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A Song of Ice and Fire Houses and Orders: Faceless Men

The Guild of the Faceless Men is a religious society of assassins who worship the Many-Faced God, a god of death.

The Guild originated in the volcanic slave mines of Valyria. Their founder came to believe that Valyria’s diverse slave population all prayed to the same god of death in many different incarnations. The Guild believes that the death gods of all religions are faces of a single, Many-Faced God. In the Guild’s House of Black and White, followers wear black and white robes and perform religious duties for the community, such as tending to the dead. The House contains a fountain and alcoves with idols of many death gods, including the Stranger of the Seven, but there are no formal services. Some visiting worshipers light candles to their god, then drink from the fountain using a black cup. The religious order refill the fountain with a poison, so that drinking from the fountain leads to a painless death. This is sometimes referred to as “the gift” of the Many Faced God.

A phrase associated with the cult of the Many-Faced God is “valar morghulis,” translated from High Valyrian as “all men must die”; a response to this is “valar dohaeris, or “all men must serve.”

posted 7 months ago on October 8, 2012
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