Rickard Rowan

Rickard Rowan’s appearances trace a passage from the contested military politics surrounding Septon Moon’s campaign at Oldtown to accommodation with the new Targaryen king. The account associates him both with the defense of Oldtown against Moon’s host and with having marched alongside Moon; after Moon’s death, Rowan abandoned the cause, returned to Oldtown, and later offered lavish gifts at the royal wedding festivities. His assessment of Jaehaerys Targaryen presents a final measure of that reconciliation: the former conflict gave way to a lord’s cautious attention to his new king.

Position in the Oldtown campaign

The narrative first places Lord Rowan among the defenders of Oldtown, alongside Lord Oakheart and their knights, while Septon Moon and his followers camped beneath the city’s walls. Elsewhere, however, Rickard Rowan is grouped with those who had marched with Moon. The account does not explain the change between these positions, leaving Rowan’s place in the campaign politically unsettled rather than presenting a simple, uninterrupted allegiance.

After an assault led by Lorcas the Learned failed, Rowan left within the hour with his knights and men-at-arms. Lord Oakheart followed the next day. Their departures helped dissolve Moon’s host: the remaining followers scattered, and fewer than four hundred were left by the time a force from Oldtown rode out against the stragglers. Rowan’s withdrawal was part of the collapse of Moon’s cause, though the account does not describe him taking part in the attack on those who remained.

Submission and reconciliation

The narrative interprets the two lords’ rapid departure as evidence that their grievance had been with Maegor, rather than with House Targaryen. After the danger had passed, both returned to Oldtown, penitent and obedient, and knelt before Prince Jaehaerys at his coronation in the Starry Sept. Rowan’s submission therefore marked more than the end of his involvement with Moon: it also signaled acceptance of the new king.

At the later wedding celebrations for Rogar Baratheon and the Queen Regent, Rickard Rowan and Torgen Oakheart were singled out among those giving especially lavish gifts. The gifts linked their recent association with Moon to a public display of reconciliation with the royal court. Rowan’s documented actions move from a disputed wartime alignment to visible submission and generosity, without the account specifying what private calculations lay behind them.

Rowan’s assessment of the young king

The wedding gathering also gave lords an opportunity to meet the boy king and judge his capacity to rule. Jaehaerys received them privately in his solar, where he invited them to speak about the realm’s problems and possible remedies. Rowan found him gentle and soft-spoken. His response places him among the lords who formed a favorable impression of the new king, and contrasts with the uncertainty of his earlier political position: Rowan’s final appearance is not as a commander in a disputed cause, but as a lord evaluating the ruler to whom he had submitted.