Knowing full well that nothing on Game of Thrones is likely "historically accurate", which is fine since the story doesn't take place on Earth in any sort of real timeline and is, in fact, a story deeply mired in the Fantasy trope of Medieval Stasis... (deep breath in)... is Podrick's leather top most closely allied with those garments one would think of as a brigandine in real Earthly history, or is it closer to a different garment, the name of which I am not finding?
Judging by the visible rivets, it is. That's the main distinction between types of coat of plates: brigandines have their metal plates riveted into the fabric or leather, while those in a jack of plates are sewn in.
There was absolutely no one in the Middle Ages so well attired as the characters from Game of Thrones. As they always seem to be in some state of brooding, and with costumes rumpled just so, I'd say they're a poor facsimile of the real thing.
@Iain Sparrow Wait... You mean to tell me that Game of Thrones isn't realistic in their depictions of medieval life? Damn, I'm writing my history thesis and Game of Thrones is my only primary source so far! (It doesn't show in text, but I'm an incredibly sarcastic person, so please don't think I'm patronizing you at all! I'm just an asshole who thinks he's funny!)
Of this there can be no doubt, but the question concerns the writing of a fanfiction, so I'm looking more for correct-to-canon rather than to real life. Though Tyrion Lannister could likely have afforded to buy Podrick that brigandine, he already has it when he comes into Tyrion's sphere of influence and everything else about Podrick's backstory (be it book or show canon) says that Podrick should be penniless to that point and certainly in no position to afford such a garment. But splendid attire is the least problematic issue with their world, imo. They cyclically experience winters that can last years: How do entire populations not die off for lack of food? Regardless, unrealistic character budgets are a mainstay of television. Most characters in most shows of any kind can't afford the homes they are portrayed to live in if their situations were real-life. https://www.ranker.com/list/poor-tv-characters-living-too-well/alexandra-plesa This list above only mentions American shows, but an old favorite of mine is the British show Primeval where the character of Abby Maitland is the equivalent of a grad student and we know she's working and living off of a grant because she loses said grant as part of the process of freeing her character up to engage in the adventures to come, but up to this point (and afterwords) she lives in a sprawling, beautiful, hardwood-floor-bedecked, loft apartment that would set anyone back quite a few quid anywhere in the U.K., let alone the untouchable market of London where she's supposed to live.
Brigandines were dirt cheap as armor goes, especially by the point plate armor was common amongst the higher nobility and knightly class (as it is in Westeros). Like, commoner militias were historically decked out in these. Podrick having one wouldn't be notable at all, especially when the common soldiery in GoT look like they've got jacks of plates.
This. Where are the immense grain storehouses? Where's the discussion of how the whole economy turns upside down to support imports from the South? Why aren't the forests empty of game within months, as the bottom of the food chain starves to death and that travels up to the top? Our Little Ice Age is argued to have triggered the Black Death (that is, its impact, not the germ itself) and the Dark Ages. And that was just one cold spell, by Game of Thrones standards.
Spoiler: My fic You address the very core of the current fic I'm working on. Much ado is made in A Feast for Crows that an entire season of crops has been lost because of the wars. They aren't ready for a normal Earthly winter, let alone a Westerosi winter. In my fic, Brienne is now Lady of Evenfall Hall, her father having died in the wars, and Podrick is formally Brienne's heir to House Tarth by royal decree, the boon Brienne requested for her services to the throne at the end of the wars. She reopens the quarries of Tarth (passing mention is made in the books that Tarth is the source for much of the stone in King's Landing, The Great Sept, etc.) and sets up a trade expedition to the Summer Isles for comestibles in exchange for the finest white marble streaked with red and pink. They arrive; shit happens.
I have nothing to contribute to this discussion except to say that the guy in the picture looks like the lovechild of Christian Bale and Jim Carrey.
