Before I delve into some examples, I want to make it clear that I’m not calling Rhaenyra a feminist. No ASOIAF female character can be a feminist because most of them are highborn women who derive power from being nobility and because feminism as an ideology didn’t exist during Medieval European feudalism. This doesn’t mean that the themes they represent aren’t feminist. Characters are vehicles for social commentary, cultural arguments, and thematic excavations of what the author is trying to point or problematize. In this sense, every ASOIAF female character who occupies a relatively chunky portion of the story has feminist themes in her narrative, and can be read through, and indeed should be read through, a feminist lens. Their stories are feminist because they deal with gendered violence, women in politics, and patriarchy at large. Thus, if I say that Cersei’s arc is feminist, obviously I do not mean that Cersei herself is a feminist. That would be ludicrous, because Cersei hates women and is as anti-feminist as one could get. However, the depiction of female trauma, surviving abuse, and how women approach their trauma differently (and not all end up being the kind of “good victim” that society wants to see) are important feminist themes in her arc. The same as I believe Clytemnestra is a vehicle for feminist explorations of misogyny in ancient Greek religion and society as well as a reflection of the misogyny of the classics themselves, I believe Rhaenyra is a feminist character for what she represents broadly and not for her actual values.
The point of this post in particular is to demonstrate that there is a gendered divide in how the current timeline ASOIAF characters view Rhaenyra. As I pointed out, Arianne explicitly identifies Rhaenyra as precedent for independent female ruling in Westeros (even though Rhaenyra only ruled for a short time), while Stannis thinks Rhaenyra was a Usurper and buys the biased, male-centric, Maester viewpoint of Westerosi History. This is deliberate upon the part of the author. Again, Rhaenyra herself is not a feminist. She’s not a revolutionary woman in the slightest. But her story is feminist because it represents what happens to even the most privileged woman in the realm when she tries to live her life and assert her rights: she’s routinely called a whore or slut (especially by her half-brothers Aegon and Aemond), has her legitimacy questioned simply because of her motherhood (her three sons, Joffrey, Lucerys, Jaecerys), she’s sexually liberal (like many men, but men are allowed to be sexually liberal without being punished––see Aegon II, Aegon IV, Robert Baratheon), loses four of her children, becomes increasingly isolated and paranoid, and dies at the young age of 33 when her brother feeds her to a dragon.
It’s not a coincidence that after the Dance, not only do the dragons die out, not only does magic sputter to a near standstill, but Targaryen women go from having some political power to being abused, sidelined, raped, treated nothing more as pawns to be married off, deriving their power mostly from marriage, and completely brutalized. Baelor Breakspear imprisons his sisters Daena, Rhaena, and Elaena in the Maidenvault because he views them as sinful. This is an assertion of Andal, feudalist, Faith-driven, religious patriarchy. Naerys is in love with her brother Aemon but is forced to marry Aegon IV and become his queen, and stand helpless as he routinely cheats on her. She asks him if they can live as mere brother and sister, but Aegon replies that for two Targaryens, that means they must be in a sexual relationship, a clear implication that Aegon was raping her. She’s a pious and demure woman who resigns herself to her lot. Daeron II marries off his sister Daenerys to Maron Martell despite the fact that she loved her brother Daemon Blackfyre (and this is one of the causes of the Blackfyre Rebellion). And while the marriage was good for the Realm because it brought Dorne peacefully into the fold, and we have an iconic moment of Princess Daenerys opening the Water Gardens of Sunspear to lowborn children (starting a tradition that has lasted to the current timeline), it’s sad that a Targaryen woman has to give up her happiness for her family and for the Realm, and can’t resist it. (Most people also neglect to mention that Maron was 30 when he married 15-year-old Princess Daenerys). Most tragic is Rhaella Targaryen, forced to marry Aerys II. She’s raped repeatedly and suffers multiple miscarriages. You then get to Daenerys Stormborn, who at the start of the series is sold as a bridal slave to 30-year-old Khal Drogo, who had an impoverished and unstable childhood with no home or security or safety, and an abusive, violent brother as her only guardian.
Targaryen women did suffer before the Dance. I’m not saying that Targaryen men were feminist allies by any means. But Targaryen women were much more powerful before the Dance. To go from Rhaenys and Visenya the Conquerors to what happens to Naerys, Dany, Rhaella, the Maidens in the Maidenvault, is a tragedy borne of Targaryen assimilation into Andal culture/the Faith. You rightfully pointed out Jaehaerys passed over Rhaenys in the succession. That act was actually the seed for the Dance itself. Jaehaerys assimilated fully into the Faith and created the Doctrine of Exceptionalism so that Targaryens could fully convert to the Faith without their incestuous practices being a barrier to that conversion. And Jaehaerys isn’t the only Targaryen man to betray Targaryen women––Aegon II, Aegon IV, Aerys II are all clear examples of what happens to Targaryens when their men abuse and betray their women: the House and Dynasty itself suffer.
While Visenya wasn’t Aerion’s heir, Rhaenys and Visenya were Aegon’s equals and actually ruled:
Though none doubted that Aegon Targaryen was the final authority in all matters relating to the governance of the realm, his sisters Visenya and Rhaenys remained his partners in power throughout his reign. Save perhaps for Good Queen Alysanne, the wife of King Jaehaerys I, no other queen in the history of the Seven Kingdoms ever exercised as much influence over policy as the Dragon’s sisters. It was the king’s custom to bring one of his queens with him wherever he traveled, whilst the other remained at Dragonstone or King’s Landing, oft as not seated on the Iron Throne, ruling on whatever matters came before her.
Despite Jaehaerys’ misogyny, Alysanne herself was very active in creating and implementing policy:
A few days later, the queen convened her women’s court in Lord Manderly’s own hall, a thing hitherto unheard of in the North, and more than two hundred women and girls gathered to share their thoughts, concerns, and grievances with Her Grace.
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“Above all else, a queen must know how to listen,” Alysanne Targaryen often said. At Castle Black, she proved those words. She listened, she heard, and she won the eternal devotion of the men of the Night’s Watch by her actions. She understood the need for a castle between Snowgate and Icemark, she told Lord Burley, but the Nightfort was crumbling, overlarge, and surely ruinous to heat. The Watch should abandon it, she said, and build a smaller castle farther to the east. Lord Burley could not disagree…but the Night’s Watch lacked the coin to build new castles, he said. Alysanne had anticipated that objection. She would pay for the castle herself, she told the Lord Commander, and pledged her jewels to cover the cost. “I have a good many jewels,” she said.” It would take eight years to raise the new castle, which would bear the name of Deep Lake. Outside its main hall, a statue of Alysanne Targaryen stands to this very day. The Nightfort was abandoned even before Deep Lake was completed, as the queen had wished. Lord Commander Burley also renamed Snowgate castle in her honor, as Queensgate. Queen Alysanne also wished to listen to the women of the North. When Lord Burley explained that there were no women on the Wall, she persisted…until finally, with great reluctance, he had her escorted to a village south of the Wall that the black brothers called Mole’s Town. She would find women there, his lordship said, though most of them would be harlots. The men of the Night’s Watch took no wives, he explained, but they remained men all the same, and some felt certain needs. Queen Alysanne said she did not care, and so it came to pass that she held her women’s court amongst the whores and strumpets of Mole’s Town…and there heard certain tales that would change the Seven Kingdoms forever.
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And so it came to pass that the second of what the smallfolk named Queen Alysanne’s Laws was enacted: the abolition of the lord’s ancient right to the first night. Henceforth, it was decreed, a bride’s maidenhead would belong only to her husband, whether joined before a septon or a heart tree, and any man, be he lord or peasant, who took her on her wedding night or any other night would be guilty of the crime of rape.
I am not calling Alysanne a feminist or a revolutionary, but the power she wields to help enact policies for women is certainly unparalleled when compared to previous Targaryen queens (save for Rhaenys and Visenya) and for Queens that come after her. She convenes women’s councils, holds town hall sessions just for women to hear their grievances, revitalizes the Night’s Watch, listens to the stories and complaints of the women who live near the Watch (women who are prostituted, trafficked, otherwise relatively ignored by the entire Realm), and abolishes the Lord’s Right of First Night, criminalizing it as rape (which, again, may not seem very shocking or subversive by modern standards, but for feudalist standards it was progress). And she abolished it after listening to women of all statuses and classes and hearing their burdens. Compare this to Cersei as Queen Consort, or Arianne as Princess of Dorne, or Asha as Princess of the Iron Islands––are they able to wield even this much power? Are they able to sway and create policy like this?
That Rhaenys could be considered a successor to Jaehaerys is because Valyrians obviously had a policy of female succession. As did the Rhoynish (which is why Dorne permits female succession). It’s not a perfect policy because women are still passed over in the succession or marginalized. This is reflected in Arianne’s arc. Despite the fact that she’s her father’s heir, he doesn’t bother to train her the way he trains Quentyn and leaves her in the dark about his plans even until she turns 24 (and only lets her in on his plans after she stages a failed, disastrous coup). Yet the tragedy of a Targaryen woman being denied her right to succession doesn’t start with Rhaenys, it starts with Rhaena the Black Bride. She would have been her father Aenys’ heir, indeed was his legitimate heir, and married her brother Aegon, but her uncle Maegor, behind her in succession, killed Aegon and forcibly took her as his wife. He married her specifically to unite their claims and prevent wars of succession; thus he was only able to legitimize his claim by marrying her. He derived his claim to the Throne from marrying her, in essence. Furthermore, Maegor wanted to name Rhaena’s daughter Aerea as his heir. He even disinherited Rhaena’s younger brother, Jaehaerys, to solidify his decision. When Maegor died and the question of succession came up again, Rhaena was one of the suggested successors, and as were her daughters, Aerea and Rhaella. Yet they were passed over for Jaehaerys.
Even after the Dance, Baela and Rhaena of Pentos are suggested as successors to the Throne but the Maesters use their gender and the Dance as proof that they shouldn’t succed to the Throne.
We see here a theme intertwined between Rhaena the Black Bride, Baela and Rhaena the Dragon Twins, Rhaenys the Queen who Never Was, Rhaenyra, and Aerea and Rhaella Targaryen: each of them are considered and suggested as legitimate candidates of independent succession to the Throne, each of them would have been legitimate independent female rulers, and yet each of them are betrayed by other Targaryens, especially Targaryen men, who assimilate to the Andal culture and thus prioritize male succession over female succession, no matter age or question of legitimacy. Andal culture and the Faith assert that only men can succeed the throne. By passing over these women, all suggested as legitimate heirs to the Throne, to give the throne to men, Targaryen men and even the women who aided them (like Alysanne, unfortunately, who did have a hand in her sister Rhaena being passed over in the line of succession) spelled ruin for their house. Assimilating into Andal culture and violating their own precedent of female ruling was terrible for the Targaryens.
So when I say that there was precedent among the Targaryens for female succession, this is what I’m referring to. No Andal or First Men descended house would ever consider listing women as independent, legitimate successors to the Throne, unless literally every other potential male heir was dead or unfit to be heir. Look at Cersei, or Catelyn Stark, or other non-Targaryen women who have political power as some kind of ruler––do they have the power to create policies the way Alysanne, Rhaenys and Visenya, did? Asha tries to fight for the Seastone Chair, but she is resoundingly defeated. by her uncle Euron who wins the Throne. She is relegated to the side. Princess Nymeria and some of the following Dornish Princesses are really the only other ruling women in Westerosi history who had the kind of power Targaryen women did before the Dance.
And all of that fades the moment the Dance ends. Not just for Targaryen women, whom as I already explained lose all their power after it. You’ll notice that thereinafter, Targaryen women were only ever Queen/Princess Consorts, never considered as candidates for heirs to the Throne itself. It was also for other women in the Realm. There’s a reason Tywin and Doran can get away with not educating Cersei and Arianne, their eldest children, why no matter how beloved or popular Asha is or how good a leader she is she can’t succeed to the Seastone chair, why the vast majority of the Queens and princesses in the current timeline series only derive their power from marriage or motherhood (Daenerys Stormborn is a significant exception to this), why even the wives of Lord Paramounts aren’t seen being involved in policymaking to the extent that their husbands are.
We thus go back to the point of the original post: Rhaenyra is not a feminist, or subversive, or progressive. Her story, however, is all of those things, and what it represents to the women of the Realm in the current timeline can be seen through Arianne citing her as precedent for wanting to crown Myrcella.
(I know that Stannis names Shireen his heir, which is a significant exception to all of this, especially considering that Stannis himself is very misogynistic, but he names her heir because he has no other children, so this goes back to the poin that non-Targaryen/Martell houses were not naming women their heirs unless there were literally no men available).
