Sir George Martyn – Sir George Henry Martin or George R. R. Martin
https://www.wizard101central.com/wiki/NPC:Sir_George_Martyn
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Martin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_R._R._Martin
Sir George Martyn is or rather was a once-famous wyrm slayer who was bested by Catalan the Lightning Lizard. The spirit of Sir George asks the player to defeat Catalan in order to ease his pain and as part of the player’s quest to become a full-fledged Knight of the Silver Rose.
There are two equally as likely possibilities for this reference. Though given the name of the quest to find and defeat Catalan the Dragon, A Song of George, I believe the latter is more likely. I present both possibilities and let you decide.
The first possibility is Sir George Henry Martin CBE (January 3, 1926 – March 8, 2016) was an English record producer, arranger, composer, conductor, and musician. He was commonly referred to as the “Fifth Beatle” because of his extensive involvement in each of the Beatles’ original albums. AllMusic has described him as the “world’s most famous record producer”. Martin’s formal musical expertise and interest in novel recording practices complemented the Beatles’ rudimentary musical education and relentless quest for new musical sounds to record. Most of the Beatles’ orchestral arrangements and instrumentation were written or performed by Martin, and he played piano or keyboards on a number of their records. Martin’s collaboration with the Beatles resulted in popular, highly acclaimed records with innovative sounds, such as the 1967 album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band—the first rock album to win a Grammy Award for Album of the Year.
In his career, Martin produced 30 number-one hit singles in the United Kingdom and 23 number-one hits in the United States, and won six Grammy Awards. He also held a number of senior executive roles at media companies and contributed to a wide range of charitable causes, including his work for The Prince’s Trust and the Caribbean island of Montserrat. In recognition of his services to the music industry and popular culture, he was made a Knight Bachelor in 1996.
Given that the name of Sir George Martyn’s quest is a riff on the name of this author’s series of fantasy novels “A Song of Fire and Ice,” I believe this is the more likely candidate for George Martyn’s inspiration.
George Raymond Richard Martin (born George Raymond Martin; September 20, 1948), also known as GRRM, is an American novelist, screenwriter, television producer and short story writer. He is the author of the series of epic fantasy novels A Song of Ice and Fire, which were adapted into the Emmy Award-winning HBO series Game of Thrones (2011–2019) and its prequel series House of the Dragon (2022–present). He also helped create the Wild Cards anthology series, and contributed worldbuilding for the 2022 video game Elden Ring. In 2005, Lev Grossman of Time called Martin “the American Tolkien”, and in 2011, he was included on the annual Time 100 list of the most influential people in the world.
The current list of all the (known) Avalon references are located here.
Although I am well versed in Pop Culture references, I do not claim to have caught them all. Let me know your favorites in the comments and if I’ve missed one you caught, let me know so I can add it to the list.
Text for this article is excerpted from the linked wiki pages.
Sir George Martyn image is from Wizard101, and are copyright of KingsIsle Entertainment.
Photo of Sir George Martin is (c) Adam Sharp, borrowed from Wikipedia and shared under the Creative Commons License CC BY-SA 3.0
George R. R. Martin photo is (c) Henry Söderlund, borrowed from Wikipedia and shared under the Creative Commons License CC BY 4.0
Image usage qualifies as fair use under US copyright law.
Vulcan Stev's Database 