Bastardy and the stigma against it isn't just a personal prejudice; it's an institution (Spoilers main)
Inspired by this discussion about wives and their reactions to bastards and this post I made about Catelyn recently, I decided to make a political analysis of bastardy as an institution. Because apparently I love the sound of my brand new Reddit inbox exploding.
I write this post because in both threads, there were implications that wives have personal prejudices against bastards, which causes them to shun their own husbands' bastards. Additionally, in the latter, there was some discussion about whether Catelyn's dislike and shunning of Jon Snow was in any way comparable to Ned's hostage-ship of Theon, and that argument seemed to center on mistreatment of children as a personal evil versus an institutional evil (along with rather creepy takes on Tyrion and Sansa's wedding night, ewwww).
Although the aforementioned argument tends to frame Catelyn's dislike of Jon (and other bastards to an extent) as a personal failing as opposed to Ned's custody of Theon as an impersonal, institutional failing, my argument is that the social status of bastards is as much an institution as the taking of hostages, the patriarchal system of Westeros, and the nobility that upholds the feudalistic society of the Seven Kingdoms, and is in fact intrinsically entwined with those institutions.
So, without further ado, let's begin!
What is an institution?
Merriam-Webster defines an institution as "a significant practice, relationship, or organization in a society or culture." In a political science sense, this refers to "formal rules, informal norms, or shared understandings that constrain and prescribe political actors’ interactions with one another. " Institutions can be enforced by state or non-state actors (such as religious authorities, economic entities, or just groups of people) so long as they are acting in a political sense. Examples of institutions include laws, legal systems, political agreements, and behavioral norms.
And before I get angry comments about "defending" institutions, this definition is a morally neutral one. Institutions merely help uphold a certain political system and are only as perfect as the systems they uphold.
Part I: Feudalism
According to Belgian medievalist François Louis Ganshof, feudalism is a legal system in which is defined by classes defined by birth and familial relationships. In the Ganshof definition, the nobility class own and control the land, while vassals are granted the land and the lord's protection in exchange for services, usually of a military or economic variety. At around the same time, Marc Bloch coined the term manoralism, which refers to the relationship between the nobility that own the land and the peasantry or serfs that work the land.
The Seven Kingdoms is a rather textbook example of feudalism, with its rather decentralized government, which allows the nobility to wield a lot of power. This means that the class system is an institution as it prescribes the use of power through the nobility and defines their political, military, and economic relationships with their vassals and the peasantry.
Additionally, since power is wielded by the noble class, there is a strict delineation between classes, with power and class status being maintained through birth and familial relations, which brings us into...
Part II: Marriage
In a feudalistic society, power amongst the nobility is maintained through alliances and blood ties. This is facilitated through marriage, another institution that is very important in Westeros. We can see an example through the STAB alliance during Robert's Rebellion- Hoster Tully, who was the head of the only house to not have a personal grudge against the Targaryens, became bound by blood to the Starks and Arryns, keeping him committed to the cause.
This also demonstrates the status of women as tools to cement these alliances (more on that in a sec). A lord, like Hoster Tully, is much more likely to fight for the Starks and Arryns when his daughters are Lady Stark and Lady Arryn respectively. Conversely, Hoster Tully, who has the power to seal or decline the alliance will only agree to bear the cost of an alliance (which in the case of a rebel group could potentially be great), in exchange for the expectation that his daughters will have the power and prestige that comes with being the wife to a Lord Paramount and that his grandchildren will eventually rule such wide swathes of land.
This contract agreement is also why betrothals are a big deal, with broken engagements leading to rebellions (like Lionel Baratheon's) and massacres (the RW). It's also why although women have more social mobility in this system, it also serves to keep the upperclass, with nobles only marrying nobles (which is another reason Aegon V's son Duncan marrying Jenny of Oldstones was such an insult. Not only is he breaking a contract with one of his father's lieges, but he's bringing a commoner into the noble ranks).
Bastards are seen to threaten this institution since it undermines the aforementioned agreement and class system. If a millkmaid's son can end up ruling his father's lands, then there is no reason for any other noble to agree to marry his daughter to said lord- it's a similar reason why nobles with children are less desirable marriage candidates, with the additional caveat that raising a common-born child to nobility threatens the feudal system that Westerosi society depends on. By sidelining bastards through the stigma of bastardy, the political action of marriage is thus constrained between its parties to only allow for advancement and alliances of the noble class.
This institution is also enforced by the Faith of the Seven both through its stigmatization of bastards (likely to deter their conception, for all the good that does)...
>"Everyone knew that bastards were wanton and treacherous by nature, having been born of lust and deceit" (ASOS, Jon VII)
...and their taboos against incest and polygamy (can't make alliances with your own siblings, and having multiple wives muddles succession).
But the bastardy stigma isn't only there to uphold and constrain the status of marriages, it also maintains the status of...
Part III: Women
Westeros is a patriarchal society, where the men generally have power over women. ^(Citation not needed) This also means that wives are subservient to their husbands and are expected to obey them, even if their husbands are brutes, and do not get a say in the decisions their husbands make.
>"She had pledged to obey" (AGOT, Catelyn II).
The system of bastardy is at its core a tool of the patriarchy. Husbands can sleep with whoever they want, and sire whatever bastards they want, while wives are expected to remain chaste under fear of disgrace and scandal at best and death at worst. The fact that there is a system of bastardy, with acknowledged bastards being given last names depending on regions shows how pervasive this double standard is.
Additionally, the presence of a bastard is seen as a grave insult and humiliation to a wife, to the point that even during a succession crisis for the Hornwood, there's hesitation to name Lord Hornwood's bastard son heir.
>“That would please the Glovers, and perhaps Lord Hornwood’s shade as well, but I do not think Lady Hornwood would love us. The boy is not of her blood” (ACOK, Bran II).
Women do not get a lot of power over what their husbands do. They cannot act against their husbands for humiliating them with infidelity and a public bastard without the threat of abuse of mistreatment, and they cannot leave their husbands without being separated from their children and the ensuing rejection by society. In short, although a modern woman would resent her husband for infidelity, a Westerosi woman cannot. However, she can resent the fruit of her untouchable husband's betrayal- she can resent the bastard. And many Westerosi women do. And although bastardy emphasizes the status of women in the Seven Kingdoms, the stigma against bastards, in a weirdly ironic way, preserves and protects it from being ruined.
Of all the bastards we meet in the books, very few are raised in their father's seat and treated equal to their trueborn siblings:
- Larence Snow, bastard son of Lord Hornwood is raised in Deepwater Motte, not the Hornwood.
- Edric Storm is raised in Storm's End, not the Red Keep.
- Falia Flowers is treated as a servant.
- Ramsey was not brought to the Dreadfort until Domeric was killed.
- Alyn and Addam of Hull were not acknowledged by Corlys Velaryon until his wife Rhaenys was dead.
And this makes sense. Raising a bastard as an equal is a sort of quasi form of legitimization, and thus in addition to insulting a wife by bringing living proof on infidelity into her home, it also insults her by threatening to displace her children. In short, bastardy is a way to protect a woman's honor and (limited) rights by stigmatizing children that are not hers. It also upholds a woman's status as a political tool, thus allowing the exclusive transmission of power between her house and her husband's.
I think it's very interesting that the places within Westeros that don't have the traditional view on bastardy are either extremely progressive for women in comparison (like Dorne or Bear Island) or even more misogynistic than the rest of Westeros (The Iron Islands and the Twins). In the former, this makes sense because women are not subject to the sexual double standard of fidelity and marriage, and thus can give birth to bastards of their own. In the latter, this also makes sense because there is even less respect given to a wife and her honor that bastards can be flaunted without care.
And that's all the examples we have of the bastard/wife relationship. There's absolutely no other relationship between important characters that would be relevant in any way to this analysis. And even if there were, it's so uncontroversial and standard that it's not even worth mentioning.
Yeah, right.
Part IV: The case of Cat and Jon
Hoooly smokes, is this a can of worms.
The relationship between Catelyn and Jon is a culmination of all these institutions rearing their ugly heads, leading to a result that is just as ugly.
Here are Cat's feelings on the subject:
>"Many men fathered bastards. Catelyn had grown up with that knowledge. It came as no surprise to her, in the first year of her marriage, to learn that Ned had fathered a child on some girl chance met on campaign. He had a man's needs, after all, and they had spent that year apart, Ned off at war in the south while she remained safe in her father's castle at Riverrun. Her thoughts were more of Robb, the infant at her breast, than of the husband she scarcely knew. He was welcome to whatever solace he might find between battles. And if his seed quickened, she expected he would see to the child's needs.
>He did more than that. The Starks were not like other men. Ned brought his bastard home with him, and called him "son" for all the north to see. When the wars were over at last, and Catelyn rode to Winterfell, Jon and his wet nurse had already taken up residence" (AGOT, Catelyn II).
So, in a nutshell, Catelyn's not personally offended that Ned cheated on her. She's offended that in bringing Jon to Winterfell (before her and their trueborn son, I might add) and publicly acknowledging him, he's disgracing her marriage and by extension, humiliating her.
Cat repeats this sentiment later on.
>"She might have overlooked a dozen bastards for Ned's sake, so long as they were out of sight. Jon was never out of sight, and as he grew, he looked more like Ned than any of the trueborn sons she bore him. Somehow that made it worse" (AGOT, Catelyn II).
It's not Jon's fault, but he is the perfect storm of characteristics that undermines Catelyn and her marriage.
- He's being raised in Winterfell equal to his siblings.
- Catelyn is forced to be around him.
- He looks like Ned, which gives him an additional legitimacy because he's unquestionably (in-universe at that point in time) Ned's son, which is an advantage that Cat's own kids don't.
- and 3) have historically been things that started succession crises and were used as justification for Daemon Blackfyre to usurp his brother.
>"Reversing the colors of the traditional Targaryen arms to show a black dragon on a red field, the rebels declared for Princess Daena's bastard son Daemon Blackfyre, First of His Name, proclaiming him the eldest true son of King Aegon IV, and his half brother Daeron the bastard" (AWOIAF, "The Targaryen Kings: Daeron II")
And yes, this is all Ned's fault, but Catelyn is not in a position to be angry at Ned for this because as nice a guy Ned is, he's in a position of power over Catelyn, and he has no problem using his authority as her husband and lord against her.
>"The Lady Ashara Dayne, tall and fair, with haunting violet eyes. It had taken her a fortnight to marshal her courage, but finally, in bed one night, Catelyn had asked her husband the truth of it, asked him to his face.
>That was the only time in all their years that Ned had ever frightened her. 'Never ask me about Jon,' he said, cold as ice. 'He is my blood, and that is all you need to know. And now I will learn where you heard that name, my lady.' She had pledged to obey; she told him; and from that day on, the whispering had stopped, and Ashara Dayne's name was never heard in Winterfell again.
>Whoever Jon's mother had been, Ned must have loved her fiercely, for nothing Catelyn said would persuade him to send the boy away" (AGOT, Catelyn II).
This is in context of Ned becoming furious to the point of scaring Catelyn when she asks him the reasonable question whether Ashara Dayne is Jon's mother, which is important because Jon having a highborn mother could afford him more support if he rose up against his siblings (especially since at this point, Catelyn's only son is Robb, which means that if something happened to him, the North, which has never been ruled by a woman, would have to choose between a bastard son or a trueborn daughter). It's also said that this was early in her marriage, so Catelyn does not know Ned enough to know if he would beat or abuse her for displeasing him.
She's also worried that Ned might have loved Jon's mother because he might be more likely to legitimize the son of a woman he loved over a wife he did not, just as Aegon the Unworthy did.
Ultimately, while the treatment of bastards is very unjust and cruel (especially when seeing it through Jon's eyes), it is not a personal failing by the scorned wives that perpetuate this injustice, but rather the very institution of bastardy in conjunction with the feudalistic, patriarchal institution, which sets the victims of this society against each other. Bastardy as an institution constrains the ability of the lower class to mobilize upwards while prescribing the norms of political marriage and women as political objects and tools for power.