#blackhaven

House Dondarrion

Words Unknown

Sigil: Purple lighting on a field of stars

Colors: Purple, White, Black

Seat: Blackhaven

The Lightning Lord

The house was founded when a messenger of the Storm King was saved by lightning striking two Dornishmen who ambushed him. He delivered his message on time and was granted the title of lord.

This is from the 2nd episode of the first season:

Harrold: Ser Criston Cole. Son of the steward of the Lord of Blackhaven.

Rhaenyra: Be welcome, Ser Criston. You saw combat in the Stormlands.

Criston: Dornish marches, Princess. I fought for a year as a foot soldier against the Dornish incursions. Ser Arlan Dondarrion knighted me after we razed two of the watchtowers along the Boneway.

We learn that, like his book counterpart, he is the son of a steward.

In the book, that steward was the steward for the house of Dondarrions, which is actually a Stormlander house near the Dornish Marches. Their castle, Blackhaven, is in the Marches. The Wiki of Ice and Fire says this of what the Dornish Marches is:

an area of southern Westeros in the border region north of Dorne. The marches are predominantly in the southwestern stormlands and extend east to the Sea of Dorne, although much of the western marches are within the Reach. People from the region are known as marchers, and they are ruled by marcher lords

And this of Blackhaven's location:

in the southwestern stormlands. Part of the Dornish Marches, it is located in the northern Red Mountains near the Dornish border, north of the Wyl and south of the Cockleswhent.

These are maps of the Dornish Marches vs Dorne vs Stormlander vs the Reach:

So, the Dondarrions Criston & Criston's father are all Stormlanders, not Dornish in the show as they were in the original lore.

EDITED/SEMI-SELF CORRECTION:

Another anon has pointed out that the first episode has Alicent calls Criston Dornish and many scripts of the same episode has Alicent SMH this while one has its narrator call Criston a "Dornish knight", which means that this one where the narrator says is possibly a past draft of the script. Even so in the show, we are meant to understand that he is supposed to be Dornish and apparently Blackhaven is --where he is supposed to come from-- and the entirety of the Dornish Marches is in Dorne in the new, "separate" HotD universe.🙄

This is the Narrator portion of the episode 1 script from this site:

During old king Jaehaerys Targaryen’s reign, tragedies took his sons’ lives, leaving the succession undecided. A Great Council convenes to choose Westeros’ future ruler. Jaehaerys’ grandchildren, Princess Rhaenys Targaryen and Prince Viserys Targaryen (Rhaenys’ younger cousin) are the candidates. Westerosi law gives a male heir precedence over a female, regardless their birth order and Viserys is chosen. Nine years into King Visery I’s reign, the Triarchy, an alliance formed by the free cities of Essos, threatens the kingdom, wanting to seize the Stepstones region. Viserys must also restrain his brother Daemon’s brutality as the City Watch commander in King’s Landing. Viserys, certain that pregnant Queen Aemma will bear him a son, holds a tournament to celebrate the impending birth. During the event, Dornish knight, Ser Criston Cole defeats Daemon in a competition while Queen Aemma and her son die in childbirth. The Hand of the King, Ser Otto Hightower, proposes that Viserys’ only living child, the young princess Rhaenyra, be named heir to the Iron Throne. After a dispute with Daemon, Viserys proclaims Rhaenyra as the next ruler.

ASOIAF MINOR LADIES WEEK by @asoiafminorhouses & @asoiafwomensource | Day 6 → the Reach Stormlands

What a Lady of House Dondarrion would wear around their ancestral home, Blackhaven

Thanks so much! And is the story of Baelor the Blessed in Dorne feasible? I mean, yes, the story is feasible because it did happen. (It’s fiction, remember.) Or at least the version as detailed in TWOIAF most likely happened – the version that relates that Baelor was bitten by the vipers around Aemon’s cage in Wyl, not the one that singers and septons tell about how his holiness protected him from being bitten.

For clarification, though, Aemon did not carry Baelor across half of Dorne, that would be extremely unfeasible! What TWOIAF says is that after they left Wyl, Aemon carried the unconscious Baelor “halfway down the Boneway” until he reached a mountain village where he was given clothing and a donkey. Aemon led the donkey carrying Baelor to the Dondarrion watchtowers; the Dondarrion men then conducted them to Blackhaven, where they recovered under a maester’s care until they were sent to Storm’s End for further treatment. They stayed at Storm’s End for more than 6 months before Baelor was well enough to return to King’s Landing.

So, some maps, for further clarification. Baelor’s original journey to Sunspear, on foot:

And then the detail of the return from Wyl: