Marriage, Swords and Shared Custody: Why Brienne and Jaime are Practically a Married Couple
There is a butt load of thematic evidence that is hinting towards a kind of union between Brienne and Jaime. If you think about it, these two are true mirrors of one another and they start off on opposite ends of the spectrum and are now gradually moving toward one another.
Just to paint you a visual with the ‘little things,’ Jaime is from Casterly Rock (West) and Brienne is from Tarth (East). Jaime is now left handed and Brienne is (assumingly) right-handed. Jaime starts off as being irreverent, immoral, dishonored and unchaste while Brienne is pretty much his opposite. Jaime is beautiful, Brienne is ugly. Jaime is male but emasculated by his sister who keeps him locked up her in bedroom without land, title, or wife whereas Brienne is female but defeminized by her appearance and is now the proper heir to Tarth.
I could honestly go on and on about the nature of their duality and how and why they’re true mirrors and truly one soul, but there’s already plenty of meta out there about that already and I want to get into what truly unites these two characters in thematic matrimony: the sword.
Let’s pause to reflect on the symbolism of swords for a second. Many cultures recognize swords as being representative of the interplay between the active and passive: destruction and creation, reason and passion, masculine and feminine. This inherent duality is also responsible for the underlying forces of virtue that depend on harmonious balance, such as justice. Indeed, codes of honor, such as chivalry, are based on the idea that a swordsman must know when to draw and when to yield; when to kill (active force, destruction, male energy) and when to offer mercy (passive force, life, female energy).
As such, apart from the reasons that no one can resist a good ol’ juvenile dick joke and the plethora of double-entendres one could make about swords and sheaths, swords are also heavily associated with sex and marriage and unity with the divine.
In Hebrew, for example, the letter zayin literally means both “sword” and “penis,” although the more feminine concepts like “nourishment” and “sustenance” also come from this root word. As such, it is no accident that the word is frequently used to refer to sexual union (sometimes used vulgarly as a stand in for “fuck.”) Given the gnostic roots of the Hebrew language, this symbolism is significant to our understanding of archetypes and symbols currently swimming around in our collective subconscious and it should be further noted that the true meaning of Zayin is directly tied in to its numerology. Zayin is the seventh letter of the alphabet. The number seven is a highly spiritual number; it represents light (seven colours in a light spectrum), creation (seven days) and divine union (seven chakras and spiritual attainment).
And in a universe like GRRM’s, where just about everything is dualism (Ice and Fire, Beauty and Beast, Westeros and Essos, Living and Dead, etc.) and the number seven (seven gods, seven kingdoms, seven hells, etc) I’d say this is pretty fucking important symbolically. Especially considering all the hullabalo about some sword called Lightbringer…
But I digress. Before this essay gets too bogged down in the archetypal, there is an even less mystical explanation for why swords represent marriage and union of spirit. You need only to consider the ceremony involved in crafting a sword.
Back before craftsmen knew anything about measures and temperatures or anything about the science behind metallurgy, the process of crafting something as complicatedly intricate as a sword was highly informed by ritual. Japanese sword-makers, for example, would craft samurai swords by determining heat-treating temperatures by holding the blade to the color of the morning sun. The crafting process was highly precise; the slightest misstep and you’d ruin the metal or throw off the balance of the blade altogether. The process took intense concentration and demanded a delicate balance between strength and gentle precision—which is why some cultures saw sword making as a reverent, highly spiritual practise. Swords are forged by equal parts fire and water, strength and a delicate touch, and the melting together of various metals to create alloys. Because of the time and skill it took to create a blade, swordmaking was seen as a binding of one’s soul to the blade.
Indeed, the ‘soul trapped in a sword’ idea is a frequent trope in myth and fiction for this very reason. Swords are never given away lightly. Think of the reverence of a knighting ceremony or why we kneel whenever a ceremonial blade is presented to someone or why Samurai’s are dishonored should they be parted from their swords. Think of why oaths sworn on a blade are considered very serious. You are swearing on your own soul.
Swords are often present during wedding ceremonies among the nobility whereupon the wife sometimes kisses her husband’s blade and her husband swears his loyalty to his wife on his sword. There is also the custom of the sword and bride ceremony to consider, wherein the bridegroom’s sword takes his place in his absence. Or why a man’s sword is always brought back to his widow should he die. Or why a knight like a member of the Kings Guard or a knight of the Faith pledging service to his lord on his blade is seen as a kind of marriage ceremony.
Because swords represent UNIONS. You pledge to take no other duty beyond your lord’s wishes, much like a husband and wife pledge their duty to no other. You are bound, body and spirit, in your oath to one another—on the sword shared between you.
That all being said, it is interesting that Jaime and Brienne share a sword, don’t you think? They don’t have one each. Indeed, even in Jaime’s weirwood dream, there’s only one sword between them—the light on Jaime’s sword goes out, but the one on Brienne’s sword remains lit.
But before we get to Oathkeeper as a symbol of their union, let’s look at how Brienne and Jaime first came together with swords. Let’s discuss their sword fight, which is actually just ridiculously sexual in nature and illustrates the sex/sword connection quite uh, succinctly.
I mean, this is the actual dialogue that opens up the scene:
“Give me the sword, Kingslayer.”
Today’s weather is a sword fight with 100% chance of double-speak. Your mind is invited to hide out in the gutter because that’s the only way you can truly really appreciate this scene.
The swords kissed and sprang apart and kissed again. Jaime’s blood was singing. This was what he was meant for; he never felt so alive as when he was fighting, with death balanced on every stroke.
Interesting way to describe a sword fight. Kissing swords? Singing blood? The juxtaposition of feeling alive because death is near—it’s a union of opposites, male and female. Of course he’s feeling excited by every stroke.
Left, right, backslash, swinging so hard that sparks flew when the swords came together, upswing, sideslash, overhand, always attacking, moving into her, step and slide, strike and step, step and strike, hacking, slashing, faster, faster, faster …
… until, breathless, he stepped back and let the point of the sword fall to the ground, giving her a moment of respite. “Not half bad,“ he acknowledged. “For a wench.”
Okay, just look at the friggin’ language. Read it aloud and listen to how sibilant this whole paragraph sounds with all the fluid ‘s’s, ‘l’s,’ m’s and soft ‘f’s’. There’s no real violence in it, but rather romantic and it does indeed sound like its describing an activity that would leave you breathless.
“Moving into her… faster, faster, faster….”
The dance went on. He pinned her against an oak, cursed as she slipped away, followed her through a shallow brook half-choked with fallen leaves. Steel rang, steel sang, steel screamed and sparked and scraped, and the woman started grunting like a sow at every crash, yet somehow he could not reach her. It was as if she had an iron cage around her that stopped every blow.
Dancing, pinning, slipping, singing, grunting… and oh, look, a ‘cage’ that stopped every blow. Someone’s getting frustrated he can’t get it.
He laughed a ragged, breathless laugh. “Come on, come on, my sweetling, the music’s still playing. Might I have this dance, my lady?“
His longsword grew heavier with every blow, and Jaime knew he was not swinging it as quickly as he’d done earlier, nor raising it as high….
… by rights, she should be the one wearing down.
Yeah, you’re lady is not wearing down.
His point scraped past her parry and bit into her upper thigh. A red flower blossomed, and Jaime had an instant to savor the sight of her blood before his knee slammed into a rock. The pain was blinding. Brienne splashed into him and kicked away his sword. “YIELD!”
Right. His sword hits her upper thigh past her defenses and a “red flower blossoms.” Where have we heard that term used before? Oh yes, GRRM frequently uses it to refer to a girl flowering and maiden’s blood. And Jaime takes a moment to ‘savor the sight’ before he goes ‘blind’ with pain—or in an analogous situation, it would be pleasure. He is immediately disarmed when Brienne ‘splashes into him’ knocks his sword away and says ‘YIELD.’
Again, no stretch of one’s dirty imagination is required here if you really consider it. But in case all of this has gone over your head anyway, GRRM closes this scene with the following:
Brienne lurched to her feet. She was all mud and blood below the waist, her clothing askew, her face red. She looks as if they caught us fucking instead of fighting. Jaime crawled over the rocks to shallow water, wiping the blood from his eye with his chained hands
That last line in particular really, really requires a perverse imagination.
“My pardons if I disturbed you. You caught me chastising my wife.“
Yeah, that’s not the only thing you do with your wife, Jaime.
But anyway, the above scene shows two people with two swords—two opposites, male and female. The union between them doesn’t happen until after Jaime figuratively ‘claims’ Brienne’s ‘blooming red flower’ and claims her as his ‘wife.’ The next time they’re within sniffing distance of swords, there’s only one sword between them.
Let’s take a look at that scene now and again at all the bedding/wedding imagery involved with this scene:
Someone had dressed her in woman’s clothes again, but this dress fit much better than that hideous rag the goat made her wear. “Blue is a good color on you, my lady,” Jaime observed. “It goes well with your eyes.” She does have astonishing eyes.
Brienne glanced down at herself, flustered. “Septa Donyse padded out the bodice, to give it that shape. She said you sent her to me.” She lingered by the door, as if she meant to flee at any second. “You look…”
“Different?” He managed a half-smile. “More meat on the ribs and fewer lice in my hair, that’s all. The stump’s the same. Come the door and come here.”
She did as he bid her. “The white cloak…”
“… is new, but I’m sure I’ll soil it soon enough.” (ASOS, 72)
Read this and tell me that this doesn’t sound like a couple about to have their first bedding. You have Jaime appraising the fit of Brienne’s dress, complimenting her genuinely, and looking into her eyes. You have Brienne blushing and obviously feeling very apprehensive. Jaime asks her to “close the door and come here” and then Brienne mentions his white cloak—which corresponds to a marital sheet, representing a Knight’s chastity—which Jaime promises he will “soil…soon enough.”
“Brienne of Tarth,” Jaime sighed. “I have a gift for you. “ He reached under the Commander’s chair and brought it out, wrapped in folds of crimson velvet. (ASOS, 72)
A sword wrapped in folds of crimson velvet. I’m not the only one with a dirty mind here, come on.
And finally, there’s this:
“I have made kings and I have unmade them. Sansa Stark is my last chance for honor.” Jaime smiled thinly. “Besides, we kingslayers should band together…” (ASOS, 72)
Jaime acknowledges the double-sided blade that is his character: “I’ve made kings” (creation) and “I have unmade them” (destruction). Sansa Stark, however, is his last chance for honor—just as she is Brienne’s. Jaime says, “we kingslayers must band together.” Band, as in join. Unite. Couple. And indeed, not only do they now share a sword (that they named together) and a quest, but they now share the same misunderstood title, “Kingslayer.”
Should Brienne kill Lady Stoneheart, however, that will certainly consummate them as one.
Now I want to make one last point about unions and the symbolic significance of this scene. Brienne and Jaime are both plagued by what they could have been. Brienne was supposed to be a wife and a mother and an heir to Tarth, but instead she chose to pursue the path of a warrior. Jaime was supposed to be lord of Casterly Rock and take a wife, but instead he chose to remain part of the Kings Guard. Indeed, the sword that would be Oathkeeper was presented to Jaime by his father when Tywin asked him to once again become Lord of the Rock. Jaime rejected the title, but he took the sword that he would have had as a Lord and Husband and gave it to Brienne to pledge herself to. Oathkeeper itself couldn’t be any more House Lannister. Brienne also doesn’t consider the sword hers—she considers it Jaime’s.
That sword, coupled with Brienne’s fever dreams wherein she cries out for Jaime is really a small wonder why the Brotherhood dubs her the “Kingslayer’s Whore.”
Except thematically, it’s more like they’re married.
origamiaround
dailybridgerton
turnnoffyourmind
snowghoul
yousharknotpass
