If a good part of the main plot in A Song of Ice and Fire takes place in the eastern continent of Essos, the story is mostly in Westeros. I will explain several elements concerning Westeros, its people, its locations,...etc
What makes the world of Westeros different than ours ?
In many fantasy stories, magic has a predominant place in the characters' plots or the chain of events. This is not the case here, if magic once really existed it no longer does, some of the population are persuaded that it never did, only in tales.
Some of these tales mentions supernatural creatures such as giants, mammoths, direwolves and especially white walkers. I will discuss the last two of them later.
Dragons, were the companions of the Targaryen royal family for many generations but the last of them, whose name is unknown, seem to have died around 150AL ( about 150 years before the first book of the series ).
One of the particularity of this world is the cycle of the seasons. If we do speak of spring, summer, autumn and winter, the four seasons do have the same durations as in our time span. Summers can last several years and winters decades. The first books are settled near the end of a long summer and the beginning of autumn. The people commonly say that a long summer is a presage for a hard winter that can be deadly as Old Nan, a character describes in one of her stories:
“ [...]Fear is for the winter, my little lord, when the snows fall a hundred feet
deep and the ice wind comes howling out of the north. Fear is for the long
night, when the sun hides its face for years at a time, and little children
are born and live and die all in darkness while the direwolves grow gaunt and
hungry [ … ]"
The Population and their regions :
The people of Westeros may be call Westerosi by the rest of the world we can still distinguish several ethnics groups among them, spread depending the regions that were old kingdoms before the Conquest. Some of these groups are not really different from their neighbours but History created tensions amongst some of them.
- The Dornishmen are the population settled in Dorne which was the last region to be united under the Iron Throne, 150 years after the Conquest. They are described as an olive-skinned people for most of them and differs in every way from the rest of the Westerosi by their origin and culture. Dornishmen are a harsh people, hot tempered and many say it reflects in their traditional food, more spicy than in the other regions. If they are generally mistrusted, there is particular tensions between the Dornish and the Dornish Marches ( border lands ). House Martell is the ruling family of Dorne.
- The Reachmen are settled in the Reach. This is the most fertile region of Westeros thus the most populated. The villages and cities are bigger than elsewhere and served by two roads helping trade and movement. The Reach is said to be the ancestral home of knighthood and tournaments. For centuries before the Conquest, the kings of House Gardener held the region and they often violently quarrelled against the Dornishmen. Since the Conquest, the Tyrells are the Lords Paramount of the Reach.
- The Stormlanders of the Stormlands are a people of ancient martial tradition. The lands are poor and mountainous. The coasts and their weather gave the name to the region. Storm's End, the capital castle placed on a rocky shore was made to resist the terrible storms that often strike. Before being united with the other regions by the War of the Conquest, the Stormlanders of House Durrendon were engaged in endless wars with Dorne and the Reach. Their current rulers are the Baratheons.
- The Crownlanders are the people from the Crownlands, a region directly controlled by the royal family from the capital of King's Landing. Mostly constituted of flat lands, the Crownlands are the heart of the Iron Throne Kingdom. The King resides at King's Landing ( the largest city ) in the Castle of the Red Keep. Trade, economy, politics, every state matters pass through King's Landing. Before the Aegon's Conquest, the Crownlands were never united under a King but an occupied region by the Storm Kings or their enemies.
- The Westerlands, ancient kingdom of the Rock is mountainous and hilly. Its gold and silver resources allowed the Westermen to create a huge number of mines generating an incredible wealth for the Lannisters who rule the Westerlands and were ancient kings of the Rock before they bent the knee to the Targaryens.
- The Ironborn ( or Ironmen ) are the fierce and despised population of the Iron Islands.With the exception of mineral resources, their isles are poor and mostly unfertile and so they turned to be raiders and looters. It is from their long-ships that they used to terrorize the coasts of the “ green lands “ and colonize the Riverlands. Harren “ the Black “ Hoare was the last Iron King who, in his gigantic castle of Harrenhall, was burned alive with his sons during the Conquest. With the end of House Hoare, the new King Aegon Targaryen offered the Ironmen to elect their own Lord Paramount, the house Greyjoy.
- The Riverlanders, formerly under the Ironborn yoke, joined house Tully and rose against house Hoares during the Conquest. Aegon later gave the Lordship of the Riverlands to house Tully. This fertile region is cut by forks and rivers and often was ruined by wars over its domination or by armies in need to cross the lands of the riverlords to join a war.
- The Vale of Arryn is the ancient kingdom of the Mountain and Vale. This is a landscape of hard mountains which forms an incredible natural fortification for the Valemen. The Arryns are the rulers of the Vale and directly descends from the old Kings of the Mountains and Vale. Their castle, the Eyrie was built on the top of the Mountain of the Moon and so far remains impregnable. If the Valemen are naturally protected against exterior aggression, their lands are infested by Mountain Tribes and their villages pillaged.
- The Northmen are a proud people, living in the largest of all the regions. Vast and wild, the North is since immemorial times under the leadership of House Stark. During the war of the Conquest, Torrhen Stark choose to forfeit his kingship to Aegon Targaryen and his dragons so spare the lives of the Northern warriors. He then was according the Lordship of the North but forever remained as the King who Knelt ( it is not always a pejorative term ).
- To travel from the Riverlands to the North you need to cross the Neck, a region of bogs and swamps inhabited by the Crannogmen. The Crannogmen were once Marsh Kings but became annexed by the King of the North. They are a shy people and rarely leave their castles hidden in the “ crannogs “. They are said to be little men, excellent fishermen and frog catchers and they fight using poisoned spears and nets.
- On the northern border of the North, a thousand years old gigantic ice Wall separates the Kingdom of the Iron Throne from what lies beyond it. 700 feet high and 300 miles long, the Wall is the hometo thef Night's Watch, a sworn-brotherhood charged to patrol this Wall and protect it from the wildling populations and lands that lives outside the Iron Throne Kingdom. Nobody really knows how the Wall was constructed, some say its size can only be due to magic. I will make a special article about the Wall, the Night's Watch and what lies beyond it soon.
I've uploaded a schematic map of Westeros that can help you to visualize the regions.
