Stannis Baratheon has spent his life being the Baratheon brother nobody wanted at the feast: too rigid for Robert's taste, too joyless for Renly's, and too honest by half for a court that ran on flattery. He held Storm's End through a siege that starved his garrison to eating rats and boot leather rather than yield, and considers that unbending resolve his defining virtue — which, in fairness to him, it usually is. Passed over for Robert's small council in favor of louder men, Stannis has built his claim to the Iron Throne on the one argument he trusts absolutely: that he is owed it by law, and the law does not care whether a man is likeable. A maester notes, with the dry respect due a subject who makes his job easier by never once lying to the record.
Stannis Baratheon
Lord of Dragonstone
- Life
- no fixed AC year given; the middle Baratheon brother
- House
- Baratheon
- Titles
- Lord of Dragonstone · King
- Allegiance
- House Baratheon
- Seat
- Dragonstone; Storm's End (birth seat)
- Culture
- Stormlands
- Religion
- Raised in the Faith of the Seven; converted to R'hllor under Melisandre's influence
- Weapon
- Lightbringer, a sword he holds up as the prophesied hero's blade reforged
- Notable for
- Claiming the Iron Throne by right of law and holding Storm's End through a year-long, starving siege
Last reported marching a host toward Winterfell in the depths of a hard winter; the outcome is not yet chronicled.
Where they appear
These partings name deaths, endings, and roads not yet ridden in the books. Unveil them only if both roads are known to you — or if you do not fear to know.
Key events
- before AGOTBorn the middle Baratheon brother.
- 282-283 ACHolds Storm's End through a year-long siege during Robert's Rebellion.
- 283 ACGranted Dragonstone after the rebellion, while his brother Renly receives Storm's End - a slight he never forgives.
- 298 ACClaims the Iron Throne after Robert's death, alleging Cersei's children are not truly Robert's.
- 299 ACAllies with the red priestess Melisandre and her god, R'hllor.
- 299 ACSuffers a catastrophic naval defeat at the Battle of the Blackwater.
- 300 ACMarches an army toward Winterfell in the depths of a hard winter.
Reading the character
Stannis's arc dramatizes a very particular tragedy: a man whose sole virtue is rigid adherence to law and duty, in a world that rewards charisma and flexible loyalty far more reliably. His claim to the throne is, by the text's own logic, the most legally sound of any claimant's, and the books use that fact to ask what justice is worth in a system that runs on other currencies entirely.
His alliance with Melisandre also stages the series' central gamble about magic and prophecy: a rational, skeptical man staking his entire cause on a foreign religion he doesn't fully understand, because it offers him, for the first time in his life, a certainty the rest of the world never has.
The arc of Stannis Baratheon
This carries the character’s road through the published novels. Read on only if you do not fear to know.
These partings name deaths, endings, and roads not yet ridden in the books. Unveil them only if both roads are known to you — or if you do not fear to know.
In the timeline
Theories about Stannis Baratheon
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House
Battles fought
Is Stannis Baratheon alive?
As of A Dance with Dragons, yes — though the chronicle leaves the battle he is fighting unresolved, as the published books do.
Who is Stannis Baratheon?
Robert Baratheon's younger brother, Lord of Dragonstone, and a claimant to the Iron Throne who has built his cause on law and stubbornness rather than charm.