now i babble about the two things martin does that annoy me most

[paranoid_monkey]

ok now that i've praised him, i must point out two things martin does that drive me up the frickin' wall. but before i start, i must note - though i've read a lot about heraldry, i am not remotely a medievalist and at least two of you are, so please correct me if i say something totally off

Comments

[den_down_unda]

It's the Cool Theory of Literature in action, Soph.

Martin thinks that stuff is Cool, so he does as much of it as he can. And if it makes no sense? So what. It's cool.

(Which isn't to say you aren't right, but the way. It's just that the Cool Theory of Literature is a wonderful explanation of things like this.)

[paranoid_monkey]

*whines* i'm sure you're right, but it's so annooooooooying! he'll have me all invested in a scene, suspension of disbelief etc etc, and then he describes tywin lannister's scarlet-lacquered armor with gold rondels gold fittings gold codpiece gold gold gold gold and then some huge snarling gold lion's head on top that somehow tywin is so cool as to be able to support without breaking his own neck. *whine*! it would be easier to deal with if other things didn't seem so realistic.

actually - you know what else bugs me? the names of the castles. everyone has castles that mean things in modern speech - you know, winterfell, sunspear, Xhall, the aerie, etc. of course this is fine some of the time, but you know, i've seen plenty of castles, and they tend to either be named for the local village (or vice-versa) - meaning, named some random meaningless sound - or, well, just some random meaningless sound. sigh.

[den_down_unda]

Yeah. It would help if they had names with words that mean "town." On the other hand, places like the Aerie don't exist in the real world, so I suppose he can be allowed a little leeway here.

(Also, I want to comment on your post about Martin's good points, but that requires a lot more complex thinking and I'm at work. Maybe when I get home.

How are you, btw? Come visit us!

[ladybird97]

The other thing about making armor out of gold is that gold is soft!! Only a complete idiot would make a helm out of gold!

And yeah, so with you on the silly jewels and things.

Also with you on the other post, but I'll comment on that over there :)

[celesteh]

Joan of Arc carried a banner in battle instead of a sword. She would run around with it, waving it, exciting the troops. She was the first one up on ladders when they were attacking um. . . some defensive fortification around Orléans.

She also got her ladder pushed down and smashed her helmet when she landed, but that's beside the point.

Anyway, she was an extremely gifted military commander, so carrying a banner isn't always stupid. It was just on a stick, though, not with golden doo-dads or whatever. She didn't start putting on airs until later. When she was captured, she was a wearing a cloth of gold which some anglo used to pull her from her horse.

[paranoid_monkey]

i think you're thinking of the barbican at orléans.

i'm not sure where banners were mentioned in the discussion? i'm not saying the banners/ heraldry are stupid at all - they had a vital function - i'm saying that martin bugs the hell out of me by creating heraldic designs that simply wouldn't work on a battlefield. there's no way a normally-sighted human can distinguish two forms of red from each other a long way off while people are trying to kill him/her, or see dark green from, say, dark blue. which is why the rules of heraldry came into being. it's especially annoying given that george martin clearly knows a lot about the middle ages, and should know better.

[celesteh]

Not the barbican, as I don't know what that is. It was either the bridge tower or the abbey, I think. This is the kind of ignorance that seeps in if you miss one of the yearly festivals, alas.

Her banner didn't have normal heraldry. But there probably weren't a lot of other people insane enough to charge through the front lines of a battle without actually brandishing a weapon, which is what brought it to mind.

Also, it's the extent of my medieval knowledge. Well, that and seeing the movie "The Lion in Winter" which I think says more about American movie audiences in the past. Sophisticated, but really confused about queers.

[paranoid_monkey]

the barbican is in fact the tower defending the bridge in front of a castle or fortified town... so it's the same thing as the bridge tower you're thinking of. in the depictions i've seen of that battle i think it's usually the barbican she's storming (that's certainly the case in /the messenger/, iirc), but you'd know better than i.

i actually suspect that there were quite a few bannermen who braved the front line of any given battle - they would have to, you'd think, to rally people on and such. of course, one hopes that they either had some other weapon, or that the banner was tied to a spear or something.

on a side note, worst job ever: those small guys (always peasants, of course) whose role during medieval battles was to run under knights' horses and gut them from underneath. ok, maybe not /worst/ job ever, but that's really damn high on the list.