Slave Trade Prohibition

Daenerys Targaryen's decree abolishing slavery in Meereen is the single most consequential and contested rule of her reign, a policy that redefines the city's identity, ignites a shadow war, and traps its queen between the uncompromising logic of liberation and the brutal necessities of rule. The prohibition is not a mere legal adjustment but a revolutionary act that attacks the city's deepest economic and social structures, transforming every former master into an enemy and every freedman into a dependent. Its enforcement becomes the central crisis of Daenerys's rule, forcing her to confront the limits of her own power and the terrible price of peace.

The Rule and Its Immediate Consequences

Daenerys's abolition is absolute and uncompromising. She declares Meereen a "free city of free men" , a statement that immediately severs its ties to the entire slave-based economy of Slaver's Bay. The city's storehouses, once filled with the wealth of the trade, dwindle as trade partners vanish. The Great Masters, stripped of their human property, retaliate not by open war but by a campaign of assassination and terror conducted by the Sons of the Harpy, who murder freedmen and Unsullied in the streets, leaving their mark in blood . The prohibition also isolates Meereen diplomatically. Xaro Xhoan Daxos, the merchant prince of Qarth, makes the terms of renewed trade brutally clear: "Qarth will gladly give you gold… for slaves" . When Daenerys refuses, he offers her a fleet to return to Westeros, but only on the condition that she abandon Meereen entirely (E02107–E02113). The Yunkai'i, the Wise Masters, mobilize a vast coalition of sellsword companies and Ghiscari legions to crush her, while Volantis, a city built on slavery, prepares its own fleet to join the war .

The Defense of the Rule and Its Costs

Daenerys defends her prohibition with a combination of ideological conviction and strategic necessity, but each defense exacts a heavy toll. She argues to Xaro that slavery is not like rain, that "no man wants to be owned" , a moral stance that admits no compromise. Yet the practical consequences of this stance force her into a series of painful accommodations. To quell the nightly murders, she agrees to marry Hizdahr zo Loraq, a Meereenese nobleman, on the condition that he can deliver ninety days of peace (E03024–E03026). This marriage, a political necessity to reconcile the city to her rule, requires her to accept the reopening of the fighting pits, the very institution she had banned as a symbol of the old slaving order . She tells Ser Barristan, "Marriage or carnage, those are my choices. A wedding or a war" , revealing the brutal calculus that the prohibition has forced upon her. The reopening of the pits is a direct concession to the slavers, a public acknowledgment that her power is not absolute and that the price of peace is the blood of the freedmen she swore to protect.

The Rule's Failure and the Queen's Flight

The prohibition's ultimate failure is dramatized in the chaos of Daznak's Pit. The peace Daenerys has purchased with her marriage and her concessions shatters when Drogon descends into the arena, killing indiscriminately and carrying her away from Meereen (E06950–E06969). Her flight is both a literal escape and a symbolic abandonment of the rule she imposed. In her absence, the city reverts to its old patterns. The Yunkish slavers establish a slave market within sight of the city walls , and the freedmen, her "children," are left defenseless. The prohibition, which was meant to be the foundation of a new order, becomes a dead letter, enforced only by the memory of a queen who has vanished. The rule of abolition, so boldly proclaimed, is ultimately unsustainable without the constant, personal presence of the ruler who imposed it, and its collapse leaves Meereen more fractured and bloody than before.