Why is it called The Seven Kingdoms?
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- Опубликовано: 3 авг 2023
- In Deep Geek - Insight and intelligent discussion on Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, The Witcher and more.
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The fact that what the characters in the story call things doesn't match what things actually are might be the most realistic thing in all of ASOIF. People do this in real life all the time. There are famously 7 hills in ancient Rome, but anyone with a map can see that there are anywhere between three and a dozen depending on how strictly one defines a hill. But, people like the idea of there being 7 hills in Rome, so we say that there are and rationalise what those hills are afterwards. It's not _entirely_ inconsistent with the truth, but accuracy is not the driving force. Similarly for the residents of Westeros.
Ditto for China. Chinese people only ever refer to "The Two Rivers" (Yellow River and Yangtze River). And for sure those are the two most important rivers, by far, but far from the only ones that China actually has within its' borders.
GRRM always tell the story about a tall building which people were not really sure how tall it was. It has become the inspiration of the unreliable narative style that he often use in his works. I don't remember the name of the building. Anyone?
@@anggi8699 I'm not sure that what I'm describing is really the same thing as unreliable narration. It's more a sort of down-to-earthness I guess?
So often in fantasy, the stories within-the-world are all true and important (eg, the trope of prophecies - which GRR Martin over exploits himself). It's more grounded to have the people within-the-world have their own stories that _aren't_ true, and that both those within-the-world and the audience knows aren't true. Because that's what people do: make up stories, build up traditions, reshape them over time, and so on. Not because they're 100% accurate, important, or are relevant for the future, but for their own sake. Giving the Targaryen's realm a name that is a little hard to square with the facts but ties in to its complicated history, its aspirations, and the belief systems of the people that live there makes the world of ASOIF feel that little bit more human and lived in.
People call USA America, so yeah.
@@anggi8699 Could he have possibly been referring to The High Tower of Oldtown, that the Maesters now use as their base of operations, that was supposedly built by Bran the Builder?
"History does not march forward in a straight line." A great reminder to have hope when things seem to be darkening.
Thanks. I will treasure that.
It doesn't march forward at all either, tons of people throughout the ages have thought that they knew what the end-point was and they were all wrong.
Soviets thought history would end in socialism, Germans thought history would end in aryan rule, Christians when Atilla was invading thought this meant the world would end in the year 500. We are no different, to think that "progress" is the correct force is just arrogant.
Robert Baratheon refers to the Riverlands as the eighth kingdom. “Making the Eight” is fucking one girl from “each of the seven kingdoms and the Riverlands”.
No, that sentence actually implies that the Riverlands are not a kingdom. If they were Robert would have simply said described “making the Eight” as fucking a girl from each of the eight kingdoms. The eight refers to eight separate territories, but not to eight kingdoms.
@@fordhouse8b “Back in my day, you weren’t a real man until you fucked one girl from each of the Seven Kingdoms, and the Riverlands. We used to call it Making the Eight.” -Robert Baratheon, Game of Thrones Season 1
@@fordhouse8bYeah he says “Back in my day you weren’t a man until you fucked one girl from each of the Seven Kingdoms AND the Riverlands”
@@fordhouse8bbingo! All the sovereign monarchs at the time of the conquest (whether conquered or not). North, West, Islands, Vale, Reach, Dorne, Stormlands. Crownlands & River were the creation of Aegon, thus not included.
@@Audentior_Ito Well, if we are adding the Crownlands into the mix, maybe the saying should have been making the nine, unless the Crownland chicks were just to ugly?
Just a bit of fun trivia, but I thought it worth mentioning that Westeros is generally inspired by Medieval England, and sometime before William the Conquerer there was a period when it was divided into a number of petty kingdoms. This came to be referred to as "The Heptarchy", which literally means "The Seven Kingdoms".
As with the ASOIAF Seven Kingsoms, the actual number varied over the centuries.
given just how much of ASOIAF is inspired by medieval UK and how much it seems to be inspired by the real world in general I'm not surprised
There is actually a bunch of stuff very clearly inspired by medieval France and Burgundy/ the Low Countries too, and perhaps other medieval European nations that I am not familiar with too.
I'm saddened that the 6th book is still not finished. It's been 12 years. Mr Martin being in his seventies, makes me think the series will never be finished. It's sad really.
Westeros is both a feudal state and a federation at the same time. The only country in real world history that closely resembles that was the Holy Roman Empire. They became even more like the HRE after they decided to make monarchy elective with the Lords Paramount being the equivalent of the prince electors
I could not agree more.
All feudal states were similar to Westeros in their early form. HRE is famous because it never rose above it.
@@nebeskisrb7765 point, but what makes the HRE more like Westeros than any other country is that it had a quasi-federal structure that other medieval feudal states such as England or France did not have. Prior to unification each of the independent seven kingdoms was already feudal in nature but bringing them together added a federal element to the structure
No, they are not a federation at all. In a federation, there are two separate laws. In the US, for instance, things can be illegal at the federal level but legal at the state level, and the state just does what the state does without regard to the federal law. That doesn't happen in Westeros. The King's laws is supreme. It is just a feudal structured tiered all the way
@@pyropulseIXXI what you described is how American federalism operates, however not all federations were like this. When I described Westeros as federal I was thinking more of the 19th century German Empire, it was undoubtedly a federation yet the Kaiser still had the authority to overrule the kings, princes and grand dukes of the states within the reich. e.g.when WWI broke out, the rulers of the duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and the duchy of Brunswick were actually reluctant to join the German war effort because of their membership in the British royal family, yet as sworn vassals of Kaiser Wilhelm, they still had to obey when called upon to join the war effort because he was their primary liege.
Westeros operates on a similar principle, where the lords paramount have autonomy to govern their respective kingdoms provided they pay their taxes to the Crown and keep the king's peace, We know this because there are examples in both in the books and onscreen where lesser lords pay taxes and swear oaths directly to their leige lords instead of to the Iron Throne. Yet notwithstanding this, we also know that Iron Throne has the right to make rules that are binding on all lords across the realm such as when Jaehaerys banned first night. In other words it's not the bottom-up kind of federalism like the US but more a top-down model seen in the first and second Reichs.
There were seven large kingdoms in Westeros when Aegon declared his kingship. The Crownlands were founded by Aegon, and the Riverlands and Iron Islands were split up as a result of the conquest. 7+2=9
Yeah, but westeros is called seven kindoms long befor that and should not forget the main religion faith of seven...
@@tomahi83we actually don't know that forsure. Everything from before the conquest is questionable history open to bias and interpretation so its entirely possible westeros wasn't called seven kingdoms until the andals came. I think they kinda pushed the 7 kingdoms thing.
@@kiddbuu5178are you talking about the Targaryen conquest or the Andels taking the land from the first men? Because I’m pretty sure the citadel and the Meisters were around taking note of major events before Aegon.
The North, the Vale, the Riverlands, the Iron Islands, the Westerlands, the Reach, and the Stormlands. That's 7 Kingdoms.
The newly formed Crownlands is basically an Imperial province under the direct management of the Iron Throne, with the Seven Kingdoms managed by a Lord Paramount from one of the Great Houses who you can think of kind of like Dukes or Earls that rule in the King's stead.
Dorne, since it was never a kingdom (and Aegon didn't conquer it) retained alot of it's independence, including it's status as a principality ruled by the Martells after Daeron II peacefully brought them into the realm, so.... 7 Kingdoms, one Imperial province, and one Principality.
Of course "King of the Seven Kingdoms and the Crownlands and also *kind of* Dorne but not really" probably didn't sound as catchy so... "King of the Seven Kingdoms" is what we got.
@@SerBretonBriarwhite Harren the Black was "King of the Rivers and Isles", the Riverlands and Iron Islands being one collective kingdom at time of conquest. Dorne is the seventh kingdom. At his first coronation Aegon styled himself Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, of course not knowing that he would fail to conquer Dorne. It is a convenient coincidence, numbers-wise, that splitting up the Isles from the Rivers brought the realms which Aegon de facto ruled up to Seven.
The most unrealistic thing about Asoiaf is how neat the borders are.
Medieval borders were a god dam mess.
In parts of Europe, sure. But not really in Britain which is what Westeros is mostly based on. The borders moved a bit over time, but weren’t especially messy.
And they weren’t very specific. Nobody knew exactly where one place became another unless there was some natural division like a river or mountains. Even then there were always disputes over water and fishing and mineral rights so little tiny marches would claim all the mountains or rivers around them regardless of how legally dubious that was.
Well it depends obviously where and when for example Iberian Penisula and Scandinavia had much more stabile borders (between Christian countries). But there is also another problem with population. For example Teutonic order could rise a army around 30.000 soldiers(mainly knights) during battle of Grunwald which is basically size of Northern army(even bigger). But North should be around size of India but Teutonic Order was around size of Belgium(or even smaller). So it could be hard to have Feudal society with do small dencity of population. It should me more like territory of modern Eastern Ukraine during medieval time.
@@nickbenton4881they are specific on a map. Just depends who drew it.
@@Zveebo The concept of borders itself is somewhat alien to all of medieval Europe. You could have a title to 1/4th of the income of the mill, 2/3rd of the honey from village x and 1/10th of the wood from forest y while all these territories were officially a fief of your distant cousin etc.
I strongly suggest that you make a deep dive video on the Crownlands - I've seen leaked casting sheet dialogue from Season 2, which while unremarkable in and of themselves, indicate that they're actually going to use the term *"the Crownlands"* in on-screen dialogue for the first time ever. Game of Thrones never called it that in EIGHT SEASONS, and it didn't come up in HotD Season 1. Important because there's going to be major military campaigns to "consolidate the Crownlands" etc. WE know about them but it's interesting how TV only viewers (the bulk of the audience) have never heard the term, nor do they really understand that there's more to the Crownlands than just King's Landing.
I think the Crownlands are pretty interesting because they're an odd mish-mash of bits from other kingdoms...even though in-universe this probably makes people think they're boring with no long history or culture of their own. It's basically made up of:
- the Narrow Sea Houses: the Valyrian mini-kingdom on the isles of Blackwater Bay, plus some Stormlander houses from Massey's Hook that openly sided with them
- First Men holdouts in the pine barrens of Crackclaw Point
- the "main" Crownlands, mostly Andals, but which used to be an extension of the Riverlands before being ruled by the Stormlands and then the Ironborn for a century. An extension of the Riverlands, always a contested borderland. The big names of course being Rosby-Stokeworth-Duskendale-Rook's Rest, plus a few others further north who pop up now and again.
Hey Robert, I just started Fire and Blood. In a large part because of how interested in it your videos got me. Thank you
The Old King’s reign is my favourite section of the book despite bing GRRM’s least interesting during the writing process
I always thouhgt the Iron Islands didn't count because they're so pathetic 😅. Thanks for the explanation.
I thought it was because the Iron Islands refuse to be apart of the Kingdoms and the latter didn't think the Iron Islands weren't really worth conquering.
I always just sort of figured the Iron Islands didn't count.
They definitely seem the least integrated
they were part of the RIverlands kingdom; and the Crownlands isn't a 'kingdom' either
Thank you for this clarification. This always confused me when reading the books and trying to count all the kingdoms. The Crownlands being a Westerosi Washington, D.C. is a great explanation for why that one isn't included.
I'm surprised you didn't mention the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy, which is clearly where GRRM got the idea from.
I never heard of this! Off to Google. Thanks!
I think it’s more like the EU
Great video. I was confused myself as to why in House of the Dragon they kept referring to themselves as the Seven Kingdoms, despite Dorne not being a part of them at that time. I also arrived at the conclusion that they were just claiming rulership over Dorne even though they had no actual authority there.
Or it was just a misjudgment on the writers part😮
@@WillsonT011No
De jure and de facto regions
Dorne has never been a kingdom, they are a princedom... Their history, heritage, culture and customs are so foreign compared to the rest of Westeros that they cannot really be considered as a westerosi people.. they are more of an essos people, and the fact that they didn't submit to Targaryen rule for so long only reinforces that they cannot be placed on the same category as the rest
English monarchs claimed the title "King of France" until *1801* as inheritance from Roi Edward III
I always thought it was due to the geographic and climate differences between the 7 major areas. The Iron Islands and the North have some artic like weather so they kind of go together, Dorne is Deserts, the Storm Lands have seasonal/yearly severe weather, ect. Add that to the religious importance of the number 7, and the ease of uniting 7 kingdoms into one rather than a number that does not have cultural value.
Claiming a title you aren’t able to exercise in practice has plenty of real world precedent. The English monarchs considered themselves the rightful kings of France for centuries, despite not being able to rule there - they only dropped the French symbols from their coat of arms in the 1800s when it became a republic.
That isn't exactly how it went down. The Napoleonic wars happened and Britain conquered france and puppeted it briefly. UK was not particularly interested in rowdy holdings by this point. UK was focussed on trade value pretty much exclusively.
There was no point in claiming it, and what a bad idea it would've been, them so keen on the guillotine
@@mandowarrior123naaa, that's also not true. Britain did not occupy France during the napoleonic wars. A coalition of several states (wich included Britain, but they provided far less men than for example Austria or Russia) defeated Napoleon and invaded France. But the goal of the war was always to remove napoleon from the throne and restore Louis VIIII Bourbon as the King of France. The coalition left immediately after it was successful. Britain's claim on France was indeed removed during the coalition wars in 1801. It was part of the peace talks. The republic of France argued that the claim was pointless because there wasn't even a throne to claim for Britain because France became a republic (the claim was pointless for 500 years already but okay) . To drop the claim was part of the peace negotiations. Britain accepted begrudgingly and removed the Fleur de Lys From their coat of arms.
Claiming the title of ruler of neighboring country? The country you have been fighting for hundreds of years, intertwined with their nobility and, in fact, controlled large parts of that country at one point or another?
Hah, that's a children's game... Franz Joseph I was king of Jerusalem! Sovereign of the kingdom that was gone for hundreds of years and was nowhere near the country he actually ruled...
@@toncek9981 “King of Jerusalem” is still one of the titles of the King of Spain til this day
Great video Robert! 👍
Thank you !!! I've always wondered why its called 7 kingdoms ? I go through and count and wonder which 7 are considered kingdoms and what not , very glad to get an answer !
Growing up a fan of the Big Ten conference which had 11 teams and now has 14 prepared me well for this.
It is Seven Kingdoms, because of a period in English history called "heptarchy" that reflected seven main Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in England.
Nine realms, I wonder if Riverlanders get offended by the Seven Kingdoms concept because they didn't have their independence at the time of Aegon's conquest.
I hope if Westeros ever break apart by the end of asoiaf that the Riverlands would be independent again. The only time they were a kingdom was during the Justman dynasty. Before that they were split into petty kingdoms killing each other and after the dynasty they were under foreign occupation.
Love your content thank You!!!
Those goddamn andals and the faith of the seven said so I bet
Amazing video!
Love this topic
the reason it's called the seven kingdoms is because while he was a great conqueror, Aegon was a lousy state builder. He had the right idea at the start when he called himself the king of Westeros, symbolizing that the time of multiple kingdoms were over. One kingdom, one nation, one king. the lord of the seven kingdoms, and allowing the provinces to refer to themselves as kingdoms just served as a permanent reminder that they had once been independent kingdoms, and could be again.
Double edged sword, i suppose.
Because as we all learnt with the ending of the tv show. The 6 kingdoms sounds awfully naff compared to seven kingdoms.
To me the crownlands are kind of like the Vatican in our world technically its own country but still part of larger italy
intriguing
@indeepgeek what is your title screen depicting? Is it from a particular series? I've always wondered, thanks
It’s always Robert, but my fiancé and I always say “woo yeah Robert” every time he confirms it
Would be fun if sam would stumble on a book before the dornish conquest written by a dornish maester..
Because of the westerosy church
Baelor the Blessed wasn't nearly as old as pictured...he was 27 when he died.
It's called the Seven Kingdoms as there were seven kingdoms at the time of the conquest - sure Dorne was ruled by a Prince rather than a King, but functionally it was still a kingdom - the North, the Vale, the Westerlands, the Reach, the Stormlands, the Isles and Rivers, and Dorne
I just noticed that the guy on the horse in the bottom left corner of the in deep geek logo looks suspiciously like Faramir in his charge at The Siege of Gondor. I don’t know if that was intentional or not.
What about where Robert talks about making the 8. One girl for each of the 7 kingdoms and the river lands.
Ooh! One of my pet topics for years! I never get past this point in discussion in the comments, because people will never agree that the Seven Kingdoms really are more than 7 realms. But since you've established it so well, my real question has been, what's the significance? If the 8-9 realms are called "the Seven Kingdoms", is there another narrative count change we should watch for? In particular, will the Three Heads of the Dragon actually be four or five people?
Stannis Baratheon approves the grammar in this video.
Just noticed, with all the kingdom's symbols ... those bearing 'creatures' ... all face west ( left ) while the Wolf of the north, faces east ( right). On purpose? Coincidence?
It's like Northwestern University being in the Midwest US.
Aegon I should have crowned himself Emperor of Westeros. (It sounds much better and superior) It a much fitting title than King of Seven former individual Kingdoms. The Starks, Lannisters, Martells, and Arryns get to keep their royal status, heritage, and traditions while still be subservient to the Targaryen Imperial Family.
Emperor was a Yi Ti title, so its out of place in Westeros really. Aegon's original title which he gave himself was King of All Westeros but when he was recognised by the realm as sovereign, he changed it to the present one, probably on the advice of the High Septon.
Remember Aegon was trying his best not to look too foreign so he decided to opt for a more traditional and the people of Westeros were already used to Kings.
@@truetory6231 It would have been more traditional to let the Kingdoms of Westeros keep their crowns and royal status. I doubt most Westeros even know what Yi Ti is. Also, Valyrian incest was eventually allowed so calling the Targaryen ruler Emperor wouldn’t have been a big deal. Mostly likely George wanted to play to Aegon’s ego of being the only King in Westeros.
@@Nubin2000 you give Westeros too little credit, the world is a lot more connected than you'd at first guess. Yi Ti has been known to Westerosi for centuries. Ageon's goal was to create a homogeneous, united kingdom so he took the steps required to integrate himself and his would be descendants into Westerosi society, adopting much of the culture of the land he conquered. Such as the Faith of the Seven and heraldry in the style of Westerosi's nobility.
@@truetory6231Go for „King of Kings“ then.
Ooooooo, Say Can You Seeeeeeeeee!
As a citizen of a country with an actual monarch, you need to turn to the US for a parallel to the Crownlands?
My guess is that at the end of the series, the unity brought by the Targaryens is ended and that Seven Kingdoms become independent again.
Lol this reminds me of the "Hundred Years' War" IRL. Despite what the name suggests, it neither lasted exactly one hundred years nor was it as single continuous conflict. "Hundred Years' War", however, rolls of the tongue significantly better than "Hundred Sixteen Years' War" and rolls of the tongue several orders of magnitude better than "Edwardian War, Caroline War, and Lancastrian War" lmao XD
Even upon Egan’s conquest that was still more than seven kingdoms
U gonna start covering the percy jackson series when rhat drops? Its more kid based yes but still pretty rich in fantasy lore and i think youd like it if u havent read it
How many English kings claimed the title "King of Scotland"? How many enforced it?
Even better. They claimed to be King of France for centuries. Interestingly, that claim is based on something similar to Laenor's claim and rejected by the French for the same reason.
@@carlrood4457 well Gascony was from Aquitaine...
@@carlrood4457revoked the claim after conquering it and putting a puppet in instead. Something about the smell.
And in the end, instead of the English King becoming King of Scotland, the Scottish King became the King of England.
I thought it was named after the 7 lords paramount Stark, Lannister martell, Baratheon, Greyjoy, Tully Arryn
Funny how most of the great houses were pretty much annihilated during the course of the show. Baratheon reduced to one bastard, Lannister to one dwarf, Tully just has Edmure. The last living Targaryen is a depressed exile north of the wall.
Now do the Big Ten :)
I love the name ‘New Valyria’
It's a nice name but it would more apply to the Free Cities than to Westeros. The Targaryens might be Valyrian but the other people are not, this applies to both nobles and commoners, therefore such a term would be misapplied.
Calling them Andals, Rhoynar and First Men is telling the truth, calling them New Valyrians would be a lie.
Great vid! But was a little distracted by the AI generated portraits :(
Could u potentially do a video about the military strength of each kingdom and which kingdom do u think could conquer Westeros
this was what confused me at first :')
I didn't watch the video , but I wont let that stop me from commenting. (Ha!)
Seems the Westerosis had a hard on for the number 7. I didn't see that aspect mentioned by many others here.
The crown lands were taxes very accessible to the kings. So if someone rebeled and they lost that funding from that area. They would always have some money to the coffers. That's y aegon made those the kings lands
The Crownlands is not a Kingdom, it's a royal demense. Dorne is not a Kingdom it is a principality. So that leaves seven kingdoms
Dorne is the seventh kingdom in the Seven Kingdoms. It's a name referring to the seven independent kingdoms that existed in Westeros at the beginning of the Targaryen Conquest, those being the North, the Westerlands, the Iron Islands / Riverlands, the Vale, the Reach and Dorne. As rulers of Dorne House Martell claimed the title of prince because it was the Rhoynish equivalent of king, so while technically Dorne might be a principality, it is the seventh kingdom as far as the people of Westeros are concerned.
So, what Kingdom are the Gift and the Wall part of? (It’s not the North since they were p*ssed they took land from them to create the Gift)
I always thought it had something to do with the Seven gods being worshipped in seven different regions.
The 7 Kingdoms and The Seven Hells sound so badass honestly, well done George o7!
The seven kingdoms are a reference time of the Heptarchy when the English were of seven or so kingdoms.
Im surprised no one I could see had the correct answer. It's called the 7 kingdoms because when Aegon conquered westeros it was separated into 7 kingdoms at the time. After he conquered it certain areas were split etc to make the current 9 kingdoms
In the TV show, Robert Baratheon talks about bedding a girl from “each of the seven kingdoms and the Riverlands” to “make the eight”, which implies that Dorne is one of the kingdoms, while the Riverlands are not.
Is this a mistake on the shows part, or is there another explanation? The hunt is not depicted directly in the books, so I assume the dialogue is made up.
I feel like saying "The Seven Kingdoms" when actually meaning all of Westeros is the same sort of situation as with "The United Kingdom" when actually meaning all of the British Isles, or "Great Britain" when meaning the same thing. They all mean very specific regions of land but the British Isles encompass them all, unbeknownst to the common layman (who hardly even needs to care, honestly). Saying "The Seven Kingdoms" when wanting to including its post-conquest lands, I figure, is identical to saying "Britain" when wanting to include Ireland and other islands. Just a quirk of misnomers!
I D G !!!!!
👍
If 2+2=5 using Big Brother rat cages, then a Harrenhall rat bucket can make 4+4=7
I haven’t watch the video but ima flex on you nerds:
The iron islands
The storm lands
Dorne
The north
The vale
The reach
The westernlands
These are the seven kingdoms, however there are areas not technically apart of these 7 kingdoms. There is the gift which is an area north that was Northern Territory given to the nightswatch to give food to the night’s watch. There is the crown lands which is the area around the original Aegon fort that turned into kings landing. And there is the river lands which isn’t actually a kingdom because the ruler was an iron born king.
What happened to your blood Raven videos?
I feel like calling them the Seven Kingdoms wasn’t to ease them into anything… it was a reminder of how they were united.
This won't mean much to Robert, but back in the 80s, there were 10 teams in the Big Ten...
I think the actual answer is "GRRM didn't plan most of this shit out, and a lot of it is just back-formed or relics of an unplanned world that, through long years of effort and skill at writing by Martin's hands, happens to come across as cohesive history". It is *entirely* possible that there were just seven kingdoms when he laid that title onto the continent.
He's not Tolkien. Most of his world was made up as needed as the plot progressed, and not beforehand. His world-building was largely "as needed" and "in the moment" rather than pre-planned. He just happens to have wound up with a convoluted world over time. If you go back and read A Game of Thrones you'll find the first book isn't huge on unnecessary detail, where "unnecessary" means "not totally required to tell this specific story of mostly just political intrigue and set up a few major plot points and characters". If you compare it to more heavily planned books like The Eye of the World, The Dragon's Path, Chung Kuo, or Gardens of the Moon it becomes quite apparent that the world is a bit blurred at the start. It only really comes into focus as the books progress.
First to take the Black 🖤
The Seven's kingdoms
The seven republics?
To be fair, the "seven kingdoms and two administrative areas" is a bit less catchy.
City-states. like London, Venice and Washington DC. Obsecure places where the concentration of 'power' is high.
And where democracy is absent. right?
Video Idea: why didn’t Aegon worship the Old Gods?
Only the North worshipped the Old Gods, it was common in medevial custom that the state church be the religion of the majority.
@@truetory6231 assuming the prophecy from House of Dragon is canon, wouldn’t you think Aegon would want to unite the 7 kingdoms under a religion that remembers the Long Night? Seems like if everyone knew about the white walkers, the more likely they’d win the next war
@@jackcoogan310 Aegon didn't actually unite the kingdoms under the Faith of the Seven, he allowed the North to keep the Old Gods and the Iron Islands to keep the Drowned God. He adopted the Faith for purely political reasons as it was the primary religion in 5 of the 7 kingdoms. I doubt he actually believed in them, or else he wouldn't have continued in both incest and polygamy. And as for unity, trying to get all of Westeros to accept the Old Gods would be very divisive, thousands of devout men would have been martyred for their faith.
AI art goin crazy
Multiple cultures, multiple races, multiple governments; what I don’t get is how it doesn’t qualify as an empire?
I would say it does they simply just dont use the title of emperor. Similar to how the British Empire was led by a King. Some also might argue an empire is generally more centralized and bureaucratic state as opposed to a feudal one like Westeros but I wouldn’t say that’s a defining characteristic
No Roman tradition, so no one to declare himself imperator or Caesar.
Been reminded how much I hate that GRRM decided to turn the whole saga into a chosen one prophecy (as opposed to just there being prophecy)
Well you can’t exactly say “The 8 kingdoms, Andals, Rhoynar, and first men.” While adding every individual tribe. There is no fiddling with it. The 7 kingdoms the 7 that were conquered. The andals, the I guess first invaders. The Rhoynar which are the Dornish. The First men which is whoever is left of first men blood in the north. It maths out quite simply. The only ones left out would be the giants and children of the forest. Though that’s because everyone thinks they’re all but extinct and just fairy tails.
lmfao I've read the series twice now and I can't believe I've never noticed the fact that there aren't really 7 kingdoms
Minor nitpick but using community fan art and show images as always is much better than using AI imo
Am i the only one that has subcribe on the lower left side, and not right? (as robert says when asking for subs)
The seven kingdoms symbolize the seven chakras; the seventh is symbolized by Dorne (the root chakra). And we all know how the root is the hardest to conquer 😏.
I feel like the Gift could even be considered a 10th region, since they’re not technically part of the North
I think the real reason is that there were seven anglo saxon kingdoms before the viking age, George martin often borrows from early history to create his world
LOL, you know what it reminds me of! I am Irish. And I know absolutely nobody who refers to the UK or Britain or Great Britain. England is England, Wales is Wales. Scotland is Scotland, and Northern Ireland isn’t even northern Ireland, it’s just the north. we pay no attention to what London decided to call its territory. England will always be England. LOL
It is called Seven Kingdoms so the Ruler must be called Emperor or Empress not King or Queen
The District of Columbia is far more complex than what you mention. Thank you for this explanation.
So is the concept of royal demesne, which is a much closer analogy
@@QuantumHistorian swing and a miss but thanks for playing. :)
@@FishTheJim Apologies for trying to provide a little bit of historical grounding, I'll let you get on with pointing out that a simplified comparison between a work of fiction and modern constitutional details is, in fact, simplified.
- Reach
- West
- Stormlands
- North
- Vale
- Dorne
- Harren Hoare kingdom of Isles and Rivers
It really 9 regions
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Only Kingdom is The North to be true because North is more of half continent
I got bord when they fucked it all up
Because the people of Westeros can't count?😅