A Refresher on the Targaryen Family Tree Before “House of the Dragon”

The fifth king in the Targaryen dynasty, Viserys I sits on the Iron Throne when we join “House of the Dragon.” He is the son of Baelon Targaryen and grandson of Jaehaerys I, known as “the Conciliator,” and is descended from Aegon I, the Conqueror, who took over Westeros and launched the royal Targaryen dynasty generations earlier. Like others in his family, Viserys is a dragonrider. In fact, his dragon is Balerion, the same dragon Aegon I rode; after Balerion’s death during Jaehaerys’s reign, Viserys does not seek a new dragon.

Viserys’s reign includes significant questions over who is to succeed him. His first marriage to Aemma Arryn only produces one surviving heir: his daughter, Rhaenyra. Although he intends for Rhaenyra to succeed him on the throne, his remarriage complicates things. His second marriage, to Alicent Hightower, produces three sons and a daughter, and the eldest son, Aegon, becomes one of the major rivals in the civil war.

Princess Rhaenyra is the only surviving child of Viserys I and his first wife, Queen Aemma, and she is Viserys’s intended heir. She, too, is a dragonrider, bonded with the dragon Syrax. She has no full-blooded siblings, but multiple half-siblings through her father’s second marriage, which launches the civil war.

Rhaenyra first marries Ser Laenor Velaryon, with whom she has three sons before she is widowed. Her second marriage to her uncle Prince Daemon Targaryen produces two sons and a daughter: Aegon, Viserys, and Visenya. After her father dies, Rhaenyra is not even told about his death until after her half-brother Aegon claims the throne. The resulting battle between Rhaenyra and Aegon’s claims explodes into the civil war.

Prince Daemon is the second son of the late Prince Baelon Targaryen and his wife (and sister) Alyssa. Daemon’s older brother is Viserys I, the king. A dragonrider like his brother, his dragon is Caraxes. He marries three times throughout his life. His first wife, Rhea Royce, dies young in a horse riding accident. He remarries to Laena Velaryon, who has some Targaryen blood through her mother, Princess Rhaenys Targaryen; they have two daughters.

After Laena’s death in childbirth, Daemon marries for the third and final time, to his niece, Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen. They have two sons and a daughter, and Daemon becomes one of Rhaenyra’s biggest champions in her quest to claim the Iron Throne she believes is rightfully hers and her descendants’.

Prince Aegon (not to be confused with his younger cousin/nephew, Aegon, the son of Rhaenyra and Daemon) is the eldest son of King Viserys and his second wife, Alicent Hightower. Even after the birth of Aegon and his siblings, Viserys still plans on making Rhaenyra, his daughter from his first marriage, his heir. This frustrates Aegon, Alicent, and the rest of their faction at court. He, too, is a dragonrider, forming a bond with the golden-scaled dragon Sunfyre.

It is that split between the half-siblings that, in the book “Fire and Blood,” sparks the civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons. After Viserys’s death, Aegon and his faction seize power, crowning him Aegon II, all before his half-sister Rhaenyra is even notified of her father’s death. Rhaenyra isn’t willing to give up her claim so easily, and the entire Targaryen clan and their allies throughout Westeros take sides in what becomes a brutal civil war.

Princess Rhaenys Targaryen is known as the “Queen Who Never Was.” She is the daughter of the late Prince Aemon Targaryen and his wife, Jocelyn Baratheon. Her father, Aemon, was the son and heir of Jaehaerys I, and she was presumed to be her father’s heir in turn. As with other Targaryens, Rhaenys is a dragonrider, riding the “Red Queen” Meleys.

However, when her father died before he could ascend to the throne, Jaehaerys had to choose between two possible heirs: Rhaenys, or Aemon’s brother (Rhaenys’s uncle) Baelon. Jaehaerys chose Baelon, whose son, Viserys, winds up becoming the next king when Baelon also dies before Jaehaerys. Rhaenys is passed over, largely because she’s a woman.

Rhaenys winds up marrying Corlys Velaryon. Their daughter, Laena, later marries Rhaenys’s cousin Daemon.

Several generations after the civil war, Aerys II Targaryen sits on the Iron Throne, with his eldest son, Rhaegar, as his presumed heir. Rhaegar is the eldest of three children born to Aerys and his wife/sister Rhaella, along with younger siblings Viserys and Daenerys. With the dragons long extinct or near-extinct, he is not a dragonrider like his ancestors but distinguishes himself as a knight.

Rhaegar marries Elia Martell and has two children with her, a son and a daughter. As his father descends further into tyranny and madness, Rhaegar causes further problems when he falls in love with Lyanna Stark. A civil war breaks out when the Starks and the Baratheons believe Rhaegar has abducted Lyanna, and it ends with the Targaryen dynasty overthrown and both Aerys and Rhaegar dead. The truth, however, is that Rhaegar and Lyanna were in love. Rhaegar had his marriage to Elia annulled and secretly married Lyanna, who died giving birth to their secret son, Aegon.

After the fall of his father Aerys, Viserys is the eldest surviving Targaryen. He flees to Braavos with his sister Daenerys, where he plots to find a way to restore their family to the throne. Part of his plan involves marrying his teenage sister to Khal Drogo, a Dothraki warlord, to get their support and military might.

Viserys’s manipulations and arrogance eventually backfire, however. As Dany grows more sure of herself and becomes beloved by the Dothraki, they lose patience with Viserys. When he threatens Dany and her unborn child and demands his “crown,” Khal Drogo has him killed by pouring molten gold on his head.

Daenerys, the youngest child of Aerys II, grows from a teenage pawn in her brother’s plans to a strong queen claimant in her own right. After the death of her brother Viserys, she embarks on a plan of her own to return to Westeros as queen. She is briefly married to Khal Drogo, but he dies, and she soon miscarries what would have been their child. She does, however, hatch three dragon eggs, the first dragons in many generations: Drogon, Rhaegal, and Viserion.

Over several years, she gathers an army of misfits, freed slaves, great and small noble houses, and many others to support her claim to the Iron Throne. Eventually, she begins fighting her way through Westeros, where she meets Jon Snow, who asks for her help defeating the Night King’s army. Dany and Jon fall in love, not realizing that they are actually related. As the battles grow more brutal and the losses get more personal, Daenerys’s grip on sanity starts to slip. She does reach the Iron Throne, but only after going completely mad and burning the entirety of King’s Landing. Jon kills her just before she can sit on the throne.

The last surviving Targaryen doesn’t even know he’s a Targaryen until very late in “Game of Thrones.” Jon Snow is raised believing that he is Ned Stark’s son, born out of an affair with a woman named Wylla. In reality, he is Aegon Targaryen, the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Ned’s sister Lyanna, making him the true heir to the Iron Throne.

After spending years with the Night’s Watch, Jon is eventually hailed as King in the North. He reunites with his surviving Stark “siblings” and takes on the task of liaising with Daenerys Targaryen in hopes of getting her help against the Night King. When he meets her dragons, he is surprised that one of them, Rhaegal, lets him ride him, and he later rides Rhaegal into battle.

Jon and Dany fall in love, unaware that they are actually aunt and nephew. When the revelation reaches them, Dany is concerned that Jon will want to take the throne, while Jon is more startled by the truth of their biological relationship. In the end, Jon stays loyal to Dany until the very end, when he is horrified by her burning of King’s Landing. He kills her in hopes of saving Westeros and returns to exile with the Night’s Watch as punishment for her death.