HBO has released online a look at one of the key artifacts from Game of Thrones. As read in the episode “Book of the Stranger,” and image of the letter sent by Ramsay Bolton to Jon Snow (usually referred to by fans as “The Bastard Letter,” or sometimes “The Pink Letter”) has been released online.
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The letter mocks and threatens Jon Snow and his half-siblings – Sansa Stark, who had just escaped Ramsay’s clutches at Winterfell, and Rickon Stark, who was just delivered to Ramsay by House Bolton – with Ramsay demanding Jon return Sansa or face terrible consequences.
Take a look:
If you’re having a little trouble with the stylized script, the Bastard Letter read:
To the Traitor and Bastard Jon Snow
You allowed thousands of wildlings
past the wallYou have betrayed your own kind
you have betrayed the NorthWinterfell is mine Bastard
Come and seeYour brother Rickon is in my dungeon
His direwolf’s skin is on my floor
Come and seeI want my bride back. Send her to me
And I will not trouble you or your wildling lovers
Keep her from me
And I will ride north and slaughter
Every Wildling man woman and babe
living under your protectionYou will watch
as I skin them living
You will watch
as my soldiers take turns
raping your sister
You will watch
as my dogs devour
your wild little brotherThen
I will spoon your eyes from their sockets
and let my dogs do the rest
Come and seeRamsay Bolton
Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North
The reading of the Bastard Letter take place in George R.R. Martin’s novels as well. In A Dance with Dragons, it is the Bastard Letter that motivates Jon to abandon the Night’s Watch. It is only then that the Watch, feeling betrayed, turns on Jon. The situation is also different in several other ways large and small, including that Ramsay does not have Rickon, and that he did not marry Sansa Stark, but Sansa’s handmaiden, Jeyne Poole, who was forced to masquerade as Arya Stark. Stannis Baratheon’s fate after marching on towards Winterfell is also unknown. Mance Rayder is also still alive, and was sent on a mission, accompanied by six spearwives, to rescue “Arya” from Winterfell.
Here’s how the Bastard Letter reads in the book:
Your false king is dead, bastard. He and all his host were smashed in seven days of battle. I have his magic sword. Tell his red whore.
Your false king’s friends are dead. Their heads upon the walls of Winterfell. Come see them, bastard. Your false king lied, and so did you. You told the world you burned the King-Beyond-the-Wall. Instead you sent him to Winterfell to steal my bride from me.
I will have my bride back. If you want Mance Rayder back, come and get him. I have him in a cage for all the north to see, proof of your lies. The cage is cold, but I have made him a warm cloak from the skins of the six whores who came with him to Winterfell.
I want my bride back. I want the false king’s queen. I want his daughter and his red witch. I want this wildling princess. I want his little prince, the wildling babe. And I want my Reek. Send them to me, bastard, and I will not trouble you or your black crows. Keep them from me, and I will cut out your bastard’s heart and eat it.
Ramsay Bolton, Trueborn Lord of Winterfell.
While the sequence of events is altered between novels and television, it’s clear that the Bastard Letter is instrumental in setting up what fans presume is a coming “Battle of the Bastards,” with Jon Snow leading an army against Ramsay Bolton at Winterfell.
Game of Thrones airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.
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