The war in the south concluded at the Battle of Blackwater, where the Lannisters and Tyrells
managed to uphold the rule of king Joffrey by securing a decisive victory against Stannis.
This made the Lannister-Tyrell alliance in the south dominant, while in the north, Lord
Tywin’s intrigues promised to end to the Stark threat.
The new northern wardens, the Boltons, seemed secure in their rule of the North, but two
remaining children of Eddard - Jon Snow and Sansa Stark - would soon launch a war to reclaim
their homeland, and culminated in the Battle of Winterfell.
Welcome to the fifth video in our series on the history of Westeros.
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Stark hegemony over the North was shattered in the aftermath of the Red Wedding in 300
AC, where King Robb Stark and most of his loyal bannermen were murdered by Roose Bolton
and Walder Frey, at the behest of House Lannister.
As a reward for betraying the Starks and Tullys, House Bolton was given the status of Warden
of the North and the Lord of House Frey was made the Lord Paramount of the Trident.
With Robb, his wife, heir and mother dead at the Red Wedding, the Starks were scattered
across the map, as Arya was training to be an assassin, Bran was to the north of the
wall, and Eddard Stark’s eldest daughter Sansa was captive in King’s Landing when
her brother was killed.
Her bastard half-brother Jon Snow was a member of the Night’s Watch, who had recently uncovered
the return of the White Walkers.
Meanwhile Rickon Stark, who was Eddard’s heir apparent with the disappearance of Bran,
was in the custody of the Boltons.
In 298 AC the Stark children had split up after Eddard’s appointment as the Hand of
the King.
Sansa had gone south with her father and had been imprisoned there ever since.
With the commencement of the War of the Five Kings, Sansa essentially served as a highborn
hostage to blackmail and threaten her brother Robb, who was waging war against King Joffrey’s
allies.
After the battle of the Blackwater ended Stannis’ ambitions in the south, and most of the Starks
were killed during the Red Wedding, the Lannisters sought to solidify Joffrey’s power by marrying
him to Margaery Tyrell, hoping to securing their powerful army and plentiful resources.
During the wedding a conspiracy bore fruit.
A poisoned necklace worn unknowingly by Sansa contained a crystallised poison, known as
The Strangler, which Olenna Tyrell retrieved and placed in Joffrey’s wine during the
entertainment.
The king drank the poisoned wine and perished during his wedding feast.
As the guests and guards were distracted by Cersei’s accusation of her brother Tyrion,
Sansa made her escape with the help of Dontos Hollard; who had given her the necklace in
the first place.
At the docks she was rescued by Petyr Baelish, while Dontos was killed.
Over the next one and a half years, Sansa travelled north with Baelish.
They first stopped at the Eyrie while Baelish organised Sansa’s next stop - her former
home of Winterfell.
The Boltons, who were seeking to solidify their hold on the north, betrayed the Lannisters
and secretly arranged for the newly legitimised Ramsay Bolton to marry Sansa.
After suffering at his hands for a few months, Sansa escaped during the First Battle of Winterfell
with the help of Theon Greyjoy, as the Bolton forces were all taking part in an attack against
Stannis.
After Stannis’ forces were ground down by attrition and enemy harassment, 1,300 remaining
Baratheon infantry desperately marched to Winterfell, and were met by 5,000 Bolton soldiers,
including 2,000 cavalry.
The cavalry easily outflanked the opposing infantry, crushing their enemy.
Stannis was killed in the aftermath of the battle.
As the Stark fugitive and her savior travelled north to Castle Black, her brother Jon Snow
had just returned from beyond the wall, where he had saved a large number of the Wildling
population from destruction by the White Walkers at the Fall of Hardhome.
However, the Night’s Watch and the wildlings had been fighting each other for centuries,
and this gesture of kindness by Jon Snow led to his death at the hands of his own comrades.
However, the sorceress Melisandre - who had abandoned Stannis before his defeat at Winterfell
- used her resurrection magic to bring Jon back to life, proclaiming that he was Azor
Ahai - the legendary ancient hero reborn, instead of the late Baratheon claimant.
This temporary death released Jon from his oath to the Night’s Watch and, upon reuniting
with his sister Sansa, he slowly came to approve of the idea of retaking their home from the
Bolton usurpers.
Things were not quaint in Winterfell, as Ramsay Bolton murdered his father in response to
the birth of a trueborn son who might have supplanted him as the future Warden of the
North.
This trueborn son and his mother were then killed by the brutal Ramsay, who fed them
to his hounds.
Knowing Sansa had taken shelter with her brother at Castle Black, Ramsay sent them a letter,
revealing that he was in possession of Rickon Stark, the youngest of Eddard’s children.
He threatened to kill Rickon, murder the wildlings and have unspeakable things done to Sansa
if she were not returned to him.
At this vile insult and threat, Jon decided to take back his home and began to slowly
raise an army.
Unfortunately for them, two of the largest and most powerful vassal houses of the North,
Houses Karstark and Umber, had already become solid allies of the Bolton usurpers.
This meant that the revanchist Stark siblings had to start small, a task made even more
difficult by the presence of 2,000 Wildlings in their army, who had fought the northmen
for many centuries and who joined the newly formed Stark army first.
At the same time, Sansa met with Baelish in Mole’s Town.
He offered her the assistance of the Knights of the Vale, but she declined due to him previously
selling her to Ramsay.
Nevertheless, he also informed Sansa that her uncle, Brynden Tully, the Blackfish, had
rallied the remaining Tully army and had retaken Riverrun.
She dispatched Brienne of Tarth to secure his forces, but this failed.
The Starks now turned to the smaller houses, and by the time they marched towards Winterfell,
they had around 2400 soldiers, mainly axe and sword wielding infantry with some archers
and cavalry supporting them.
The latter were commanded by Davos Seaworth, who joined the Starks after Stannis was killed.
The Starks also had one giant fighting for them.
Meanwhile, the Boltons had 6,000 soldiers, including 2,000 Bolton cavalry, 3,000 infantry
and 1,000 men from houses Karstark and Umber.
Parlay attempts between the two sides failed when Ramsay declined Jon’s offer to prevent
the battle by single combat, and when Jon refused to accept Ramsay’s terms of surrender.
The night before the conflict began, Sansa sent a raven to Petyr Baelish, who was encamped
at Moat Cailin, having changed her mind about asking for his assistance.
The opposing armies formed up across the freezing plains outside of Winterfell on a misty morning,
with 6 flayed and burning corpses tied to crosses in between the two forces; an attempt
by Ramsay to intimidate his foe.
Archers were in the front line of both armies, with cavalry in the second line and infantry
in the third.
In addition, House Bolton had a contingent of soldiers trained to act as a Phalanx, with
one line holding a large shield in front and a second armed with a long pike.
Before the battle began, the youngest Stark sibling, Rickon, was used as bait by Ramsay
Bolton, who played a game by allowing the boy to run towards his brother’s army while
Ramsay shot arrow after arrow at him, possibly missing deliberately the first three times.
In response, Jon charged alone on horseback in the hopes of rescuing the boy, but Rickon
was struck through the torso just before Jon reached him.
The Stark commander was now right where Ramsay wanted him: trapped alone in the middle of
the battlefield.
Ramsay commanded the Bolton archers to rain arrows down on and behind Jon, preventing
him from moving back to his own line, if not killing him outright, and his horse was killed
under him.
At this point Davos ordered his own cavalry, as well as the wildling infantry, to charge
and assist their commander.
Now that Jon was vulnerable, Ramsay ordered his own 2,000 strong cavalry contingent to
charge as well, in the hopes of finishing his enemy off.
The two charging forces met in the center of the battlefield and a vicious melee began,
with both sides suffering heavy casualties in the first few minutes.
In order to support their infantry, archers on both sides were ordered to loose arrows
into the cavalry engagement.
While Ramsay had no qualms about killing some of his own men as well as many enemies, Davos
refused and stopped his archers from firing.
This continuous withering storm of Bolton arrows caused titanic losses on both sides,
creating a mound of corpses on the battlefield which was a dozen feet in height.
However, since the Bolton numbers were superior, they could afford to suffer the losses.
Seeing the reserves and archers were effectively useless in this situation, Davos ordered the
rest of his infantry to charge, and his archers to take up their swords and attack also, in
addition to the single giant they had on their side.
However, this was the moment Ramsay was waiting for.
Now that the entirety of the Stark army was committed and pinned down, the Boltons dispatched
their infantry, commanded by Smalljon Umber, to surround the mass of Jon’s mainly undisciplined
wildling army with large shields and spears on three sides, while sword and axe wielding
footmen halted any escape attempts over the corpse mound to the rear.
The Bolton phalanx advanced forward and began to slowly melt away the Stark forces.
Just as it seemed all was lost, warhorns began to sound in the distance.
Over a hill surrounding the battlefield, the white falcon banner of House Arryn flew, and
2,000 heavy mounted knights crashed into the unprepared Bolton phalanx, devastating it
and effectively destroying Ramsay’s remaining forces.
Seeing that this unexpected turn of events had annihilated his army, Ramsay retreated
to Winterfell, pursued by Jon, Tormund Giantsbane and the giant.
In what was his and his species’ final act, the giant broke down the gates of Winterfell,
taking hundreds of crossbow bolts and arrows before finally perishing.
Winterfell was taken and Ramsay was later killed by his own hounds.
Casualties in this battle are unknown, but the vast majority of the Wildlings and Northmen
who fought for the Starks were dead, as were the majority of the Bolton army, who were
crushed by the Arryn reinforcements, who in turn suffered only light losses.
The Stark banners flew over Winterfell once again, and Baelish, who had essentially won
the battle for Jon, now held a position of influence at the new Winterfell court.
Though trouble still loomed for the resurgent Starks, they could now look to the north and
to the true threat.
Jon knew that the army of the dead was marching south.
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