Aegon IV came to the Iron Throne already notorious for appetites the Red Keep had never quite managed to curb — for food, for women outside his marriage bed, for grievances nursed against a sister-wife, Naerys, he never much wanted and rarely troubled to hide his contempt for. Where a more disciplined king might have kept his mistresses discreet, Aegon kept his in something close to open rotation, and fathered, by the Citadel's admittedly generous counting, more bastards across the Seven Kingdoms than any Targaryen before or since. Four of them — sired on noblewomen and acknowledged, if never quite legitimized during his life, as the 'Great Bastards' — grew up close enough to the throne to know exactly what they had been denied.
House Targaryen
Aegon IV Targaryen
the Unworthy
- Life
- 135 AC
- House
- Targaryen
- Titles
- King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men · Lord of the Seven Kingdoms
- Allegiance
- House Targaryen
- Seat
- King's Landing (the Red Keep)
- Culture
- Valyrian (Targaryen)
- Religion
- The Faith of the Seven, observed loosely alongside Targaryen custom
- Weapon
- Blackfyre (Valyrian steel, the ancestral sword of House Targaryen — later gifted away from the crown)
- Notable for
- A reign remembered for gluttony and infidelity, and a deathbed decree legitimizing his bastards that launched the Blackfyre Rebellions
A king remembered for appetite more than statecraft — the chronicle keeps his reign's ending, and its long shadow, veiled for readers not yet there.
Key events
- 135 ACBorn into House Targaryen.
- no fixed yearWed his sister, Naerys, in a match he never much wanted and rarely troubled to hide his contempt for.
- no fixed yearFathers, by the Citadel's admittedly generous counting, more bastards across the Seven Kingdoms than any Targaryen before or since.
- no fixed yearFour of his bastards — sired on noblewomen — grow up close enough to the throne to know exactly what their birth denied them.
- 184 ACOn his deathbed, against the counsel of his own Grand Maester and Hand, signs a decree legitimizing every bastard child he can name.
- 184 ACChief among them, Daemon Blackfyre — born of his cousin and mistress, Daena — receives both the legitimization and the ancestral Valyrian steel sword Blackfyre.
- 184 ACDies so swollen with excess he can no longer walk, his deathbed decree setting the stage for a century of intermittent war.
Reading the character
Aegon IV is one of the more unambiguously unflattering portraits Fire & Blood offers of a Targaryen king — a man whose personal appetites the Citadel makes little effort to soften, and whose reign leaves behind almost no accomplishment that doesn't come with an asterisk attached. Where other kings in this dynasty at least get credited with some redeeming competence, Aegon IV's record reads as a long catalogue of indulgence with the actual business of ruling handled mostly by other people.
His lasting significance to the Seven Kingdoms has almost nothing to do with anything he built and everything to do with one decision made as he was dying — a single deathbed decree whose consequences the Citadel now treats as the most direct cause, in the whole of Targaryen history, of any king's dying wish producing generations of war afterward.
The arc of Aegon IV Targaryen
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.
Sourcesfire-and-bloodtwoiafthe-sworn-sword
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Who is Aegon IV Targaryen?
A Targaryen king remembered for gluttony, infidelity, and a deathbed decree legitimizing his many bastards — an act that launched the Blackfyre Rebellions.
Why is Aegon IV called the Unworthy?
For a reign marked by cruelty to his lawful wife, open infidelity, and a deathbed legitimization of his bastard children that plunged the realm into generations of war.