View source for A Caution for Young Girls

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'''''A Caution for Young Girls''''' is an erotic book, allegedly the autobiography of Lady [[Coryanne Wylde]].

==History==
''A Caution for Young Girls'' is infamous as one of the most debased works of carnal debauchery circulating through the [[Seven Kingdoms]], of the lowest sort. It is supposedly the memoir of Lady [[Coryanne Wylde]], recounting a life of "sin, suffering, and [[slavery]]"—in the words of [[Archmaester]] [[Gyldayn]]—in which she finds herself as [[handmaid]] to a queen, the [[paramour]] of a young [[knight]], a [[camp follower]] in the [[Disputed Lands]], a serving wench in [[Myr]], a [[mummer]] in [[Tyrosh]], the "plaything" of a [[corsair]] queen in the [[Basilisk Isles]], a slave in [[Volantis]], the handmaid of a [[Qartheen]] [[warlock]], the mistress of a [[pleasure house]] in [[Lys]] and ultimately a [[septa]] in the [[Starry Sept]] of [[Oldtown]], where she sets down the story of her life as a warning to young [[maid]]s.{{Ref|FAB|A Surfeit of Rulers}}

There are several variants of the book in circulation, due to its nature as a book of erotica: most of the population in [[Westeros]] is illiterate, and professional book-copiers only serve the elite. Maesters are strictly trained to reproduce books exactly, while septons are encouraged to strike out passages considered obscene or offensive.  Such professionals would not transcribe erotica, so ''A Caution for Young Girls'' was probably copied by various less reliable sources such as expelled drunken septons, or failed students from the Citadel. "Worst of all", however, are mummers, who feel a great need to add "improvements" to works they are reproducing - usually by adding increasingly more lascivious incidents into the existing text.{{Ref|FAB|A Surfeit of Rulers}}

These inaccurate transmissions and intentional additions had the combined effect of producing different versions which are truly different books, and indeed, do not even share the same title - through all do share the subtitle "A Caution for Young Girls", by which maesters refer to them collectively. The four primary variants are ''Sins of the Flesh'', ''The High and Low'', ''A Wanton's Tale'', and ''The Wickedness of Men''.{{Ref|FAB|A Surfeit of Rulers}}

''Sins of the Flesh'' and ''The High and Low'' are apparently the earlier versions, and they are shorter, while ''A Wanton's Tale'' and ''The Wickedness of Men'' are apparently later versions, particularly because they are longer with additions not present in the others.{{Ref|FAB|A Surfeit of Rulers}}

''A Caution for Young Girls'', despite its extreme depravity and infamy, has proved very popular. Several hundred copies were ordered burned by [[Baelor I Targaryen|Baelor the Blessed]] during his reign, but this failed to destroy all of them. Hundreds more have since been recopied, circulating around the brothels and other low places of Westeros.{{Ref|FAB|A Surfeit of Rulers}}

Gyldayn used ''A Caution for Young Girls'' as a source for an incident during the reign of [[Jaehaerys I Targaryen|Jaehaerys the Conciliator]], as all official sources of the time considered the event too scandalous to remark upon at all. Allegedly, a young lady Coryanne was hired to seduce Jaehaerys I, in an attempt to break up his incestuous [[marriage]] to his sister [[Alysanne Targaryen|Alysanne]], which might have started another [[Faith Militant uprising]]. Some versions say that she did have sex with Jaehaerys but he later repented, while others say he was tempted to but lost heart, while others say he rejected her altogether. The variants also disagree on who is supposed to have hired Coryanne: Some say it was Lord [[Rogar Baratheon]]'s younger brother, Ser [[Borys Baratheon|Borys]], others that it was Lord Rogar himself, and still others that Rogar had sex with her first.{{Ref|FAB|A Surfeit of Rulers}}

==Recent Events==
===''A Dance with Dragons''===
[[Tyrion Lannister]] has the choice of three books aboard ship, including "a well-thumbed tome about the erotic adventures of a young slave girl in a Lysene pillow house", which he considers "the worst written but the most engrossing".{{Ref|aDwD|33}}

==References==
{{References}}

[[Category:Books and scrolls]]
[[fr:Une mise en garde adressée aux jeunes filles]]
[[es:Advertencia para jovencitas]]