Flea Bottom
Flea Bottom, also called the Bottom,[1] is the poorest slum in King's Landing, the foulest and most lawless district of the city.[2]
Contents
Layout
- See also: Images of Flea Bottom
Flea Bottom is a down-trodden area of town, rife with poverty and crime. It is a maze of twisty, unpaved alleys and cross-streets below the Street of Flour on the way down the east side of the Hill of Rhaenys. The buildings lean over the narrow alleys, almost touching. The air is filled with the stench of pigsties, stables, and tanner's sheds, mixed in with the smell of winesinks and whorehouses.[1] Gambler's dens and rat pits are also found there.[3]
In cheap pot-shops along the alleys one can get a 'bowl o' brown', a kind of thick stew with vaguely discernable meat of dubious origin.[4]
History
Origins
King's Landing began as an unplanned boom-town after Aegon's Conquest. What had started as King Aegon I Targaryen's initial foothold and stockade on the mainland mushroomed in size so quickly and haphazardly that several slum districts developed, the largest and worst of which was Flea Bottom. By ten years after the Conquest, King's Landing had reached the size of a true city, almost as large as Gulltown or White Harbor. By twenty-five years after the Conquest, it had outgrown both of them in size, surpassed only by Lannisport and Oldtown.[5] It is unclear when the slum known as Flea Bottom first congealed out of the mud during this rushed expansion, but the earliest chronological mention of Flea Bottom is in 49 AC.[6]
Tom the Strummer, the Bard of Flea Bottom, participated in the War for the White Cloaks.[6] Queen Alysanne Targaryen later had the City Watch of King's Landing search Flea Bottom for Tom so that he could become the court singer.[7]
During the terrible winter of 59 AC, when the plague known as the Shivers struck Westeros, King's Landing was badly affected. So many of the City Watch died in the plague that the city outside of the Red Keep was reduced to lawlessness and looting. Rego Draz, the master of coin, was killed in Flea Bottom during this time by an angry street gang, who cut the gemstones from his dead fingers.[2]
The Dance of the Dragons
By 105 AC, Prince Daemon Targaryen was known to the smallfolk as Lord Flea Bottom for his propensity for spending time in winesinks, gambling pits, and brothels.[8]
According to The Testimony of Mushroom, Ser Criston Cole found Prince Aegon Targaryen at a Flea Bottom rat pit when he went to inform the prince that he would crowned during the Dance of the Dragons.[9] Blood and Cheese were recruited in the stews of Flea Bottom.[10] Rioting broke out in the slums during the fall of King's Landing to Aegon III's rival, Daemon's wife Rhaenyra Targaryen.[11] According to Mushroom, Ser Ulf White drunkenly rode naked through Flea Bottom after being knighted.[12]
A great riot in the capital began in Flea Bottom in 130 AC, and bands of lawless men roamed the district. Ser Lorent Marbrand led a hundred knights and men-at-arms to bring order to Flea Bottom, but he was slain in the effort and only sixteen of his men returned safely to the Red Keep.[13] While trying to prevent the Storming of the Dragonpit, Prince Joffrey Velaryon fell to his death while flying on Syrax above Flea Bottom. The Seven Who Rode fought to retrieve the prince's body from the mob.[13]
When the greens marched against the Shepherd, Ser Perkin the Flea led his gutter knights from Flea Bottom up the slope of the Hill of Rhaenys.[14] Two thousand men and boys from Flea Bottom armed with spears and pot helms were part of Lord Borros Baratheon's host in the Battle of the Kingsroad.[14]
During the Hour of the Wolf, the younger son of Lord Hornwood and two of his companions disappeared in Flea Bottom, with Mushroom suggesting they ended up in a bowl of brown.[15]
Whores in Flea Bottom did well when visitors came to King's Landing for the wedding of Aegon III Targaryen and Jaehaera Targaryen.[16] Lady Baela Targaryen is said to have wagered coin and sometimes clothing in Flea Bottom's rat pits.[16]
Recent History
Ser Duncan the Tall had a rough childhood growing up in Flea Bottom before meeting Ser Arlan of Pennytree.[17][18][19]
The smuggler Davos was a beggar in Flea Bottom during his childhood, and he was sometimes fed by septons.[20]
As part of his wildfire plot, King Aerys II Targaryen had his alchemists place caches of wildfire throughout King's Landing, including in the hovels of Flea Bottom.[21]
The violent Ser Clayton Suggs grew up in Flea Bottom.[22]
Recent Events
A Game of Thrones
After escaping the purge of House Stark from the Red Keep, Arya Stark sleeps in rooftops and stables in Flea Bottom.[1]
A Clash of Kings
Flea Bottom is set afire during the riots in King's Landing. Tyrion Lannister tasks Bronn and Sandor Clegane with having the water wagons protected so that the fire cannot reach the Guildhall of the Alchemists.[23]
Drunkards in Flea Bottom begin smashing doors and climbing through windows during the Battle of the Blackwater,[24] and the district turns into a great drunken riot as the battle progresses.[25]
A Storm of Swords
A brawl in a Flea Bottom pot-shop leaves a Tyrell man-at-arms dead and two of Lord Tremond Gargalen's men scalded.[26]
A Feast for Crows
The small council of Queen Regent Cersei Lannister is referred to as "the smallest council" in Flea Bottom, according to reports by Ser Addam Marbrand.[27]
A Dance with Dragons
People of Flea Bottom travel to the slopes of Aegon's High Hill to watch Cersei's walk of atonement.[28]
When Tyrion joins the Second Sons outside Meereen, he recognizes that Kem has a Flea Bottom accent.[4]
People from Flea Bottom
Quotes
Better a beggar than a thief. He had been both in Flea Bottom, when he ran with Ferret, Rafe, and Pudding, but the old man had saved him from that life.[19]
—thoughts of Duncan the Tall
The Bottom had a stench to it, a stink of pigsties and stables and tanner's sheds, mixed in with the sour smell of winesinks and cheap whorehouses.[1]
—thoughts of Arya Stark
We can lose all of Flea Bottom if we must, but on no account must the fire reach the Guildhall of the Alchemists, is that understood?[23]
There's a pot shop I know in Flea Bottom makes a savory bowl of brown. All kinds of meat in it, I hear.[29]
I have great respect for your order and its vows. Ser Clayton does not share my feelings, though. He learned all he knows in the wynds of Flea Bottom. Were I to put you in his charge, he might strangle you with your own chain or scoop your eye out with a spoon.[22]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 A Game of Thrones, Chapter 65, Arya V.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Fire & Blood, The Long Reign - Jaehaerys and Alysanne: Policy, Progeny, and Pain.
- ↑ The Princess and the Queen.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 A Dance with Dragons, Chapter 66, Tyrion XII.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, Three Heads Had the Dragon - Governance Under King Aegon I.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Fire & Blood, The Year of the Three Brides - 49 AC.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, A Time of Testing - The Realm Remade.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, Heirs of the Dragon - A Question of Succession.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, The Dying of the Dragons - The Blacks and the Greens.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, The Dying of the Dragons - A Son for a Son.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, The Dying of the Dragons - The Red Dragon and the Gold.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, The Dying of the Dragons - Rhaenyra Triumphant.
- ↑ 13.0 13.1 Fire & Blood, The Dying of the Dragons - Rhaenyra Overthrown.
- ↑ 14.0 14.1 Fire & Blood, The Dying of the Dragons - The Short, Sad Reign of Aegon II.
- ↑ Fire & Blood, Aftermath - The Hour of the Wolf.
- ↑ 16.0 16.1 Fire & Blood, Under the Regents - The Hooded Hand.
- ↑ The Hedge Knight.
- ↑ The Sworn Sword.
- ↑ 19.0 19.1 The Mystery Knight.
- ↑ A Clash of Kings, Chapter 10, Davos I.
- ↑ A Storm of Swords, Chapter 37, Jaime V.
- ↑ 22.0 22.1 The Winds of Winter, Theon I
- ↑ 23.0 23.1 A Clash of Kings, Chapter 41, Tyrion IX.
- ↑ A Clash of Kings, Chapter 60, Sansa VI.
- ↑ A Clash of Kings, Chapter 65, Sansa VIII.
- ↑ A Storm of Swords, Chapter 53, Tyrion VI.
- ↑ A Feast for Crows, Chapter 27, Jaime III.
- ↑ A Dance with Dragons, Chapter 65, Cersei II.
- ↑ A Storm of Swords, Chapter 32, Tyrion IV.