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[SPOILERS] Family trees and successions


Lord Varys

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This would be the place to add new members to the various families, and to try to figure out how everything fits together it if fits together.

There are Velaryons, Baratheons, Hightowers, Starks, Lannisters, and others aplenty in the book. And at times we get pretty close to build a complete family tree. But only pretty close ;-).

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Well, then I start this:

The Velaryons:

We have Daemon (I) Velaryon and then Aethan Velaryon - no relations given, but likely father and son since we also learn that the first Corlys Velaryon is the great-great-uncle of the Sea Snake - meaning that Lord Commander Corlys must have been a brother of Aethan. About Aethan we learn that he is also one of the greatest allies of Aegon I.

Aethan Velaryon's wife and the mother of Alyssa Velaryon is Alarra of House Massey (giving us an explanation as to why the Masseys stood with the Targaryens rather than the Durrandons during the Conquest, and it is also a hint that this is not the first such marriage, considering the fair looks of a Massey like Ser Justin). Aethan and Alarra (presumably, since there is no other wife mentioned) have multiple sons, the eldest of which is Daemon (II) Velaryon. He lives to very old age and dies at 87, I think (although we cannot pin down his year of death it seems to have been in the late 80s or around 90 AC).

Alyssa Velaryon has various Velaryon nieces, we get to know Larissa Velaryon, who seems to be about the same age as Princess Rhaena, and who is thus likely a daughter of Daemon (II) Velaryon. Later we meet Lianna Velaryon, who is both a cousin of Queen Rhaena as well as a niece to Daemon (II) Velaryon, hence the confirmation that Daemon and Alyssa must have had at least one brother.

Daemon Velaryon has at least three sons, named Corwyn, Jorgen, and Victor. Since the names are given in that order I put forth the tantalizing speculation that Corwyn is Daemon's eldest son and Corlys' father. We don't know Corlys' mother.

Corlys has two younger, unnamed brothers. The elder brother has one son, the infamous Vaemond Velaryon. The younger brother has five sons. Only those five sons - cousins to Vaemond - lose their tongues when Viserys I delivers his judgment. Three of the so-called 'silent five' die during the Dance, fighting for Aegon II (we don't get their names). When the Sea Snake dies, both the remaining two silent ones, Ser Malentine Velaryon and Ser Rhogar Velaryon, and Ser Vaemond's sons, Daemion and Daeron, make attempts to prevent the bastard from claiming Driftmark. Daemion and Daeron, having tongues, petition the regents to award Driftmark to them, fail, and make their peace with Lord Alyn (who gives them land on Driftmark in exchange for them sending ships to his fleet) whereas Malentine and Rhogor try to murder Lord Alyn. Malentine is slain in the attempt, Rhogar captured and allowed to take the black.

Daeron Velaryon dies during Alyn's campaign on the Stepstones - he drowns with his ship - he was married to Lady Hazel of House Harte who died of the Winter Fever. Their only child (it seems) and later the ward of Lord Alyn and Lady Baela is Daenaera Velaryon, the future Queen of the Seven Kingdoms.

Alyn and Baela's first child is Laena (II) Velaryon, we already saw in the family tree. At the book's end Baela is pregnant again and close to birth, but we don't yet know whether her second child will be a boy or a girl. This second Laena Velaryon is not unlikely to be the Targaryen-Velaryon who may give the Penroses or other obscure Targaryen cousins their dragon blood, possibly helping to explain the marriages of Baelor Breakspear and his younger brothers.

Those are the Velaryons I recall.

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So...

- Lord Manfred Hightower was succeeded by his son Lord Addam Hightower
- Lord Martyn Hightower from TWOIAF is now the second Lord Manfred Hightower (not to be confused with his grandsire)
- Lady Ceryse Hightower is now daughter of the second Lord Manfred Hightower

Does this mean Lady Patrice Hightower is likely to be the sister of Lord Addam, and granddaughter of the first Lord Mandred?
 

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5 minutes ago, Bael's Bastard said:

So...

- Lord Manfred Hightower was succeeded by his son Lord Addam Hightower
- Lord Martyn Hightower from TWOIAF is now the second Lord Manfred Hightower (not to be confused with his grandsire)
- Lady Ceryse Hightower is now daughter of the second Lord Manfred Hightower

Does this mean Lady Patrice Hightower is likely to be the sister of Lord Addam, and granddaughter of the first Lord Mandred?
 

Nope, as Lord Martyn's maiden aunt (who is the brother of Ceryse), she would be a sister of Manfred (II).

Manfred (II) is likely Addam's son but that's not confirmed.

Manfred (I) likely had multiple wives - like our own Leyton Hightower - explaining why he had a young daughter at the ready to offer to Aegon I.

The blasted family tree starts to fall apart with Donnel the Delayer, Martyn's apparent successor. Is he Martyn's son, brother, or cousin? We don't know.

Donnel already has grandsons in the 50s (two of them accompany Elissa), indicating Donnel must have already been pretty old when he rose to his lordship in the late 40s. His succession is completely unclear, especially as it is pointed out that the Hightowers are this huge family.

His surviving known grandson Eustace loses wife and children in the 50s, when Donnel himself dies, too - if he were the only/eldest son of Donnel's eldest son, then he might be Donnel's successor. But that's completely unclear since Donnel could have had a bunch of sons and Eustace could have just been some younger grandson.

If it were the case, then Eustace could have remarried and and be the father of Otto Hightower and his older brother - especially if there were a considerable age gap between Otto and his older brother.

Ormund Hightower has three sons - Lyonel, Martyn, and our favorite Garmund - and at least one daughter, Bethany. Lord Lyonel has the hots for the second wife his father, his own stepmother, Samantha 'Sam' Tarly, and takes her own as a paramour after his father's takes (Lady Sam likes being the Lady of Oldtown) and their bastard children are later legitimized when a new High Septon allows them to marry (the old one considers their relationship a form of incest).

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OK, I see now that Lord Martyn still exists, but is now Ceryse's brother rather than father.

I know histories don't necessarily fill in all the blanks about the whole lines of lords, or whether a successor was a son or some other relative, but since Fire and Blood seems to be our only real and last published chance to clarify the lines of lords and relations of major houses, I wish the gaps would have been filled in more, especially the Starks.

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I think Lord Brandon could be Torrhen's son - @Ran since you have had access to that mysterious list of Lords of Winterfell, can you give us a hint whether there is - or were, when you saw the list - another Lord of Winterfell between Torrhen and Brandon?

The rationale would be that Torrhen himself doesn't seem to be that old around the Conquest, considering his bastard half-brother might not be that old if he is the guy from Bran's vision.

Later, I think, Edric can't be Ellard's father if the numbers from the MUSH are worth anything (and even if not, they are effectively confirmed for Cregan, at least).

In that sense, chances are pretty good, I think, that Ellard is either a younger brother or a cousin of Edric.

I'd also assume (without any textual evidence whatsoever) that Alysanne did end up brokering matches for Alaric's strong sons and his daughter.

As for holes in the family tree - I find it really sad that we are missing key Velaryons (Corlys' parents and brothers; Vaemond's wife) and Baratheon - else we could really make a grand Targaryen family tree for the first 136 years with the two main cadet branches.

And I do think Orys Baratheon was Aegon's half-brother, never mind what Ran wants to believe ;-).

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Quote

And I do think Orys Baratheon was Aegon's half-brother, never mind what Ran wants to believe ;-).

So do I. That's not my objection.

My issue is that F&B cannot be taken to contradict George's commentary in TWoIaF that

Quote

The favor that Aegon the Conqueror showered upon Orys Baratheon made many credit the rumors that he was Aegon’s bastard half brother. Though never proved, that tale is widely believed to this very day.

How to reconicle these things? That the maesters do not necessarily all take things recovered from records of Jaehaerys's day, or alleged to be from Jaehaerys's day, as being proof positive, for some reason that we presently can't understand. There must be some reason to suppose that things like Jaehaerys allegedly stating it baldly were not necessarily in line with other evidence.

Orys stands in a very strange position of being the only "rumored bastard" besides... well, Cersei's children. Could it be that there were stories that Aerion didn't really father him? Could it be that Orys's mother denied it, or his mother's husband did? Could these be issues that blurred things, and were minimized or ignored in Jaehaerys's court, but later became more relevant later? We don't presently know, but for whatever reason, in Westeros there's some dispute on it that isn't reflected in Gyldayn's sourcing of Jaehaerys matters.

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10 minutes ago, Ran said:

So do I. That's not my objection.

My issue is that F&B cannot be taken to contradict George's commentary in TWoIaF that

How to reconicle these things? That the maesters do not necessarily all take things recovered from records of Jaehaerys's day, or alleged to be from Jaehaerys's day, as being proof positive, for some reason that we presently can't understand. There must be some reason to suppose that things like Jaehaerys allegedly stating it baldly were not necessarily in line with other evidence.

Orys stands in a very strange position of being the only "rumored bastard" besides... well, Cersei's children. Could it be that there were stories that Aerion didn't really father him? Could it be that Orys's mother denied it, or his mother's husband did? Could these be issues that blurred things, and were minimized or ignored in Jaehaerys's court, but later became more relevant later? We don't presently know, but for whatever reason, in Westeros there's some dispute on it that isn't reflected in Gyldayn's sourcing of Jaehaerys matters.

I know you can't reveal any actual information, but do you know anything that hasn't been published about Orys's parentage, like anything about his mother, or about whether or not his mother had a husband?

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No, George hasn't really written anything about them at all. All we know is that Baratheon was his surname, and apparently it wasn't a bastard name (since Waters is the bastard name) so either he won his own name at some point or in fact he had the name from his mother or perhaps his mother's husband/titular father.

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1 minute ago, Ran said:

No, George hasn't really written anything about them at all. All we know is that Baratheon was his surname, and apparently it wasn't a bastard name (since Waters is the bastard name) so either he won his own name at some point or in fact he had the name from his mother or perhaps his mother's husband/titular father.

Ok, thanks!

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26 minutes ago, Bernie Mac said:

Yet another Joffrey, this time for House Arryn.

The Gulltown Arryns are a lot older than I thought, an established branch during the Dance. 

If one has too much time - not me right now - one can try to piece together how the Eyrie is handed down through the six male branches of House Arryn founded by Hubert Arryn after the rebellion of Jonos the Kinslayer.

Rodrik Arryn seems to be descended at least from the second son, Jeyne seems to be the daughter of Rodrik's eldest son by his first wife, whereas Ser Arnold is the son of the younger one (he is Jeyne's first cousin). One also may suspect that Rodrik's eldest daughter ended up marrying Lord Yorbert Royce, explaining how it came to be that he was the Lord Protector of the Vale and not Jeyne's Arryn uncle (assuming he was still alive then). This could also work fine in light of Jeyne's harsh reaction to Daemon's presumption to claim Runestone - if Rhea was her cousin they would have been more than just liege and vassal.

Both Joffrey and Isembard should be descended from one of Hubert's younger sons.

11 minutes ago, Ran said:

So do I. That's not my objection.

Oh, now I realize what the issue was there. This is easily reconciled. Historians today simply don't know what people back in the day knew, and are unwilling for this or that reason to declare a person a bastard who - as far as they know - was never properly acknowledged as such. Or not in the way they would like it to happen.

Just because Jaehaerys I believes something, doesn't mean proper historians take this as gospel without actual contemporary corroboration of the fact. Which we, at this point, simply don't have. In part because we have pretty much no background on Orys. Nor anything of note on Lord Aerion aside from the fact that he married a Velaryon and had a maester.

But if George ever were to write something more about this period he would have to come up with an explanation for the fact why this thing is still a rumor. Perhaps Orys Baratheon had a legal father who acknowledged him as his son, never mind that Lord Aerion gave gifts to Orys' mother implying he was a dragonseed. That in and of itself could make the actual parentage vague - just because Lord Aerion believed something doesn't mean his seed quickened in the womb of a woman.

However, one should also keep in mind that George hadn't yet fleshed out Rogar's story when he gave you that tidbit for TWoIaF you cited. That he did for the Jaehaerys material of TWoIaF.

But anyway - can you give us a hint on the Stark thing? Is there a different Lord of Winterfell between King/Lord Torrhen and Lord Brandon as far as you know?

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Sorry, guys, I didn't get my copy yet, but I am reading spoilers everywhere I can find it (yeah, I am the person who read last page of detective novel before starting reading the book).

Anyway, what I found from discussions - seems like there is an error: Lady Baratheon's father's name either is Olyver (she named her son over him, not Aegon, as her husband wanted) or it's Royce Caron as it's said in other chapter? 

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As for the Velaryons, there is a little addendum there I overlooked above. Here

Quote

She had been a beautiful child, all men agreed, the daughter of the mighty Aethan Velaryon, Lord of the Tides, and his lady wife Alarra of House Massey. Her line was ancient, proud, and rich, her mother esteemed as a great beauty, her grandsire amongst the oldest and closest friends of Aegon the Dragon and his queens.

we learn that Daemon (I) Velaryon was indeed Alyssa Velaryon's grandfather and subsequently also the father of Aethan Velaryon and Corlys (I) Velaryon.

This could have rather interesting implications since we now can pinpoint Lord Daemon's age better than we could previously. Alyssa is born in 7 AC, but her brother Daemon (II) lives to very old age and dies at 88. Unfortunately, it is not clear whether Corlys is already Lord of Driftmark or not when he marries Princess Rhaenys in 90 AC. When the groom is introduced we get a Lord of the Tides, when a dialogue is given between Rhaenys and Corlys, he is called 'Ser Corlys', but it might be that this is sometimes before the wedding.

In any case, if we assume that Corlys became Lord of Driftmark around the time of his marriage or shortly before, that would mean Daemon (II) was older than Alyssa and born around the Conquest.

In turn, this would mean Aethan Velaryon would have to be born at least around 15-20 AC, with Daemon (I) Velaryon being born at least in 30s or 40s BC. Both could, of course, be older when they had their first children

This could have very interesting repercussions for the dynamics between Daemon (I) and Aegon the Conqueror - the man could have been somewhat of a mentor figure, possibly helping young Aegon and his sisters if they lost their father, Lord Aerion, early. It also makes it possible, likely, even that Daemon (I) and Valaena Velaryon are actually siblings. To be the mother of the Targaryen siblings Valaena would reasonably have been born between the mid-40-50s BC, so she could very well be an older sister of Daemon's.

This makes it not likely that Valaena's (and Daemon's) Targaryen mother might have been a daughter of either Lord Aelyx or Lord Baelon. Considering Jaehaerys and Alysanne picked the name Baelon for their second (living) son, it may not be unlikely that they know they are descended from both Lord Baelon and Lord Daemion.

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I found a minor tidbit on the very early Targaryens; one of the claimants at the 101 AC Great Council descended from Gaemon the Glorious, the greatest Lord of Dragonstone (who I REALLY WANT to know more about; was slightly disappointed not to see any more info about the Century of Blood Targs) via a younger daughter and her Lord husband. This likely means that Gaemon had several daughters, for if there was merely one it would read "by Gaemon's younger daughter" instead of "by way of a younger daughter". It also means that the Targaryens potentially married into a Westerosi family separate from the Valyrian Celtigers and Velaryons (considering that the Sea Snake was aiming to see his son as the next heir, I can't imagine that the Velaryons would put forward multiple claimants and why not simply mention the Celtigers if it was that family?).

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8 hours ago, Hiigara129 said:

I found a minor tidbit on the very early Targaryens; one of the claimants at the 101 AC Great Council descended from Gaemon the Glorious, the greatest Lord of Dragonstone (who I REALLY WANT to know more about; was slightly disappointed not to see any more info about the Century of Blood Targs) via a younger daughter and her Lord husband. This likely means that Gaemon had several daughters, for if there was merely one it would read "by Gaemon's younger daughter" instead of "by way of a younger daughter". It also means that the Targaryens potentially married into a Westerosi family separate from the Valyrian Celtigers and Velaryons (considering that the Sea Snake was aiming to see his son as the next heir, I can't imagine that the Velaryons would put forward multiple claimants and why not simply mention the Celtigers if it was that family?).

We already know that Gaemon had at least one daughter, Elaena, who ruled together with her brother-husband Aegon after Gaemon's death.

So, yeah, we gained one unnamed Targaryen woman for the family tree. And it might very well be that there were more daughters than just these two. Just as there might be descendants - through the male and the female line - or Aenar's siblings and other kin. Considering he had wives, plural, there may have been more children than just Gaemon and Daenys, and from different mothers.

I expect the Masseys to have gotten at least one Targaryen or Targaryen-Velaryon bride, prior to Alarra Massey marrying back into House Velaryon, as Alyssa's mother.

And I really prestigious match for the Dragonstonian Targaryens could have been a Darklyn match. Duskendale was the largest harbor in the region, it would have made sense to establish ties there. But neither are likely going to count as petty lords.

Come to think of it, perhaps the family of the man claiming descent from Gaemon's daughter are the Hartes? They are sufficiently minor house to intermarry with some petty lord - or be called petty lords themselves -, and it could certainly help Daenaera Velaryon's overwhelming Valyrian beauty if her mother Hazel of House Harte were actually the daughter of the guy who presented his claim at the Great Council...

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