Game Of Thrones: Age Of Heroes & The Long Night Explained

3. Age Of Heroes

The Age of Heroes began around 10,000 years before Aegon I Targaryen's conquest of Westeros, and is the time that followed the Pact between the Children of the Forest and the First Men, which closed out Westeros' Dawn Age.

With peace in Westeros between its inhabitants came a period of great prosperity, and a number of legends. So much of the Age of Heroes is shrouded in myth and fables, which makes the description of this story not being what you think all the more intriguing.

It's from this time we have the legendary Bran the Builder, who is said to have founded House Stark, built the Wall and Winterfell. There's also Lann the Clever, who founded House Lannister and took Casterly Rock from the Casterlys using nothing but his wits. And there's Symeon Star-Eyes and Serwyn of the Mirror Shield, two heroic figures who are the subject of many songs, but may not have existed at all.

What we do know is that this is the period when the First Men expanded out across Westeros, from the Land of Always Winter to the Summer Sea, laying the foundations for the Seven Kingdoms it'd later become. However, as Martin writes in The World of Ice and Fire of figures such as Bran and Lann, "it is likely that their legends hold less truth than fancy."

What's certain, though, is that the Age of Heroes lasted for thousands of years, but a great terror fell upon the world in the midst of it.