Are there any great houses that DON'T include some Targaryen blood?

[Aebram]

There seem to be so many that do; and it's not surprising, really.  The Targaryens ruled Westeros for 300 years. I'm sure every noble family made some effort to arrange a marriage to one of them.

Just a little exercise for the genealogically inclined.  :^)

[James Steller]

The Starks, arguably. Jon isn’t a Stark, after all.

Also, the Tully’s never got their Targ match because Aegon V’s incestuous kids.

Edited December 26, 2023 by James Steller

[Alester Florent]

The most likely route for Targ blood to have got into the other great houses is via the Baratheons, specifically the early Baratheons. We know there was at least one marriage with a Lannister man, but possibly not the main line. Another one married Thaddeus Rowan, though there may not have been offspring; if there were, these might have eventually ed into the Tyrells or Tullys or Lannisters, the Rowans being a powerful house.

There was an early marriage with the Arryns, but that was fed back into the main Targaryen line as Aemma was the only offspring.

There are three marriages unaccounted for of main-line female Targs: Daella, Vaella and Rhae, but all of their marriages were fairly recent (just about within living memory). It is not impossible that one of them married Jasper Arryn, the father of Luthor Tyrell or the son of Dagon Greyjoy, we'd probably expect to have heard about it if so. In Luthor's case, he was himself betrothed to a Targ, so it would seem odd for him to be the son of one too: Aegon V wasn't a supporter of incest and two successive marriages to the Tyrells would run the risk of creating a powerful rival cadet branch.

The only other feasible route would be via Elaena Targaryen, or bastards. Elaena's children were Penroses and Plumms: it's possible there was a Baratheon-Penrose marriage at some point but the Baratheons already have known Targ blood. The Lannisters don't seem to have married a Plumm at any relevant point, although it's not impossible, nor is it impossible I guess that they married a Tully.

Of Aegon's bastards, the only ones that I think really need to concern us are the Great Bastards and those who were passed off as legitimate children of a different father. In the latter case, our named contenders are Viserys Plumm (already a known Targ descendant) and Jeyne Lothston, who is unlikely to have made a high marriage after being Aegon's lover and contracting the pox. Unnamed contenders are Lord Butterwell's purported grandchildren, who might conceivably have married and reproduced, but not obviously into any great houses.

Or Bloodraven's (full) sisters. He had two, they were legitimised , but we don't know what names they took. Willam Stark did marry a Blackwood (right family) at about the right time... but it's the wrong first name.

It is possible that there are some very old Targ branches which found their way into the Velaryons (from between Aenar and Aerion) and thereafter out into other Westerosi families, but we have no information on that.

In short, I don't think we can assume that any of the great houses have Targ blood (except where explicit), as the opportunities for them to pick it up are fairly limited and in some cases we have good enough genealogies to make it even less likely. Certainly, I think, if any of the great houses aside from the Baratheons and Martells have Targ blood, it's very thin, and not relevant to any plot considerations (either to the characters themselves or to us as readers).

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

The Starks, save for Jon but he's a bastard. 

The Tullys as far as we know. 

Certainely not the Greyjoys for obvious reasons. If there's any great house the Targaryens weren't interested in marrying i should be them.

The Tyrells never had any marriage with the Iron Throne until Margaery's marriage with Joffrey and Tommen.

Edited December 26, 2023 by Terrorthatflapsinthenight9

[PrettyLittlePsycho]

Stark, obviously.

And as some people mentioned before, Greyjoy, though I do find it hard to call them a GREAT house, They´re more like a backwater property no-one else actually wants.

[Willam Stark]

Arryn, Baratheon, Martell for the LP.

I don't believe the others have Targ blood.

[Adaneth]

22 hours ago, James Steller said:

The Starks, arguably. Jon isn’t a Stark, after all.

By blood he is.

[PrettyLittlePsycho]

On 12/26/2023 at 2:26 AM, James Steller said:

The Starks, arguably. Jon isn’t a Stark, after all.

I´m not buying that R+L=J theory until it´s confirmed in the books. There´s better, more interesting ways to explain Jons heritage.

[SaffronLady]

5 minutes ago, PrettyLittlePsycho said:

There´s better, more interesting ways to explain Jons heritage.

Care to extrapolate?

[PrettyLittlePsycho]

4 minutes ago, SaffronLady said:

Care to extrapolate?

Just posted this on another thread:

R+L=J is BS promoted by the abomination. Jon´s the son of Ned and a woman he secretly married early during the rebellion. Might have been Ashara Dayne, not sure on that though.

Ned was later forced by Hoster Tully to marry Cat fully knowing he was already married. Ned had to do it though to get the support of the Riverlands.

Bottom line, Jon is the actual heir to Winterfell, Cats children are bastards.

[SaffronLady]

9 minutes ago, PrettyLittlePsycho said:

Jon´s the son of Ned and a woman he secretly married

Ah yes. Baby swaps and secret marriages. This is why I stay to making theories about the Faith of the 7 and not individual characters.

Come to think of it, the medieval church acts as a birth registry of sorts. Not that it's always effective, but like many other aspects of the actual church, the Faith's birth registry function is utterly dysfunctional whenever required. Maybe it's normal under normal circumstances...

[Hippocras]

On 12/26/2023 at 2:26 AM, James Steller said:

The Starks, arguably. Jon isn’t a Stark, after all.

Also, the Tully’s never got their Targ match because Aegon V’s incestuous kids.

Unless they already had one. Celia may actually have been a Targ cousin. We don't know who Aegon V's sisters married, so we know they had kids just not who with. Much is made of the fact that Aegon V did not agree with the incest practice, however given how common cousin marriage was throughout Westeros it is in fact very doubtful that Aegon V's distaste extended to that. What he did not like was brother-sister marriages. Cousins were fine, and in fact necessary to prevent the rise of conflicting claims with no allegiance.

Also since I strongly suspect that Benjicot Blackwood's child married a child of Baela and Alyn, and since the Blackwoods are Tully bannermen, it is very possible the Tullys had some Targ blood by that route as well.

@Alester Florent I think you might be missing some loose ends. This is most of them, from what I can tell:

1. Great Bastards of Aegon IV. All of them, including the girls, were legitimized if they were born to noble women (including Butterwells) in 184. Many of them might have made strong marriages and ended up being ancestors of current Great House members. GRRM distracts us with the drama between Bittersteel and Bloodraven so we forget to look at where the others went.

2. Aerys II was either infertile (which creates some obvious problems) or must have had a bastard or two. He was said to have had as many mistresses as Aegon IV before the year 274.

3. Velaryons have of course married into plenty of Houses as well, and descend from Baela.

4. Descendants of Rhaena Hightower's 6 daughters.

5. You mentioned Elaena but not her sisters. Daena was very likely married off and probably into exile right after Daemon was born. Her descendants were central to the politics and alliances of the subsequent era. And while Rhaena "eventually" became a septa, the word eventually suggests she had time to do other things first, including getting married and having one or more children.

6. Vaella was simple, but did not die and might have been married. I suspect the Stokeworths descend from her.

7. Daenora, mother of Maegor. She was young when Aerion died and probably remarried in large part to secure her and her son's allegiance to Aegon V.

8. Maegor himself of course.
 

Edited December 27, 2023 by Hippocras

[Alester Florent]

9 hours ago, Hippocras said:

Unless they already had one. Celia may actually have been a Targ cousin. We don't know who Aegon V's sisters married, so we know they had kids just not who with. Much is made of the fact that Aegon V did not agree with the incest practice, however given how common cousin marriage was throughout Westeros it is in fact very doubtful that Aegon V's distaste extended to that. What he did not like was brother-sister marriages. Cousins were fine, and in fact necessary to prevent the rise of conflicting claims with no allegiance.

Also since I strongly suspect that Benjicot Blackwood's child married a child of Baela and Alyn, and since the Blackwoods are Tully bannermen, it is very possible the Tullys had some Targ blood by that route as well.

@Alester Florent I think you might be missing some loose ends. This is most of them, from what I can tell:

1. Great Bastards of Aegon IV. All of them, including the girls, were legitimized if they were born to noble women (including Butterwells) in 184. Many of them might have made strong marriages and ended up being ancestors of current Great House members. GRRM distracts us with the drama between Bittersteel and Bloodraven so we forget to look at where the others went.

2. Aerys II was either infertile (which creates some obvious problems) or must have had a bastard or two. He was said to have had as many mistresses as Aegon IV before the year 274.

3. Velaryons have of course married into plenty of Houses as well, and descend from Baela.

4. Descendants of Rhaena Hightower's 6 daughters.

5. You mentioned Elaena but not her sisters. Daena was very likely married off and probably into exile right after Daemon was born. Her descendants were central to the politics and alliances of the subsequent era. And while Rhaena "eventually" became a septa, the word eventually suggests she had time to do other things first, including getting married and having one or more children.

6. Vaella was simple, but did not die and might have been married. I suspect the Stokeworths descend from her.

7. Daenora, mother of Maegor. She was young when Aerion died and probably remarried in large part to secure her and her son's allegiance to Aegon V.

8. Maegor himself of course.
 

I accounted for Bloodraven's sisters: we don't know where they went. We don't know of any other Great Bastards, albeit there may have been some. The Otherys kids might have been legitimised, but it's not clear that they were; moreover it seems relatively unlikely their bloodlines found their way back to Westeros.

Aerys II may have had bastards but with the possible exception of the Lannister kids, none of them will be in the main line of great houses.

I don't know how widely the Velaryons actually would have married. They seemed almost as insular as the Targs, and their decline after Corlys (when they were de facto a great house in their own right) to a minor house might have limited the marriage pool. Still, I did forget that they descend from Baela.

I did forget about Rhaena's Hightower daughters.

I doubt Rhaena (daughter of Aegon III) had any children. Daena might have, but the only one we know of is Daemon.

If the Vaella you mean is Daeron's daughter I suspect she wasn't married off into a great house. Not so much because she was simple-minded but because of her dynastic claim, which could give rise to future issues.

With regard to Vaella, Daenor and Maegor, even if they did marry and have descendants, these would all have been very recent. There isn't really enough of a gap between their potential marriage and the present to allow their descendants to feed back into great houses. It is conceivably possible that one of the women was the mother of Quellon, or Jon Arryn, or even Hoster Tully, but it seems very unlikely.

 

 

[Gilbert Green]

Lyanna is a secret Targ.  I realized this when I found out that Lady Stark was a Stark by birth and not just by marriage (hence Lyanna does not need to get her Stark features from Rickard); and that Rickard (and his wife?) were in KL during Aerys' randy period of messing with other men's wives.

Rhaegar realized he was not TPTWP when he realized he was son of Bonifer, not Aerys.  So he sets out to unite the lines of Aerys and Rhaella.  He, a son of Rhaella, must unite with a daughter of Aerys.  So first he marries Elia, born a "month early" after Elia's mom returns from KL.

Then, when Elia can have no more kids, he goes chasing after Lyanna.

[BRANDON GREYSTARK]

On 12/25/2023 at 8:12 PM, Aebram said:

There seem to be so many that do; and it's not surprising, really.  The Targaryens ruled Westeros for 300 years. I'm sure every noble family made some effort to arrange a marriage to one of them.

Just a little exercise for the genealogically inclined.  :^)

Starks ,Greyjoy .

[Hippocras]

12 hours ago, Alester Florent said:

I accounted for Bloodraven's sisters: we don't know where they went. We don't know of any other Great Bastards, albeit there may have been some. The Otherys kids might have been legitimised, but it's not clear that they were; moreover it seems relatively unlikely their bloodlines found their way back to Westeros.

Three Butterwell girls were supposedly impregnated by Aegon IV and yet as the names or stories of the babies were never given, they are never listed among the other Great Bastards. I think there are more examples of this. Other Great Bastards whose stories were simply not told. Yet.

12 hours ago, Alester Florent said:

Aerys II may have had bastards but with the possible exception of the Lannister kids, none of them will be in the main line of great houses.

No, agreed. Although if he did have bastards then they were, more often than not, with the ladies-in-waiting of Rhaella. And ladies in waiting to the crown princess and then queen would have been very high status indeed. So it is possible. It is even possible that Elia was Aerys's bastard though her mother was much much older than him, probably still married, and Aerys would have only been 12 or 13 years old at the time.  All we really know about Elia's mother is that she served along side Johanna Lannister in KL as a lady-in-waiting.

12 hours ago, Alester Florent said:

I don't know how widely the Velaryons actually would have married. They seemed almost as insular as the Targs, and their decline after Corlys (when they were de facto a great house in their own right) to a minor house might have limited the marriage pool. Still, I did forget that they descend from Baela.

Baela had at least one daughter and one son, but probably more children. 1 for every great voyage Alyn Velaryon took is something I have seen proposed, and this oblique way of indicating it would fit GRRM's sneaky methods at least.

I think  that one daughter of Baela's married a Dondarrion and another the son of Benjicot Blackwood. That or a daughter of BB married Baela and Alyn's son. Either way, their friendship and the return of Addam's bones make this match likely.

I think that Rhaena's daughters married into at least one Vale House, possibly House Dayne, and one or two Reach Houses. Any one of those Reach Houses likely later had a match with House Tyrell.

12 hours ago, Alester Florent said:

I doubt Rhaena (daughter of Aegon III) had any children. Daena might have, but the only one we know of is Daemon.

There is not really any reason to believe Rhaena did not actually. Becoming a septa can happen any time in life, and Viserys was actively seeking out mariage matches for her. Even if she did not go, as he had planned, to Braavos, a marriage arranged by Viserys II is in fact likely. 

As for Daena, I am really very convinced that Rohanne of Tyrosh was her daughter. Exile to Tyrosh after Daemon's birth makes infinite sense as it removed a dangerous alternative claim to Viserys's from contention by taking her away from any potential allies in Westeros. Aegon IV then arranged a match between Daemon and Daena's first daughter Rohanne to help strengthen his claim. Following that, a strong need was created to contain the danger of Daena's line and her allies in Essos, resulting in not one, but two marriages between Kiera (Daena's daughter or grandaughter) to crown princes directly in line for the throne. It is virtually the only thing that could possibly explain the prominence of Kiera of Tyrosh.

Daena could have had any number of children in Tyrosh, and several of them could have married Westerosi families who had trade relationships with Tyrosh.

12 hours ago, Alester Florent said:

If the Vaella you mean is Daeron's daughter I suspect she wasn't married off into a great house. Not so much because she was simple-minded but because of her dynastic claim, which could give rise to future issues.

Agreed. I just think that once a Targ match has been made to a minor House, the children of that House then become interesting matches for their overlords. And that indirect route is how great Houses acquired their drops of Targ blood.

12 hours ago, Alester Florent said:

With regard to Vaella, Daenor and Maegor, even if they did marry and have descendants, these would all have been very recent. There isn't really enough of a gap between their potential marriage and the present to allow their descendants to feed back into great houses. It is conceivably possible that one of the women was the mother of Quellon, or Jon Arryn, or even Hoster Tully, but it seems very unlikely.

True. These things are recent. My leading theory on the Daynes is that the main branch (Arthur, Ashara, Allyria, Ned) descends from Daenora (Targaryen) Dayne, and that her son by Aerion, née Maegor but possibly later given a different name, became eventually the head of High Hermitage and father or grandfather of Gerold Dayne.

Finally, Aerys I's wife Aelinor is stated to be his cousin. Hard to see how if she was not the daughter of Rhaena, Daena, or one of the great bastards. I suppose also possible she had a Martell mother. All we really know is that she was NOT the daughter of Elaena (Targaryen) Penrose.

Edited December 28, 2023 by Hippocras

[Hippocras]

11 hours ago, BRANDON GREYSTARK said:

Starks ,Greyjoy .

Starks might via Melantha Blackwood or other route. Greyjoys are harder to pinpoint but also still might.

[Lord of Oldstones]

Baratheon and Martell are the evident one.

Tyrells could have Targ blood by Rhaena Hightower's daughters.

Lannister having Targ blood by Viserys Plumm's descendant is very possible.

But Stark getting Targ blood is very unlikely but theres tiny chance if Aegon IV-Lothson-Whent theory holds or Melantha Blackwood being daughter of Bloodravens sister.

I dont see Arryns with Targ blood by any way.  

[Hippocras]

2 minutes ago, Lord of Oldstones said:

Baratheon and Martell are the evident one.

Tyrells could have Targ blood by Rhaena Hightower's daughters.

Lannister having Targ blood by Viserys Plumm's descendant is very possible.

But Stark getting Targ blood is very unlikely but theres tiny chance if Aegon IV-Lothson-Whent theory holds or Melantha Blackwood being daughter of Bloodravens sister.

I dont see Arryns with Targ blood by any way.  

More likely that Melantha descended from Baela.

Edited December 28, 2023 by Hippocras

[Lord of Oldstones]

5 minutes ago, Hippocras said:

More likely that Melantha descended from Baela.

I think Laena daughter of Baela marries in stormlands and is ancestor of Aelinor Penrose. 

It makes more of a sense for Benjicot's son marrying the youngest daughter of Cregan by Alysanne Blackwood.