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Looking back at the rebellion


Susaku

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Hi, first of all, sorry if this is in a wrong section of the forums, not sure whether this qualifies as a re-read or as part of TWOW.

So after I read all of the books (including Dunk and Egg) and after pressing the 'random' button a few hundred times at work I got to thinking...

In my opinion, things weren't all that bad with the Targaryans in charge, sure there were kings who were clearly insane but at the same time there were those who would've been fantastic kings.

In the beginning I was a really big fan of Robert and his rebellion but after reading just about everything there is to read, I just became sad that the Targaryans are no longer kings.

Long story short, what do my fellow readers think? Was the rebellion a good thing? Did Westeros gain anything by having Robert beeing victorious?

In my personal opinion, I would've liked to see his rebellion fail, Rhaegar had alot of promise to him, not to mention all those other Dragons.

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Things could have gone better, but RR was pretty justified. Aerys was awful and needed to be removed. Rhaegar, whilst he probably would've made a decent king from what we know of him, should've removed his father from power far more quickly. His decision to wait whilst his father grew madder, eventually culminating in the things that kicked off the war, was a really silly move on Rhaegar's part.

Aerys:

- Murdered Brandon and Rickard in a horrible fashion, after promising them a trial.

- Raped and beat his wife.

- Burnt other people alive.

- Demanded the heads of Ned Stark and Robert Baratheon from Jon Arryn.

And then when he realised he was about to be brought to justice for what he did, he decided to burn the entirety of KL and all of it's citizens to death. The guy had to go.

Anyway, I don't really think the Targs were good for Westeros. They're responsible (directly or indirectly) for the biggest wars the continent has ever gone through. They also caused numerous Blackfyre rebellions, and a bunch of their kings were wackjobs. Personally, I'd like Westeros to go back to what it was before Aegon landed. Without dragons, and with the Great Lords being as powerful as they are, there's no real way to ensure Westeros stays united for long.

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Hi, first of all, sorry if this is in a wrong section of the forums, not sure whether this qualifies as a re-read or as part of TWOW.

So after I read all of the books (including Dunk and Egg) and after pressing the 'random' button a few hundred times at work I got to thinking...

In my opinion, things weren't all that bad with the Targaryans in charge, sure there were kings who were clearly insane but at the same time there were those who would've been fantastic kings.

In the beginning I was a really big fan of Robert and his rebellion but after reading just about everything there is to read, I just became sad that the Targaryans are no longer kings.

Long story short, what do my fellow readers think? Was the rebellion a good thing? Did Westeros gain anything by having Robert beeing victorious?

In my personal opinion, I would've liked to see his rebellion fail, Rhaegar had alot of promise to him, not to mention all those other Dragons.

A slight correction to your post; Rhaegar did not have any Dragons...unless of course you are referring in general to Targ's in general. The last dragon died out some 150 years prior to Rhaegar being born. IIRC, around the time of Jaehaery's I. Someone might want to correct me on the actual time period.

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Things could have gone better, but RR was pretty justified. Aerys was awful and needed to be removed. Rhaegar, whilst he probably would've made a decent king from what we know of him, should've removed his father from power far more quickly. His decision to wait whilst his father grew madder, eventually culminating in the things that kicked off the war, was a really silly move on Rhaegar's part.

Aerys:

- Murdered Brandon and Rickard in a horrible fashion, after promising them a trial.

- Raped and beat his wife.

- Burnt other people alive.

- Demanded the heads of Ned Stark and Robert Baratheon from Jon Arryn.

And then when he realised he was about to be brought to justice for what he did, he decided to burn the entirety of KL and all of it's citizens to death. The guy had to go.

Anyway, I don't really think the Targs were good for Westeros. They're responsible (directly or indirectly) for the biggest wars the continent has ever gone through. They also caused numerous Blackfyre rebellions, and a bunch of their kings were wackjobs. Personally, I'd like Westeros to go back to what it was before Aegon landed. Without dragons, and with the Great Lords being as powerful as they are, there's no real way to ensure Westeros stays united for long.

I thought the Blackfyres caused the Blackfyre Rebellion?

Every dynasty has had its share of "wackjobs" as well as great kings as Jaeherys II said "Madness and greatness are two sides of the same coin. Whenever a new Targaryen is born, the gods toss the coin in the air."

I think it's sad what befell the family at the time, with the only bad apples in the family being Aerys and Viserys. They both had it coming, but the rest of the family didn't deserve it.

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I thought the Blackfyres caused the Blackfyre Rebellion?

Every dynasty has had its share of "wackjobs" as well as great kings as Jaeherys II said "Madness and greatness are two sides of the same coin. Whenever a new Targaryen is born, the gods toss the coin in the air."

I think it's sad what befell the family at the time, with the only bad apples in the family being Aerys and Viserys. They both had it coming, but the rest of the family didn't deserve it.

The Blackfyre rebellion occurred when Aegon III handed the kingdom to his son Daeron, but the Targ Sword Blackfyre to his bastard son Daemon Blackfyre. Several "players" encouraged Daemon to legitimize himself as king by overthrowing Daeron.

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The Blackfyre rebellion occurred when Aegon III handed the kingdom to his son Daeron, but the Targ Sword Blackfyre to his bastard son Daemon Blackfyre. Several "players" encouraged Daemon to legitimize himself as king by overthrowing Daeron.

Fair enough, I know Aegon IV was responsible for planting the seeds for the Blackfyre Rebellion, both figuratively and literally. Daemon recieved his encouragement from yes men.

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A slight correction to your post; Rhaegar did not have any Dragons...unless of course you are referring in general to Targ's in general. The last dragon died out some 150 years prior to Rhaegar being born. IIRC, around the time of Jaehaery's I. Someone might want to correct me on the actual time period.

Well when I say Dragons I meant Targs :)

But considering the instability Westeros is in right now (at any stage in the books really) I can't help but wonder at a different scenario, but then again I suppopse that is the beauty of this epic sceries, you can think about the story long after you've finished reading it :)

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Well when I say Dragons I meant Targs :)

But considering the instability Westeros is in right now (at any stage in the books really) I can't help but wonder at a different scenario, but then again I suppopse that is the beauty of this epic sceries, you can think about the story long after you've finished reading it :)

And we apparently have a very long time to think about the story before the next book comes out..... :bawl:

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I thought the Blackfyres caused the Blackfyre Rebellion?

As has been said, Targs planted the seeds, and a Targ in all-but-name kicked off the war.

Every dynasty has had its share of "wackjobs" as well as great kings as Jaeherys II said "Madness and greatness are two sides of the same coin. Whenever a new Targaryen is born, the gods toss the coin in the air."

Jaeherys has a flawed view. There were a number of mediocre Targ kings. I just find the Targ dynasty tends to lean more to the crazy side than any other dynasty.

I think it's sad what befell the family at the time, with the only bad apples in the family being Aerys and Viserys. They both had it coming, but the rest of the family didn't deserve it.

Yep.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I think Robert's Rebellion was the one Jenga piece that made the increasingly shaky structure tumble. It seems obvious that Robert wasn't a great king, maybe not even a good one, but he was a fierce warrior who struck at the right time for the right or wrong reasons depending on what you think. The Targs had been ruling from precedent and status quo since the last dragon died and Aerys didn't help any either.

If Robert's rebellion did anything good for the Targaryens it was to hatch the dragons. No way they would've hatched if the family was still cushy and kick back in kings landing. No doubt the maesters woulda been sprinkling them with oils and potions trying to hatch them and then just thrown their shoulders up when they didn't. This way you get Aerys and Viserys out of the way (sorry Rhaegar) and and get a fresh start with a true Blood of the Dragon Targaryen who might be able to take the kingdom back and hold it in their family for at least another 300 yrs.

Aegon landed with his dragons soooo long ago, the way things used to be is all but song fodder now. The relm is going to want to coalescearound Dany and or Aegon and this point in history will be like the yr Jordan retired between the bulls' 2 3reapts....

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I think the rebellion itself was called for, but they way it finished out spoiled it all.

Robert mentions in the first book that Jon Aryn or Ned Stark should be sitting the throne, not him. Therein lies the truth of it.

Ayres could not continue to rule, that much is clear. He slipped deeper and deeper into madness, burning the innocent and growing paranoid of anyone who posed a threat (real or imagined, Tywin Lannister for one, his own son Rhaegar for another. I believe it was a Ser Barristan chapter where he remembers how Ayres grew jealous and suspicious of his son, beloved by all). If the rebellion hadn't happened, it's possible Rhaegar would've died at his father's own flame any way. Perhaps not, but I get the feeling Aryes wanted to hold the throne forever, and he was just mad enough to try.

However, though the rebellion was necessary, the murder of Rhaegar's children (and the bounty put on the head's of Viserys and Daenerys) voided all the good that was done by ousting Ayres. Rhaegar, if he had one speck of honor, would have probably died anyway, being that Jaime Lannister slew his father.

On top of that, Ser Gregor murdered Elia of Dorne, drawing hostility from the far south.

I believe that if another man had been in charge, i.e. Stark or Aryn, many lives would have been saved and many problems avoided. Robert Baratheon being crowned king ruined it all.

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I think the rebellion itself was called for, but they way it finished out spoiled it all.

Robert mentions in the first book that Jon Aryn or Ned Stark should be sitting the throne, not him. Therein lies the truth of it.

Ayres could not continue to rule, that much is clear. He slipped deeper and deeper into madness, burning the innocent and growing paranoid of anyone who posed a threat (real or imagined, Tywin Lannister for one, his own son Rhaegar for another. I believe it was a Ser Barristan chapter where he remembers how Ayres grew jealous and suspicious of his son, beloved by all). If the rebellion hadn't happened, it's possible Rhaegar would've died at his father's own flame any way. Perhaps not, but I get the feeling Aryes wanted to hold the throne forever, and he was just mad enough to try.

However, though the rebellion was necessary, the murder of Rhaegar's children (and the bounty put on the head's of Viserys and Daenerys) voided all the good that was done by ousting Ayres. Rhaegar, if he had one speck of honor, would have probably died anyway, being that Jaime Lannister slew his father.

On top of that, Ser Gregor murdered Elia of Dorne, drawing hostility from the far south.

I believe that if another man had been in charge, i.e. Stark or Aryn, many lives would have been saved and many problems avoided. Robert Baratheon being crowned king ruined it all.

@Suzymofo....just for clarification purposes the OP pertained to the Blackfyre Rebellions. Your response was centered on "Roberts" Rebellion. Two different rebellions; approximately separated by a couple of hundred years.

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@Suzymofo....just for clarification purposes the OP pertained to the Blackfyre Rebellions. Your response was centered on "Roberts" Rebellion. Two different rebellions; approximately separated by a couple of hundred years.

lol whoops, completely missed that.

Many of the responses seem to center around Robert's, it seems.

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@Suzymofo....just for clarification purposes the OP pertained to the Blackfyre Rebellions. Your response was centered on "Roberts" Rebellion. Two different rebellions; approximately separated by a couple of hundred years.

Actually...now that I'm re reading the original post...are you certain that's the case? Sounds a lot like Robert's Rebellion to me.

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Actually...now that I'm re reading the original post...are you certain that's the case? Sounds a lot like Robert's Rebellion to me.

On a second read myself...I could be mistaken. Curious outcomes when one only mentions rebellions. Aye?

Fairly important that we identify the rebellion at hand: Greyjoy (which, IIRC we know little), Blackfyre (see Dunk & Egg) and Robert (which we only have a few chapters, and very little on the ToJ).

@Suzymofo...you are vindicated.

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A long rant about Westerosi politics

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I think from a meta-perspective, I'd actually have to disagree with The Drunkard. Targaryen rule was neither good nor bad in my opinion- save for the Night's Watch and Ironborn, and what it did was tone-down a lot of widespread medium-intensity, local warfare into brief but high-intensity, realm-wide warfare.

I base this on the fact that, from what we can gather of the pre-Conquest period of Westeros, its political and power structures seems to have been operating in a realist kind of anarchy. In this scenario, each major power (in this case, the Six Kingdoms and Dorne) probably had sort of a core territory of loyal nobles, and a periphery of nobles constantly changing sides in the never-ending ebb and flow of warfare. There's explicit reference to this in the books, with mentions of the The Riverlands (which also included the Crownlands at the time), the Stepstones, the Sisters and Dornish Marches; all being contested territorial areas, while mentions of Theon Stark, the "Hungry Wolf"- who put his people through so much war they were constantly starving, the Blackwood-Bracken feud, the Ironborn ruling from the Arbor to Bear Island, serious fears of Argilac about Black Harren gaining ground on the Stormlands, etc. are actual acounts of the conflict.

The reaction of the King Lommen and King Mern to Aegon's Conquest further supports this imo., since there's little evidence in both the books and in Dunk & Egg to Lannister and the Reach having any special historical ties that would make them natural allies. Rather, they formed an alliance out of an extraordinary perturbation of Westeros' balance of power during Aegon's Conquest, something they would otherwise be unlikely to willing to cooperate on.

What the Targaryen hegemony did for Westeros was eliminate this anarchy and provide a structure through which interregional feuds could be negotiated through (i.e.appealing to the King). Also, theoretically, it provided collective security for Westeros both from external invasion (via. Wardenship, such as during the War of the Ninepenny Kings) and internal rebellion (i.e. how all the Houses came together twice to squash Ironborn rebellions). It did however break down a number ofngs times, and most notably during royal succession (Dance of Dragons and the Blackfyre Rebellion being the worst). By nature of being run by despots, when they're enlightened rulers things go ok but when things get bad (such as with Aegon IV or Aerys II) it results in much bigger wars than Westeros was used to; since unlike before, where only external threats to the balance of power could compel rulers to cooperate, internal threats created by secession crises brought about war. And they are obviously more frequent during the Blackfyre realm than in Westeros (at least since the invasion of the Andals nearly a millenia ago, if the timeline is to be trusted).

Now is this good for Westeros? In some areas yes, in others... no. I think with a pre-Conquest system of localized despots working in a balance of power, which Robert ironically catalyzed when he took over the throne, can work; but since it's been interrupted, the result is the horrors of the War of the Five Kings. It results in near constant low-level warfare, but there would likely be few big wars (created only when one power gets big enough that everyone else threatens to squash it). The Targaryens squished a lot of the localized conflict, leaving only intra-kingdom conflict (like the Reyne/Tarbeck rebellions) and preventing the kind of endless, low-level warfare that dogged Westeros for so many centuries. However, they also created a situation where big wars are more likely to happen- and that has proven horrible for generations that have to deal with it.

I wouldn't characterizing Targaryen rule as "bad", it just changed the rules. What the Targaryens were bad at was longevity and planning; constant interbreeding obviously has helped insulate a lot of mental instability within Targaryen rulers, and the chance of one of them slipping up and pulling an Aerys made them problematic. They're also probably solely responsible for the degredation of the Night's Watch, since the dearth in never ending warfare drove their recruitment levels down to unsustainable levels. But, bad? Unstable perhaps, torn apart by structural forces within Westerosi politics- but they were obviously good for a time, and the reigns of certain kings (Jahaerys I especially) were glorious periods in Westeros' history.

On topic (:P)

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I would agree with OP though that Robert's rebellion was tragically necessary, but very short-sighted- both on the part of Robert and Rhaegar. On Robert's part, it seemed like, in order for his rebellion to be successful and last long-term, he would either have to abdicate his claim to the throne in favor of a new, manipulable Targaryen claimant (Viserys or Aegon) that he could force to do his bidding and dispose of later (as Littlefingermight) or pull a Tywin and annihilate the household completely. He settled for the latter in lazily done and incomplete fashion, earning him the scorn of Dorne in the process. The brutal way in which he reacted to Aegon and Rhaenys' deaths also drove Ned away from him, a long-term ally, as did his mistreatment of Stannis (both of whom make for poor politicans but good allies and yes-men at court). His indulgence in Tywin Lannister's gold left the kingdom brewing in debt and gave the Lannisters cause to install themselves in KL- and his complete and utter disregard for his children left him failing to see what Sansa, Jon Aryn, Littlefinger and many others did; that something was amiss with his children.

On Rhaegar's part, from what we know of him he was well-liked, honorable and an overall upstanding citizen. However, I have my doubts that'd be any more an effective ruler than Robert. We're lead to believe by Maestar Aemon that Rhaegar was a rather quiet fellow who came to decision without consultation and little discussion (starting with him wanting to become a Knight one day after having read something in a book). He is indeterminate and rash, abducting (either willingly or unwillingly) Lyanna Stark after a Tourny attended by all the realm- and in Jaime Lannister's PoV, it's possible that he may have been implying a plan to depose his father (possibly confirming Varys' whisperings to Aerys). But it all came too late. He also tried to face Robert in combat; which, even for someone like Rhaegar, must have been crazy. Ned couldn't even lift Robert's warhammer, and he was something like a smaller but fiercer version of Gregor in his youth. It'd be like if Rob gave in to Jaime Lannister wanting to "settle" the rebellion with him one-on-one.

However, with the both of them acting like idiots (in 20/20 hindsight) and Aerys' mad execution of Rickard and Brandon, it became wholly unavoidable and one side was going to end up losing big-time. It was an all around lose-lose for the realm, the way it happened.

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"I think it's sad what befell the family at the time, with the only bad apples in the family being Aerys and Viserys. They both had it coming, but the rest of the family didn't deserve it."

I would say you can possibly add Dany to that list as well if her trajectory is going where i think it is. Like in real life sometimes people are bad seeds while others start out with the best of intentions only to end in the same place.

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I think that Robert's Rebellion highlighted the problems in a system of absolute power that allowed Aerys to get away with what he did for so long. Then Jon Arryn, Ned Stark, Robert Baraetheon pretty much maintained the status quo. That's the bad thing.

I like that Stannis doesn't have a kingsguard, it's one of the flawed institutions of the old Targaryen regime. The fact that his hand of a king isn't a toady but someone who will defy him is good too.

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"I think it's sad what befell the family at the time, with the only bad apples in the family being Aerys and Viserys. They both had it coming, but the rest of the family didn't deserve it."

I would say you can possibly add Dany to that list as well if her trajectory is going where i think it is. Like in real life sometimes people are bad seeds while others start out with the best of intentions only to end in the same place.

I'm interested in hearing where you think Dany is headed that would end up anywhere near her brother and father

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