Quick answer: Maekar I was the fourth son of King Daeron II, the father of Aegon V (“Egg”) and Aerion Brightflame, and — in the cruelest accident in the dynasty’s history — the man whose mace killed his own brother Baelor Breakspear at the Ashford trial of seven. He was never supposed to be king. Then everyone ahead of him died. Find his branch on the Targaryen family tree.
| Born | Mid-170s AC |
| Died | 233 AC, at Starpike — crushed by a stone from the battlements |
| Parents | King Daeron II & Mariah Martell |
| Brothers | Baelor “Breakspear”, Aerys I, Rhaegel |
| Married | Dyanna Dayne |
| Children | Daeron, Aerion (“Brightflame”), Aemon (yes, that Aemon), Daella, Aegon V (“Egg”), Rhae |
Who Was Maekar Targaryen?
Imagine being the fourth son. Your eldest brother Baelor is the realm’s golden boy — the greatest knight and finest Hand anyone can remember. Your other brothers are a scholar and a charmer. And you’re Maekar: dour, prickly, proud to the point of rigidity, a genuinely excellent soldier that history will remember mostly for one terrible afternoon.
That’s the tragedy of Maekar in a nutshell. By the standards of his family he was solid — a proven commander against the Blackfyre pretenders, a stickler for duty, the kind of man who’d make a wonderful second-in-command and was doomed to be remembered as an accidental fratricide. Readers of the Dunk and Egg stories know him as the stern father looming over Egg’s childhood; fans of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms know exactly how heavy that shadow was.
Ashford, 209 AC: The Mace
We’ve told the full story on Aerion’s page — the puppet show, the beating, the trial of seven — but here’s Maekar’s angle, and it’s brutal.
When Aerion demanded his trial, Maekar rode for his sons. His boy Daeron had lied about the hedge knight Dunk; Aerion was plainly the villain of the piece; and yet family is family, and Maekar took the field against Dunk’s seven — opposite his own brother Baelor, who had chosen to champion the innocent.
In the crush of the melee, Maekar’s mace met Baelor’s helm. After the battle, Baelor removed that helm and the back of his skull came away with it. The heir to the Iron Throne — the best man of his generation — was dead at his brother’s hand, in front of the court, over a puppet show.
Maekar lived twenty-four more years. There’s no record of him ever forgiving himself. There’s a record of everything else he did, though — and it all reads like penance.
The Penance Years
Look at what Maekar did after Ashford. He exiled Aerion to the Free Cities — the son he’d ridden to defend, sent away because he finally saw him clearly. And he let his youngest, Aegon, go squire for a hedge knight — a prince of the blood, sleeping in ditches with Duncan the Tall, because Maekar had decided that his sons needed to learn what the world actually was before it taught them the way it taught Aerion.
Say what you like about the man: the father of Egg made the single best parenting decision in Targaryen history, and he made it standing in the wreckage of the worst day of his life.
King by Default (221–233 AC)
Maekar was never meant to rule. The line ahead of him was long: Baelor, then Baelor’s sons, then Aerys, then Rhaegel and his children. Then the Great Spring Sickness of 209 AC carried off King Daeron II and both of Baelor’s boys in one season. Aerys I — bookish, heirless, increasingly absent — reigned twelve years while Bloodraven ran the realm. Rhaegel choked to death on a pie in 215 AC (we wish we were joking), and his son Aelor died two years later at the hands of his own twin sister-wife in a mishap the histories politely leave vague.
And so in 221 AC the crown came to the fourth son. Maekar I — the anvil of the family, as the hedge knight stories frame him; the hard, unglamorous weight everything else broke against.
His twelve years were thankless: Blackfyre pretenders stirring in Essos, a realm still pocked by the Sickness, and a court that never loved him. He ruled competently anyway. It’s what anvils do.
Death at Starpike (233 AC)
In 233 AC, Lord Peake rose in revolt, and the king did what Maekar always did — rode to the fighting himself, armor on, no delegating. At the assault on Starpike, a stone dropped from the battlements crushed his helm. He was near sixty and still leading from the front, which is either admirable or stubborn and is, in fact, both.
His death triggered the Great Council of 233 AC — the one that passed over Aerion’s infant son Maegor, heard Maester Aemon refuse the crown, and finally gave it to the fourth son of a fourth son: Aegon V, called “the Unlikely.” Egg. The hedge knight’s squire, king of Westeros. Maekar’s penance, completed.
Maekar’s Place in the Family Tree
Daeron II ═ Mariah Martell
│
┌────────┬────┴─────┬──────────┐
Baelor Aerys I Rhaegel Maekar I ═ Dyanna Dayne
(d.209) (r.209-221) (d.215) │
┌────┴──────────────────┐
Daeron, Aerion, Aemon,
Daella, Aegon V, Rhae
│
Aegon V → Jaehaerys II → Aerys II
→ Rhaegar, Daenerys → JonWithout Maekar’s branch, there’s no Egg, no Mad King, no Daenerys, no Jon Snow. Follow the whole chain down on the interactive Targaryen family tree.
FAQ
How is Maekar related to Egg?
Maekar was Egg’s father. Egg — King Aegon V — was Maekar’s fourth son, which is why his eventual coronation was so unlikely they nicknamed him “the Unlikely.”
Did Maekar kill Baelor Breakspear?
Accidentally, yes. At the Ashford trial of seven in 209 AC, Maekar fought on the side of his sons against the seven championed by his brother Baelor — and the blow from Maekar’s mace to Baelor’s helm killed him.
How did Maekar I die?
Fighting the rebel Lord Peake at Starpike in 233 AC — a stone dropped from the battlements crushed his helm. He died as he lived: armored, in person, in the front.
Is Maekar in A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms?
Yes — he’s a central figure in the Dunk and Egg era: father of Aerion and Aegon, brother of Baelor, and the looming presence over the Ashford story.
Why did Maekar let Egg squire for a hedge knight?
After Ashford, Maekar concluded his sons needed the kind of education the Red Keep couldn’t give. Letting Aegon travel the realm with Ser Duncan the Tall — sleeping rough, meeting smallfolk — was deliberate, and it produced one of the best kings the family ever had.