Seat of House Tyrell, capital of the Reach, and by common reckoning the heart of chivalry in the Seven Kingdoms. It stands upon a broad green hill above the Mander where the ocean road meets the roseroad, which has made it a crossroads as much as a stronghold. Garth the Gardener is said to have raised it.
Three Rings of White Stone
Three curtain walls of white stone ring the hill, each higher than the last, and between the outer and the middle lies the briar labyrinth that delights guests and slows intruders. The oldest towers are squat and square and date from the Age of Heroes; the tall slender ones came after the Andals. The godswood holds three weirwoods called the Three Singers, and beyond the walls the fields of golden roses run as far as the eye can follow.
Gardener and Tyrell
House Gardener ruled here for thousands of years and welcomed the Andals into the Reach rather than fight them forever, taking the Tyrells out of that same Andal stock to serve as hereditary stewards. When Aegon the Conqueror burned King Mern IX and his host on the Field of Fire, the steward Harlan Tyrell yielded the castle without a fight and was granted it, and dominion over the Mander with it. The Florents, Rowans, and Oakhearts all claim Gardener blood of their own, and none have quite forgiven the stewards their promotion.