Meribald

For the Lord of Greenshield, see Moribald Chester.

Septon Meribald
Septon Meribald and Dog, by vazdelart ©
Title	Septon
Allegiance	Faith of the Seven
Culture	Rivermen
Born	247 AC or 248 AC the riverlands
Book	A Feast for Crows (appears)
Played by	Ian McShane (as Brother Ray)
TV series	Game of Thrones: Season 6

Meribald is a septon without a sept who travels through the riverlands.

In the television adaptation Game of Thrones, Meribald is merged with the Elder Brother as Ray, and portrayed by Ian McShane.

Appearance and Character

See also: Images of Meribald

Meribald is six feet tall, and walks with a slight hunch that makes him seem much shorter. He has a shock of thick grey hair. His face is lined and windburnt, and he has wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. The septon has large, leathery hands, with red knuckles and dirt beneath his nails. He also has extremely large, bare, weathered feet, with calluses as hard as horn. Meribald has not worn shoes for twenty years.

Meribald's usual path takes him around most of the countryside, circling the region from Maidenpool to Maidenpool, and is said to take no less than half a year per circuit. Because the septon usually ministers to the smallfolk in market towns, small villages, and holdfasts, he is not as familiar with the Trident and its castles as he is with the small roads, tracks, hedges, and unmapped rills and caves.

Meribald travels alone in most of his walks, with only his dog, Dog, as his companion. Normally, he also takes an unnamed donkey to carry his heavy load, including packs of food and goods he means to give to the hungry and poor of the villages he passes by. Meribald is fond of oranges. He often sleeps in the kitchens or stables of inns, and he also knows of septries, holdfasts, or castles where he might find hospitality. If nothing else is available, Meribald will sleep under hedges or trees.

History

Meribald was born and has lived his entire life in the riverlands. As a boy, Meribald went to fight in the War of the Ninepenny Kings with his brothers. His older brother, Willam, agreed to jokingly take Meribald as his squire. During the war, however, both Willam and another brother, Robin, died from a fever. His last brother, Owen, was killed in battle, and Owen's friend, Jon Pox, was hanged for rape. Meribald may have become a broken man because of this. When Meribald returned to the riverlands, he joined the Faith of the Seven, but used his position as a world-savvy septon to convince young women to have sex with him. He now walks barefoot as penance for these sins he committed as a youth.

He cannot read or write, but he knows a hundred different prayers and can recite passages from The Seven-Pointed Star by memory, which makes him capable enough to minister the Faith to smallfolk. For nearly forty years, Meribald has been walking the countryside of the riverlands as a wandering septon in exchange for food and shelter.

Recent Events

A Feast for Crows

Septon Meribald guides Brienne of Tarth, Podrick Payne, and Ser Hyle Hunt through the riverlands from Maidenpool to Saltpans, where he took his first stop on his circuit. Along the way, he spooks Podrick with stories of mud along the Trident's mudflats that can swallow up ignorant travelers and tales of a large, monstrous, man-eating, demon-like she-wolf that leads a pack of savage wolves prowling throughout the Trident. Meribald also tells his own story, explaining how he came to be a septon and his duties to the smallfolk of the riverlands. He explains about broken men, and that travelers should beware of them, but also pity them.

Meribald guides Brienne and her companions to the Quiet Isle to meet the Elder Brother. He later guides Brienne and her companions to the inn at the crossroads, telling them of its history, and he feeds and ministers to the children there. After Brienne defends the inn from the outlaw Brave Companions, the brotherhood without banners takes her and her companions prisoner, but allows Meribald to continue his journey.

Quotes by Meribald

I have a weakness for the orange, I confess.

—Meribald to Brienne Tarth

There are many fine hedges in the riverlands. The old ones are the best. There's nothing beats a hundred-year-old hedge. Inside one of those a man can sleep as snug as at an inn, and with less fear of fleas.

—Meribald to Brienne Tarth

I have not worn a shoe in twenty years. The first year, I had more blisters than I had toes, and my soles would bleed like pigs whenever I trod on a hard stone, but I prayed and the Cobbler Above turned my skin to leather.

—Meribald to Brienne Tarth

The broken man lives from day to day, from meal to meal, more beast than man. Lady Brienne is not wrong. In times like these, the traveler must beware of broken men, and fear them... but he should pity them as well.

—Meribald to Podrick Payne

Brienne: How old were you when they marched you off to war?
Meribald: Why, no older than your boy. Too young for such, in truth, but my brothers were all going, and I would not be left behind.

—Brienne Tarth and Meribald

Hyle: The War of the Ninepenny Kings?
Meribald: So they called it, though I never saw a king, nor earned a penny. It was war, though. That it was.

—Hyle Hunt and Meribald

Faith. Believe, persist, and follow, and we shall find the peace we seek.

—Meribald to Hyle Hunt

Meribald: We mean no harm, lad. When Masha Heddle owned this inn she always had a honey cake for me. Sometimes she even let me have a bed, if the inn was not full.
Gendry: She's dead. The lions hanged her.

—Meribald and Gendry

Quotes about Meribald

Meribald was a septon without a sept, only one step up from a begging brother in the hierarchy of the Faith.

—thoughts of Brienne Tarth

The septon was set free to go upon his way. There was no harm in him.

—Thoros of Myr to Brienne Tarth

Behind the Scenes

George R.R. Martin's favorite passage from A Song of Ice and Fire is Septon Meribald's speech about war and broken men.