Welcome to the “third episode” of Russian Game of Thrones, where every week to celebrate the final season of the show, for each House in George R.R. Martin’s fantasy world, I search for a Russian city that has a similar Coat of Arms and try imagining how the main characters of that House would look like if they belonged, instead to the “equivalent” Russian “Dom” (Dom means “house” in Russian).
I wonder if the Lannisters ever payed their debt (at least of gratitude) to the Russian city of Rzhev for blatantly copying their coat of arms…. If you look closely you can see that it really is almost identical, from the lion’s pose, to the tongue sticking out to the exact shape of the tail!
In the course of events, the Lannisters have had their fair share of deaths, but this is actually nothing compared to the real story of Rzhev.
During World War II, Rzhev was occupied by German troops from 14 October 1941 to 3 March 1943. More than one-sixth of the population was sent off to forced labor in Germany during the Nazi occupation and some nine thousand residents were shot, starved, or tortured to death in a concentration camp set up in the center of town. During this occupation, the general area of Rzhev, Sychyovka and Vyazma was the site of a set of major military operations between the Red Army and Nazi German military forces. These operations, which resulted in a great loss of civilian and military life, are commonly referred to as the Battles of Rzhevand almost completely wiped out the population of the town. Almost no old architecture survived these battles.
While i was trying to figure out which character of Russian history would be a “good match” for a Lannister, I thought of one that really was a lion, at least by name: Leonid Brezhnev, the was General Secretary of the Central Committee of the governing Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) from 1964 until his death in 1982, second only to Joseph Stalin in terms of length of his mandate.
As you can see in the original picture, Brezhnev did not really have a golden right hand, but he does have another trait in common with Jamie.
Both these guys very quickly rose through the army ranks not so much because of their military valor, but for being excellent protégés. And they have never been shy when it comes to display their golden epaulettes!
Brezhnev had spent the entire war as a political commissar rather than a military commander, but in August 1946 he left the Soviet Army with the rank of Major General, mostly because his patron Khrushchev succeeded Stalin as General Secretary. Years later, in 1964, Brezhnev ousted the very same Nikita Khrushchev and took over as First Secretary of the CPSU, the most powerful position in the Kremlin.
Sounds like Jamie riding North after “betraying” his sister Cersei?…
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The images of Jamie were taken from Game of Thrones, or from a websites created and owned by HBO, the copyright of which is held by HBO. The use of such images is believed to fall under the fair dealing clause of copyright law. This image is used with the permission of HBO, but on the understanding that they can request its removal at any time.
Russia Through The Lens 
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