Dance of the Dragons

The Dance of the Dragons, or simply the Dance of Dragons, is a royal succession war in the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros fought between two rival factions of House Targaryen, the Blacks and the Greens. The war emerged between the children of the late Viserys I Targaryen: his eldest daughter, Rhaenyra, and his eldest son, Aegon II, over who should succeed their father on the Iron Throne. It is the first full-scale civil war to ever take place in the Seven Kingdoms.
==History==
===The Blacks and the Greens===
The war began when King Viserys I died. His designated heir for many years had been his only surviving child by his first wife, Queen Aemma Arryn, his daughter Princess Rhaenyra. After Aemma's death, the Velaryons and the Hightowers competed for Viserys's hand. Ultimately, Viserys chose to marry his Hand's daughter, Alicent Hightower. Together, they had four children, the eldest of which was Prince Aegon. The Seven Kingdoms had never had a ruling queen before, having passed over Princess Rhaenys Targaryen at the Great Council of 101 AC to appoint Viserys himself as king, and many were troubled by the thought of Rhaenyra ascending the throne. Per the traditional inheritance laws of the Andals, a younger son is always ahead of an elder daughter in matters of succession, but the Targaryens had never formalized royal inheritance laws for their new realm after Aegon's Conquest 130 years prior; Aenys I had inherited the throne on account of being the eldest of two sons, but both Maegor I and Jaehaerys I took the throne by force, and Viserys I was elected ahead of the most senior heir, Rhaenys. Thus all but one of Aegon the Conqueror's successors had passed over what the Westerosi would consider to be the senior line, the most recent of which would set a precedent in the public mind that a woman could not inherit the Iron Throne.
Viserys had extracted oaths of fealty to Rhaenyra from the lords of the realm. However, after the birth of Aegon, many lords came to assume that he would succeed Viserys on the throne instead of Rhaenyra, as he was the king's firstborn son. In the royal court at King's Landing, tensions began rising between those who supported Rhaenyra's claim, and those who supported Queen Alicent and Ser Otto Hightower's claim for Aegon. These tensions not only divided the lords and knights at court and across the realm, but were also passed down to Rhaenyra and Alicent's children. Their hostility was heightened by the belief that Rhaenyra's children by Ser Laenor Velaryon were, in fact, bastards born out of wedlock with Ser Harwin Strong. Their conflict led to the rise of two rival factions: those who supported the Hightowers came to be known as the Greens, while Rhaenyra's own followers came to be known as the Blacks.
===War of ravens and messengers===
The morning after Viserys dies, the Green Council, formed from Viserys's own Small Council, stage a coup in King's Landing, and Aegon is crowned in the Dragonpit as King Aegon II. Rhaenyra, as the Princess of Dragonstone, holds her powerbase on the eponymous island. In response to Aegon's coronation, the Black Council is formed. Rhaenyra is crowned queen by her uncle-husband Daemon, and gains the support of Lord Corlys Velaryon and his fleet. The Blacks begin making plans to gain the support of the remaining Great Houses that have not yet openly allied with King Aegon, namely Houses Stark, Arryn, and Baratheon. Daemon also intends to treat with House Tully to gain the Riverlands. Rhaenyra's sons Jacaerys and Lucerys are sent to each of the houses to win their support. Jacaerys flies on his dragon Vermax to the Eyrie and Winterfell, while Lucerys travels to Storm's End atop his dragon Arrax.
When Lucerys arrives at Storm's End, he discovers that King Aegon's younger brother Aemond has gotten there ahead of him. Having failed to gain the allegiance of Borros Baratheon, Lucerys leaves Storm's End. However, he is chased by Aemond atop his dragon Vhagar. A fight ensues above Shipbreaker Bay between the two princes' dragons, which results in the deaths of both Lucerys and Arrax, much to Aemond's dismay, as he intended only to intimidate Lucerys into cutting out one of his eyes in revenge for his own. When news of Lucerys's death reaches Dragonstone, Rhaenyra is consumed by rage and grief.
==In the books==
The Dance of the Dragons has been mentioned as a historical event since the first of the A Song of Ice and Fire novels. George R.R. Martin later began writing a series of prequel novellas describing the war, written as in-universe history books, not POV character prose like the A Song of Ice and Fire series or the Dunk & Egg novellas.
The Dance split the Seven Kingdoms in two, as lords, knights, and smallfolk declared for one side or the other. House Targaryen itself was divided, when the kin of each claimant became embroiled in the fighting. Over the two years of struggle, a terrible toll was taken on the highborn and smallfolk of Westeros alike. 
The Dance was a war unlike any other ever fought before or afterwards in the long history of the Seven Kingdoms: armies met in savage battles, but much of the slaughter took place on water, and especially in the air, as dragons fought dragons. It was a war marked by stealth, murder, and betrayal as well, a war fought in shadows and stairwells, council chambers and castle yards with knives and lies and poison.
Aegon II's main supporters were his mother Alicent's family, the powerful House Hightower that rules Oldtown. Rhaenyra's main supporters were her first husband's family, House Velaryon, as well as her mother's family, House Arryn. The rivalry between Rhaenyra on one side and Alicent on the other festered at the royal court for years during the reign of Viserys I. One way this rivalry took shape was in the fashions of clothing that courtiers wore, to display their faction allegiance. Once at a major tournament Rhaenyra wore a black and red gown, the colors of House Targaryen, while Alicent wore a green gown (in the TV series, green is one of the Hightower colors. In the books this is not the case; Alicent simply preferred to wear green). Soon, all of Rhaenyra's supporters started wearing black clothing, while all of Alicent's followers started wearing green. Over the years, the popular names applied to both factions were inspired by the colors they wore: Rhaenyra's supporters were called "the blacks," and Aegon II's supporters were called "the greens."
The Dance of the Dragons draws inspiration from the real-life civil war in medieval England known as the "," when Princess Matilda was the only child of King Henry I, but her cousin Stephen usurped the throne, leading to nineteen years of protracted civil war. Similarly, Matilda was unpopular because she was thought to be imperious and domineering for a woman.
==References==
===Notes===
==External links==
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Category:Featured pages
Category:House Targaryen
Category:Wars
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