Morgana

If I could, I'd be your little spoon And kiss your fingers forevermore But, big spoon, you have so much to do And I have nothing ahead of me

A Feast for Crows, Samwell Ⅰ

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“So do you, Sam. Have a swift, safe voyage, and take care of her and Aemon and the child.” The cold trickles on his face reminded Jon of the day he’d bid farewell to Robb at Winterfell, never knowing that it was for the last time. “And pull your hood up. The snowflakes are melting in your hair.”

A Dance with Dragons, Jon Ⅱ

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One thing I love about Jon the most is that he remembers. He loves. Hard. It’s the smallest details that tell of his heart. How many times has he recalled snow melting in Robb’s hair - I do not think it’s a new observation. But it still amazes me from time to time, that he finds so much sadness, love, and perhaps comfort in a mere glimpse. And amongst them all, maybe this one with Sam is my favorite.

The Queen of dragons and Queen of roses enjoying a walk along the Mander 🐉🏵️

I loved a maid as fair as summer, with sunlight in her hair

I loved a maid as red as autumn, with sunset in her hair

It is important to understand why Daenerys is the only character who has earned the title “Mother of Dragons” in the series. It is her central epithet and perhaps her defining characteristic, what sets her apart as a literary icon both within the series and in the cultural zeitgeist. 

“Mother of__” is not a title exclusive to Daenerys. Motherhood is a theme that George R.R. Martin explores extensively, through characters like Catelyn Stark (”mother merciless”) and Cersei Lannister. Much has been written on his sidelining and pathologization of motherhood as well, what with some mothers, like Lysa Arryn, being written as insane, and other mothers, like Rhaella Targaryen, being treated as voiceless off-screen martyrs. Thus, Daenerys, Catelyn, and Cersei remain his most important and most fleshed out maternal characters. 

The importance of “Mother of Dragons” is its relation to Daenerys. It is not a title given to every woman who’s given birth to a Targaryen––otherwise, Rhaella, Aema Arryn, etc, various women who’ve had Targaryen children would all be called mother(s) of dragons. Yet it is only Dany who receives this epithet. 

The reason it is so significant that Daenerys is the Mother of Dragons is that dragons were dead for over a century. Daenerys was not supposed to have birthed dragons: 

“Dragon’s eggs, from the Shadow Lands beyond Asshai,” said Magister Illyrio. “The eons have turned them to stone, yet still they burn bright with beauty.” (Dany II AGOT) 

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Ser Jorah lowered his eyes respectfully. Illyrio smiled enigmatically and tore a wing from the duck. Honey and grease ran over his fingers and dripped down into his beard as he nibbled at the tender meat. There are no more dragons, Dany thought, staring at her brother, though she did not dare say it aloud. (Dany II AGOT) 

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There were nineteen skulls. The oldest was more than three thousand years old; the youngest a mere century and a half. The most recent were also the smallest; a matched pair no bigger than mastiff’s skulls, and oddly misshapen, all that remained of the last two hatchlings born on Dragonstone. They were the last of the Targaryen dragons, perhaps the last dragons anywhere, and they had not lived very long. (Tyrion II AGOT)

The dragons have been dead for a century, such that the mere possibility of hatching a dragon egg, let alone riding a dragon, has become a children’s story, a song, nothing but a memory. No one was supposed to wake dragons from stone. And the symbolic representation of this is important too: with Robert’s Rebellion, Viserys and Daenerys become the last Targaryens, their House incredibly weak. Dragons are physically dead, and their House is exiled, hunted, and impoverished, barely hanging on. 

What Daenerys does in Dany X AGOT is a miracle borne of her sacrifice and intuition. Over the course of AGOT, there are several references to dragons both in Dany’s chapters and in other chapters, such as Ned, Arya, and Tyrion’s chapters. Dany initially has no idea that the dragon eggs can hatch, but through her experiences with the Dothraki and her own prophetic dragon dreams (traits that she shares with House Targaryen, with other characters such as Daeron the Drunken, Daenys the Dreamer, and Rhaegar Targaryen all having prophetic dreams and visions), Daenerys pieces together the clues to successfully birth her dragons. 

It’s important to note that no one else does what she does in the series, or sacrifices what she sacrifices, to birth the dragons. She does all of this before the reader learns of the prophecy of Azor Ahai, before Stannis is declared Azor Ahai, and before Daenerys is declared Azor Ahai by Maester Aemon and the Red Priests of Volantis. She herself is still unaware of the prophecy. The birth of the dragons did not happen by accident, luck, or overnight; it required Dany’s intelligence and bravery to take place. This is confirmed within the text and by GRRM: 

“They are mine,” she said fiercely. They had been born from her faith and her need, given life by the deaths of her husband and unborn son and the maegi Mirri Maz Duur. Dany had walked into the flames as they came forth, and they had drunk milk from her swollen breasts. “No man will take them from me while I live.” (Dany I ACOK) 

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The whole point of the scene in A Game of Thrones where Daenerys hatches the dragons is that she makes the magic up as she goes along; she is someone who really might do anything. (GRRM)

The magical aspect of this cannot be understated. With the birth of the dragons, Dany has brought back magic to the world: 

“Half a year gone, that man could scarcely wake fire from dragonglass. He had some small skill with powders and wildfire, sufficient to entrance a crowd while his cutpurses did their work. He could walk across hot coals and make burning roses bloom in the air, but he could no more aspire to climb the fiery ladder than a common fisherman could hope to catch a kraken in his nets.” Dany looked uneasily at where the ladder had stood. Even the smoke was gone now, and the crowd was breaking up, each man going about his business. In a moment more than a few would find their purses flat and empty. “And now?” “And now his powers grow, Khaleesi. And you are the cause of it.” (Dany III ACOK) 

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Xaro looked troubled. “And so it was, then. But now? I am less certain. It is said that the glass candles are burning in the house of Urrathon Night-Walker, that have not burned in a hundred years. Ghost grass grows in the Garden of Gehane, phantom tortoises have been seen carrying messages between the windowless houses on Warlock’s Way, and all the rats in the city are chewing off their tails. The wife of Mathos Mallarawan, who once mocked a warlock’s drab moth-eaten robe, has gone mad and will wear no clothes at all. Even fresh-washed silks make her feel as though a thousand insects were crawling on her skin. And Blind Sybassion the Eater of Eyes can see again, or so his slaves do swear. A man must wonder.” (Dany V ACOK) 

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“They, hmmm, seem to be working better than they were.” Hallyne smiled weakly. “You don’t suppose there are any dragons about, do you?” “Not unless you found one under the Dragonpit. Why?” “Oh, pardon, I was just remembering something old Wisdom Pollitor told me once, when I was an acolyte. I’d asked him why so many of our spells seemed, well, not as effectual as the scrolls would have us believe, and he said it was because magic had begun to go out of the world the day the last dragon died.” (Tyrion XI ACOK) 

Dany’s magic is so powerful that the birth of her dragons ushers in magic back into the world, which strengthens the warlocks, the alchemists, and the various sorcerers and priests of the world in both Westeros and Essos. This is a unique effect of the birth of the dragons. 

There is also thematic relevance to Dany’s character journey contained within the title “mother of dragons”. For starters, “waking the dragon” is something that appears throughout Dany’s AGOT storyline: 

Dany said nothing. Magister Illyrio was a dealer in spices, gemstones, dragonbone, and other, less savory things. He had friends in all of the Nine Free Cities, it was said, and even beyond, in Vaes Dothrak and the fabled lands beside the Jade Sea. It was also said that he’d never had a friend he wouldn’t cheerfully sell for the right price. Dany listened to the talk in the streets, and she heard these things, but she knew better than to question her brother when he wove his webs of dream. His anger was a terrible thing when roused. Viserys called it “waking the dragon.” (Dany I AGOT) 

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Ser Jorah’s face was drawn and sorrowful. “Rhaegar was the last dragon,” he told her. He warmed translucent hands over a glowing brazier where stone eggs smouldered red as coals. One moment he was there and the next he was fading, his flesh colorless, less substantial than the wind. “The last dragon,” he whispered, thin as a wisp, and was gone. She felt the dark behind her, and the red door seemed farther away than ever. “… don’t want to wake the dragon, do you?” (Dany IX AGOT) 

All her life, Dany has been told that Rhaegar was the last dragon, and that her duty is to endure her brother’s abuses and obey him as her true King. “Waking the dragon” is initially the mantra her abuser uses against her, before physically, sexually, and emotionally abusing her. In her last prophetic dragon dream (Dany IX AGOT), Dany sees herself as the last dragon, wearing Rhaegar’s armor. This is before she births the dragons. Thus, the concept of “waking the dragon”, even beyond its relevance to the Azor Ahai/TPTWP prophecy (”waking dragons out of stone”), is important to Dany because it’s a symbolic reclamation of her autonomy, both physical and political. It represents her strength, courage, and freedom from patriarchal violence (her brother’s abuse, Drogo’s ownership of her, being relegated to the sidelines because of her gender). “Waking the dragon” for Dany is not just physically waking her dragon sons from stone; it is awakening herself, her potential, her liberation from gendered oppression. The undying call her the “daughter of death” because the deaths of men in her life who’d have taken her place pave her path. Dany can reach her full potential once she’s free of these patriarchal chains.

Secondly, Dany experiences a traumatizing miscarriage, which permanently affects her sense of motherhood and identity. Mirri Maz Duur tells her that she is infertile. There are theories that Dany is not actually infertile and that Mirri was lying. Nevertheless, Dany herself thinks she’s infertile, and this impacts how she conceives of her motherhood: 

Even Captain Groleo was glad of that, now. There had been one small fire, easily extinguished; against that, Balerion suddenly seemed to have far fewer rats than she’d had before, when she sailed under the name Saduleon. And her crew, once as fearful as they were curious, had begun to take a queer fierce pride in “their” dragons. Every man of them, from captain to cook’s boy, loved to watch the three fly … though none so much as Dany.

They are my children, she told herself, and if the maegi spoke truly, they are the only children I am ever like to have. (Dany I ASOS) 

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Dany felt a lightness in her chest. I will never bear a living child, she remembered. Her hand trembled as she raised it. Perhaps she smiled. She must have, because the man grinned and shouted again, and others took up the cry. “Mhysa!” they called. “Mhysa! MHYSA!” They were all smiling at her, reaching for her, kneeling before her. “Maela,” some called her, while others cried “Aelalla” or “Qathei” or “Tato,” but whatever the tongue it all meant the same thing. Mother. They are calling me Mother. (Dany IV ASOS)

As Mhysa and Mother of Dragons, Dany proves that you don’t have to physically give birth to be a mother. This is incredibly important not only for her storyline but for women and queer people everywhere, and people of diverse body types, who may want families but may not have the physical capacity to give birth. It is a very humanizing portrayal of what it means to be a mother, to embody motherhood, to seek a family and companionship, even if you can’t biologically have children. It disrupts and subverts the idea that motherhood and family should be based exclusively on biology and reproductive capacity, transforming how we perceive the relationship between a “mother” and a “child”, a queen and her subjects, and the concept of family itself. Dany is always longing for love and for a home she never knew, and her ability to retain a maternal identity even after losing the physical capability to be a mother is foundational to her storyline. Taking away the significance of Dany being an actual mother to her three dragons (having a dream of her thighs soaked with blood in her first prophetic dragon dream, feeling the eggs warm in relation to her emotions, calling the dragon eggs Rhaego’s “brothers”, the dragons suckling on her breasts) undermines this theme and message. 

Thirdly, an overarching theme GRRM is interested in is the play between light and dark, monster and hero, the human heart in conflict with itself, as he’s fond of speaking about. Most of his major characters struggle with internal moral conflict, self-deprecation, and the bifurcation of identity. For Daenerys, this is represented in her dual identities as queen and young girl, mother of dragons and Mhysa, Targaryen heir and Queen of Meereen. Given both her traumatizing experiences and the burden on her shoulders, Daenerys is an incredibly self-reflective and, in fact, self-deprecating person. She thinks about her failures and mistakes and crucifies herself for the pain her people endure. Dany thus conceives of herself as a “monster”, and even reframes herself as one: 

Mother of dragons, Daenerys thought. Mother of monsters. What have I unleashed upon the world? A queen I am, but my throne is made of burned bones, and it rests on quicksand. Without dragons, how could she hope to hold Meereen, much less win back Westeros? I am the blood of the dragon, she thought. If they are monsters, so am I. (Dany II ADWD)

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Somewhere beneath those roofs, the Sons of the Harpy were gathered, plotting ways to kill her and all those who loved her and put her children back in chains. Somewhere down there a hungry child was crying for milk. Somewhere an old woman lay dying. Somewhere a man and a maid embraced, and fumbled at each other’s clothes with eager hands. But up here there was only the sheen of moonlight on pyramids and pits, with no hint what lay beneath. Up here there was only her, alone. She was the blood of the dragon. She could kill the Sons of the Harpy, and the sons of the sons, and the sons of the sons of the sons. But a dragon could not feed a hungry child nor help a dying woman’s pain. And who would ever dare to love a dragon? (Dany II ADWD)

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What have I done? she thought, huddled in her empty bed. I have waited so long for him to come back, and I send him away. “He would make a monster of me,” she whispered, “a butcher queen.” But then she thought of Drogon far away, and the dragons in the pit. There is blood on my hands too, and on my heart. We are not so different, Daario and I. We are both monsters. (Dany IV ADWD) 

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… and folded. The dragon gave one last hiss and stretched out flat upon his belly. Black blood was flowing from the wound where the spear had pierced him, smoking where it dripped onto the scorched sands. He is fire made flesh, she thought, and so am I. (Dany IX ADWD) 

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No. You are the blood of the dragon. The whispering was growing fainter, as if Ser Jorah were falling farther behind. Dragons plant no trees. Remember that. Remember who you are, what you were made to be. Remember your words. “Fire and Blood,” Daenerys told the swaying grass. (Dany X ADWD) 

Fans often unfairly use Dany’s identity as the Mother of Dragons to claim that she will go dark or mad, that she is a villain, and a tyrant. They claim that having dragons is not a replacement for rebuilding a nation. Yet Dany has already considered the ramifications of draconic power and has agonized over the great power she has in her hands, especially after Drogon kills Hazzea. When Dany critiques herself for her failures, she calls herself a monster or a butcher––this is then unironically used by the fandom to claim that she’s going mad. When Daenerys realizes that the Meereneese peace is false and reclaims her fire and blood - her dragon - identity, it is further used by fans as proof that Dany “can never accept peace” and that she will die in a political power struggle. 

Rather than seeing how nuanced and poignant Dany’s internal struggle with identity is, fans routinely demonize her for being the Mother of Dragons. To then take that epithet and apply it to an unrelated character that does not struggle the way Dany specifically does with her dragon identity, and who does not receive the hatred or villification Dany does for being the Mother of Dragons, is a disservice to Dany’s character and to GRRM’s intentional writing. Monster identity is not a theme unique to Dany, but being the Mother of Dragons specifically is. And reconciling her Mother of Dragons side with her Mhysa side is going to be very important for Dany’s character growth.