"Princess Rhaenys made no attempt to flee. With a glad cry and a crack of her whip, she turned Meleys toward the foe. Against Vhagar alone she might have had some chance, but against Vhagar and Sunfyre together, doom was certain" -Fire&Blood
You could actually count on 1 hand the amount of mad Targaryens and most of them are questionable or were driven into madness. The issue with them is if one Targaryen shows any form of brutality they are instantly labelled mad but some of the things they did was the same as Starks and Lannisters have done but they don’t get labelled. Bad stereotyping and generalising from the other characters. The Mad King wasn’t born mad. He was a very good ruler in the beginning. He was then captured by a rebel house who imprisoned and tortured him for months. It wasn’t until Ser Barristan rescued him that the Mad King then started becoming mad. His wife's multiple miscarriages and stillbirths also contributed to his madness. The house that tortured him were all killed except 1 member - Dontos Hollard. The same man who helped Sansa escape King's Landing after Joffrey died was later himself killed by Littlefinger. He was spared because he was a child at the time. Grand Maester Pycelle was the maester at the time when Queen Rhaella (the Mad King's sister-wife and Daenerys' mother) had multiple failed pregnancies and it is theorised that he had a hand in the failed pregnancies as he was loyal to the Lannisters. If we're including the show canon too then Daenerys was driven into madness to by losing everyone and her dragons around her. Other mad Targaryens are questionable. One Targaryen was simply labelled mad because he was once caught dancing naked in the Red Keep. Over 100 Targaryens and there are less than 3 who were actually truly born mad. Even then it wasn’t because of incest as the truly mad ones were the children of a Targaryen and non-Targaryen. The incest actually seemed to have no effect on them. Marrying other houses had an effect on them. Aemond is another one who is often cited as one of the mad Targaryens and he isn’t the product of incest. Game of Thrones exaggerated the 'everytime a Targaryen is born the Gods flip a coin' line. It was mentioned once in the books as a quip but the show kept repeating it as if it was fact. You also have to remember the characters in the show are biased. The Starks, Lannisters, Baratheons overthrew the Targaryens and the last Targaryen king being mad is still fresh in their minds so they aren’t going to speak about them positively. The books better show how these same characters still talk about the Targaryens pre the Mad King and how great they were. The books really show how important the Targaryens were in the foundation of the Seven Kingdoms. They built roads, helped reduce famines that were common in the North, ended centuries of petty warfare between the kingdoms, fully abolished slavery (it was previously already abolished but they got rid of all slavery that the Ironborn were still practising), ended horrible practices such as the 'first night' which allowed lords to sleep with women getting married in their lands before the groom, were religiously tolerant. Yes, there were wars in their time like the Dance of Dragons but even that was started by non-Targaryens - Alicent and Otto (and in the books Criston Cole too). The Starks conquered and killed to come to the rule the North too. They didn't get their by playing nice. They wiped out houses that refused to bend the knee to them. Not everyone happily did. The Boltons were forced too. Ned Stark was an anomoly when it came to how good a Stark is. His honour came from Jon Arryn. The other Starks were more ruthless and some were power-hungry. Ned's own father was more power-hungry. There were bad Targaryens and bad Targaryen rulers but they're were bad Stark rulers and bad Lannister rulers too. No dynasty ever had all good rulers. As someone else said as well. The Valyrians (which includes Targaryens) practiced incest to ensure the dragon riding blood stay stong otherwise it becomes thin and they would lose their bond to the dragons.
Thank you for this comment game of thrones didn't near irreparable damage to house Targaryen with the flip a coin bullshit and Danys ending in the show didn't help in truth Targaryens are no different from anyone else they are not uniquely evil or cruel nor are they the worst people in the universe, they have committed crimes just as much as they've forged Peace they are the true definition of gray in terms of the family as a whole.
In fact they became mad when they stopped practizing incest. The maddest of Targaryen are among the least inbred. Even the Mad king even if his parents were siblings, his granpa married a Blackwood, his great granpa a Dayne, and his great-great granpa a Martell.
Yea ironically the most famous " mad " Targaryens weren't born of incest areys was the only exception and his case was trama not incest in asoiaf incest has no known side effects, the faith only hates it likely because of old valyrea.
@@thatoneblackdude3333 In fact of all 77 Targayrens we know off only 3 got "mad": Duncan (who became mad cause of his tormenting dreams, which seams that he became not that he was born mad) then Aerion who drank balefyre (out of arrogance rather than madness) and Aerys who was tormented so much so, he became mad. Of all this only Aerys is a direct ancestor of Daenerys. PD: That "Coin" thing is rather religious propaganda against the Targaryens indeed.
the targaryens indeed had the power to end wars and unite the realm against the dark, but they lost their way as years went by. one of the points of the dance of the dragons is to show how wrong they were for using the dragons simply as weapons to fight each other and plunge the realm into war. daenerys was supposed to be the exception. she was supposed to be the one to unite the realm, the one to use the magic and power she brought to life for the good of the world and correct the mistakes of her ancestors. but game of thrones fucked that up.
But if you dilute the blood too much- the dragons are like nope. Without the dragons the targaryans could not have stopped the white walkers. It’s the old truism- your greatest strength is built on the back of your greatest weakness.. a wise woman once said.
@@cmo9400 since when is Valaryon blood dragon blood? And George has already given us direct lore that says no, dragons will bond with whoever they want in the right circumstance.
@@TheKillaShow and which dragon has bonded with a person of non targ or valaryon blood or which non targ or Valeryon has ever bonded with a dragon? Valeryons were with the targaryons in old Valyria. We have no idea who Adam’s mother was- but literally every other dragon rider is a targaryan.
Meleys is my fav dragon. She loved Rhyneas and Rhyneas loved her. That last look she gave her was soooooo incredibly sad as if she was saying goodbye. Amazing episode.
I'd like to say that people who have read all of the books, including GoT history, know better than to act like the Targaryens are all bad. But unfortunately that isn't the case. There even seem to be many people (who claim to have read the books) claiming that HotD is whitewashing Rhaenyra, but that isn't true either. The show does seem to be filling huge gaps from the books with positive scenes of Rhaenyra, but she was not a villain in the books so I don't think the show is some kind of huge tilt on the story.
"Beloved daughter of Lady Jocelyn Baratheon and Prince Aemon Targaryen, faithful wife to Lord Corlys Velaryon, mother and grandmother, the Queen Who Never Was lived fearlessly, and died amidst blood and fire." also, "Im tired of this Deamon side quest"... get comfy.
Honestly there is only a handful of mad Targaryens and they were literally driven to that point by Someone else or pressures I don’t think the incest caused the madness because they literally are dragon/human hybrids they literally have dragon blood and magic in their dna it’s why when a baby Targaryen hasn’t come full term they come out looking like dragon hybrids. Their incest isn’t the same as ours they are literally magical.
