Orphans of the Greenblood

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An orphan of the Greenblood. © Fantasy Flight Games

Orphans of the Greenblood are the Dornish descendants of the Rhoynar who fled to Dorne after the Rhoynar Invasion but refused to assimilate into Dornish culture.

Orphaned from their Homeland

The orphans still mourn the loss of their distant homeland and so continue to practice the traditions of their river-faring ancestors.

They consider themselves to be “orphans” as they are of the Rhoynar and have been orphaned from her, their “Mother,” the river Rhoyne which in their faith also holds a divine status, therefore they also identify the river as "Mother Rhoyne."

Way of Life

The orphans live on rafts along the river Greenblood. It is said that when they first came to Dorne they built their smaller boats from the burned carcasses of the ships they used to cross the narrow sea.

The orphans of the Greenblood pole their boats up and down the river and its tributaries, fishing, picking fruits, and doing whatever work is required. They go to Planky Town to trade with the carracks, cogs, and galleys from across the narrow sea. Some have been known to sell cloth and spices up and down the Greenblod. [1]

They dance and sing on the river, and are also said to have great knowledge of the healing arts, able to cure warts and produce the best midwives. [2]

Some Greenblood born orphans have returned home to Mother Rhoyne, such as Yandry and Ysilla who ply the river on the Shy Maid. [2]

Orphans of the Greenblood on a boat plying the river. © FFG

Orphan Boats

The orphan boats are pole boats. They have hardly any draft to speak of and are painted and carved. They have low roofs and wide beams. The Young Dragon disparaged them as “hovels built on rafts,” but that is hardly a fair assessment, [1] all but the poorest orphan boats are wonderfully carved and painted.

The pole boat that ambushes Princess Arianne and her companions when they reach the Greenblood is painted in shades of green, with a curved wooden tiller shaped like a mermaid, and fish faces peering through her rails. Poles and ropes and jars of olive oil clutter her decks and iron lanterns swing fore and aft.

Quotes

Nymeria’s blood is in me, along with that of Mors Martell, the Dornish lord she married. On the day they wed, Nymeria fired her ships, so her people would understand that there could be no going back. Most were glad to see those flames, for their voyagings had been long and terrible before they came to Dorne, and many and more had been lost to storm, disease, and slavery. There were a few who mourned, however. They did not love this dry red land or its seven-faced god, so they clung to their old ways, hammered boats together from the hulks of the burned ships, and became the orphans of the Greenblood. The Mother in their songs is not our Mother, but the Mother Rhoyne, whose waters nourished them from the dawn of days. [1]

- Arianne Martell, to Myrcella Baratheon

References and Notes

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 A Feast for Crows, Chapter 21, The Queenmaker.
  2. 2.0 2.1 A Dance with Dragons, Chapter 14, Tyrion IV.