Thinking About This Illustration By Marc Fishman From The Cover Of Thelimited-edition ReleaseofA Dance

Thinking about this illustration by Marc Fishman from the cover of the limited-edition release of A Dance with Dragons, featuring Jon with Daenerys watching over him in the sky and I will never get tired of this particular imagery associated with them:

“A trader from Qarth once told me that dragons came from the moon,” blond Doreah said as she warmed a towel over the fire.

[…]

Silvery-wet hair tumbled across her eyes as Dany turned her head, curious. “The moon?”

“He told me the moon was an egg, Khaleesi,” the Lysene girl said. “Once there were two moons in the sky, but one wandered too close to the sun and cracked from the heat. A thousand thousand dragons poured forth, and drank the fire of the sun. That is why dragons breathe flame. One day the other moon will kiss the sun too, and then it will crack and the dragons will return.” — Daenerys III, AGOT.

*

She dreamed. All her cares fell away from her, and all her pains as well, and she seemed to float upward into the sky. She was flying once again, spinning, laughing, dancing, as the stars wheeled around her and whispered secrets in her ear. — Daenerys X, ADWD.

*

I loved a maid as fair as summer with sunlight in her hair.

I loved a maid as red as autumn with sunset in her hair.

I loved a maid as white as winter with moonglow in her hair.

Guys! Guys, she is the MOON!

The white wolf raced through a black wood, beneath a pale cliff as tall as the sky. The moon ran with him, slipping through a tangle of bare branches overhead, across the starry sky.

“Snow,” the moon murmured.

[…]

“Snow,” the moon called down again, cackling. — Jon I, ADWD.

*

You should look behind you, Lord Snow. The moon has kissed you and etched your shadow upon the ice twenty feet tall. — Jon VI, ADWD.

And he is the WOLF! He is the white wolf and she is the moon in the sky and the moon is WATCHING over him, CALLING for him, KISSING him!

Say whatever you want about GRRM but don’t ever say he is not a romantic at heart and a sucker for beautiful symbolism.

I love the fact that when Jon and Dany meet, they'd be King and Queen because they are be their brothers' heir, Robb and Viserys respectively.

If / when Jon bonds with any of Dany's dragons, I need it to be Viserion so, so badly. Like yeah Jon is Rhaegar's son & Rhaegal is named after him so blah blah who cares. think about the aesthetic of it all. The silver queen rides the black dragon, so the black brother should ride the white dragon. A boy named Snow who already has a white wolf, with a white dragon? How perfect is that?

And I can make it work narratively, too; I will get into this in more depth someday, but for the longest I've felt that there were some intentional anti parallels going on with the Viserys-Daenerys & Jon-Arya relationships in AGOT. That being the contrast between an oppressive & hateful older brother who has mentally, physically, & sexually abused his younger sister, versus a loving brother who cherishes & encourages his sister. "The cream-and-gold I call Viserion. Viserys was cruel and weak and frightened, yet he was my brother still. His dragon will do what he could not." (ACOK, Daenerys I) Like how Jon could be a good older brother when Viserys could not? Idk, maybe I'm grasping at straws here, but either way I'd prefer for the dragon Jon bonds with to be Viserion.

a lot of jonerys antis say that there aren't enough time for jon and dany to have a romance in the last two books what do you think about this ?

"not enough time for romance", what does that even mean?

as far as Canon is concerned, both Jon and Dany will meet in the middle to fulfill their clear destiny in the War of Dawn, and if GRRM doesn't want to make a joke of himself as D&D did, his final antagonist, the literal apocalypse will last at least good months, time in which the two will be brought together and some kind of relationship and dynamic will ensue naturally, not matter its nature

romance doesn't stop happening on the side because other things are going on; does there need to be a romantic plot gated enclosure in the narrative? can't Jon and Dany walk and chew at the same time?

how many "books" did Daenerys need to have a romance with Daario and call it love, with Drogo and call it love? for Jon to have a romance with Ygritte and call it love?

is there a timetable for romance? graphs and checklists? Jon and Dany could meet today and be lovestruck in a day or a week? or they could come together as cold allies and grow over close over sharing the crucial leading experience in a fight of life and death? or they could just be buddies or accept each other as family or just as partners?

but the idea that "time" is decisive in matters such as this? Lol, some people on this site try so hard to appear "high and above" that they no longer appear to seem to understand how a person works

I made a post about Jon Snow being a Corn King figure here. So, this post references that one heavily. 

The Corn King is a term for a male fertility god/sacred king who dies or is sacrificed for the good of his people to bring fertility or spring back into the land. The Corn King is born at Yule, matures through the year, and dies at harvest, only to be reborn the next year. At Beltane, the Corn King weds an Earth Goddess (an aspect of the Earth Mother). The consummation of their wedding restores fertility to the land.

The king was the incarnation of a dying and reviving god, a solar deity who underwent a mystic marriage to a goddess of the Earth. He died at the harvest and was reincarnated in the spring. Frazer claims that this legend of rebirth is central to almost all of the world’s mythologies. FROM WIKI

I just wanted to make a ship-specific post as we know that Jon and Dany have both been set up as our savior figures to stop the Long Night, restore balance, and bring Spring back again. And, their convergence has been stated has being the point of the series. Does Dany fit the figure of an Earth Goddess, an Earth Mother? The Mother part is easy as Dany is connected to motherhood from the first book and first season onwards. Mhysa means “mother.” She’s the Mother of Dragons.  

Frazer, in The Golden Bough, uses Diana, the Roman moon and nature goddess (who has also been called Light Bringer interestingly) and her symbolic marriage to the priest-king Nemi “the two figuring as King and Queen of the Wood in a solemn marriage which was intended to make the earth gay with the blossoms of spring and the fruits of autumn.” Egyptian kings married their sisters and they impersonated Osiris and Isis in the rites of spring. 

In Barbara L Talcroft’s The Death of the Corn King which is built on Frazer’s The Golden Bough, she says:

Irish texts speak of the banais rigi or “the wedding of the kingship” which probably meant that the queen, who also impersonated the earth goddess,  chose a mate from among her war band and later to become the king-sacrifice. Mac Cana relates the story from Irish literature of King Eochaidh whose kingship was not recognized because his goddess-wife, Edain, had been taken away from him. Mac Cana concludes, “In the context of Irish tradition, the meaning of this is clear. Eochaidh had become king, but his kingship could be validated only by his union with the goddess of sovereignty, in this case, Edain. This union of king and goddess was at one time ritually enacted at the Feast of Tara.”

So, this part is interesting because it’s the Goddess of Sovereignty that gives the king legitimacy. Without her, his kingship is not validated. 

The ceremony so essential to the legitimacy of the king took place at his inauguration and had two parts- some form of drink offered by the goddess-bride to the king and the sexual union

Have I just talked myself into accepting Bran’s legitimacy VO while Jon/Dany are having sex? Heh.

The intricate relationship between king and Goddess, at least in the Celtic tradition, was undoubtedly caused by the conflicting emphases of the patriarchal sun religion represented by the king, and of the matriarchal earth and moon religion represented by the Goddess.

Moon symbology has figured in Daenerys’ story. ‘Moon of my life’ which Drogo called her is only one such example. The dragon creation myth is another. There are a lot of moon references in Dany’s chapters. But, there are even more moon references in Jon’s chapters. The Azor Ahai myth and R’hollorism is filled with sun, moon, and star references too. R’hllor specifically is connected to sun and stars.

“He told me the moon was an egg, Khaleesi, the Lysene girl said. Once there were two moons in the sky, but one wandered too close to the sun and cracked from the heat. A thousand thousand dragons poured forth, and drank the fire of the sun. That is why dragons breathe flame. One day the other moon will kiss the sun too, and then it will crack and the dragons will return.”

Melisandre says to Jon in ADWD  "You should look behind you, Lord Snow. The moon has kissed you and etched your shadow upon the ice twenty feet tall.“

R’hllor,” sang Melisandre, her arms upraised against the falling snow, “you are the light in our eyes, the fire in our hearts, the heat in our loins. Yours is the sun that warms our days, yours the stars that guard us in the dark of night.”

I was researching the Corn King mythology and I found the references to the Earth/Moon (often used interchangeably) Goddess and the role she plays in the Corn King story. It’s not just his death and rebirth that brings fertility to the land, but it’s the consummation of their marriage. I’m not taking this literally for Jon and Dany, but rather, that their partnership will be what helps saves the world and brings Spring again. 

Daenerys and Jon, their parallels, and their journeys as leaders and rulers

(I’m reposting this in an attempt to make it appear in the tags)

There are many metas detailing the parallels between Jon and Dany. But I don’t think I’ve seen many that focus on their actions as leaders and rulers. And often, I read things like “Jon and Dany complement each other because Dany is a conqueror and Jon is an administrator/ruler”, or things like “Jon is a rebuilder and Dany is a destroyer”, and I feel like these are not good assessments of Jon and Dany. So I wanted to write my own Jon/Dany parallel meta, showing both their general parallels, and how similar I think these two are as rulers, and where I think they differ.

In this meta, I won’t talk about the foreshadowing for Jon and Dany’s romantic relationship, only about their parallels. Even then, this is still a very long meta, but I think it’s worth it, because Jon and Dany have tons of parallels (to me, it’s almost as if they were the same character having the same story in different locations), and I think their parallels are fascinating.

These are the topics of this meta:

General Parallels

Jon and Dany becoming leaders

Jon and Dany as rulers

Jon and Dany are both conquerors

Compromises and Identity Crisis

Conclusion

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