What was Rhaegar Targaryen thinking?

[UnmaskedLurker]

1 minute ago, thelittledragonthatcould said:

No, not really.

While we, the book readers, can see that some prophesies may have a shed of truth to them the people in Westeros view prophesies in much the same way that people believed in them in our own middle ages. We only have to look at Luwin's reaction to Bran's dreams. The educated don't tend to believe in them, the desperate and superstitious do.

 

But wouldn't it be intelligent to believe in Bran's dream (they are accurate, after all)? And we know that Aemon believes in the prophecy. Aren't we supposed to consider him to be both wise and intelligent? I think the readers are supposed to understand that in this world -- magic is real and prophecy is real -- and a lot of the "sophisticated and educated" people refuse to believe in this stuff -- but they are wrong to dismiss it. The truly intelligent and insightful are the ones who see the real danger -- the Others, for example --and realize that the prophecy is a real warning.

[Greymoon]

42 minutes ago, Kal-L said:

I don't really get how the absene of the Warden of the North was quite telling about his loyalty, I mean we know the North isn't all for that kind of festivities (Tourney) so I don't find it so surprising he decided to let his children have fun while he stayed at Winterfell (after all a Stark have to stay there).

Ned would be there with Robert and Jon, Lyanna had to be there to meet with the 'South traditions' and her betrothed, Brandon was the heir and couldn't have missed it so at the end only Benjen could have stayed back and I guess he might have been unfair for him to miss the biggest events of the realm where all the greatest knights would fight.

We are talking about the greatest tourney seen in along time, the event of the century. All of the realms who's who is meant to attend. Boycotting such an event is not only ostracizing yourself from the rest of the realm, its making a political statement, especially if Rhaegar was involved in the planning of the tourney.

Sure, all of the Stark children were there. It's still an insult not to come personally, though.

 

[Greymoon]

25 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

Two more squires, Arthur's and Oswell's, for example.

 

Two unknown characters. Like I said, we can make them up or we can look at characters we already know.

[purple-eyes]

56 minutes ago, Greymoon said:

by deduction, Lewyn is a strong candidate.Who could Rhaegar's companions possibly be?

we can add completely unknown characters to the story, or we can look at characters we know had ties to Rhaegar.

We know Arthur Dayne and Oswell Whent were part of it and that Jaime and Barristan weren't. Rhaegar had two squires: Myles Mooton and Richard Lonmouth. The later is mentioned in the tale of the KotLT, as told by Meera Reed, so he seems like a character we should pay attention to.

that's four companions counting two white cloaks and two squires. Who else? Jon Connington views himself as a good friend of Rhaegar's, he also happens to be mentioned in the tale of the KotLT. Sure, he doesn't appear to have been involved in the plot later on, but that does not eliminate him as a potential ally for the first part of it. The same goes for Lewyn Martell. Among the remaining Kingsguard he would seem like the most likely candidate to chose loyalty to Rhaegar over loyalty to Aerys, just because of Elia.

(Gerold Hightower was LC and Jonothor Darry showed his loyalty to Aerys when he failed to protect Rhaella from her husband.)

And before you argue against that, this only works if Rhaegar's motivations were not love and his goal was not to elope with Lyanna. And that's the theory I adhere too. You are free to adhere to your own theory and attribute other motivations to the characters, but keep in mind that I argue from a different stand point and do not believe that love and prophecy were Rhaegar's motivations.

Though I do believe in R+L = J

 

 

 

I know you are talking ably politics. 

There are only 7 KG and aerys used to feel so unsafe that he had to have all of them with him to go around. What make you think he will be fine let rhaegar take almost half of them out of town without even knowing why and where? It was written in app that rhaegar abducted lyanna with aid of whent and arthur. For somebody as important as oswell, if not more,  like lewyn, he should have been mentioned. 

[thelittledragonthatcould]

7 minutes ago, Greymoon said:

his plan was not to alienate them by giving Lyanna the crown. In this theory, crowning Lyanna and later, rescuing her are two somewhat independent actions.

Well there is absolutely no evidence in the books that he rescued her.

And yes, crowning her was a monumentally stupid action as it alienated the Lord of the Stormlands, the Lord of Dorne and the heir of the North (and their allies). It was both dumb and arrogant.

Just now, Greymoon said:

Two unknown characters. Like I said, we can make them up or we can look at characters we already know.

That is hardly making them up. Knights have squires, that is just a fact.

 

3 minutes ago, UnmaskedLurker said:

But wouldn't it be intelligent to believe in Bran's dream (they are accurate, after all)?

It is easy to say that with the benefit of hindsight. Rhaegar's prophesy seems to be terribly inconsistent and is used as a basis to give into his lust and run off with whatever young girl he is most attracted to.

 

5 minutes ago, Greymoon said:

We are talking about the greatest tourney seen in along time, the event of the century.

Hardly. In retrospect it looks more important because of the effect it had leading up to the war but it was not anything hugely special. Certainly not the event of a century.

[Greymoon]

Just now, purple-eyes said:

I know you are talking ably politics. 

There are only 7 KG and aerys used to feel so unsafe that he had to have all of them with him to go around. What make you think he will be fine let rhaegar take almost half of them out of town without even knowing why and where? It was written in app that rhaegar abducted lyanna with aid of whent and arthur. For somebody as important as oswell, if not more,  like lewyn, he should have been mentioned. 

it's written in the app because that's the information we have been given in the books. What we don't know is not yet in the app, else the app would be spoilery.

It's not. So most information in the app is information already found in the books. Nothing new. We however do know that Rhaegar left with more than two companions. Lewyn is a suggestion, to me, he seems a strong possibility for the reasons I mentioned above, and because he does not require us to invent another character who could possibly be loyal to Rhaegar in a political move against Aerys.

[Kal-L]

Just now, Greymoon said:

We are talking about the greatest tourney seen in along time, the event of the century. All of the realms who's who is meant to attend. Boycotting such an event is not only ostracizing yourself from the rest of the realm, its making a political statement, especially if Rhaegar was involved in the planning of the tourney.

Sure, all of the Stark children were there. It's still an insult not to come personally, though.

 

I fail to see how it is an insult honestly, it's not as though all Stark family missed it -and even though they did, Stark were known to not involve into the South business- all children, the future of the House were there to represent the family (at the end the only one who stayed was the Stark who had to stay at Winterfell). I honestly don't see how could Rhaegar had took it as a slight especially as again the Stark aren't used to come in the South.

Besides the attendance to the Tourney isn't a duty, Rhaegar used the price to attract all the great House and the knights of the 7K, Brandon was the most likely to attend it however an lord like Rickard had absolutely nothing to gain here.

[purple-eyes]

1 minute ago, Greymoon said:

it's written in the app because that's the information we have been given in the books. What we don't know is not yet in the app, else the app would be spoilery.

It's not. So most information in the app is information already found in the books. Nothing new. We however do know that Rhaegar left with more than two companions. Lewyn is a suggestion, to me, he seems a strong possibility for the reasons I mentioned above, and because he does not require us to invent another character who could possibly be loyal to Rhaegar in a political move against Aerys.

Nope, app has spoilers, especially on false spring and RR. 

I would rather believe they are squires of arthur and oswell or rhaegar's current two squires. 

Lonmouth and mooton are his previous squires FYI. They are knights by then. 

 

[Greymoon]

2 minutes ago, thelittledragonthatcould said:

1) Well there is absolutely no evidence in the books that he rescued her.

And yes, crowning her was a monumentally stupid action as it alienated the Lord of the Stormlands, the Lord of Dorne and the heir of the North (and their allies). It was both dumb and arrogant.

2) That is hardly making them up. Knights have squires, that is just a fact.

 

It is easy to say that with the benefit of hindsight. Rhaegar's prophesy seems to be terribly inconsistent and is used as a basis to give into his lust and run off with whatever young girl he is most attracted to.

 

Hardly. In retrospect it looks more important because of the effect it had leading up to the war but it was not anything hugely special. Certainly not the event of a century.

1) read the rescue theory.

There is evidence, hinted at by Martin himself, that all is not as it seems. There's a SSM stating that eloping or running away from an arranged marriage was absolutely not done in the middle ages.

Why is it so easy for some people to accept that Rhaegar was a fool, when, by all means, no one besides Robert thinks badly of him? Not even Ned. Why do people easily state that he was obsessed with the prophecy and acted to fulfill it, when there is evidence he believed Aegon to be the PtwP and little evidence that he changed his mind or thought he must have a child with Lyanna? 

Why accept that he was so politically inapt that he believed it a great idea to hide away in a remote tower with an underage girl, without ever anticipating any consequences, at a time when Aerys's rule was becoming increasingly erratic?

We have evidence he meant to act against his father (through Jaime, through Yandel). So why do people insist on putting all of this aside, in favor of casting Rhaegar as a lovesick, prophecy obsessed, fool? 

2) how many Kingsguard have squires? Jaime is the only one that comes to mind. And why haven't we heard of these two? If one of these if Gerold Dayne, ok, why not. Already introduced. But I don't see why we should go with two characters we can only assume existed, when there are other characters linked to Rhaegar in the books, that can have been involved.

[purple-eyes]

22 minutes ago, Greymoon said:

We are talking about the greatest tourney seen in along time, the event of the century. All of the realms who's who is meant to attend. Boycotting such an event is not only ostracizing yourself from the rest of the realm, its making a political statement, especially if Rhaegar was involved in the planning of the tourney.

Sure, all of the Stark children were there. It's still an insult not to come personally, though.

 

Hoster tully seem to be missing too. Not just Rickard. 

Both Tywin and doran (likely) were missing too. Kevan and oberyn were there and mentioned. 

For LP, we only have mace, jon and robert. Three out of seven. 

It is not a sign of treason or unfaithfulness. 

[purple-eyes]

3 minutes ago, Greymoon said:

1) read the rescue theory.

There is evidence, hinted at by Martin himself, that all is not as it seems. There's a SSM stating that eloping or running away from an arranged marriage was absolutely not done in the middle ages.

Why is it so easy for some people to accept that Rhaegar was a fool, when, by all means, no one besides Robert thinks badly of him? Not even Ned. Why do people easily state that he was obsessed with the prophecy and acted to fulfill it, when there is evidence he believed Aegon to be the PtwP and little evidence that he changed his mind or thought he must have a child with Lyanna? 

Why accept that he was so politically inapt that he believed it a great idea to hide away in a remote tower with an underage girl, without ever anticipating any consequences, at a time when Aerys's rule was becoming increasingly erratic?

We have evidence he meant to act against his father (through Jaime, through Yandel). So why do people insist on putting all of this aside, in favor of casting Rhaegar as a lovesick, prophecy obsessed, fool? 

2) how many Kingsguard have squires? Jaime is the only one that comes to mind. And why haven't we heard of these two? If one of these if Gerold Dayne, ok, why not. Already introduced. But I don't see why we should go with two characters we can only assume existed, when there are other characters linked to Rhaegar in the books, that can have been involved.

Grrm only said high born girl will not run with a stable boy, not a crown prince and future king. Many noble girls would be eager to elope or sleep with princes or carry their bastards. 

At this point, IMHO, It is quite safe to say lyanna is mad in love with rhaegar and it is quite safe to say rhaegar is very focused in prophecy. 

Rest of them, not sure. 

 

[purple-eyes]

Tourney is likely more attractive to young lords and knights. 

For older guys like Rickard, Tywin and hoster, it is not surprising they do not show up. And doran, who seems not very Athletic. 

Mace is young and robert is young. Jon aryyn is physically close to harrenhal, so they showed up. 

[grinny]

20 minutes ago, Greymoon said:

1) read the rescue theory.

There is evidence, hinted at by Martin himself, that all is not as it seems. There's a SSM stating that eloping or running away from an arranged marriage was absolutely not done in the middle ages.

Why is it so easy for some people to accept that Rhaegar was a fool, when, by all means, no one besides Robert thinks badly of him? Not even Ned. Why do people easily state that he was obsessed with the prophecy and acted to fulfill it, when there is evidence he believed Aegon to be the PtwP and little evidence that he changed his mind or thought he must have a child with Lyanna? 

Why accept that he was so politically inapt that he believed it a great idea to hide away in a remote tower with an underage girl, without ever anticipating any consequences, at a time when Aerys's rule was becoming increasingly erratic?

We have evidence he meant to act against his father (through Jaime, through Yandel). So why do people insist on putting all of this aside, in favor of casting Rhaegar as a lovesick, prophecy obsessed, fool? 

2) how many Kingsguard have squires? Jaime is the only one that comes to mind. And why haven't we heard of these two? If one of these if Gerold Dayne, ok, why not. Already introduced. But I don't see why we should go with two characters we can only assume existed, when there are other characters linked to Rhaegar in the books, that can have been involved.

Mostly because non of what he did made any sense, if it was for a political plot.

If the plot was to use her as leverage against Richard and Robert to help him get rid of his father and the whole thing started to early and not on his terms.

Do that exactly thing but with Ned and Robert. There was no letter telling them: hey I actual saved her from my father, for being the kotlt. So let's work together and get rid of my father.

And let Lyanna write a letter to saying the same: he is keeping me save bla bla bla...

He didn't. So why didn't he if that was more or less the plan from the beginning. And to fall that fast for your political hostage is a special kind of stupid...

[Greymoon]

30 minutes ago, purple-eyes said:

Grrm only said high born girl will not run with a stable boy, not a crown prince and future king. Many noble girls would be eager to elope or sleep with princes or carry their bastards. 

At this point, IMHO, It is quite safe to say lyanna is mad in love with rhaegar and it is quite safe to say rhaegar is very focused in prophecy. 

Rest of them, not sure. 

 

It was really not done to run away from an arrange marriage. If you wish to understand GRRM's point to be mostly about the status of the husband, fine. But I beg to differ, it is not "safe to say that Lyanna was mad in love with Rhaegar" or "Rhaegar is very focused in prophecy". The bit about the prophecy comes to us through Maester Aemon and Dany's vision in the HotU.

Maester Aemon does not say that Rhaegar was obsessed with the prophecy. He says that Rhaegar believed in it. There is a difference. He also says that Rhaegar believed Aegon to be the PtwP. Sure, Rhaegar read something when he was a boy, that made him turn toward swords. But where does it ever say that the boy and the man must believe in the same things?

The vision of the HotU shows us a plausible interaction that Rhaegar had with Elia. I say plausible, because we are talking about the HotU. The visions are not 100% accurate. Some are right out false, others are metaphors and open to interpretation. Why should this one be 100% true?

Anyway. In the vision, Rhaegar confirms that Aegon is the PtwP and says "there must be one more". He does not say "with Lyanna Stark" or "Lyanna is the girl that will help fulfill the prophecy". In fact, this line of thinking is entirely made up by fans. We do not know what motivated Rhaegar to pay attention to Lyanna in the first place - it's all based upon speculation. We can't even be a 100% certain that Rhaegar wanted three children and that's it. Kevan Lannister speaks of "sons".

When we look at the war of the 5K we have a multitude of players with multiple interests and a multitude of events finally culminating in open war. GRRM has shown us how complex war can be, how complex the motivations of people can be. Why should Robert's rebellion have started in a different manner? Why reduce Rhaegar to a man with a single intend? and a foolish one atop of that?

[UnmaskedLurker]

Just now, thelittledragonthatcould said:

It is easy to say that with the benefit of hindsight. Rhaegar's prophesy seems to be terribly inconsistent and is used as a basis to give into his lust and run off with whatever young girl he is most attracted to.

No, not just hindsight. This is a world where prophecies are repeatedly seen as coming true. This is a world that has dragons, after all. It is arrogant to dismiss these clues -- and as noted, Aemon does not. As to whether Rhaegar used the prophecy to justify running off with Lyanna is something we don't know yet -- but we know he was focused on fulfilling the prophecy long before he even met Lyanna.

[Greymoon]

36 minutes ago, grinny said:

Mostly because non of what he did made any sense, if it was for a political plot.

If the plot was to use her as leverage against Richard and Robert to help him get rid of his father and the whole thing started to early and not on his terms.

Do that exactly thing but with Ned and Robert. There was no letter telling them: hey I actual saved her from my father, for being the kotlt. So let's work together and get rid of my father.

And let Lyanna write a letter to saying the same: he is keeping me save bla bla bla...

He didn't. So why didn't he if that was more or less the plan from the beginning. And to fall that fast for your political hostage is a special kind of stupid...

I addressed that issue earlier, I believe. I'd add also that in spite of the surprising frequency of ravens arriving at destination, we are talking about a fictional realm that has no modern, reliable, postal service.

[WSmith84]

Probably 'damn, I gotta get me a piece of that Northern ass!'

[purple-eyes]

19 minutes ago, Greymoon said:

It was really not done to run away from an arrange marriage. If you wish to understand GRRM's point to be mostly about the status of the husband, fine. But I beg to differ, it is not "safe to say that Lyanna was mad in love with Rhaegar" or "Rhaegar is very focused in prophecy". The bit about the prophecy comes to us through Maester Aemon and Dany's vision in the HotU.

Maester Aemon does not say that Rhaegar was obsessed with the prophecy. He says that Rhaegar believed in it. There is a difference. He also says that Rhaegar believed Aegon to be the PtwP. Sure, Rhaegar read something when he was a boy, that made him turn toward swords. But where does it ever say that the boy and the man must believe in the same things?

The vision of the HotU shows us a plausible interaction that Rhaegar had with Elia. I say plausible, because we are talking about the HotU. The visions are not 100% accurate. Some are right out false, others are metaphors and open to interpretation. Why should this one be 100% true?

Anyway. In the vision, Rhaegar confirms that Aegon is the PtwP and says "there must be one more". He does not say "with Lyanna Stark" or "Lyanna is the girl that will help fulfill the prophecy". In fact, this line of thinking is entirely made up by fans. We do not know what motivated Rhaegar to pay attention to Lyanna in the first place - it's all based upon speculation. We can't even be a 100% certain that Rhaegar wanted three children and that's it. Kevan Lannister speaks of "sons".

When we look at the war of the 5K we have a multitude of players with multiple interests and a multitude of events finally culminating in open war. GRRM has shown us how complex war can be, how complex the motivations of people can be. Why should Robert's rebellion have started in a different manner? Why reduce Rhaegar to a man with a single intend? and a foolish one atop of that?

I agree rhaegar's motivation is a complex one. Likely A combination of his desire in lyanna and his belief in prophecy. And I also agree he knows politics, although not that excellent in it. 

But this does not mean his "abduction" is a political move to remove aerys or a rescue of lyanna from aerys. It does not fit with the texts and plots. 

[King Viserys Targaryen IV]

2 minutes ago, purple-eyes said:

I agree rhaegar's motivation is a complex one. Likely A combination of his desire in lyanna and his belief in prophecy. And I also agree he knows politics, although not that excellent in it. 

But this does not mean his "abduction" is a political move to remove aerys or a rescue of lyanna from aerys. It does not fit with the texts and plots. 

But it does fit.

If he was Aerys was not moving to arrest Lyanna, then explain the timing.

There is no reason what so ever that Rhaegar needs to move at that time to take Lyanna. None. There needs to be a reason he would do it when he did.

We know from the World Book that TKotLT extremely bothered Aerys and he declared him an enemy. We know that Aerys backers were looking for reason to call Rhaegar and any other that might join with Rhaegar as traitors.

A daughter of a Lord Paramount plotting against the King (in their eyes), The Crown Prince hiding her secret, a secret alliance between the Stark's allies and Rhaegar (in their eyes).

This would be exactly the thing that they were searching for.

 

Otherwise, it does not fit the descriptions we have of Rhaegar. He was an intelligent, studied man who believed in planning. He was not some impetuous love sick idiot.

[OuttaOldtown]

If the consequences are in question then we've yet to see them fulfilled if he indeed had a child with Lyanna. We can only guess the reasoning but my belief is Lyanna was TKatLT, the sigil was a carved weirwood face & this was the sign he was waiting for. We are given limited information on the prophecy of TPtwP, we know he believed he was but that tells us very little as to what it entailed or whether he died believing he was..