2 Catelyn I - Discuss only this chapter and anything prior

[Hannah]

Chat away!

[Brianna]

thoughts while reading:
I wonder who the Children of the Forest are. Especially versus the Others and the nameless gods Ned honors.
Why did they carve faces into the trees and are they all different?
Are their words the same when winter is already happening? Silly question I know. lol

[Ria]

There's not much information about them in the books, at least as far as I can remember, but I have the "A World of Ice and Fire" encyclopedia (is that what it is? not really sure), so I can check them out, if you want, surely there's some neat spoiler-free information there.

[Brianna]

That would be awesome! I've really been wanting to get my hands on that book but haven't yet. :(

[Ria]

First, I want to say sorry for not writing earlier, I just read your comment today. So, now that I've got that out of the way... The children of the forest are mentioned several times in the 'encyclopedia'. The whole thing starts with a detailed description of the creatures which lived in Westeros before the First men, inculding the children of the forest. So, I'll just share the first two chapters and then explain what happened later with a few words. The book I have is in Bulgarian, so what I'll be sharing is a rough translation, coming in two or three separate comments because it's really long. I apologise for any mistakes I might have made and I hope I'm not breaking any copyright laws. (This text is like 2% of the whole content.)
PS. The information here is extremely interesting, especially if you're a history buff, and the pictures are amazing, so I definitely recommend buying it whenever you have the chance. I was feeling kind of guilty at first when I bought it, because it cost an arm and a leg, but oh, boy, was it worth it.

[Ria]

Part 1.
…So what exactly could we say about the Dawn of time? The eastern lands were crowded with people – uncivilized, like the world, but many. However, on Westeros, from the Land of Eternal winter to the shores of the Summer Sea, there were only two peoples – the children of the forest and the race, which we know as the giants. Not much can be said about them and their life in the Dawn of time, because no-one collected their tales, their legends and history. Men from the Night’s Watch claim that the wildlings speak of how the giants lived with the children of the forest; they went wherever they desired and took whatever they liked. According to all descriptions, the giants were huge and powerful, but simple. Rangers on the Wall, the last humans to see a living giant, write in their notes that the creatures were covered with thick hair, instead of simply being large men, as it is said in fairytales.

We have significant proof of burials amongst giants, mentioned by master Kennet (or however his name is supposed to be written)... From the bones he found there and sent back to the Citadel some maesters measured the size of the largest giants to be around four meters and a half, thought others claim the more accurate measurement is about four meters. Maesters from the Watch have written down stories of rangers who unanimously claim that the giants didn’t have homes or clothes and didn’t know more intricate instruments of production than broken branches.

The giants had no kings and masters; they lived in caves and hollows in the roots of giant trees. They didn’t farm the land and never learnt to forge metal. They remained creatures from the Dawn of time, while centuries passed and men multiplied.

Now there are no giants even in the lands beyond the Wall, and they were last seen over a hundred years ago. Even these sightings are alleged, stories, which rangers tell by the fire.

The children of the forest were in many ways the opposite of giants. As small as children, but dark-skinned and beautiful, they lived primitively compared to us, but were more sophisticated than the giants. They didn’t forge metal, but they processed obsidian (that, which people call dragon stone, and in valyrian means “frozen fire”) – from it they made tools and weaponry for hunting. They couldn’t weave, but they skillfully wreathed leaves and tree bark to make clothes. They learned how to make bows from weirwood, and they also made loops from grass to throw (sort of like lassos, but that’s not the word they used, so I don’t know how to translate this). Both the men and the women were hunters.

Their songs and their music are rumoured to have been as beautiful as them, but we have forgotten what they sang for, all that’s left are pieces from ancient times. A part of a ballad telling about the time when Brandon the Builder sought the help of the children, while he built the Wall, is kept in “Kings of winter, legends and genealogy of the Starks of Winterfell” by master Kilder.

He was taken to a secret place to meet them. At first he didn’t understand their language, which he described as the murmur of a stream, touching pebbles, as the wind in the leaves, as rain drops falling in water. How he learned their language is a story in itself, but there’s no need to repeat it here. It seems, though, that their speech was inspired by the sounds of nature around them.