| “ | The Hand even went so far as to dismiss Septon Eustace, bringing in a younger man, Septon Bernard, to tend to the spiritual needs of the court and supervise His Grace's religious and moral instruction. Bernard too was of his blood, being descended from a younger sister of his great-grandsire. | „ |
| ~ Writings of Archmaester Gyldayn |
| “ | The Lyseni and their queer foreign gods had no place in the Seven Kingdoms. It was always intended that Lady Larra should die together with her brothers, so Viserys would be free to take a proper Westerosi queen. | „ |
| ~ Septon Bernard, as paraphrased by Archmaester Gyldayn |
Septon Bernard is a minor character in the A Song of Ice and Fire novel series. He was a septon of the Faith of the Seven and a cousin to Lord Unwin Peake, the head of House Peake and a Lord Regent and the Hand of the King to King Aegon III Targaryen.
Personality[]
| “ | Sadly, Septon Bernard preferred composing sacred music to setting down court gossip, and his writings are therefore of little interest to historians and scholars (and of less interest to those who find pleasure in sacred music, it grieves us to say). | „ |
| ~ Writings of Archmaester Gyldayn |
Septon Bernard was regarded as a pious fool. He was also fanatical, jingoistic and xenophobic, given his hatred towards House Rogare, mainly due to them being foreigners (as they are a noble family of Lys) and also because they followed a different religion and worshipped the gods of the Lyseni. Thus, he would even go as far as to aid the conspirators during the Secret Siege and even seek to kill Prince Viserys' wife, Larra Rogare, so he could force Viserys to take a Westerosi queen who follows the Faith of the Seven, once the prince would ascend to the throne after Aegon III.
According to maesters, Bernard had lackluster skills in writing and composing sacred music, which which was not well-received by Archmaester Gyldayn, who describes it as being appallingly written.
Biography[]
Bernard was a direct descendant of a younger sister of Lord Unwin Peake's great-grandfather. The names of his parents were not given, making it unclear whether Bernard himself was highborn or lowborn. It is also not said whether Bernard was trueborn or a bastard.
During the regency of King Aegon III Targaryen in 133 AC, Lord Unwin Peake seized power at court when he became Hand of the King, also assuming full control of the capital King's Landing. Being unscrupulous and opportunistic, he decided to replace the court's main priest, Septon Eustace, who had supported the cause of King Aegon II Targaryen, with a much younger man, in which he chose his own cousin Bernard. A year later, after Unwin resigned from his post and returned to the Reach, the family members he had appointed, such as Bernard, Ser Amaury Peake and Ser Mervyn Flowers, continued to remain at court. When Lady Larra Rogare, the wife of Prince Viserys Targaryen, gave birth to their eldest son, Prince Aegon, it was Septon Bernard who anointed the newly-born baby with the seven oils in the royal sept.
During the plot against House Rogare in 135 AC, he unsuccessfully tried to persuade King Aegon to leave the safety of Maegor's Holdfast during the secret siege, praying loudly for the Crone to light the king's way back to wisdom. Bernard even wrote down the false confession of Unwin's successor Hand of the King, Lord Thaddeus Rowan, while the latter was being brutally tortured by Lord George Graceford, after being stripped of his office. Bernard fully detailed Lord Rowan's alleged crimes: he confessed to have had taken bribes from the Rogares, in the form of gold and young girls, had sent Moredo Rogare to the Vale to dispossess Ser Arnold Arryn of his rightful inheritance, had conspired with Lord Alyn Velaryon to remove Unwin Peake as the King's Hand, had helped to loot the Rogare Bank of Lys, thereby defrauding and impoverishing many "good and leal men of Westeros of noble birth and high station," had appointed his own son, Ser Robert Rowan, to a command "for which he was manifestly unworthy," leading to the death of thousands of men in the Mountains of the Moon during the Arryn succession conflict (a third of the Iron Throne army died before reaching the Bloody Gate, while being led by Robert and Lord Benjicot Blackwood after the former's death).
The worst recorded crime of all, Thaddeus confessed to the accusation of having plotted with Moredo, Lotho and Roggerio Rogare to poison King Aegon and his Queen Consort, Daenaera Velaryon, so as to place the king's brother, Prince Viserys Targaryen, on the Iron Throne with Larra Rogare as his queen, thus extending House Rogare's power in both Lys and Westeros. To end his pain, Thaddeus was forced to confess he and the Rogares were the ones responsible for the poisoning of Queen Daenaera and the ward Gaemon Palehair, resulting in the latter's death. Pointing to further evidence, Septon Bernard reminded King Aegon that the poison used was the Tears of Lys, provided by Roggerio, which Grand Maester Munkun confirmed, and added that the Seven Gods spared Aegon himself from being poisoned. Bernard also tried to provoke feelings of revenge into Aegon by reminding him of how the poisoning killed the king's young old friend Gaemon.
However, Bernard and his accomplices' plot failed when Viserys started asking Lord Thaddeus more questions, resulting in him making strange confessions, such as stating that Gaemon Palehair was part of the plot or that he personally poisoned the late King Viserys I Targaryen. The fool Mushroom also pointed out Thaddeus was missing all his teeth. After this, King Aegon, visibly upset, declared Thaddeus Rowan to be innocent and still his Hand. He then ordered Ser Marston Waters, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard and briefly Hand of the King, to arrest Bernard, Lord Graceford, and all the other real conspirators, naming them traitors and also guilty for having cruelly tortured an innocent man and public official. Marston obeyed, and Bernard and the others ended up in the Red Keep's black cells.
After George Graceford's confession, Septon Bernard was named an accomplice to the plot to arrest Larra Rogare and murder Queen Daenaera Velaryon, along with Ser Amaury Peake, Ser Mervyn Flowers, Tessario the Tiger, the royal master-at-arms Ser Gareth Long, the King's Justice Ser Victor Risley, Ser Lucas Leygood of the gold cloaks, six of the seven gold cloak captains of the city gates, Lady Cassandra Baratheon, Lucinda Penrose, and Priscella Hogg. However, despite their efforts, the confessors were unable to gain the names of either Lord Unwin Peake or his aunt Clarice Osgrey, mistress of the queen's household. Aside for Daenaera's three accused ladies, the other culprits, including Bernard, were all Peakes or friends and supporters of Unwin Peake, who had all personally been appointed by him.
Septon Bernard eventually confessed to his involvement in the ploy, citing his hatred of the Lyseni and their foreign gods. He claimed that it had been intended for Larra to die, so Viserys could ascend the throne and take a "proper Westerosi queen." Bernard's trial was one of the only three trials King Aegon bothered to attend, the others being Ser Gareth Long and Lord George Graceford, while he he showed no interest in the trials and judgements of all the other conspirators.
During the treason trials, the High Septon wrote from his seat at Oldtown, asking that Bernard be spared execution so that he might repent through prayer, contemplation, and good works, which Aegon and his then-ruling regent and new Hand, Lord Torrhen Manderly, obliged. Bernard was gelded and was made to walk barefoot from King's Landing to Oldtown with his manhood hung around his neck. He then spent the rest of his life as a scribe copying holy books at the Starry Sept, while under a vow of silence. Bernard's relative, Ser Gedmund Peake, was found innocent, and was named Lord Admiral and Master of Ships to appease Lord Peake and his supporters.
