Once Rhaenyra becomes marriageable, Viserys fields a plethora of suitors for her hand. The worthies of Westeros vow their loyalty to Rhaenyra as royal successor. Viserys in “House of the Dragon” works from a similar playbook. The durability of his arrangements for Matilda’s rise to authority was immediately tested. Henry I died two years later of food poisoning after eating eels, a favorite dish of his. A son, Henry, was born two years later, and a third pledge followed. Henry I then turned to arranging a marriage for Matilda so she could give birth to a grandson and buttress her position.Īfter Matilda’s nuptials with Geoffrey, count of Anjou, the barons were summoned to renew their oath to her in 1131. Henry I, determined to forge a sacramental bond between his daughter and England’s magnates, compelled his barons in 1127 to swear their support for her as his successor. Matilda, who had married the Holy Roman Emperor Henry V in 1114, returned to England a widow in 1125. Henry I pursued measures to make his daughter palatable to them. The challenge for a medieval king, whether Henry I or the fictional Viserys, was to persuade the nobles to overcome their prejudices and not just accept but actively support a woman’s ascension to power. Left with his young daughter Rhaenyra, he decides to make her a ruling queen, a role the girl relishes as she seeks to change “the order of things.” When Daemon’s conduct becomes intolerable, Viserys disinherits and banishes him. Sonless, Visery’s named heir is his younger brother, the debauched, sinister Daemon. The boy – the desperately desired heir – doesn’t live out the day. A fading hope for a son is dashed when a breached birth and a brutal Caesarian section, intended to save the child, ends up killing Aemma. Once installed, however, Westeros’ new king would have understood the plight of England’s Henry I.Īemma, Viserys’ queen, suffers stillbirths and miscarriages and produces only a daughter, Rhaenyra. Yet the male Viserys becomes king and Rhaenys, “the queen who never was,” later ruefully concedes that this represented “the order of things.” Rhaenys, a female, is the older of the two. The old king, having outlived his sons, empowers a council of nobles to choose his successor between two of his grandchildren, the cousins Rhaenys and Viserys. Viserys and Henry I share the same plightĪ similar scenario drives the plot of “House of the Dragon.” The absolute preference in the fictional kingdom Westeros for a male ruler is expressed in the series’ opening scene. The queen was the conduit through which power was transferred by marriage and childbirth, not its exclusive wielder. ![]() Her role, moreover, as an intimate confidant and counselor could be consequential.īut a queen was not expected to swing a sword or lead troops into battle and forge the personal loyalties on which kingship rested, to say nothing of the misogyny inherent to medieval English society. A queen could exert influence in her husband’s physical absence or when, after a king’s death, their son was a minor. The move was unprecedented in medieval England. The cradle sat empty and the sands in Henry I’s hourglass ran low, so he resolved that his lone legitimate child, Matilda, would have the throne as a ruling queen. The queen had died two years earlier, so Henry I remarried – Adeliza of Louvain – but they had no children together. When his also-inebriated helmsmen hit a rock, the prince drowned. In 1120, a drunken 17-year-old William attempted a nighttime channel crossing. With William’s birth, the foremost responsibility of medieval queenship was fulfilled: There would be a male heir. But with his queen, Matilda, he had only a daughter, the future “Empress” Matilda, and a son, William. The story went like this: Henry I sired two dozen or more children out of wedlock. ![]() Martin, whose novels were the foundation for the HBO series “Game of Thrones,” has made no secret of his inspiration for “House of the Dragon”: the Anarchy, a two-decade period, from 1135 to 1154, when a man and a woman vied with each other for the English throne. ![]() This storyline reflects the real obstacles facing women who aspired to exercise royal authority in medieval society. A king, lacking a male heir to his throne, elevates his teenage daughter to be his named successor, and a complex dynastic drama ensues. “House of the Dragon” is one of those TV shows. However, popular fantasy, unencumbered by the competing priority of “getting it right,” can, in broad strokes, reflect the values of the medieval society that inspires it. Judged by their historical accuracy, cinematic portrayals are a mixed bag. (THE CONVERSATION) In three decades of teaching medieval European history, I’ve noticed my students are especially curious about the intersection of the stories told in class and the depictions of the Middle Ages they see in movies and television.
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