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Who was the acting Hand of the King?


Nucky Thompson

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After the death of Jon Arryn and before Ned Stark became Hand of the King, someone had to fill the position temporarily. Who might that have been? Moreover, with the king, the queen "and all the rest of them" out of the capital, a "castellan" of sorts was needed to govern King's Landing in his stead. My bet is that it was either Pycelle or perhaps Ser Barristan. Any other suggestions? Littlefinger and Varys are among the usual suspects as well, but I don't think that either of them could actually be entrusted with such an important task. They would also be likely to try some plot if entrusted with so big a responsibility - Littlefinger would probably try to stage a coup and secede the capital in the king's absence while Varys would be likely to invite Illyrio's army to seize the place. Barristan is probably capable of holding the place in the king's absence but Robert doesn't seem to have liked him that much. In such a situation Stannis would've been the logical choice, but he probably was too preoccupied with being holed up on Dragonstone to notice. By the way, what would be his reaction when receiving ravens from the capital? "Nah, bugger that, let fatso Robert think of that. I'll sit safely here and wait for him to do something stupid and get himself killed. By something like... a boar?"

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I was under the impression that the Small Council in general (Including Littlefinger, Pycelle, and Varys) would govern the city until the King returned, and all matters that need a King or Hand to decide would wait until their return. It's not like there were a lot of things happening while they were en route as we can tell by the first Small Council meeting held upon Ned's arrival.

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This is not modern-day state, who always have their governments, even technical ones. Kindgom could survive for a few weeks without a Hand - it's not like that Hand's role is absolutely obligatory for stability of the realm on a daily basis. So, between Jon's death and Ned's acceptance of the role, position was simply vacant.

As for who ruled kingdom in King's absence - Robert probably named a castellan who ruled in his name. It seems to be usual practice - as we know Catelyn (with Ser Rodrik) and Jon Arryn (with Nestor Royce) both did so. It was certainly not Varys, and it's very very unlikely it was LF (who, by the way, couldn't staged a coup at that stage even if he wanted to). King's steward in mentioned on several occasions during AGOT - so maybe Robert appointed him to rule.

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He probably named Renly, as he's Master of Laws and the king's brother. Not that Renly had any real power during the interim, he probably just headed up the meetings of the small council.

I would say this is the most logical answer.

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Yeah, I totally forgot about Renly. He seems like the logical choice of someone to run things in the capital while Robert was absent. Speaking about Renly, though, if he had so much of Robert's confidence, why wasn't Renly his first choice when deciding who to appoint as Warden of the East? Sure, he disliked Ned's suggestion of Stannis, but why prefer Jaime over his trusted other brother? If he was fit to run the capital for a while, how would the wardenship of the East prove more difficult?

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Yeah, I totally forgot about Renly. He seems like the logical choice of someone to run things in the capital while Robert was absent. Speaking about Renly, though, if he had so much of Robert's confidence, why wasn't Renly his first choice when deciding who to appoint as Warden of the East? Sure, he disliked Ned's suggestion of Stannis, but why prefer Jaime over his trusted other brother? If he was fit to run the capital for a while, how would the wardenship of the East prover more difficult?

Because he didn't have Renly's sister telling him what to do. Jaime's sister had a bit more pull with the king.

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