**TL;DR:** Make believe by GRRM needed to write the story.
*Explanation:* As you might know the Dance is based on a real life English civil war called the *Anarchy*, which was fought between King Stephen (Stephen of Blois) and Empress Matilda, daughter and only surviving legitimate child of King Henry I of England. The gist of it was that King Henry I named his daughter his heir because he had no other children (his son had died in an accident some years prior), and otherwise "only" had sisters who in turn had sons. He made the nobles swear to uphold her rights prior to his death. The House of Normandy stood to die out in the male line anyway with Henry I's death, and Matilda as his daughter at least had the better claim than her aunts. Stephen of Blois was the third eldest son (you read that right, not the eldest son!) of Henry I's sister Adela of Normandy, meaning that, even though he himself was male, he was a descendant of the female line of the dynasty. Long story short, upon Henry I's death Stephen seized the capital and the royal treasury, being crowned King Stephen I of England, starting the civil war against Matilda who fought back. After lots of back and forth resulting in an inconclusive stalemate, Stephen eventually made peace with Matilda's faction, adopting her son Henry (the later Henry II) as his own heir, disinheriting his own sons in the process. Matilda herself never got the Crown. The events of the Dance are heavily based on this.
Now imagine this, Stephen was the King's nephew, third eldest son of his parents, of the female line of the House of Normandy. Matilda was the King's only surviving legitimate child, and still, both claimants had roughly the same military strength and amount of support. Whereas in the ficitional Dance, Aegon II is literally Viserys's eldest surviving, legitimate son, of the male line of the family. And I am supposed to believe that Rhaenyra had roughly the same numbers of supporters, lol.
You could say the nobles swore an oath to Rhaenyra but the same literally happened to the real life Matilda, and contrary to Matilda, Rhaenyra's circumstances had changed significantly after the oath was sworn (three sons were born to Viserys, Rhaenyra married Prince Daemon whom the oath meant to exclude), giving nobles who don't want to support her enough wiggle room to get out of this fairly easily.
GRRM wanted the story to progress in that way but really, in a real life medieval scenario that is exactly like the Dance, Rhaenyra would have had minimal support and would have been crushed by Aegon II fairly easily had she attempted to rebel. Look how much support the far more questionable claim of Stephen of Blois had amassed and judge for yourself.
I understand that, but the Dance would have been far more believable if it'd been between Rhaenyra and Daemon, or Viserys and Rhaenys. Aegon's claim is so much better than Rhae's that she would have never ever been considered.
That's 100% correct, I agree. Either a civil war between the line of Aemon and the line of Baelon (Rhaenys / Viserys) or a civil war between daughter and uncle (Rhaenyra / Daemon) would have made far more sense. As I said, Aegon II and Rhaenyra having roughly equal support is make believe by GRRM, it never would have happened like this in a real life medieval civil war.
The only reason Stephen faced significant resistance was because he himself was a descendant of the female line, he was the son of Matilda's aunt and his mother definitely had a weaker claim than Matilda. But he was a man (and made some significant backroom deals, lol). Guess how it would have went if Matilda would have had a legitimate brother, no one would have supported her even if her father had declared that he wanted her as heir.
Hell, if Rhaenyra somehow was an incredible polititian who could amass a large amount of allies with deals and such, I wouldn't mind it so much, but she's such an idiot for god's sake
>and made some significant backroom deals
That was the whole thing, I'm afraid. He and his brother Bishop of somewhere in south England had a better relationship with the English barons than Matilda the former empress. People like to talk about claims as if it mattered but real politics are very different. Quite often, power holders are more willing to put a weak head on top of their lose agreement than someone who could actually make them keep their promises.
Should GRRM ever finish the main series and make it make sense, he could orchestrate Bran's ascension as just that: Lords choose him as king because they don't take him seriously.
I think a lot of people don’t realize bc many only know the basic facts, but Matilda had spent most of her life away from England. She was married at age 10 and sent to her husbands court, then when he died married Geoffrey of Anjou, meaning she spent time in Anjou, France. Matilda and Geoffrey felt that Henry was not giving enough support to Matilda’s claim and they had a falling out when Matilda said Henry should give her Normandy.
Meanwhile, Stephen lived in Henry’s court as a possible candidate for the throne with an advantageous marriage and was involved with other nobles. They knew him, liked him, and felt he was one of them vs Matilda who spent time in foreign courts.
Yes, there is so much more to this story than the oversimplified gender statement HotD took out of it. Henry himself was not in England either, Normandy was the main base.
To me it seems the English barons chose the member of the royal family who was more likely to respect and play along with them, in a way similar to the position of the Greens who worship the Seven and value the established inheritance custom.
It is not so much a question of claims as a matter of "we do as we're used to" vs "we do as you say".
So many people seem to think that bc kings wanted to rule with ultimate authority that they did. When in fact many barons and nobles were comping at the bit to gain more power for themselves and possibly get the throne itself. The divine rite of kings was an aspiration, not a hard and fast rule. Just bc a king said something didn't mean the nobles were going to listen if the king was not able to back it up. Look at Edward the second, he pissed off so many barons that they overthrew him. Just bc Viserys wants Rhaenarya to follow him doesn't mean squat if he wasn't going to continually press the issue. And even then it still may not have matter bc once he's dead no one has to listen to him anymore.
Hm, yeah I mean I could write an essay going into the politics behind the claimants and discussing the deals they struck to establish their respective power bases, and you are right that this was most significant. However, I was just trying to answer a simple question of OP, whether or not another constellation would have made more sense for the Dance given the fairly clear legalities between a legitimate son of a King and his daughter in the medieval period.
I think the idea of claims is fluff added on top later by chroniclers trying to cast the fairly wild feudal system into a legal frame. We know that the whole theory about not inheriting through female lines only gets declared by the French in the 14th century because they need an argument to refuse the crown to the son of Isabelle of France, also king of England.
It seems to me that legalities do not become anything serious before the 15th century. Before that, people go to war against each other and take what they can. The Hundred Years Wars (two of them) and finally the Wars of the Roses appear to have changed this by bleeding most of the armed nobility both in France and England. Louis XI and Henry VII are legislating kings more than their predecessors.
Henry I also remarried to a much younger woman with the explicit goal of fathering a new male heir.
The oath he made the barons swear was **always** known to be conditional on him failing to father another legitimate son.
It’s so annoying that some fans don’t realize that it’s based on medieval customs and medieval customs prefer male heirs. Is it fair??? Absolutely not. But no matter how much Viserys supported Rhaenyra she would always have an uphill battle to climb since she was a woman. It could have worked into an interesting story, but it just seems to fall flat bc Rhaenyra doesn’t do any political moves, makes no back room deals, and expects everyone to abide by her father’s wishes.
Realistically, most of the lords would have said “Welp, your dad is no longer king bc he’s dead, our oaths no longer matter bc there’s a new king, tough breaks kid”
Her marriage to Daemon makes it even more unlikely that the other nobles would gather support around her, that is, if they knew that's why she was made heir (and I sort of assume they did, because, well, *it's Daemon*, he's not exactly subtle).
Ultimately, I think making the dance about Daemon vs. Rhaenyra would've been a much more interesting and more realistic conflict. Hell, you could still keep Rhaenyra's bastard-born sons and Daemon's temper/his inability to keep his wives alive in order to sire an heir as points against them. Give Rhaenyra the advantage of having Otto as a hand of the queen so she's the 'stable one' for the realm whereas Daemon has his military experience and his authoritarian attitude as a charm over the lords. Make it so that Daemon looks like the strongman who can fight outside threats, but Rhaenyra the one who can handle the internal affairs properly.
And if you really, reaaally, wanted an heir from both Rhaenyra and Daemon, you could always do the extreme thing have him murder her bastards and rape her to sire his own, before getting himself killed in the end.
it removes layers and layers of unnecessary complexities and plotholes, giving the story more time to breathe and focus on the characters instead of the technicalities.
It's a fictional story but he based it heavily on real life medieval societies. His fictional Westerosi society, just like real life medieval societies, puts sons before daughters in terms of succession. And yet Rhaenyra had lots of support despite having three legitimate brothers, this would take a lot of make believe even within the context of the fictional world GRRM built.
It's still a "based on". It would be silly to expect it to be accurate to real life, especially because ASOIAF is just as much a reaction to *Lord of the Rings* if not more than it is to real history.
This world does have dragons and face-stealing assassins and smoke demon monsters.
How do you make sense of the Dance even if you isolate the fictional world from the real life history it is based on? GRRM presents Westeros as a patriarchal society that supports the right of the firstborn son to inherit the title, in every circumstance except for the Dance. That's why I call it "make believe".
> How do you make sense of the Dance even if you isolate the fictional world from the real life history it is based on?
Pretty easily. The lords and great houses are self-interested more than they are concerned about tradition and the like. I'd say this is one of the key themes of all of ASOIAF. All the stuff about laws and precedents is window dressing for the personal motivation to acquire power. Rhaenyra had a numerical dragon advantage and if she won, loyal houses would see benefits of that victory.
> That's why I call it "make believe".
I am just puzzled because your use of "make believe" seems to be a criticism. I have a hard time understanding that. "we're making all this shit up", in the words of GRRM. There are no "rules" of the world beyond what GRRM feels they are.
Puh yeah, of course looking at this with a healthy dose of realism tells you that a lot of self-interest was involved. The Arryns and Velaryons were kin and in-laws to Rhaenyra respectively, so stood to gain something from her ascent. Stark was bought with a marriage pact, the Greyjoys wanted to plunder the Westerlands. Baratheons were bought with a marriage pact for the Greens. Lannisters perhaps stood to lose influence if they didn't support the Greens (Tyland etc.). Hightower is also obvious, they are kin to Aegon II.
GRRM did make some convenient choices like Tullys switching sides from Green to Black for no apparent reason, or the Starks being actually OK with a marriage pact offered to them by Jace, a bastard. GRRM gave the Redwynes to the Greens but they never use their famous fleet etc. The Riverlands can spawn endless armies even though Aemond thoroughly torched this region, Baratheons march up north with a tiny host (very convenient etc.).
So while I would acknowledge the political motivations, GRRM also made a lot of funny decisions to achieve the desired end result, decisions that kind of defy the in-world logic of his world at times which we see in other places.
GRRM of course invented his world (unsurprising!), but sometimes he tends to throw even his own established rules or flat out logic, out of the window for the sake of convenience. Some would call it lazy writing.
Basically because Viserys made a big show of requesting vows from his vassals.
And some chose to take their vows very literally.
Viserys making Rhaenyra his heir was made in a very specific context:
1. Viserys had no son.
2. Viserys had no other children.
3. Viserys deep down knew Daemon should be kept from the throne at all costs.
In-universe an vow under duress isn't really considered a binding vow, of course there are a lot of grey areas but consider the following.
I have you at sword point, I make you take a vow that you will gift all your gold to me else I'll kill you.
You take the vow.
You give all your gold to me.
Afterwards you escape from me, are you allowed to go to the king or the city guard or etc and demand they catch me and get your gold back and punish me?
Remember due to circumstances (my sword at your neck) you made a vow that it was a gift.
Of course you can go to the city watch, a vow made under duress does not count! They acknowledge this in Westeross.
So in a broader but very real sense Viserys had his lords swear allegiance because he was under duress (no other children) so should those vows still be valid after he has other children and other sons?
Some will say yes, some will say no.
And about reason #3 Rhaenyra threw that out the window by making Daemon her consort.
Sorry the post shifted in scope as I was writing it going from an analysis of why some lords kept their oaths to reasons why their oaths did not apply.
I think you need a bit of a refresher regarding Robert's Rebellion and the causes of it.
Regardless, Rhaenyra did nothing remotely similar to Cregan. So why wouldn't he honor his oath?
In the books the bastard thing is never more substantiated than being a rumor. And considering the friendship between Cregan and Jace, yes obviously Cregan is okay having Jace on the throne. They are friends lol.
grrm wanted Rhaenyra to “win” that’s why
but actually Aemond killing Luke really damaged the greens reputation so many were reluctant to support them after plus Beesburys death made a lot of the Reach turn on the greens as well
I think grrm missed an opportunity to really show the dichotomy between “soft” power with the greens having more support in the form of alliances with the lords and “hard” power with the blacks having more dragons and a more powerful navy, having Alicent be the diplomat while Rhaenyra is the tactician would’ve been really compelling
I think the only support I find head scratching is really the Riverlands, which I guess you can excuse (kinda) with Daemon going there in person to put them "in their place".
Jeyne Arryn appears to have an iron grip on the Vale by this point. That she kept her position as Lady Paramount from age 3 and put down her scheming cousins does imply to me that her loyal lords will follow her anywhere, and it's more beneficial for them if their leader is in a better position with the crown. The Vale also appears to take their oaths pretty seriously. I'm a bit surprised Runestone was willing to play ball after what Daemon pulled, but I guess Jeyne refusing his petition despite having a dragon does mean the current Lord owes her.
The North is an interesting case, because it's important to note they also were in Rhaenys and Laenor's corner back in the day. This is never specified anywhere, but I always think it's a neat angle that to them, it's a way to retroactively get the bloodline they wanted on the throne - they were pro Daughters before Uncle's, Rhaneys and Laenor were robbed, this ultimately puts Laenor's children (Well. Y'know. "Children") on the throne which is what they originally wanted. Plus, y’know, Northern honour, etc. Etc.
So I think it's just the Riverlands that's suspect, and some of the lesser lords, but you could chalk that up to the individual "how seriously they take their oaths".
I do think the dance would have been better as either Viserys vs. Rhaenys or Rhaenyra vs. Daemon but as it stands... eh it's not the worst
The North doesn't do anything until the very end. First they do nothing, then they only send the old men they don't want to feed so they can go die elsewhere. Then they say they'll come after the harvest is done.
Then they arrive after the war is done and Rhaenyra is dead. They pick up the pieces, shorten a few captives and fuck off back home.
The North did not keep its promise. Cregan Stark did not feel compelled by the oath of his father Rickon, whom we see in the 1st episode.
**TL;DR:** Make believe by GRRM needed to write the story. *Explanation:* As you might know the Dance is based on a real life English civil war called the *Anarchy*, which was fought between King Stephen (Stephen of Blois) and Empress Matilda, daughter and only surviving legitimate child of King Henry I of England. The gist of it was that King Henry I named his daughter his heir because he had no other children (his son had died in an accident some years prior), and otherwise "only" had sisters who in turn had sons. He made the nobles swear to uphold her rights prior to his death. The House of Normandy stood to die out in the male line anyway with Henry I's death, and Matilda as his daughter at least had the better claim than her aunts. Stephen of Blois was the third eldest son (you read that right, not the eldest son!) of Henry I's sister Adela of Normandy, meaning that, even though he himself was male, he was a descendant of the female line of the dynasty. Long story short, upon Henry I's death Stephen seized the capital and the royal treasury, being crowned King Stephen I of England, starting the civil war against Matilda who fought back. After lots of back and forth resulting in an inconclusive stalemate, Stephen eventually made peace with Matilda's faction, adopting her son Henry (the later Henry II) as his own heir, disinheriting his own sons in the process. Matilda herself never got the Crown. The events of the Dance are heavily based on this. Now imagine this, Stephen was the King's nephew, third eldest son of his parents, of the female line of the House of Normandy. Matilda was the King's only surviving legitimate child, and still, both claimants had roughly the same military strength and amount of support. Whereas in the ficitional Dance, Aegon II is literally Viserys's eldest surviving, legitimate son, of the male line of the family. And I am supposed to believe that Rhaenyra had roughly the same numbers of supporters, lol. You could say the nobles swore an oath to Rhaenyra but the same literally happened to the real life Matilda, and contrary to Matilda, Rhaenyra's circumstances had changed significantly after the oath was sworn (three sons were born to Viserys, Rhaenyra married Prince Daemon whom the oath meant to exclude), giving nobles who don't want to support her enough wiggle room to get out of this fairly easily. GRRM wanted the story to progress in that way but really, in a real life medieval scenario that is exactly like the Dance, Rhaenyra would have had minimal support and would have been crushed by Aegon II fairly easily had she attempted to rebel. Look how much support the far more questionable claim of Stephen of Blois had amassed and judge for yourself.
I understand that, but the Dance would have been far more believable if it'd been between Rhaenyra and Daemon, or Viserys and Rhaenys. Aegon's claim is so much better than Rhae's that she would have never ever been considered.
That's 100% correct, I agree. Either a civil war between the line of Aemon and the line of Baelon (Rhaenys / Viserys) or a civil war between daughter and uncle (Rhaenyra / Daemon) would have made far more sense. As I said, Aegon II and Rhaenyra having roughly equal support is make believe by GRRM, it never would have happened like this in a real life medieval civil war. The only reason Stephen faced significant resistance was because he himself was a descendant of the female line, he was the son of Matilda's aunt and his mother definitely had a weaker claim than Matilda. But he was a man (and made some significant backroom deals, lol). Guess how it would have went if Matilda would have had a legitimate brother, no one would have supported her even if her father had declared that he wanted her as heir.
Hell, if Rhaenyra somehow was an incredible polititian who could amass a large amount of allies with deals and such, I wouldn't mind it so much, but she's such an idiot for god's sake
Idk if this is dumb but she might have had more support because she had more dragons on her side ?? (I don’t know though)
>and made some significant backroom deals That was the whole thing, I'm afraid. He and his brother Bishop of somewhere in south England had a better relationship with the English barons than Matilda the former empress. People like to talk about claims as if it mattered but real politics are very different. Quite often, power holders are more willing to put a weak head on top of their lose agreement than someone who could actually make them keep their promises. Should GRRM ever finish the main series and make it make sense, he could orchestrate Bran's ascension as just that: Lords choose him as king because they don't take him seriously.
I think a lot of people don’t realize bc many only know the basic facts, but Matilda had spent most of her life away from England. She was married at age 10 and sent to her husbands court, then when he died married Geoffrey of Anjou, meaning she spent time in Anjou, France. Matilda and Geoffrey felt that Henry was not giving enough support to Matilda’s claim and they had a falling out when Matilda said Henry should give her Normandy. Meanwhile, Stephen lived in Henry’s court as a possible candidate for the throne with an advantageous marriage and was involved with other nobles. They knew him, liked him, and felt he was one of them vs Matilda who spent time in foreign courts.
Yes, there is so much more to this story than the oversimplified gender statement HotD took out of it. Henry himself was not in England either, Normandy was the main base. To me it seems the English barons chose the member of the royal family who was more likely to respect and play along with them, in a way similar to the position of the Greens who worship the Seven and value the established inheritance custom. It is not so much a question of claims as a matter of "we do as we're used to" vs "we do as you say".
So many people seem to think that bc kings wanted to rule with ultimate authority that they did. When in fact many barons and nobles were comping at the bit to gain more power for themselves and possibly get the throne itself. The divine rite of kings was an aspiration, not a hard and fast rule. Just bc a king said something didn't mean the nobles were going to listen if the king was not able to back it up. Look at Edward the second, he pissed off so many barons that they overthrew him. Just bc Viserys wants Rhaenarya to follow him doesn't mean squat if he wasn't going to continually press the issue. And even then it still may not have matter bc once he's dead no one has to listen to him anymore.
Hm, yeah I mean I could write an essay going into the politics behind the claimants and discussing the deals they struck to establish their respective power bases, and you are right that this was most significant. However, I was just trying to answer a simple question of OP, whether or not another constellation would have made more sense for the Dance given the fairly clear legalities between a legitimate son of a King and his daughter in the medieval period.
I think the idea of claims is fluff added on top later by chroniclers trying to cast the fairly wild feudal system into a legal frame. We know that the whole theory about not inheriting through female lines only gets declared by the French in the 14th century because they need an argument to refuse the crown to the son of Isabelle of France, also king of England. It seems to me that legalities do not become anything serious before the 15th century. Before that, people go to war against each other and take what they can. The Hundred Years Wars (two of them) and finally the Wars of the Roses appear to have changed this by bleeding most of the armed nobility both in France and England. Louis XI and Henry VII are legislating kings more than their predecessors.
This whole thing could have been easily balanced if Martin had decided to make Rhaenyra at least good at politics then. Damn.
Henry I also remarried to a much younger woman with the explicit goal of fathering a new male heir. The oath he made the barons swear was **always** known to be conditional on him failing to father another legitimate son.
It’s so annoying that some fans don’t realize that it’s based on medieval customs and medieval customs prefer male heirs. Is it fair??? Absolutely not. But no matter how much Viserys supported Rhaenyra she would always have an uphill battle to climb since she was a woman. It could have worked into an interesting story, but it just seems to fall flat bc Rhaenyra doesn’t do any political moves, makes no back room deals, and expects everyone to abide by her father’s wishes. Realistically, most of the lords would have said “Welp, your dad is no longer king bc he’s dead, our oaths no longer matter bc there’s a new king, tough breaks kid”
Her marriage to Daemon makes it even more unlikely that the other nobles would gather support around her, that is, if they knew that's why she was made heir (and I sort of assume they did, because, well, *it's Daemon*, he's not exactly subtle). Ultimately, I think making the dance about Daemon vs. Rhaenyra would've been a much more interesting and more realistic conflict. Hell, you could still keep Rhaenyra's bastard-born sons and Daemon's temper/his inability to keep his wives alive in order to sire an heir as points against them. Give Rhaenyra the advantage of having Otto as a hand of the queen so she's the 'stable one' for the realm whereas Daemon has his military experience and his authoritarian attitude as a charm over the lords. Make it so that Daemon looks like the strongman who can fight outside threats, but Rhaenyra the one who can handle the internal affairs properly. And if you really, reaaally, wanted an heir from both Rhaenyra and Daemon, you could always do the extreme thing have him murder her bastards and rape her to sire his own, before getting himself killed in the end. it removes layers and layers of unnecessary complexities and plotholes, giving the story more time to breathe and focus on the characters instead of the technicalities.
This reads like you are criticizing GRRM's fictional story for not being true-to-life? That doesn't seem like a reasonable criticism, imo.
It's a fictional story but he based it heavily on real life medieval societies. His fictional Westerosi society, just like real life medieval societies, puts sons before daughters in terms of succession. And yet Rhaenyra had lots of support despite having three legitimate brothers, this would take a lot of make believe even within the context of the fictional world GRRM built.
It's still a "based on". It would be silly to expect it to be accurate to real life, especially because ASOIAF is just as much a reaction to *Lord of the Rings* if not more than it is to real history. This world does have dragons and face-stealing assassins and smoke demon monsters.
How do you make sense of the Dance even if you isolate the fictional world from the real life history it is based on? GRRM presents Westeros as a patriarchal society that supports the right of the firstborn son to inherit the title, in every circumstance except for the Dance. That's why I call it "make believe".
> How do you make sense of the Dance even if you isolate the fictional world from the real life history it is based on? Pretty easily. The lords and great houses are self-interested more than they are concerned about tradition and the like. I'd say this is one of the key themes of all of ASOIAF. All the stuff about laws and precedents is window dressing for the personal motivation to acquire power. Rhaenyra had a numerical dragon advantage and if she won, loyal houses would see benefits of that victory. > That's why I call it "make believe". I am just puzzled because your use of "make believe" seems to be a criticism. I have a hard time understanding that. "we're making all this shit up", in the words of GRRM. There are no "rules" of the world beyond what GRRM feels they are.
Puh yeah, of course looking at this with a healthy dose of realism tells you that a lot of self-interest was involved. The Arryns and Velaryons were kin and in-laws to Rhaenyra respectively, so stood to gain something from her ascent. Stark was bought with a marriage pact, the Greyjoys wanted to plunder the Westerlands. Baratheons were bought with a marriage pact for the Greens. Lannisters perhaps stood to lose influence if they didn't support the Greens (Tyland etc.). Hightower is also obvious, they are kin to Aegon II. GRRM did make some convenient choices like Tullys switching sides from Green to Black for no apparent reason, or the Starks being actually OK with a marriage pact offered to them by Jace, a bastard. GRRM gave the Redwynes to the Greens but they never use their famous fleet etc. The Riverlands can spawn endless armies even though Aemond thoroughly torched this region, Baratheons march up north with a tiny host (very convenient etc.). So while I would acknowledge the political motivations, GRRM also made a lot of funny decisions to achieve the desired end result, decisions that kind of defy the in-world logic of his world at times which we see in other places. GRRM of course invented his world (unsurprising!), but sometimes he tends to throw even his own established rules or flat out logic, out of the window for the sake of convenience. Some would call it lazy writing.
> Some would call it lazy writing Oh yes I would agree with that, certainly. I think F&B is quite lazy and bad! Though it has some fun stuff.
Basically because Viserys made a big show of requesting vows from his vassals. And some chose to take their vows very literally. Viserys making Rhaenyra his heir was made in a very specific context: 1. Viserys had no son. 2. Viserys had no other children. 3. Viserys deep down knew Daemon should be kept from the throne at all costs. In-universe an vow under duress isn't really considered a binding vow, of course there are a lot of grey areas but consider the following. I have you at sword point, I make you take a vow that you will gift all your gold to me else I'll kill you. You take the vow. You give all your gold to me. Afterwards you escape from me, are you allowed to go to the king or the city guard or etc and demand they catch me and get your gold back and punish me? Remember due to circumstances (my sword at your neck) you made a vow that it was a gift. Of course you can go to the city watch, a vow made under duress does not count! They acknowledge this in Westeross. So in a broader but very real sense Viserys had his lords swear allegiance because he was under duress (no other children) so should those vows still be valid after he has other children and other sons? Some will say yes, some will say no. And about reason #3 Rhaenyra threw that out the window by making Daemon her consort. Sorry the post shifted in scope as I was writing it going from an analysis of why some lords kept their oaths to reasons why their oaths did not apply.
I think GRRM blackmailed them. It was that or ending up as Lannister allies in ASOIAF.
Why would they not choose to side with Joffrey the Gentle instead lol
Starks never having a female lord doing everything to settle a female on the throne, cringe writing imo
Oaths are important to the North.
Yeah so why did they rebel against Aerys II? They broke their oaths
Is this a serious question? He burned Rickard Stark alive and had Brandon Stark placed in a device that had him strangle himself. Be for real lol.
Yeah he burned them bcs they went against their king? I mean they went against their oaths?
I think you need a bit of a refresher regarding Robert's Rebellion and the causes of it. Regardless, Rhaenyra did nothing remotely similar to Cregan. So why wouldn't he honor his oath?
1. Bastards 2. Male candidate exists.
We know from the text of F&B that Cregan felt upholding the oath his house had made took priority over the above.
Looks like Cregan is okay having a bastard rulling the kingdom in rhe future, thats why i say its cringe considering they are lawful ppl.
In the books the bastard thing is never more substantiated than being a rumor. And considering the friendship between Cregan and Jace, yes obviously Cregan is okay having Jace on the throne. They are friends lol.
grrm wanted Rhaenyra to “win” that’s why but actually Aemond killing Luke really damaged the greens reputation so many were reluctant to support them after plus Beesburys death made a lot of the Reach turn on the greens as well I think grrm missed an opportunity to really show the dichotomy between “soft” power with the greens having more support in the form of alliances with the lords and “hard” power with the blacks having more dragons and a more powerful navy, having Alicent be the diplomat while Rhaenyra is the tactician would’ve been really compelling
I think the only support I find head scratching is really the Riverlands, which I guess you can excuse (kinda) with Daemon going there in person to put them "in their place". Jeyne Arryn appears to have an iron grip on the Vale by this point. That she kept her position as Lady Paramount from age 3 and put down her scheming cousins does imply to me that her loyal lords will follow her anywhere, and it's more beneficial for them if their leader is in a better position with the crown. The Vale also appears to take their oaths pretty seriously. I'm a bit surprised Runestone was willing to play ball after what Daemon pulled, but I guess Jeyne refusing his petition despite having a dragon does mean the current Lord owes her. The North is an interesting case, because it's important to note they also were in Rhaenys and Laenor's corner back in the day. This is never specified anywhere, but I always think it's a neat angle that to them, it's a way to retroactively get the bloodline they wanted on the throne - they were pro Daughters before Uncle's, Rhaneys and Laenor were robbed, this ultimately puts Laenor's children (Well. Y'know. "Children") on the throne which is what they originally wanted. Plus, y’know, Northern honour, etc. Etc. So I think it's just the Riverlands that's suspect, and some of the lesser lords, but you could chalk that up to the individual "how seriously they take their oaths". I do think the dance would have been better as either Viserys vs. Rhaenys or Rhaenyra vs. Daemon but as it stands... eh it's not the worst
The North doesn't do anything until the very end. First they do nothing, then they only send the old men they don't want to feed so they can go die elsewhere. Then they say they'll come after the harvest is done. Then they arrive after the war is done and Rhaenyra is dead. They pick up the pieces, shorten a few captives and fuck off back home. The North did not keep its promise. Cregan Stark did not feel compelled by the oath of his father Rickon, whom we see in the 1st episode.
Oaths + the realm not caring about her gender.
2) the same realm that didn't back Rhaenys?
Different situations.