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Was Robert's Rebellion indeed based on a lie?


Ser Meryn Frey

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In the last episode of season 7, Bran the Almighty said "Robert's Rebellion was based on a lie", but I do not think this is true.

Yes: Lyanna was not abducted, and she followed Rhaegar willingly.

But since the rebellion didn't start because of this, but because King Aerys burned Rickard and strangled Brandon to death, and asked for the heads of Robert and Ned, it was not based on a lie. Jon Arryn did NOT raise his banners because the fiancée of his ward was "abducted", and no declaration of war was done on Rickard's/Brandon's parts either. The shit hit the fan when the Mad King decided he could kill whomever he wanted to.

One could argue that it started before that - that it started with Lyanna/Rhaegar running off, but in that case it started long before that, as Rhaegar crowned Lyanna QoLaB a year past. And before that, the Mad King's wife gave birth to Rhaegar. THAT has to be the start. Oh, no, wait ... she also had parents, et cetera. Something important always comes after something else (unless Planetos' universe had a Big Bang as well, but you get what I mean).

The rebellion started because the Mad King was batshit insane and murdered people left and right (like the two hundred northmen with Rickard), and wanted to continue this. This is not a lie, and therefore Robert's Rebellion was NOT based on a lie.

 

What do you think?

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The Rebellion was not based on a lie. The Rebellion was based on the horrific murders of Lord Rickard Stark of the North, His eldest child and heir, Brandon Stark, The Heir to Jon Arryn in the Vale, other heirs to lordships of the North who accompanied Brandon to KL when it was reported, accurately, that Married Prince Rheagar had abducted and or met with and left off together with Brandon's betrothed to Robert Baratheon, sister Lyanna Stark. If Rheagar wanted to marry her and "legall" dump his wife of years, who bared his children, making them bastards, then he should have had the respect to let her father know what he intended. Hell, it would have enhanced the North's prestige but Rheagar did not do that. He was the adult. Lyanna was a 15 year old girl, him 25+ years old. No matter how you look at it, Rheagar and his father, Mad King Aery's II caused it.

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On 29.08.2017 at 7:52 PM, Erkan12 said:

The Rebellion didn't start on a lie. The main reason was Aerys' madness, and Rhaegar's incompetence on overthrowing his mad father in time before the things gets worse, he waited too long for his father's stupidity and ignored his crimes for too long, and then they had a rebellion in their hands.

Being with Lyanna was the end point, but then Lyanna was promised to the House Baratheon, not House Targaryen. Lyanna should obey his father Rickard Stark and she knew that they wrong and which is why they escaped from all of these.

Not only that Rhaegar was already married, and with another great house. It's really idiotic to expect nothing after all of these, and Rhaegar did nothing to prevent the Rebellion, he just made it worse. He didn't explain anything to anyone else, instead he just took Lyanna to ToJ even when he knew that his father wasn't in any condition where he can keep the peace in the realm, he knew his father better than anyone, yet he choosed to ignore Aerys's madness and let him to deal with the consqeuences.

Rhaegar was selfish, Lyanna was ungrateful to her own House.

 

Ned knew all of these, he knew that Lyanna was stupid and wrong, yet she was still his sister, and he did a last favor to her by taking his bastard as his son. That's all. He had no regret on it, because Rhaegar, Lyanna, and especially Aerys were wrong and the Rebellion was right.

 

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I think we are confusing wether the rebellion was justified with how it was actually started. Robert announced that Lyanna was abducted,  thus prompting Brandon Stark to go demand her release. 

The real question is did Robert know that Lyanna willingly left with Rhaegar or did he lie about that out of anger or pride?

Had Robert known/ accepted that Lyanna left willingly, Brandon would not have demanded her release, been killed, the rest of the seven kingdoms would not have rebelled, etc

Would Aerys have eventually done something else crazy enough to warrant such a rebellion?  Possibly but we can't know for sure

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Who told Brandon? He was on his way from Riverrun to join his father coming from the North for his wedding. What was said to him? I don't think Robert was there and already knew. Anyway, he went straight to KL, with his escort Ethan Glover, Kyle Royce, Elbert Arryn, and Jeffory Mallister. Not even waiting for his father. If he had not shouted for Rhaegar to "come out and die", maybe things would have happened differently.

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5 hours ago, The Greenseer said:

We are still missing the central question:

Did Robert know that Lyanna ran off with Rhaegar willingly and make up the abduction story?

if not Robert then who would've made up the story?   Perhaps Rhaegar and Lyanna?

Maybe Rhaegar and Lyanna organized it so that it looks like an abduction. But the consequences would be what we had, considering the Mad King's temper. Any of Rhaegar, the Starks or Robert could die of that. I don't think they did that or made the story later.

Apparently the first one to conclude to the abduction was Brandon. And Robert to follow his conclusion.

But maybe someone lied to the king too, about the meaning of the abduction? Transforming a love affair in a rebellion.

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6 hours ago, The Greenseer said:

We are still missing the central question:

Did Robert know that Lyanna ran off with Rhaegar willingly and make up the abduction story?

if not Robert then who would've made up the story?   Perhaps Rhaegar and Lyanna?

 

50 minutes ago, BalerionTheCat said:

Maybe Rhaegar and Lyanna organized it so that it looks like an abduction. But the consequences would be what we had, considering the Mad King's temper. Any of Rhaegar, the Starks or Robert could die of that. I don't think they did that or made the story later.

Apparently the first one to conclude to the abduction was Brandon. And Robert to follow his conclusion.

But maybe someone lied to the king too, about the meaning of the abduction? Transforming a love affair in a rebellion.

I'm partial to the crazy "the Maesters 'lost' all the letters explaining the situation" theory. I don't necessarily believe it, but I like the idea they're up to more than they're letting on.

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i think the war, from ned and arryn's perception started with the deaths of rickard and brandon. but robert was their figure head, and it was his betrothed that rhaegar ran off with. robert has this bad habit of making things personal, i think it has something to do with his temper, very quick to be a friend and very quick to be an enemy. since it was his betrothed, he turned this war to resist and depose the mad king into his personal vendetta against rhaegar. when rhaegar died, he extended that vendetta to include all targaryens, regardless of if they had anything to do with the war or not, thus including daenerys and viserys. and when he finds out that lyanna is dead after being away with rhaegar, he blames that death on rhaegar as well, and feeds his rage hard-on for targs, so that even after 20 years of targs being powerless and in exile, the very mention of their names brings him to a frothing rage. and since he became king, not like anyone was going to contradict him.

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Rhaegar and Lyanna planned and acted as if he "kidnapped" her on swordpoints. The purpose is probably to make Lyanna and house Stark look better. in stead of a defiant Stark woman eloping with a married man and breaking their holy betrothal with House Baratheon, Lyanna became an innocent victim and house Stark could keep their hinor and promise intact. It sounds like something which our brave and honorable Lyanna would request from Rhaegar.

ANd yes, this rebellion was based on a lie, a lie made by Rhaegar and Lyanna. 

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I agree with those who disagree with the narrative. Game of thrones, and the books, are built upon harsh reality destroying your fairytale. Sansa should be the stand in for fans. She has this fantasy in her head and she gets abused left and right until she finally understands that the world she lives in ain't a fantasy. 

 

Even if the two eloped and secretly were in love, that doesn't matter. Her father and brother were killed for it. And her brother and ex were about to be killed too. House Stark as we know it was about to go extinct cause no way tye mad king was gonna stop. 

 

When Lyanna was "kidnapped" there wasn't a war. People made demands, but there was no war. The war started because the king straight up disregarded his lord paramount and the established law of the land. Then went on to murder these nobles and let everyone know that he doesn't care one lick about their title. 

 

If the "kidnapping" never happened, and lord stark was upset about how Rhaegar disrespect his daughters honor and wanted recompense, he may have still gotten burned and the war would still be on. 

 

The kidnapping was the catalyst, but the war was fought because the king went mad. If it was only because a girl (any girl) was kidnapped, none of the other lords would have joined in. They helped cause arys was a huge threat to everyone and they knew he may come for them next. The dude was senile. 

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On 9/3/2017 at 5:30 AM, Graydon Hicks said:

i think the war, from ned and arryn's perception started with the deaths of rickard and brandon. but robert was their figure head, and it was his betrothed that rhaegar ran off with. robert has this bad habit of making things personal, i think it has something to do with his temper, very quick to be a friend and very quick to be an enemy. since it was his betrothed, he turned this war to resist and depose the mad king into his personal vendetta against rhaegar. when rhaegar died, he extended that vendetta to include all targaryens, regardless of if they had anything to do with the war or not, thus including daenerys and viserys. and when he finds out that lyanna is dead after being away with rhaegar, he blames that death on rhaegar as well, and feeds his rage hard-on for targs, so that even after 20 years of targs being powerless and in exile, the very mention of their names brings him to a frothing rage. and since he became king, not like anyone was going to contradict him.

Well, Aerys did call for Robert's head as well.

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yet we never hear robert froth over aerys calling for his execution. he only seems to remember rhaegar taking lyanna. he focused almost exclusively on rhaegar, then the other targaryens became more like an after thought, a loose end to be tied up, then sort of became the surrogate rhaegar for him to hate, since they were still alive. cause he never got lyanna back from rhaegr, so in his mind, rhaegar won. robert may have killed him, but rhaegar got lyanna, so rhaegar won.

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On 9/2/2017 at 7:42 AM, The Greenseer said:

I think we are confusing wether the rebellion was justified with how it was actually started. Robert announced that Lyanna was abducted,  thus prompting Brandon Stark to go demand her release. 

The real question is did Robert know that Lyanna willingly left with Rhaegar or did he lie about that out of anger or pride?

Had Robert known/ accepted that Lyanna left willingly, Brandon would not have demanded her release, been killed, the rest of the seven kingdoms would not have rebelled, etc

Would Aerys have eventually done something else crazy enough to warrant such a rebellion?  Possibly but we can't know for sure

This. 

Most likely Brandon does not even go to KL if not for this lie. 

Similar to the War of the Five Kings. Technically it started when Catlyn abducts Tyrion but she never would have done that if not for Littlefinger's lie. 

Now the key question is who lied?

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