Lord of Highgarden · Warden of the South · High Marshal of the Reach
A lord who commands the Reach's wealth and numbers, and who has spent his life letting other men's competence be mistaken for his own.
Credit Where Others Did the Work
Mace Tyrell, Lord of Highgarden and head of the Seven Kingdoms' second-richest house, married Alerie Hightower and fathered four children of note — Willas, Garlan, Loras, and Margaery — and built his martial reputation on a single campaign of Robert's Rebellion in which the actual fighting was done largely by his own bannerman, Randyll Tarly, at the Battle of Ashford. Mace, present and titled, kept the credit that history remembers.
He commanded the Reach's siege of Storm's End during that same war until Lord Eddard Stark's arrival forced a bloodless surrender — two campaigns, one deserved reputation between them, and Mace has never seemed to notice the difference.
The Reach's Great Gamble
He threw the Reach's full strength behind first Renly Baratheon's claim to the throne, then — within days of Renly's murder, with barely a blush — behind the Lannister-held crown instead, arranging his daughter Margaery's marriage first to Joffrey and then, after the Purple Wedding, to Tommen in quick succession, a pivot as cynical as it was successful.
He came to King's Landing to claim influence on the small council commensurate with the Reach's contribution to the crown's survival, and when the High Sparrow's Faith Militant arrested Margaery on charges of adultery, marched his own army to besiege the last Baratheon holdout at Dragonstone instead — reclaiming his family's martial pride, if not yet his daughter's freedom, as the published chronicle ends.
Key events
282 ACCredited with the loyalist victory at the Battle of Ashford, largely won by his bannerman Randyll Tarly.
299 ACBacks Renly Baratheon's claim to the throne, then transfers the Reach's allegiance to King's Landing after Renly's murder.
300 ACLeads the Reach's host to besiege Dragonstone after his daughter Margaery's arrest by the Faith Militant.
Legacy
Mace Tyrell's entire career is a study in how far borrowed competence can carry a man who never once doubts it's his own — his bannermen's tactics, his soldiers' numbers, and his children's marriages have done rather more for House Tyrell than anything Mace has personally accomplished.
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Who is Mace Tyrell?
A lord who commands the Reach's wealth and numbers, and who has spent his life letting other men's competence be mistaken for his own.
Is Mace Tyrell from the books or the show?
Book canon. This profile follows George R. R. Martin’s novels and histories, and notes where the television series diverges rather than following it.