The series, House of the Dragon is now streaming on the HBO platform and has now entered the second episode. The series received a good response from viewers as this is a prequel to the Game of Thrones series. As the show goes on there will be the emergence of theories pertaining to different topics like the background of things, places, houses, dragons, etc.
Background Of The Two Political Factions That Will Appear Later In ‘House Of The Dragon’
The beginning of episode 1 started with the history of House Targaryen and how they ended in the possession of the king’s landing. The show is set 200 years before the main series of Game of Thrones. King Jaehaerys, the descendent of Aegon the Conqueror, the conciliator and the wise, is the fourth Targaryen to sit on the iron throne. He ruled very well as his kingdom flourished and lived peacefully during his reign.
King Jaehaerys’s sons are consumed by natural tragedy. When Jaehaerys was left without any male heir then he decided to call The Great Council of the houses and lords of the seven kingdoms to choose the new descendent to the thrones. The council was only left with two choices as there were only two candidates for Iron Throne, the first one was prince Viserys who was the grandson of the king and the second one was princess Rhaenys who was the granddaughter of the king and the eldest heir to the throne.
The council chose the first one because of the trait followed in the kingdom to choose the male heir as there wasn’t a single female who sat the iron throne before that time. After that Rhaenys was also called ‘the queen who never was’.
A few years after the great council, the present king Viserys has only one daughter left named Rhaenyra because of the death of his first wife Aemma Arryn during the birth of his son Baelon. Now there were two heirs left again to the throne, The king’s brother Daemon and his daughter Rhaenyra but the king was not determined to give up the throne to anyone. After some time, a misunderstanding occurred between Viserys and his brother Daemon due to the celebration of the death of prince Baelon so the king sent his brother away from the king’s landing. After this Viserys declared Rhaenyra the heir to the throne.
Lord Corlys Velaryon, the master of ships and the husband of the princess Rhaenys offered king Viserys his daughter, Laena Velaryon but the king wasn’t sure about this proposal as Laena was only 12 years old.
Alicent Hightower and king Viserys spent some good time together talking about history and other stuff, this moment led to the affection between them. Therefore, the king refused Corlys’s offer and decided to marry Alicent over Laena. This is the point where events will start to go in the direction of Dance of the Dragons as this created a rift of misunderstanding between Alicent Hightower and Rhaenyra which will lead ultimately to the Targaryen civil war.
House Of The Dragon: How Were The Green And Black Factions Created?
On the fifth anniversary of the marriage of queen Alicent to King Viserys, there was a grand tournament held at the king’s landing in 111 AC. In this event queen Alicent wore a green gown, and princess Rhaenyra dressed in their traditional Targaryen red and black. After this moment, the people of the kingdom assigned these attributes to identify the two factions and it became the custom to call them Greens and Blacks when to indicate their groups.
The difference which started with the marriage of Alicent Hightower has now become a political rivalry between two friends. This turned bad when Alicent and her father Otto started to support the rule of Aegon 2 who was the first son of Viserys with Alicent. Rhaenyra opposed this claim as she was chosen by her father as his heir so she decided to gather her supporters to push to the iron throne.
The Greens Faction And Their Allies
The Greens who were also known as Queen’s party were the faction who decided to support the claim of Aegon 2 as the king of the seven kingdoms during the Targaryen civil war called Dance of the Dragon. They were opposed by the Blacks for this claim. The Greens carried the sigil with a golden dragon which symbolizes Sunfyre.
Alicent Hightower made a council of her loyal supporters to stronghold her position on the Crown. This council was called the Green Council as it was created by Greens. Green Council members were Alicent Hightower, Otto Hightower, Criston Cole, Tyland Lannister, Jasper Wylde, Larys Strong, and Orwyle. The council was very effective in decision-making on the behalf of the king.
Some foreign allies reached the Greens with their support and loyalty and played an important role in that succession war. They were the High Council of the Triarchy and Sharako Lohar an admiral for the Triarchy.
The Black Faction And Their Allies
This was the group of people who supported princess Rhaenyra for her claim to the Iron Throne. They were also called the party of the princess. They carried the sigil of Rhaenyra Targaryen which have the red dragon sigil, the moon and falcon sigil of House Arryn, and the silver seahorse on the sea of green of house Velaryon.
She was supported by the House of Arryn, uncle Daemon Targaryen, Corlys Velaryon, Jaecarys Velaryon, Rhaenys Targaryen, Lucerys Velaryon, and many other royal Targaryen members. Later Corlys defected to the Greens and many Greens defected to the Blacks because of their self-interests as the politics of civil war created unrest in the realm. Rhaenyra made a council to manage the strategy and tactics in the throne succession war which was called the Black council.
some members of the council were Daemon, Rhaenys, Jacaerys, Lord Bartimos, Lord Staunton, Lord Gormon, etc. A famous house like Stark also supported the princess. Foreigners’ houses and many individuals also came under the canopy of civil war. Like Greens, the Blacks also have their share of foreign support which was Black Trombo and Mysaria who was formerly the mistress of Daemon.
House of the Dragon will depict these factions in its ninth and tenth episodes, called ‘The Green Council’ and ‘The Black Queen’.
