts aren’t man made but rather an old greenseer cave used by the children of the forest and then maybe the others once the long night started. So maybe the oldest kings are deepest to protect against the others who maybe inhabited or made their last stand on the lower levels giving us the reason it ascends as opposed to descends with time. This will probably get lost in comments but none of my friends read ASOIAF so here I am
Holy crap Bran becoming the new Bran the builder and restarting everything blew my mind. And that weirdly kinda ties into another bestheda video game series, the elder scrolls, and the kalpa cycle of time in that world
for the 'the oldest kings are at the bottom' thing, i just always assumed the original starks built like the biggest crypt imaginble all at once. like a big enough crypt to hold thousands of years worth of Starks down there and only now are we getting to the top floor. which is fucking insane but A) it's not like this is a world lacking in fucking insanely massive construction's having been done around that time, and B) like your theory suggests, maybe Bran was involved in planning it and knew ahead of time how big it needed to be
The earlier Starks were probably buried deeper because that's where they entombed people when they were living through the Long Night. The custom persisted but they started working their way up.
Our videos come out at the same time on Saturdays. So after I watch my own video, simultaneously judging hashly and checking myself out. And then right after I get all worked up, I watch your vid to calm my heart rate down. Ps, I love Fallout, and you connecting them makes me so nerdy and happy.
Bran supposedly builds a wall that looks like only a god could have made it. Him having a deep enough crypt for a hundred generations or so of his kin doesn't seem like that much of a stretch.
This is...wow. It DOES read like there are at least some of the trees having been corrupted somehow. That Harren was on a MISSION to get rid of them because of it. THAT 'corruption' began in the Westerlands/Riverlands area. I have always wondered WHY Harren, an iron Born {they do not sow} wanted to spread his rule across the entire land. Like, he seems to settle in on land-that bothered me. He was following the corruption of the Trees. THAT was why he kept spreading out and tearing it all down.
I'm new to ASOIAF lore but i have heard it being said that winterfell is a stone tree that grows? Or something to that extent, maybe the starks going into the stone is another way of them going into the tree.
"Did you know the Boltons are flaying people again?" Brandon the Builder: "No, I was not aware of this. Is it really so hard not to flay people? My goodness... It's a violation of their feudal contract. I authorize you to deal with them in any way you see fit."
I mean if we apply the idea of Howland’s magic turning earth to water and vice versa as something the older Starks were capable of then they could have “sank” each layer of the crypts deeper as they built the new ones? Idk would be an interesting way to hint at their magic I guess.
One technical caveat (but not thematic) that I noticed - the Blackwoods bury their dead beneath their dead weirwood. Since their weirwood is dead, it might be disconnected from the rest of the corrupted tree magic. Also, I now can't stop thinking of your theory as a Ponzi Tree now lol
That would make total sense of bran the builder was the three-eyed crow... It would also make more sense that he would have been the one to send them the fire wolves as well as the one that potentially could be working the direwolves also like ghosts for example who seems to just go off randomly and do things himself but at the same time they protect the starks... I feel like someone is worging ghost as well and I always thought that it was the three out of Raven as in Lord rivers however it could be bran the builder... Hell every single bran in history could be the new replacement for the original bran the builder and that's why the name Brandon gets used so often in stark history kind of like the theory of roose Bolton doing his thing with people you know skin changing them... It could be that every Brandon that's born is meant to take the place of the past Brandon that's there... Sorry if there's any mistakes I was having to use voice text
So, Bran the Builder down in the crypts and likely also the heart of the weirwood network. If say Bran co-opted the tree magic for use by him (being connected to the stone), could that be the thing that threw the seasons out of balance? And the Stark words referring to Winter could also be a small acknowledgment that they are responsible for long winters? One the topic of different magical networks, you mentioned trees, streams, and stones. This got me thinking that in the past there was often thought to be 4 elements: earth, fire, water, and air. The earth could be stones, the streams water, and fire could be the trees (because you can burn them to create fire). But is there a group in the books that use air, or go into the air? Could this be the Ironborn? Originally I thought they might be related to the streams/water, but their religion includes drowning people and then reviving them. Giving them air back into their lungs. What do you think? Otherwise, are there any cultures that practice cremation in Westeros? I would also consider this going into the air. What about Melisandre? We consider her to have fire magic, but she burns people to get power. Could the Lord of Light actually be air magic masquerading as fire magic? You can’t burn without air. Oh I dearly want to hear your thoughts on this!!!
Assuming that Bran the Builder was Bran or at least a very powerful greenseer, he probably time travelled, counted number of future Starks that would have to be buried in the Crupts and then sank the Crypts deep enouggh to hold them all.
I think what you mentioned about Bran being the Three-Eyed Crow is great evidence. I think the most important tidbit is this: Bran lists his types of dreams, wolf dreams, tree dreams and crow-dreams. He loves being a wolf. Sees a weirwood talking to him and the Crow teasing him to fly. Bloodraven says he has been watching Bran and guiding him to himself. He is stuck on the trees. So it's presumably him looking at Bran through the trees. Bran at one point sees a dream where the tree is about to talk to him, but gets interrupted by the Crow saying fly or die. If Bloodraven is the Crow, and the tree, did he interrupt himself? No. Also Bloodraven famously has, a thousand eyes and one. The thousand being his greensight, and the one being his actual physical eye. Neither of them is three. LML's idea that the third eye is on the dream crow is pretty stupid. Bloodraven's third eye was lost on the Red-Grass field in battle, not as a sacrifice for magic power. But Bran does have three eyes. In the dream the Crow pecks a hole into his forehead and it becomes his third eye, and the Crow's dreams help him develop his skill, i.e. gain a third eye.
Bran the Builder is likely the Bran we know in the present day who has sat the greenseer throne and reached back through the weirwood network into the past to whisper the secrets of weirwood building to an ancient ancestor of his own, a man named Brandon. Brandon was able to do what he did only because Bran told him how to do it. This is why BtB is such a mysterious figure who is said to have built all the most amazing things across the seven kingdoms. Bran himself, the boy we know, is likely the very person who establishes the bloodmagic rituals of the past in the first place because that'd be darker than Bran redeeming a past figure. Instead he turns a past man into his tool against the Others and shoulder him with the burdens of first making sure all those sacrifices take place. It's also going to be Bran who ENDS the war most likely as well from his future greenseer seat at Harrenhall.
If it's true that starks go into the stone then may jon go into a stone dragon? Or wargs/merges into a dragon of sorts. There was a dragon sighted by summer, that could be a stone dragon meant for jon. Somehow being moved. His firewight state may be as temporary as him being in ghost.
I have an idea. Thought about this idea a lot- the whole crypts being out of order thing. Hear me out Michael- What if the original Starks knew exactly how many crypts they would need before the others would return? They would know exactly how many of their ancestors would be returned and by the time we get to Lyanas death, no more Starks would end up dying and having their bodies returned to winterfell since that point. There’s enough room for just the right amount of Starks before winterfell may fall or the Others might resurrect the Starks dead. If the others do resurrect the Starks, maybe the statues will protect the living descendants. The crypts may have to be sealed to protect everyone at winterfell much like the ancient burial mounds that dot the northern landscape.
I've been thinking. The old gods could describe the Northern gods, the drowned god, rhollor, similar to pagan religeons, whereas the Faith of the Seven is centralised similar to christianity. (edit) it also makes me think of the 4 elements (fire, ice and water.....not sure how earth/wind fit in) and the way you talk about balance reminds me of the four humors.
I love your mind and your videos have reinvigorated my fandom but if you had said "some level or another" one more time i probably would have put my head thru the drywall 😂
Well if everything was Bran all along, then the builders of Winterfell would've known how many tombs they would need until the long night and built the crypts exactly to spec
So I got an idea. What if all the really ancient statues of the Starks are really not statues but the actual starks? They are like stone weirwoods. The managed to stay connected to the trees without getting entangled somehow... maybe with their swords they keep on their knees or maybe with the living starks. But how many times is it mentioned that they felt like they were being watched in the crypts? Too many. Is it possible they are sitting on WW thrones in the crypts? Or they somehow merged in some clean and elegant way that they look like statues? Maybe they have that stone disease Idk... I'm just spitballing' here. It's a bit more fani-fiction but i think the idea of the statues being actual starks or maybe even the original old gods hence the starks seemingly getting the most magic genes and the responsibility to guard the wall. So maybe they were aboriginals? Edit: I should start finishing the voids before I comment. I posted this on an IDG vid the other day. I guess we are on the same page kinda Edit 2 16:07: Damn... you def thought about this way deeper than I did. I thought maybe they somehow kept from being covered in roots and looked like stone statues but were essentially like petrified WW bodies that only had eyes that could move. I m starting to think the Starks got some sort of Sweet Deal very early on or took power early on and like you said, we are watching a fluke generation that isn't brutal like they have been . Just their battle wih the Boltons and ho fucking gory that shit gets means there is some crazy psychopathic back and forth going on. Oh yeah... Bran is the 3 eyed raven.... and the all the dead bodies are bootstrapped Brans that died and future Bran had to tweek shit to make it work until we get our Bran... It's just how many times he experimented with different things to get himself to the wall with broken legsa, and maybe Hodor... all the pieces this tiome around could be very different then the last... He just needed to get to the wall once in a cycle and from then on hehas been starting over and over running through all of history doing different things to get to this outcome. He's been playing the game against the pother gods and his tree power is what gives him the upper hand because he cnan see all of time at once... It's like Groundhogs day but the other gods can change hit a little here and there.... I made a comment on IDG that spells it out... But he is doing the same loop over and over again and all the gods are fighting in the 4D game of Thrones and he is forever always tweaking shit. We are seeing the 5000th or 8000th time through where he is always tweaking little things here and there to get his ultimate outcome. He may be the only one that can change time but the Gods can see it change and adjust their moves accordingly. I think Bran as T3ER actually set up Euron as one of his chess pieces. Euron doesn't know he is being played but Bran has manipulated him with basically saying he cannot be a god and whatever he knows that will egg Euron on to get the magical shit he needs that no one else has the balls to get. His piece to basically play against the drowned God. he also has an ally with The God of Death who is helping him via Jaqen and Missandei to steer things along.
the way your laying things out makes me think og Thor ragnarok the comic version where ragnarok is an event caused by these beings who sit above in shadow to strengthen themselves restarting and ending the world in a cycle but Thor ends that breaking the string of fate and sets the gods free from this fate of death and rebirth will bran be Thor here and end the long night by allowing it to happen then destroying those who sit above to restart the world with no influence from them
It may not be a case of whom or where but when. If the lower crypts are largely inaccessible or so claimed, how would you keep safe something that is not of the world?
Could the spirits or personalities /memories of the dead Starks in the crypts of Winterfell be going into the stone, but the blood and flesh be going into the trees via the Weirwood roots?
Edit: this comment was made 5 minutes in. You make the mr house argument after, guess I wasn't far off in speculation. No idea how deep the crypts are, but they could represent the twin of the wall but then underground. As there needs to be a stark in winterfell and a watch at the walls. And when the wall breaks so could the crypts at the same time. Summoning the statues or whatever it does. A trigger linked by the weirwood, as you've shown with the makeup of the wall in your last video. Since you mention here the roots are down there. There is a link of sorts. Perhaps the weirwood then wargs into the statues, for the lack of a better description. Possible because of the warging abillity of past starks. Or maybe the warging is just a clue, not the actual method. And not important beyond that.
Bran is going to talk with the Builder as a tree, the story says that the Builder learn to imitate sounds from nature to talk with the Children and If Im not wrong Bran only could move "his" branches as a tree when he saw Eddard in the past. Brandon the builder knows how to speak "tree"
But, Marwyn the Mage has a candle. He can undo the founder if the founder is the first Stark is entangled in the root of the heart tree. If they bring down the wall how can they stop the army of all those frozen fast zombies and the Others? It would be a horror story if the Others go across Planetos.
in regards to your intro - know you’re not sold on the winterfell is warm because of a dragon idea - is it warm bc of all the glass candles burning down there for thousands of years?
@@sirpepeofhousekek6741So is the word “is” and the. And builder. Mister isn’t but maybe master is. Plus, the bible we have, the words in it are from a language that didn’t even exist then. It was originally written in Ancient Greek or in Hebrew.
Think of the "crypts" under Winterfell like BR's cave system. There are levels, there are roots and there are bodies and there is an underground river/sea. ALL of the cave systems in the North at least, connect up in a few places. Winterfell is one. The majorest of them all. To me, THOSE crypts are CotF kind of thing-like the cave Arienne finds herself in when looking for whatshername. That place was carved out-to me, it seems like the crypts have been carved out the same kind of way. The Winterfell caves/crypts also have a level of carving where there don;t seem to be roots yet. ALL of these caves have that in common, if I am making sense. These were places men hid from Others...and where CotF hid from men before THAT. Only Winterfell seems to have been 'infallible' somehow. Barrowton USED to be where men went for safety in winter, etc. but then the Long Night happened and men moved their safeplace to Winterfell after they figured out that Winterfell was the better place-safer for men for some reason. Even The Barrows King knew it-that is why their 'wars' with the Starks read so feeble and so spread out. It doesn't really read to me like the Barrow Kings hated the Stark rule. You are right to question the different types of gods there might be and how they might be connected. Looking at you, Patchface! And hey-the going into the stones...and into the trees. Those trees and eggs BOTH can petrify-turn to stone. The eggs can come back from petrification. I read that to mean the trees can as well. IF something living has petrified, the possibilty is there for rez, somehow, depending on what it is. But it looks like it is shaping up to be any living thing that petrifies has a chance to be alived again. Think about what THAT means for greyscale, cuz THAT is coming. Makes Illyrio's wife's hands kinda scary now. Scarier? Cz it is kinda lowkey scary that he even kept her hands. Seastone Chair..Blackwoods Heart Tree. Any other eggs out there...crazy, huh? IF the oily black stone is petrified blood, wtf is going to happen if THAT stoneware can come to life?
Maybe Bran The Builder built it with foresight of House Stark and how many would rule it and die so the crypt was built, the whole complex , with that in mind 🤔
Ned Starks line when he's dreaming of a "frozen hell reserved for Starks" always made me think something like this theory is possible.
GRRM re-used this idea in Elden Ring, with Merika having people's souls go into the ErdTree for the magic of the Golden Order.
Doesn’t Weirwood turn to “stone” rather than rot? Maybe these statues are, or were originally, carved from petrified Weirwood, so that these elder Starks of yore have actually gone into these trees.
Could greyscale be connected to this somehow?
Grayscale is what happens when the dead warg into the living. Al-la Stone Zombies.
@@davey815 interesting. What are you basing this on?
@@micp4130 We see examples of all kinds of different warging throughout the novels. Some even backwards through time. However what we've seen is the living warging into other versions of the living. Humans to Humans. To animals. Even to trees.
Who's to say the Living Dead don't possess the same power? Dead warging through Dead is very easily done. Just like Living to Living. This is where the whites come in underneath the higher captains of the others. However. Going from Dead to Living would bear consequences. That's where the symptoms of Grayscale come in. It's the Dead fighting to possess the body of the living until completing the transformation into Stone Men.
I believe we will see a magical connection arise from Marwyn the Mage using forgotten methods to fight off this so called disease.
@@micp4130 Of course this is just what I've come to speculate over the years. Reading through the five novels multiple times now, and drawing deeper conclusions each time
One theory is that the crypts of Winterfell were natural caves, connecting to the underground tunnel systems of Westeros. This is why the ground wasn't leveled when Winterfell was built on top of it. The natural caves and tunnels were carved to become the crypts, meaning that the lower levels were always there. Perhaps in the deepest level, there was some important feature, such as a source of magic, which is why Bran the Builder was buried there. From there, each following King of Winter was buried in the next tomb, creating the tradition of burying them from the deepest level to the one above it. Hence, the oldest kings are buried the deepest. At some point, the secret of Bran the Builder had to be kept, so the lowest levels were intentionally made to collapse, to bury the secret. The foundations were too strong for such a thing to occur naturally, especially since the cryps were most probably carved under Bran the Builder's supervision.
So modified children of the forest dens, with starks lining the crypts the way the CotF did in the roots Bran saw as Hodor.
Thematically your theory hits all of the mark. If George favorite subject is about the conflict within human heart. This eon long conflict within bran or brans heart fits well. On another point George does like to give us various hints into the magic system of asoiaf the prolong of in the dance he give us the clue about the second life, which immediately reminds of the dream Bran and Rickon had right after Ned died. Maybe Ned’s second life was pull back to the crypt and into the stones. There clues that all of the stark children have warging abilities, maybe it’s something passed down the line.
Winterfell has veins that somehow move water about through its walls. What else do we know that has veins that move water through its walls? Winterfell could be a giant stone weirwood with Brandon’s face at its base? Could it have a weirwood growing through it slowly building it like the Seawing summer palace? What if all the major seats work the same in some way? We know the Targs go to the fire, Starks to stone, Tully to the stream, but the others give themselves to the seven. Though all were once First Men and so where were their dead brought, knowing the Casterly and Lannisters I’d assume Casterly rock has a tomb somewhere, the others probably do as well.
Bad...it is possible the the original first tower at Winterfell is also a trunk, VERY old, VERY large petrified tree trunk.
That reminds me of something that would be in elden ring. Well george did work on it.
I think Winterfell just has piped heating lol. "Veins" in Winterfell is a metaphor for the civilizational regress in Westeros. "Modern" westerosi can't even grasp the concept of pipes, so they call it "veins".
but also-they DO have a concept of plumbing...Jaehaerys piped KL and stuff.
There is that giant face at the bottom of the first castle@@Yamaazaka
With that crazy fire god too, we have the four elements in a sense which in most stories are considered the primordial gods etc...
Like a magpie I was drawn to what I thought was the glimmer of tinfoil, but it seems I luckily uncovered an entire gold hoard instead.
Brilliant video, will subscribe and watch more!
10:48 if remember correctly, when people walks pass the dragons skulls, its eyes seems to follow as well
Stark means strong in German. Martin has always talked about how important his names are. Always love seeing new videos from you! Keep up the incredible work!
Hey Michael! Another great video mate and appreciate the shoutout! Looking forward to the livestream!
💀🍻
I think this is my new favorite RUclips channel
That's a cool take. I was thinking the Kings of Winter would rise as wights like Coldhands and help fight the Others but the statues get the characterization. There's a cave similar to Bloodraven's in the Rainwood in one of TWoW's Arianne chapters, she sees petrified columns and faces with sad eyes carved into stone. I've wondered if there's something to how the Ghiscari and the Starks keeping crypts.
Taking the AA Weirwoodnet-invasion idea (from LML, I think?), could we land on Bran the Builder being behind the Others? Could the Others be the securitrons somehow?
I think the reason winterfells oldest crypts are the deepest is bc it was covered in a landslide. I think once the magical wall went up and the seasons got messed up, there was probably a mass defrost of everything south of the wall. So the original winter fell and its crypts were buried and they just kept building on it.
Does that mean bastard names are just what they get feed too. Snow, stone, rivers
holy shit lol
love Eldric's series on the stone men of winterfell. Can't wait for this collab!
Fun Fact: Michael is literally real in real life, literally. I LOVE all the crypt lore theories. Between you, Robert(@InDeepGeek) and @EldricStonskin are on to something. The motif of having "Life" be powered from a place of "Death", like a crypt (i.e. the "Tomb as Womb") motif is found in many mythologies and is a very GRRMY sort of thing do do. "Only Death can pay for Life."; "What is Dead, may never Die."; "stone giants rising from the Earth("Living Rock of Winterfell" used to make the "Living Stark Eulogy Statues"), the living "Stonemen" in Essos, Petrified Weirwood/Yronwood(IRL Iron is made from stone-ore), the Stone Fist sigils/armor decorations, even Oily Black Stone suggests stone can be more than "just rock", etc....There are zillions of examples, once you start looking for them.
I'm off to put up a ceiling. Wish me luck. Cheers!
Good luck.
Good Luck!
months later_ how is that ceiling holding up? maybe you should not have put it over the family tomb, oh, well...
I've really been enjoying Eldrics videos, look forward to seeing a colab between you two
for what it is worth I have always wondered about the Night's Queen because she is always described in a similar way to the white walkers she is also something different. Also, the crypts are often described as having the cold come rolling up and out of the crypts as if some force was generating cold, what if the Night's Queen is at the heart of the crypts strapped to a wyrwood tree and that is why the weirwood magic has now become ice based powered by something parallel to a fire based burning candle but ice based?
I think the Winterfell Crypts are a cavesystem akin to that of bloodravens, Just masoned it had work done on it, and with the natural springs all around that also run up into the walls of the castle, it would be sensable that some cannal, aqueduct and irrigation systems must have been also built to allow the waters to flow. the construction of the crypts could have started as a creation of the hot-waterways
The stonescale got me thinking about Hodor, Valyria, Azor Ahai and Shireen.
What if the magic runs on a typical body and spirit currency system?
You shouldn't warg into a human because their spirit already exists in that body and so as seen with Hodor you risk turning that person to stone but not in the sense of stoneskin in the sense that you petrify their spirit within the time stream.
Azor Ahai supposedly forged Lightbringer using the spirit, the blood sacrifice of his love.
The Valyrian steel could then logically be thought of as blood or shadow magic, the spirit of a human reforged into the earth, the stone, the body of the metal. We haven't been able to forge Valyrian steel since because after the Doom of Valyria the art of binding a soul to a blade was lost.
Until recents times when Melisandre attempted to rediscover the technique by hoping to place the soul of Shireen (the love of Stannis, supposed Azor Ahai) into his blade (supposed Lightbringer).
The shadowbinders of Asshai come to mind too. All around the world people were binding souls, spirits to bodies through various methods; blood, ice, fire, shadow but ultimately all containing two alchemical bases - a body and a spirit. Which one was which is how you defined one parameter of the magic. If you placed an spirit of the earth, obsidian, into the body of a man? Well I think you get the antithesis. You get a spiritual alchemical reaction and temporal ice is birthed. Why does Valyrian Steel destroy the others? Because it attempts to place a human soul back into the body of something that is now void of human spirit, an ice wraith and the temporary bargain that was struck is cancelled. The sword 'wargs' the energy of the ice wraith and the alchemical circle completes.
And maybe one final step further of rabbit hole random
What if as legend says Joramun was the right-hand man of Bran the Builder after the fight versus the Night's King OR Joramun was the great king of the Children and worked with Bran to build the wall. He anchored himself to his horn through magic binding his spirit in a pact with Bran perhaps even being the central sacrifice to the weirwood wall. His spirit temporally stuck inside the horn but body inside the wall fueled by blood with an eternal ice spirit. The Valyrian Steel equivalent to warging an other would be blowing the horn to warg Joramun's spirit back into his body and ending the weir-wall magic.
"Qhorin Halfhand lists Joramun among Kings-Beyond-the-Wall who either broke their strength on the Wall, or had their strength broken by the power of Winterfell on the far side."
Bran 'broke' Joramun's 'strength' on the wall.
Bran split Joramun's body and spirit and placed them like a 1-step Horcrux.
Also, Joramun... Jörmungandr..
There’s a common hypothesis that the crypts are built into a huge weirwood cave. That’s how the oldest graves are at the bottom. The crypts are built from the bottom up. The closed off part at the very bottom of the crypts is still a weirwood cave. Could be all kinds of stuff going in there.
This video has ideas that are kinda out there tbh. But you might be close with the idea that there is something in the winterfell crypts. What is causing hot springs? I waved them off as general thermal activity but could it be some kind of fire wight strapped to a tree? Some kind of opposite to the ice wights that may be strapped to trees in the wall?
“night king may actually be alive if bran the builder is” reminded me of a vid preston jacobs did on one of grrms old stories where two chess masters are playing each other but it’s actually also across different timeline outcomes of their lives - like a timeline battle, seems significant given the numerous dualistic religions in the book - any evidence that the night king is also a player? from the house of the undying maybe
I think I have commented here that the 3 Eyed Raven is Bran the Builder. He made the Pact with the Children of the Forest and he has been living since the beginning of multiple consecutive 2nd Lives hosted in the bodies of Green Seer Children on the Forest (that are still in the cave) until he ran out and then lured BloodRaven to his cave. Later years the cave was surrounded by the Night King's wights. They couldn't go in but the Children also could not get out.
The many levels of the crypt are a HUGE clue regarding the timeline. It foretells when the timeline will END.
Here is what I think is really going on. Although this story is told over several books the same story is told over and over again with some variations. The system of primogeniture instead of a meritocracy is the basis of all discontent. Example: Samwell Tarly was almost killed because he was thought not to be up to the standard of taking over his family's house. I also suspect that Varys's castration was really due to someone not wanting to commit kin slaying. The "legal" ways to get rid of a pesky brother is to send him to the Wall or castration (yes, I think Reek's castration was deliberate, and side eye why Benjen is at the Wall)
This is a story of the fight between two brothers Bran the "heir" and Jon Snow the Bastard. This fight has been fought since the building of the wall. Bran created a Pact with the Children to destroy his brother Jon. The scene in the show is a lie, I think eventually we see that it was Jon Snow being impaled by the Children.
But there was a problem, the Children accidentally made Jon Snow/ Night King immortal. (Because there is power in kin's blood). To remedy this Bran (the Builder) built the Winterfell crypts to entomb his brother. I think the collapse in the bottom crypt was due to the Night King escaping into the tunnels and roots of the Weirwoods until he finally escapes at Hardhome. The brothers on the wall said that the flames were so bright that it looked like the Sun/son was rising in the North. That was the "resurrection" of Jon Snow.
So there are these two entities that have been playing an extremely slow pace game of chess. In the with season we saw how they work. When Bran strategically timed telling Sam about Jon's birth that directly lead to Jon killing Dany. It is the butterfly wings that create hurricanes. That is how they work small whispers etc.
I like your idea of sentinels because I think that Bran the Builder and Night King do have sentinels. Like Bran could skin change into Hodor the Night King also skin changes but in the the dead. I think that all the people who should have died but mysteriously survived are the Night King's sentinels ie Little Finger, Syria Forel, Beric Donarion, Arya, Cold Hands, The faceless men. I think that Bran the Builder take over people just for small moments ie Catelyn in a daze for days not leaving Bran's bedside.
But the big reveal is that present-day Bran and Jon are physical replicas of their predecessors. Bran is lame like Bran the Builder and Jon has been stabbed in the heart and is un-dead.
Another clue in the 8th season was the constellation pictures in the caves.
I think what Bran has been waiting for is the rebirth of his original body in Bran and a constellation of a particular eclipse that signifies the rebirth of the planet. At that time Bran the builder can take over Bran's body permanently. Here is where disagree with you. Bran is the baddie because he is in a pact with the children. When the 3 eyed raven said he would fly, I think that meant he would become the Stallion that mounts the world.
Bran the Builder had hundreds of years head start in this fight/game and in that time he created legends, lores, and prophecies about the night king being the baddie. Hundreds of years of negative propaganda.
But the Night King is coming in strong. His main disadvantage is that Bran the Builder downloaded everything from the weirwood net which makes it impossible for him to hide. To make a long story short I believe that the Night King in the show orchestrated his own death and had been training Arya to "kill" him. I think in the end he slipped into the dead body of Tormund Giantsbane and melted in the the roots of the Winterfell Hear tree.
(Side note: I think that the Starks are buried in stone so that their memories are NOT downloaded into the weirwood networks. This is why Ned put Leanna in the crypt's. Instead, he supposedly brought her dead body and her baby all the way from Doran to Winterfell. Something he did not want known in the weirwood net - hint IMHO , Ned killed Lyanna and he want to hide the parentage of Jon : B+L=J)
All this talk about the Crips of Winterfell.
What about their opps? The Bloods of Winterfell deserve some love too!
😁
What if there was a forgotten magical process to actually turn the bodies into stone for longevity or reanimation at a later date? I say this because I think Greyscale might be a corrupt and uncontrolled version of this process. I also suspect that the same thing happened to the dragon statues on Dragonstone. The ancient Valyrians turned them to stone for later reanimation when needed. After the Doom, the knowledge was lost, but Greyscale is spreading where Valyria once was...
I was just listening to an In Deep Geek livestream from several years ago and it came up that inne of the prerelease chapters for the winds of winter, a person is in a cave and come across carved stone columns with face and sad eyes. Her companion comes up beside her and say “This place belongs to the children of the forest.”
This immediately made me think of the crypts of Winterfell. What if the crypts were not dug out but are part of a pre-existing cave system that originally belonged to the children of the forest? It would explain a lot.
Bran's character feels like a mix of paul atreides, leto the second and Frodo. Bran's warging abilities and green seeing is very similar to paul's visions and dreams and maybe if bran becomes king in the books like he does in the show, then maybe his reign will be similar to paul atreides and leto the 2nd's reigns as emperor, and also skin changing and warging into other people is similar to how the bene geserit & paul and leto can access all the memories of their ancestors and also bran's personality just feels very similar to Paul's and frodo's. Also the Bolton's being the ancestral enemies of the starks and being extremely cruel and violent is very similar to the harkonnens being the ancestral enemies of the atreides and the harkonnens are also extremely cruel and violent. tywin lannister conspiring with the boltons and the freys to wipe out the starks is very similar to the emperor conspiring with the harkonnens to wipe out the atreides. the golden lion throne is the seat of power for house corrino and the lannister sigil is a golden lion
Yoooo that is a damn interesting parallel. Bravo.
Interesting idea but I think I side more with Crowfood’s Daughter in the idea that Bloodraven is the Three Eyed Crow but was confused about the name because he doesn’t see himself like that in the astral realm just like Bran would probably be confused if Jon ever told him he was a direwolf in his dreams. Things in the dreamscape and prophecy are symbolic and hard to decipher while you’re in it. Only the readers can get a clearer picture because we’re somewhat removed.
As a fellow new Vegas lover this blew my mind
Thanks!
If this theory is correct or most of it turns out to be true, perhaps Bran the Builder is more malicious than we think, and he wants Bran to continue where he left off.
Loving this theory .. I've only recently discovered you but now I'm worried that if we do ever get the remaining two books they won't be as good as your theories 😂
The statues of the Starks get carved into their likeness, but is there any word on the relationship? I always thought the dead were buried beneath the sitting statue, but does it say anywhere that the stark bones are ground up and used in the concrete used to make the statue? I don't remember that or anything like that being said.
If they do then absolutely they could be reanimated as the Stark they represent. If they do not then the best that might happen is that the form is animated by somehow warging into it.
A huge clue in this is in the Arianne sample chapter. There were stones with faces deep in a cave, carved by the children. Seems "into the trees and into the stones" is actually pretty much literal and direct. Maybe the oldest and deepest sections won't be statues of starks, but stones carved by the children, and the stark statues are a human imitation
Can't wait to watch this after my well deserved Saturday afternoon nap. Will report back after.
What if all the souls of the dead humans of westeros are powering the wall and that's why both the trees and the wall are Always described as weeping: the souls of the dead are suffering to keep the song of ice at bay
Wonder if Ned had statues of his brother and sister made because he wanted them to go into stone
Is there also a fire & ice bran the builder somewhere too? Is bran just the green magic version? Rhlor in asshai and the heart of winter could be possibles for that. It feels unbalanced if it's just all btb. And talking of going into stone in the crypts that always makes me think of the seastone chair too, maybe a big lovecraftian twist in there somewhere in the future!
Expanding the size of the crypts could work when the cave is made of stone from weirwood. They can move their roots as they wish
Like in bran’s cave, and the undying tower that keeps changing passages and is made of oily black stone (petrified blue weirwood of essos )
The first Kings are down that deep because they are connected to the Weirwood net.
The general vibe and course you are taking seems to set off bells of recognition in my mind, from someone who has read and re-read the books countless times. Some kind of magical harvesting of souls in connection with the ‘corrupted’ as you say weirwoods. I find it a shame ASOIAF couldn’t have been made into an animated series, as there would be no budget and live action constraints. All of this undercurrent of hinted magic could have been included. I appreciate the show until series 5, but it felt like sitting down at a fancy restaurant and only being served half of your meal when a whole tasting menu was advertised.
What if since wintefell is the where winter fell the crypts aren’t man made but rather an old greenseer cave used by the children of the forest and then maybe the others once the long night started. So maybe the oldest kings are deepest to protect against the others who maybe inhabited or made their last stand on the lower levels giving us the reason it ascends as opposed to descends with time. This will probably get lost in comments but none of my friends read ASOIAF so here I am
Holy crap Bran becoming the new Bran the builder and restarting everything blew my mind. And that weirdly kinda ties into another bestheda video game series, the elder scrolls, and the kalpa cycle of time in that world
also the using others life force as energy REALLY reminds me of Soul gems from the elder scrolls series so MORE bethesda!!
Mr. House is from New Vegas, that game was made by….Obsidian
Bran the builder being some puppet master of Starks and their history alive in the crypts be pretty wild.
Maybe that was the pact:
I’ll give you blood but I’ll keep my kings as a check and balances thing
for the 'the oldest kings are at the bottom' thing, i just always assumed the original starks built like the biggest crypt imaginble all at once. like a big enough crypt to hold thousands of years worth of Starks down there and only now are we getting to the top floor. which is fucking insane but A) it's not like this is a world lacking in fucking insanely massive construction's having been done around that time, and B) like your theory suggests, maybe Bran was involved in planning it and knew ahead of time how big it needed to be
The earlier Starks were probably buried deeper because that's where they entombed people when they were living through the Long Night. The custom persisted but they started working their way up.
This reminded me of David LmL's fire wight/Fire Other theory, the stone men are stone/water wights and the statues are Stone/Water Others
Something to do with calcification I think
Our videos come out at the same time on Saturdays. So after I watch my own video, simultaneously judging hashly and checking myself out. And then right after I get all worked up, I watch your vid to calm my heart rate down.
Ps, I love Fallout, and you connecting them makes me so nerdy and happy.
Bran supposedly builds a wall that looks like only a god could have made it. Him having a deep enough crypt for a hundred generations or so of his kin doesn't seem like that much of a stretch.
Preston Jacobs was ahead of everyone i wish he returned to theory videos.
This is...wow. It DOES read like there are at least some of the trees having been corrupted somehow. That Harren was on a MISSION to get rid of them because of it. THAT 'corruption' began in the Westerlands/Riverlands area. I have always wondered WHY Harren, an iron Born {they do not sow} wanted to spread his rule across the entire land. Like, he seems to settle in on land-that bothered me. He was following the corruption of the Trees. THAT was why he kept spreading out and tearing it all down.
I'm new to ASOIAF lore but i have heard it being said that winterfell is a stone tree that grows? Or something to that extent, maybe the starks going into the stone is another way of them going into the tree.
I think what we'll really find in the crypts of Winterfell is ourselves.
"It's the friends we made along the way that are the true treasures"
"Did you know the Boltons are flaying people again?"
Brandon the Builder: "No, I was not aware of this. Is it really so hard not to flay people? My goodness... It's a violation of their feudal contract. I authorize you to deal with them in any way you see fit."
I mean if we apply the idea of Howland’s magic turning earth to water and vice versa as something the older Starks were capable of then they could have “sank” each layer of the crypts deeper as they built the new ones? Idk would be an interesting way to hint at their magic I guess.
5:47 - what if bran IS the Night's King? that they are the same person with different names?
One technical caveat (but not thematic) that I noticed - the Blackwoods bury their dead beneath their dead weirwood. Since their weirwood is dead, it might be disconnected from the rest of the corrupted tree magic. Also, I now can't stop thinking of your theory as a Ponzi Tree now lol
That would make total sense of bran the builder was the three-eyed crow... It would also make more sense that he would have been the one to send them the fire wolves as well as the one that potentially could be working the direwolves also like ghosts for example who seems to just go off randomly and do things himself but at the same time they protect the starks... I feel like someone is worging ghost as well and I always thought that it was the three out of Raven as in Lord rivers however it could be bran the builder... Hell every single bran in history could be the new replacement for the original bran the builder and that's why the name Brandon gets used so often in stark history kind of like the theory of roose Bolton doing his thing with people you know skin changing them... It could be that every Brandon that's born is meant to take the place of the past Brandon that's there... Sorry if there's any mistakes I was having to use voice text
The guy strapped to the tree isn’t just a random guy the children of the forest chose to bind.
So, Bran the Builder down in the crypts and likely also the heart of the weirwood network. If say Bran co-opted the tree magic for use by him (being connected to the stone), could that be the thing that threw the seasons out of balance? And the Stark words referring to Winter could also be a small acknowledgment that they are responsible for long winters?
One the topic of different magical networks, you mentioned trees, streams, and stones. This got me thinking that in the past there was often thought to be 4 elements: earth, fire, water, and air. The earth could be stones, the streams water, and fire could be the trees (because you can burn them to create fire). But is there a group in the books that use air, or go into the air? Could this be the Ironborn? Originally I thought they might be related to the streams/water, but their religion includes drowning people and then reviving them. Giving them air back into their lungs. What do you think? Otherwise, are there any cultures that practice cremation in Westeros? I would also consider this going into the air. What about Melisandre? We consider her to have fire magic, but she burns people to get power. Could the Lord of Light actually be air magic masquerading as fire magic? You can’t burn without air. Oh I dearly want to hear your thoughts on this!!!
Assuming that Bran the Builder was Bran or at least a very powerful greenseer, he probably time travelled, counted number of future Starks that would have to be buried in the Crupts and then sank the Crypts deep enouggh to hold them all.
I think what you mentioned about Bran being the Three-Eyed Crow is great evidence.
I think the most important tidbit is this:
Bran lists his types of dreams, wolf dreams, tree dreams and crow-dreams. He loves being a wolf. Sees a weirwood talking to him and the Crow teasing him to fly. Bloodraven says he has been watching Bran and guiding him to himself. He is stuck on the trees. So it's presumably him looking at Bran through the trees. Bran at one point sees a dream where the tree is about to talk to him, but gets interrupted by the Crow saying fly or die. If Bloodraven is the Crow, and the tree, did he interrupt himself? No.
Also Bloodraven famously has, a thousand eyes and one. The thousand being his greensight, and the one being his actual physical eye. Neither of them is three. LML's idea that the third eye is on the dream crow is pretty stupid. Bloodraven's third eye was lost on the Red-Grass field in battle, not as a sacrifice for magic power. But Bran does have three eyes. In the dream the Crow pecks a hole into his forehead and it becomes his third eye, and the Crow's dreams help him develop his skill, i.e. gain a third eye.
Bran the Builder is likely the Bran we know in the present day who has sat the greenseer throne and reached back through the weirwood network into the past to whisper the secrets of weirwood building to an ancient ancestor of his own, a man named Brandon. Brandon was able to do what he did only because Bran told him how to do it. This is why BtB is such a mysterious figure who is said to have built all the most amazing things across the seven kingdoms.
Bran himself, the boy we know, is likely the very person who establishes the bloodmagic rituals of the past in the first place because that'd be darker than Bran redeeming a past figure. Instead he turns a past man into his tool against the Others and shoulder him with the burdens of first making sure all those sacrifices take place. It's also going to be Bran who ENDS the war most likely as well from his future greenseer seat at Harrenhall.
I can't with the constant Bob the Builder memes 😭😂 this theory is very interesting tho 😊
I've not read the books for about a year now but I'm sure somewhere glass candles do get mentioned. Or i might jus be mis rememberin...
Maybe Lan the clever is in the tree too? 0: 5:00
If it's true that starks go into the stone then may jon go into a stone dragon? Or wargs/merges into a dragon of sorts.
There was a dragon sighted by summer, that could be a stone dragon meant for jon. Somehow being moved.
His firewight state may be as temporary as him being in ghost.
How does the blood get to the trees on the wall? The wall is covered in ice. Furthermore, the nightswatch burns their dead. As well as the wildlings.
I have an idea.
Thought about this idea a lot- the whole crypts being out of order thing.
Hear me out Michael-
What if the original Starks knew exactly how many crypts they would need before the others would return? They would know exactly how many of their ancestors would be returned and by the time we get to Lyanas death, no more Starks would end up dying and having their bodies returned to winterfell since that point.
There’s enough room for just the right amount of Starks before winterfell may fall or the Others might resurrect the Starks dead. If the others do resurrect the Starks, maybe the statues will protect the living descendants. The crypts may have to be sealed to protect everyone at winterfell much like the ancient burial mounds that dot the northern landscape.
I've been thinking. The old gods could describe the Northern gods, the drowned god, rhollor, similar to pagan religeons, whereas the Faith of the Seven is centralised similar to christianity.
(edit) it also makes me think of the 4 elements (fire, ice and water.....not sure how earth/wind fit in) and the way you talk about balance reminds me of the four humors.
I love your mind and your videos have reinvigorated my fandom but if you had said "some level or another" one more time i probably would have put my head thru the drywall 😂
Well if everything was Bran all along, then the builders of Winterfell would've known how many tombs they would need until the long night and built the crypts exactly to spec
So I got an idea. What if all the really ancient statues of the Starks are really not statues but the actual starks? They are like stone weirwoods. The managed to stay connected to the trees without getting entangled somehow... maybe with their swords they keep on their knees or maybe with the living starks.
But how many times is it mentioned that they felt like they were being watched in the crypts? Too many. Is it possible they are sitting on WW thrones in the crypts? Or they somehow merged in some clean and elegant way that they look like statues? Maybe they have that stone disease
Idk... I'm just spitballing' here. It's a bit more fani-fiction but i think the idea of the statues being actual starks or maybe even the original old gods hence the starks seemingly getting the most magic genes and the responsibility to guard the wall.
So maybe they were aboriginals?
Edit: I should start finishing the voids before I comment. I posted this on an IDG vid the other day. I guess we are on the same page kinda
Edit 2 16:07: Damn... you def thought about this way deeper than I did. I thought maybe they somehow kept from being covered in roots and looked like stone statues but were essentially like petrified WW bodies that only had eyes that could move.
I m starting to think the Starks got some sort of Sweet Deal very early on or took power early on and like you said, we are watching a fluke generation that isn't brutal like they have been . Just their battle wih the Boltons and ho fucking gory that shit gets means there is some crazy psychopathic back and forth going on.
Oh yeah... Bran is the 3 eyed raven.... and the all the dead bodies are bootstrapped Brans that died and future Bran had to tweek shit to make it work until we get our Bran... It's just how many times he experimented with different things to get himself to the wall with broken legsa, and maybe Hodor... all the pieces this tiome around could be very different then the last... He just needed to get to the wall once in a cycle and from then on hehas been starting over and over running through all of history doing different things to get to this outcome. He's been playing the game against the pother gods and his tree power is what gives him the upper hand because he cnan see all of time at once... It's like Groundhogs day but the other gods can change hit a little here and there.... I made a comment on IDG that spells it out...
But he is doing the same loop over and over again and all the gods are fighting in the 4D game of Thrones and he is forever always tweaking shit. We are seeing the 5000th or 8000th time through where he is always tweaking little things here and there to get his ultimate outcome. He may be the only one that can change time but the Gods can see it change and adjust their moves accordingly.
I think Bran as T3ER actually set up Euron as one of his chess pieces. Euron doesn't know he is being played but Bran has manipulated him with basically saying he cannot be a god and whatever he knows that will egg Euron on to get the magical shit he needs that no one else has the balls to get. His piece to basically play against the drowned God. he also has an ally with The God of Death who is helping him via Jaqen and Missandei to steer things along.
the way your laying things out makes me think og Thor ragnarok the comic version where ragnarok is an event caused by these beings who sit above in shadow to strengthen themselves restarting and ending the world in a cycle but Thor ends that breaking the string of fate and sets the gods free from this fate of death and rebirth will bran be Thor here and end the long night by allowing it to happen then destroying those who sit above to restart the world with no influence from them
This blows time traveling Bran out of the water.
It may not be a case of whom or where but when. If the lower crypts are largely inaccessible or so claimed, how would you keep safe something that is not of the world?
Could the spirits or personalities /memories of the dead Starks in the crypts of Winterfell be going into the stone, but the blood and flesh be going into the trees via the Weirwood roots?
Edit: this comment was made 5 minutes in. You make the mr house argument after, guess I wasn't far off in speculation.
No idea how deep the crypts are, but they could represent the twin of the wall but then underground.
As there needs to be a stark in winterfell and a watch at the walls.
And when the wall breaks so could the crypts at the same time. Summoning the statues or whatever it does. A trigger linked by the weirwood, as you've shown with the makeup of the wall in your last video.
Since you mention here the roots are down there. There is a link of sorts.
Perhaps the weirwood then wargs into the statues, for the lack of a better description. Possible because of the warging abillity of past starks. Or maybe the warging is just a clue, not the actual method. And not important beyond that.
Maybe whoever designed the crypts knew exactly how many Starks would be buried in it.
Bran is going to talk with the Builder as a tree, the story says that the Builder learn to imitate sounds from nature to talk with the Children and If Im not wrong Bran only could move "his" branches as a tree when he saw Eddard in the past. Brandon the builder knows how to speak "tree"
Maybe the entrance to the crypts has been relocated over time.
Have you read The Stone City? Very trippy, strong recommend.
But, Marwyn the Mage has a candle. He can undo the founder if the founder is the first Stark is entangled in the root of the heart tree. If they bring down the wall how can they stop the army of all those frozen fast zombies and the Others? It would be a horror story if the Others go across Planetos.
The north says they remember but I think there’s a lot that they’ve forgotten. I don’t think Ned knew anything about these deeper mysteries.
in regards to your intro - know you’re not sold on the winterfell is warm because of a dragon idea - is it warm bc of all the glass candles burning down there for thousands of years?
*reads title of the video* none of these words are in the bible
"Builder" is
Wrong mythos. But this one is better, imo
Mr house is a bible
What? The word "house" is in the Bible.
@@sirpepeofhousekek6741So is the word “is” and the. And builder. Mister isn’t but maybe master is. Plus, the bible we have, the words in it are from a language that didn’t even exist then. It was originally written in Ancient Greek or in Hebrew.
18:51 It's a Wal-Mart. Excuse me, Wall-Mart
Okay, I don't know the books well enough to develop this but could the gods of the stream be the same as the Drowned God?
The reason that Bran is all the Brans would be because he will get (and or has gotten) a tree download!
Ooo, this is MY perfect niche.
I love the Bran the Builder is the 3ER theory but why would he bother sending Bran North of the Wall instead of into the crypts?
Think of the "crypts" under Winterfell like BR's cave system. There are levels, there are roots and there are bodies and there is an underground river/sea. ALL of the cave systems in the North at least, connect up in a few places. Winterfell is one. The majorest of them all. To me, THOSE crypts are CotF kind of thing-like the cave Arienne finds herself in when looking for whatshername. That place was carved out-to me, it seems like the crypts have been carved out the same kind of way. The Winterfell caves/crypts also have a level of carving where there don;t seem to be roots yet. ALL of these caves have that in common, if I am making sense. These were places men hid from Others...and where CotF hid from men before THAT. Only Winterfell seems to have been 'infallible' somehow. Barrowton USED to be where men went for safety in winter, etc. but then the Long Night happened and men moved their safeplace to Winterfell after they figured out that Winterfell was the better place-safer for men for some reason. Even The Barrows King knew it-that is why their 'wars' with the Starks read so feeble and so spread out. It doesn't really read to me like the Barrow Kings hated the Stark rule. You are right to question the different types of gods there might be and how they might be connected. Looking at you, Patchface! And hey-the going into the stones...and into the trees. Those trees and eggs BOTH can petrify-turn to stone. The eggs can come back from petrification. I read that to mean the trees can as well. IF something living has petrified, the possibilty is there for rez, somehow, depending on what it is. But it looks like it is shaping up to be any living thing that petrifies has a chance to be alived again. Think about what THAT means for greyscale, cuz THAT is coming. Makes Illyrio's wife's hands kinda scary now. Scarier? Cz it is kinda lowkey scary that he even kept her hands. Seastone Chair..Blackwoods Heart Tree. Any other eggs out there...crazy, huh? IF the oily black stone is petrified blood, wtf is going to happen if THAT stoneware can come to life?
So the 1st Starks are now the Lovecraftian " Deep old Ones"
Maybe Bran The Builder built it with foresight of House Stark and how many would rule it and die so the crypt was built, the whole complex , with that in mind 🤔
And maybe the Starks went into thestone by the weirwood roots bursting into their bones!
We've had first breakfast yes, but what about 2nd breakfast? I don't think he knows about 2nd breakfast Pip."