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| “ | When I am queen, I will create a new order. | „ |
| ~ Rhaenyra Targaryen to Rhaenys Targaryen. |
| “ | Everyone says Targaryens are closer to gods than to men, but they say that because of our dragons. Without them, we're just like everyone else. | „ |
| ~ Rhaenyra to her father Viserys I. |
Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen, disputedly Queen Rhaenyra I Targaryen in her lifetime, is a major character in the A Song of Ice and Fire novel series and the main protagonist of the television adaptation House of the Dragon.
Rhaenyra was the firstborn and only surviving child of King Viserys I Targaryen's first marriage to his cousin Aemma Arryn. To prevent his brother Prince Daemon Targaryen from becoming king, Viserys named Rhaenyra his heir when she was 8, and since then she had expected to become the first reigning Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. However, Viserys later married Alicent Hightower and had three sons. Alicent tried to have her eldest son, Prince Aegon, named heir, but Viserys refused to change the succession.
Rhaenyra was first married to Ser Laenor Velaryon, and the two were the parents of Princes Jacaerys, Lucerys, and Joffrey Velaryon, who were rumored to be the bastard sons of Ser Harwin Strong. After Laenor's death, Rhaenyra married her uncle Daemon and the two had two sons—Princes Aegon and Viserys—and a stillborn daughter, Visenya. Rhaenyra was the older sister of an unnamed son and Prince Baelon, who both died in infancy. She was the older half-sister of King Aegon II, Queen Helaena, and Princes Aemond and Daeron.
In House of the Dragon, she is portrayed by Emma D'Arcy as an adult and Milly Alcock as an adolescent.
Biography[]
Rhaenyra was the firstborn and only surviving child of King Viserys I's first marriage to his cousin Aemma Arryn. Rhaenyra became a dragonrider at the age of seven.
To prevent his brother Daemon Targaryen from becoming king, Viserys named Rhaenyra his heir when she was 8, and since then she has expected to become the first reigning Queen of the Seven Kingdoms.
However, Viserys later remarried to Alicent Hightower and had sons. Alicent tried to have her eldest son Aegon named heir, but Viserys refused to change the succession.
Rhaenyra was married to Ser Laenor Velaryon, heir to Driftmark, and had three sons, Jacaerys, Lucerys, and Joffrey Velaryon. However, despite having two Valyrian-looking parents, all three had brown hair and pug noses, similar to Ser Harwin Strong, their mother's rumored lover. This led to accusations that they were bastards.
Laenor was later murdered by Ser Qarl Correy, possibly his lover, who disappeared after the murder. Shortly after this, Daemon married his niece (he was rumored to have paid Ser Qarl to murder Laenor, then murdered him). Daemon and Rhaenyra had two sons, Aegon and Viserys.
When Viserys died, Rhaenyra was on Dragonstone. Alicent and the Small Council decided Aegon should be king, as by the laws of succession, a son came before a daughter. The only man who spoke for Rhaenyra, Lord Lyman Beesbury, was murdered by Ser Criston, though according to another account, he died while imprisoned. On hearing of her brother's coronation, Rhaenyra miscarried her daughter. Rhaenyra had her own coronation, with her husband, Daemon, placing the crown on her head. She was supported by Laenor's father, Lord Corlys Velaryon, Master of Driftmark and the richest man in the Seven Kingdoms.
Terms were sent to her by Aegon, offering her Dragonstone to be held after her by Jacaerys and for Lucerys to be named heir to Driftmark. She refused. Jacaerys on his dragon was sent to gather the support of the Arryns, Manderlys, and Starks, and Lucerys on his dragon to Storm's End, in the hope Lord Borros Baratheon would support her. However, though Jacaerys was successful, Lucerys was not. He encountered his half-uncle, Aemond Targaryen, who had been sent to Storm's End for the same purpose. Borros forced Lucerys to leave, at which point Aemond pursued Lucerys' dragon on his own and slew them both. In revenge, Daemon sent the two men "Blood and Cheese" into the Red Keep, who murdered Aegon's heir Jaehaerys, fleeing with his head.
Aegon II was wounded at Rook's Rest in battle with Corlys' wife, Rhaenys Targaryen, who died in the battle. Jacaerys came up with the idea of recruiting dragonriders from the "dragonseeds," people who claimed illegitimate Targaryen blood. Corlys persuaded Rhaneyra to have Addam and Alyn, the sons of Marilda of Hull, legitimized as Velaryons and heirs to Driftmark, claiming they were the sons of Laenor. However, due to Laenor not showing much interest in women and more in men, it is widely believed that Corlys was the true father of Addam and Alyn.
Among the dragonseeds were Hugh Hammer, Ulf the White, and Nettles. Jacaerys was killed in the Battle of the Gullet, however, and Viserys was taken by the fleet of the Kingdom of the Tree Daughters, though Rhaenyra's son Aegon escaped.
Queen Rhaenyra during her short-lived reign.
Aemond had become regent and took most of King's Landing's forces to retake Harrenhal from Daemon Targaryen. However, Rhaenyra took King's Landing, though her half-brother escaped. Yet when she took power, many were executed, and taxes increased, leading to King's Landing turning against her. She was nicknamed "King Maegor with Teats" after Maegor the Cruel. While King's Landing starved, she held a lavish party to declare Joffrey Prince of Dragonstone.
Later, Hugh and Ulf turned against Rhaenyra's forces at the Battle of Tumbleton, attacking her army and sacking the town. Rhaenyra then declared the Dragonseeds traitors. When Corlys helped his heir, Addam Velaryon, escape, Rhaenyra had him imprisoned. She sent a message to Lord Mooton ordering him to execute the dragon-rider Nettles, her husband's lover. However, the Maester warned Daemon, and Nettles escaped. Daemon and Aemond then slew each other in the Battle over the God's Eye.
Rhaenyra burns to death on her half-brother's orders.
A riot in King's Landing led to the deaths of all the dragons in the city, along with Prince Joffrey. Rhaenyra sold her crown to buy passage to Dragonstone. However, Aegon had fled there and taken the island. He fed Rhaenyra to his dragon, Sunfyre, before the eyes of her son, Aegon. However, Aegon II died the following year from poison, leading to Rhaenyra's son succeeding him as Aegon III Targaryen.
The Dance of the Dragons claimed the lives of Rhaenyra's three eldest sons, but her two youngest sons by her second husband and uncle, Prince Daemon Targaryen, survived. The war was officially over when King Aegon II died in 131 AC with no male issue and was succeeded by Rhaenyra's and Daemon's son, Aegon III Targaryen, who had personally witnessed his mother's death by the dragon Sunfyre. After Aegon III's death, his sons Daeron I and Baelor I would also die without any issue, and thus Rhaenyra and Daemon's second son would succeed them as King Viserys II Targaryen. The current Targaryen and Baratheon lines both have Rhaenyra as a direct descendant.
Legacy[]
| “ | Daemon Blackfyre, the brothers Toyne, the Vulture King, Grand Maester Hareth... traitors have always paid with their lives ... even Rhaenyra Targaryen. She was daughter to one king and mother to two more, yet she died a traitor's death for trying to usurp her brother's crown. | „ |
| ~ Stannis Baratheon to Davos Seaworth. |
Though the current line of Targaryens is descended from Rhaenyra, the official histories do not refer to her as a queen and treat her as a usurper, though history would also not be equally kind to Aegon II. Both of them are generally remembered negatively as tyrants in the history of Westeros, with Archmaester Gyldayn's account describing Rhaenyra as a "grasping and vindictive woman" and "a queen as cruel as any king before her".
Rhaenyra's time on the Iron Throne is infamously remembered for countless mass executions and increasingly high taxes on the smallfolk, which led them to resentfully nickname her 'King Maegor with teats.', which, a hundred years later, changed to 'Maegor with teats', which became a common curse over time amongst those living in King's Landing. According to Septon Eustace, during her short reign, it was noticed that after Rhaenyra descended from the Iron Throne, bleeding cuts were seen on her legs and on the palm of her left hand. Eustace claimed that while no one in the court dare speak the truth aloud, they nevertheless knew it in their minds; the Iron Throne had spurned Rhaenyra, and the days of her reign would not be long, which proved to be true.
Rhaenyra sitting on the iron throne.
When King Baelor I Targaryen died during his pious fasting, the line of succession became unclear, as Baelor didn't father any children. Some lords and smallfolk believed that the Iron Throne should pass to Princess Daena Targaryen, the eldest daughter of King Aegon III Targaryen. However, the sisters' confinement in the Maidenvault by their late brother had left them without powerful allies while others recalled the troubled times during Rhaenyra's short reign, and they don't trust the idea of having a woman on the throne. As a result, the succession rights of Princess Daena and her sisters were dismissed, and their uncle, Prince Viserys Targaryen, was chosen to succeed Baelor as King Viserys II. Because Viserys was chosen over Daena, a permanent precedent was set. The royal succession laws were made to place all female heirs behind all possible male heirs and will inherit the throne only when the entirety of the male line is extinct.
The memory of Rhaenyra's life remains controversial as of the present; some, such as Stannis Baratheon, brand her as a traitor who tried to usurp her brother's crown, while to others she is seen as King Viserys I's rightful heir. Ultimately, both Rhaenyra and King Aegon II proved to be unfit to rule, and the entirety of the Dance of the Dragons brought about nothing but mass death, destruction, and the near-annihilation of all the Targaryen dragons until they eventually went extinct during the reign of Aegon III, leaving a severely weakened House Targaryen. Despite this, the Targaryen Dynasty would continue to rule the realm for many years until it was eventually overthrown during Robert's Rebellion and replaced by House Baratheon of King's Landing.
Recent History[]
A Storm of Swords[]
Rhaenyra was mentioned by Stannis Baratheon as he named a list of those who died as traitors. Stannis mentions her as the daughter of one king (King Viserys I) and mother to two more (Aegon III & Viserys II), and she died a traitor's death for trying to usurp her brother's crown.
A Feast for Crows[]
Princess Arianne Martell cites Rhaenyra as a justification for her crowning of Princess Myrcella Baratheon.
A Dance with Dragons[]
Daenerys Targaryen recounts the Dance of the Dragons and how King Aegon III witnessed Rhaenyra being eaten by her brother's dragon.
Quotes[]
George R. R. Martin[]
| “ | Her mother's death and her father's second marriage did little to disturb her expectations, but when his new Hightower queen gave the king three healthy sons and a daughter in rapid succession, the seeds of the Dance of the Dragons were sown. You will probably want to paint Rhaenyra as she was at her father's death, when she laid claim to the Iron Throne. Pampered from an early age, she was a pudgy girl and a stout woman, with a thick waist and a very large bosom. She was very proud and stubborn, and there was a certain petulance to her small mouth. Rhaenyra did have the silver-gold hair of the Targaryens, which she wore long and braided in the manner of Aegon the First's warrior wife Visenya. Rhaenyra was no warrior herself. She always dressed richly, favoring purple and maroon velvets and golden Myrish lace in intricate patterns. Her bodice often glittered with pearls and diamonds, and there were always rings on her fingers. Whenever she was anxious, she would turn them compulsively, round and round. Though Rhaenyra could be charming, she was quick to anger and never forgot a slight. During the Dance of the Dragons, she wore her father's crown. |
„ |
| ~ George R. R. Martin to the artist Roman Papsuev, aka "Amok", during the year 2006. |
| “ | Queen Helaena, a sweet and gentle soul, is much beloved by the smallfolk of King's Landing. Rhaenyra was not, so when rumors began to arise that Helaena did not kill herself, but rather was murdered at Rhaenyra's command, the commons are quick to believe them. “That night King's Landing rose in bloody riot,” I wrote on p. 506 of FIRE & BLOOD. It is the beginning of the end for Rhaenyra's rule over the city, ultimately leading to the Storming of the Dragonpit and the rise of the Shepherd's mob that drives Rhaenyra to flee the city and return to Dragonstone... and her death. | „ |
| ~ George R. R. Martin on his blog, in September 4 2024. |
A Song of Ice and Fire[]
| “ | My half-brothers would be more to his taste. | „ |
| ~ Rhaenyra's misgivings over the option of marrying Laenor Velaryon, due to the rumors of homosexuality on his account, as well as accusing him of being a pedophile. |
| “ | Tell my half-brother that I will have my throne, or I will have his head. | „ |
| ~ Rhaenyra to Grand Maester Orwyle. |
| “ | He will not remain a boy forever. Let him grow to manhood, and soon or late he will seek to revenge himself upon my own sons. | „ |
| ~ Rhaenyra to Corlys Velaryon, when the latter counseled her to spare her half-brother Daeron Targaryen. |
| “ | Rhaenyra: Your sons might have had places of honor at my court if they had kept faith. But they sought to rob me of my birthright, and the blood of my sweet sons is on their hands. Alicent: Bastard blood, shed at war. My son's sons were innocent boys, cruelly murdered. How many more must die to slake your thirst for vengeance? Rhaenyra: I will hear no more lies. Speak again of bastardy, and I will have your tongue out. |
„ |
| ~ Rhaenyra and Alicent Hightower, according to the accounts of Septon Eustace and Grand Maester Munkun, while Mushroom told a more sensational, cruel, scandalous, and more dubious reaction from Rhaenyra. |
| “ | She is a common thing, with the stink of sorcery upon her. My prince would ne'er lay with such a low creature. You need only look at her to know she has no drop of dragon's blood in her. It was with spells that she bound a dragon to her, and she has done the same with my lord husband. | „ |
| ~ Rhaenyra about Nettles, who was allegedly in a relationship with Daemon. |
| “ | Rhaenyra's advantages were few. Some older lords might yet recall the oaths they had sworn when she was made Princess of Dragonstone and named her father's heir. There had been a time when she had been well loved by highborn and commons alike, when they had cheered her as the Realm's Delight. Many a young lord and noble knight had sought her favor then… though how many would still fight for her, now that she was a woman wed, her body aged and thickened by six childbirths, was a question none could answer. Though her half-brother had looted their father's treasury, the princess had at her disposal the wealth of House Velaryon, and the Sea Snake's fleets gave her superiority at sea. And her consort, Prince Daemon, tried and tempered in the Stepstones, had more experience of warfare than all their foes combined. Last, but far from least, Rhaenyra had her dragons. | „ |
| ~ Writings of Archmaester Gyldayn about Rhaenyra's position in the early Dance of the Dragons. |
| “ | And as her lord husband Prince Daemon escorted her from the hall, cuts were seen upon Her Grace's legs and the palm of her left hand. Drops of blood fell to the floor as she went past, and wise men looked at one another, though none dared speak the truth aloud: the Iron Throne had spurned her, and her days upon it would be few. | „ |
| ~ Septon Eustace's writing of Rhaenyra. |
| “ | But the Queen's Hand argued against this, for both girls had younger brothers. Rhaenyra's own claim to the Iron Throne was a special case, the Sea Snake insisted; her father had named her as his heir. Lords Rosby and Stokeworth had done no such thing. Disinheriting their sons in favor of their daughters would overturn centuries of law and precedent, and call into question the rights of scores of other lords throughout Westeros whose own claims might be seen as inferior to those of elder sisters. It was fear of losing the support of such lords, Munkun asserts in "True Telling", that led the queen to decide in favor of Lord Corlys rather than Prince Daemon. The lands, castles, and coin of Houses Rosby and Stokeworth were awarded to the sons of the two executed lords, whilst Hugh Hammer and Ulf White were knighted and granted small holdings on the isle of Driftmark. |
„ |
| ~ Rhaenyra ironically refuses to start an historical precedent for future succession crisis by normalizing inheritance for females over younger males, as she saw her own claim an exception to the norm, which came from the will of her late father. |
| “ | Neither Waters nor any of the other knights and lords present in the yard spoke a word of protest as King Aegon II delivered his half-sister to his dragon. Sunfyre, it is said, did not seem at first to take any interest in the offering, until Broome pricked the queen's breast with his dagger. The smell of blood roused the dragon, who sniffed at Her Grace, then bathed her in a blast of flame, so suddenly that Ser Alfred's cloak caught fire as he leapt away. Rhaenyra Targaryen had time to raise her head toward the sky and shriek out one last curse upon her half-brother before Sunfyre's jaws closed round her, tearing off her arm and shoulder. Septon Eustace tells us that the golden dragon devoured the queen in six bites, leaving only her left leg below the shin "for the Stranger." Elinda Massey, youngest and gentlest of Rhaenyra's ladies-in-waiting, supposedly gouged out her own eyes at the sight, whilst the queen's son Aegon the Younger watched in horror, unable to move. Rhaenyra Targaryen, the Realm's Delight and Half-Year Queen, passed from this veil of tears upon the twenty-second day of the tenth moon of the 130th year after Aegon's Conquest. She was thirty-three years of age. |
„ |
| ~ Rhaenyra's death, recounted by Archmaester Gyldayn |
Trivia[]
- Rhaenyra rode Syrax at age seven.
- In the history of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros, up to the present time, Rhaenyra is marked as a traitorous usurper rather than an heir.
- So far in the television series House of the Dragon, Rhaenyra seems to be slightly more noble than her novel counterpart, such as Daemon killing Vaemond Velaryon on his own instead of Rhaenyra having him do it and then feeding Vaemond's corpse to her dragon.
- Given that the Dance of the Dragons has just started, the show may yet cover her descent into tyranny.
- In the House of the Dragon season 2 episode "The Smallfolk," Rhaenyra showed that she was also attracted to women, as she kissed Mysaria, which caused some controversy. However, in the book version, some readers speculated that Rhaenyra might have been bisexual, theorizing that Rhaenyra was in a relationship with Laena Velaryon and her husband, Rhaenyra's uncle, and future second husband, Daemon Targaryen (in addition to her relationship with her alleged relationships with Ser Harwin Strong and Ser Criston Cole). However, there are very little clues for this theory, such as readers interpreting how it was said that Rhaenyra began to felt "fond and more than fond" for her new sister-in-law and aunt by marriage. Laena and Daemon would often visit Rhaenyra on Dragonstone, and Rhaenyra would often visit them on Driftmark.
- There is no indication that Rhaenyra was in a relationship with Mysaria in the book universe, and it seems it was a creation of the showrunners of House of the Dragon, allegedly upon suggestion of Emma D'Arcy who is an LGBT and nonbinary.
External Links[]
- Rhaenyra Targaryen on the A Wiki of Ice and Fire.
- Rhaenyra Targaryen on the Wiki of Westeros.
