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Why is Jon's name Aegon?


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2 hours ago, falcotron said:

But it would still be two Aegons in the same generation with the same father.

There's a reason "I'm Larry, this is my brother Darryl, and this is my other brother Darryl" was a recurring joke on Newhart, not just a statement of fact: because it's so unusual that it's funny.

How many people have you met with a brother, or half-brother, with the same name? And it doesn't seem to be any more common in Westeros than it is in real life, based on either the book appendices or the show DVD extras. (Even less common, because real life has George Foreman to blow out the curve for everyone else…)

Sorry, I mixed you up with someone else who'd responded on the same other thread as you. Apologies for the confusion.

Someone left a comment on this thread making a point about about how it could relate to fAegon. I can see the sense in the idea that GRRM would have a fake Aegon pretending to be the real Aegon, first son of Rhaegar, who is actually dead after all, but his second son, who was also named Aegon and who no one knew about, was alive and well, and living his life out as the bastard son of Ned Stark, Jon Snow. 

I can see the flaws in that, of course, but I had personally been hoping for Jon to be revealed as Aegon, so I was happy to see that was his name, at least in the show. 

You and I have discussed differences in the show and books before, so I would not at all be shocked if the show named Jon Aegon due to the lack of fAegon and that GRRM had something else up his sleeve. 

 

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1 hour ago, J. Stargaryen said:

:cheers: Definitely check out ADwD, Jon II. The part where Maester Aemon gives Jon the same advice he gave his brother. "It takes an Aegon to rule," "Kill the boy," etc. 

ETA: Regarding the bold, that's exactly the trick GRRM is using to distract us from the otherwise obvious truth. The only name we really rule out for Jon is Aegon. He doesn't rule out Aemon or Jaehaerys. Just Aegon. But it turns out it's not as much of an obstacle as it first appears to be. In fact, there's a good amount of evidence supporting it. Hmm...

I think your right on how to look at many of GrrM's mysteries.  He tries to obscure the obvious answer, and that leaves all the other possible answers as muddled because they become too numerous.

I think his name will be Aegon in the book, either for the reason you stated, or that the original Aegon was just a stand-in, not Rhaegar and Elia's child to begin with.

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If Rhaegar was involved in the naming and he chose Aegon because it was suppose to be the name of a great warrior then perhaps he should have looked elsewhere.  Outside of Aegon I the name seems to be cursed in some kind of way as the other four kings to have the name were 

Aegon II - depending on one's POV was a usurper, he went to war for a crown he had to be convinced to take, he spent most of that war laid up, as the only two times he went to battle he ended up severely wounded.  In the end he was poisoned by his own men.

Aegon III - called the dragonbane,  extremely traumatized by his experiences with dragons blamed for their extinction, always depressed and withdrawn.

Aegon IV-called the unworthy, basically King Robert on steroids, and legitimized his bastards which led to rebellion after rebellion

Aegon V-was not a particularly bad king just that his reign ended in tragic way.

The legacy of the name would be enough for him to come up with something different.  I would have gone with Aemon and it would have fit great as Aemon the dragonknight was a legendary warrior and maester Aemon was someone very close to Rhaegar, and the first Aemon(Jaehaerys I son) married his aunt.

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It's clearly just a nod to the books, where Aegon is alive... like how show Euron seems to be a nod to a Euron/Victarian combo character.  I think the Golden Company coming into play and having the marriage annulled makes the book story much, much more interesting... a true new Blackfyre to be angry for the opposite reasons, delegitimized instead of legitimized potentially taking that plotline forward.

But to the name... George Foreman has 5 sons, all named George.  George Jr, George III, George IV, George V, George VI... they all have random nicknames too.  It's equally absurd.

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I believe it may be due to what is commonly called D&D syndrome. A rare affliction suffered by certain TV shows, whereby logic and continuity are entirely thrown out the window, so that folly and stupidity may take over and wreak havoc on the story and characters that the audience has come to love.

Sadly, there is no cure.

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I'm no historian but I've come across many times royal children sharing the same name of their siblings who have died young, especially with heirs. I don't find it that odd in the setting, I personally wouldn't do it, then again i'm not living in that sort of time nor am I royal passing on a grand legacy.

Don't think it's a given it is the same in books yet I wouldn't rule it out either.

I would not think Rhaegar had any part of it as he was dead and probably expected the baby to be a girl and I would expect Lyanna knew about baby Aegon's death via KG. It might have even been the KG who helped suggest the name it was the heir they were protecting. Even though it wasn't planned, Rhaegar could have discussed things, his desire of his heir and the PTWP to be named Aegon, then when Lyanna gave birth to a son and heard baby Aegon had been killed she named Jon Aegon instead. She was dying so.... maybe didn't over think it. 

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7 hours ago, daemonTheBlack said:

It could simply be that Rhaegar believed the Prince that was Promised was to be named Aegon. When he believed his first son to be the PtwP, he named him Aegon. Then something else he read / saw / foresaw clarified his understanding, and he did the same with his second son.

This is what I thought too. Something happened between the birth of Aegon 1 and Jon (Aegon 2 apparently) that made him think the PtwP was Jon not Aegon 1.  

I still wanted his name to be Aemon though! 

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3 hours ago, J. Stargaryen said:

I think what really trips people up about Jon being named Aegon is that everyone assumes Rhaegar was involved in the naming. Imagine for a second he wasn't. Now imagine that Lyanna also knew that Rhaegar's family in KL had been murdered. Bear in mind that there is evidence to support both hypotheticals. 

 

I could buy that, except that's amazingly crass for Lyanna to name the new baby the same name as the dead baby of the woman the new husband had just left her for. Sort of like dissolving a perfectly good and consummated marriage, and potentially bastardizing your children or taking them out of the succession, right before they're murdered. I can believe Lyanna's choice of a traditional Targ name on her own; she didn't know Rhaegar wasn't going to come back from the Trident and it's doubtful she would have picked a northern name in the interim. The choice is mystifying from the perspective of what-it; what if all Rhaegar's kids had lived. "Which son of yours named Aegon are you referring to, sire?" Maybe season 8 will reveal a deeper side of asshole behavior from Lyanna and Rhaegar. Even assuming someone got a raven out of KL to inform them that his kids were basically pulp, regardless of who chose the name, it still makes no sense considering the existence of never-to-be Aegon VI. Also, I see no mythos around the name Aegon to begin with; some of them were complete shits. 

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56 minutes ago, BulletTooth_Tony said:

But to the name... George Foreman has 5 names, all named George.  George Jr, George III, George IV, George V, George VI... they all have random nicknames too.  It's equally absurd.

 

Lol, true. George Foreman Sr. has been bashed upside the head several times. Make of that what you will.

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yeah, I'm not a huge fan of this decision. If Rhaegar and Lyanna discussed this before he went off to fight Robert then his first son Aegon would still be alive. Not sure Lyanna would be aware that Aegon had been killed by the Mountain as she was in hiding with no contact with anyone.

It's probably an allusion to Aegon in the books (as his story was removed).

I prefer the theory that his real name is Aemon. It fits better. Radio Westeros do a good video on Jon and his name is part of it.

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Im just finishing the first book ..but i've read online that rhaegar was obsessed with the prince who was promised prophecy and that had something to do with bringing ice and fire together so thats why he loved lyanna, the prince is supposed to be name Aegon in the prophecy maybe?

they first aegon didn't count coz it wasnt of ice and fire,it was of fire and sand :-) ..

am i close?

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45 minutes ago, Danny- said:

Im just finishing the first book ..but i've read online that rhaegar was obsessed with the prince who was promised prophecy and that had something to do with bringing ice and fire together so thats why he loved lyanna, the prince is supposed to be name Aegon in the prophecy maybe?

they first aegon didn't count coz it wasnt of ice and fire,it was of fire and sand :-) ..

am i close?

Close, sure -- it's all speculative and now inferred because the show storylines have advanced further than the books so it isn't about hitting a bullseye, but just sticking one in the board.  But I think you'll find a different conclusion as you read more.  It's way more nuanced - Elia had some problems, Lyanna had her own history that may have caught his eye, and Rhaegar had a little (a lot) obsession with prophecy.

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1 hour ago, Sand11751 said:

I could buy that, except that's amazingly crass for Lyanna to name the new baby the same name as the dead baby of the woman the new husband had just left her for.

That's the bit that really gets me. I'm aware that children were sometimes named after older siblings who died in infancy but surely mothers named them after their own dead children? Not the dead child of the woman who your new husband humiliated and dumped for you.

Then again, was it ever actually established in the show that Rhaegar's son was called Aegon?

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At the end of the day, I do not believe it really matters what Jon's name is. (Besides the fans of the show of course) I do think it is not unfathomable that Lyanna would want to name him Aegon, nor do I think that this is fAegon melding with show Jon.

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13 hours ago, falcotron said:

Why not Jon Targaryen, or Jaehaerys Targaryen, or Rickard Targaryen? Or, since it seems like he was never going to get an official naming ceremony and Ned was going to put him in hiding right away, why not just (unnamed boy) Targaryen, who will have to choose his name if he's ever revealed as Rhaegar's heir?

They've already told us that Rhaegar's first son—who, as far as I know, Lyanna should at this point believe is still alive and well—is named Aegon. At least Thoros referred to him by name in season 3, and I think there are a couple of others.

If there were some compelling reason for D&D to reuse the name, maybe it would be worth it anyway, but I can't figure out what that reason might be. Are they drawing a connection to one of the five kings named Aegon? Or planning to drop a prophecy next season that names Rhaegar's son Aegon by name, and the big secret is that it means Jon rather than his brother? All I can think is that they deliberately wanted us—and by us, I mean the book readers—to connect him to the other Aegon as a winking nod to the Little Griff story they cut. But they have to know that book snobs will be unhappy with that, and nobody else will get it.

In-universe, it's much the same question, but I suppose there might be a different answer to "what were D&D thinking" and "what was Lyanna thinking".

If Rhaegar annulled his marriage the earlier Aegon would become a bastard. In effect Rhaegar was disowning and disavowing his children when he annulled the marriage and married Lyanna instead. Officially his only trueborn children then would be whoever Lyanna gave birth to, so naming her first born Aegon would have been perfectly OK, considering that was a family name.

When I was researching my family tree, one couple among my ancestors had three sons named Christian, and two named Mathias. The reason being that those were family names, and as one died, they just gave the name to the next son who came along.

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