Jaehaerys and Alysanne's Public Wedding transformed a marriage already known at court into a public royal union. Celebrated beneath the Iron Throne in the Red Keep, it gathered about a thousand witnesses, included members of the royal family who had travelled to attend, and ended with bells and ravens announcing the union across the realm. Its significance lay not in beginning the relationship, but in giving a formal, witnessed shape to a marriage that had until then remained secret.

Background and Preparation

Jaehaerys Targaryen summoned Alysanne Targaryen to join him after the two had been apart for nearly half a year. She left Dragonstone within an hour of receiving the summons, travelling with her dragon, Silverwing; the rest of her household followed by ship. Their marriage was already widely known, but the king and queen observed a period of propriety before their second wedding: they slept separately for a moon while preparations were made.

The ceremony was deliberately more modest than the previous royal wedding celebrated by the court. Jaehaerys did not intend to spend money the Crown did not have on another Golden Wedding. Forty thousand people had witnessed his mother, Alyssa Targaryen, marry Rogar Baratheon; about a thousand assembled in the Red Keep to see Jaehaerys marry his sister Alysanne again. The difference in scale reflected both the Crown’s finances and the more contained setting of this ceremony. It was public, but not an attempt to reproduce the immense spectacle of his mother’s wedding.

Witnesses and Setting

Septon Barth pronounced Jaehaerys and Alysanne man and wife beneath the Iron Throne. That setting placed the marriage at the centre of royal power: the couple’s union was affirmed not in private, but before the court and under the symbol of the monarchy. The ceremony’s witnesses included Rogar Baratheon and the Dowager Queen Alyssa, who had returned from Storm’s End with Rogar’s brothers Garon and Ronnal to attend.

Another guest drew particular attention. Rhaena Targaryen, known as the Queen in the West, flew to the gathering on Dreamfyre. Her visit brought the royal family together for more than the wedding: she had also come to see her daughter, Aerea Targaryen. Her arrival connected the ceremony to the family’s wider, sometimes dispersed household, while making the event a gathering of Jaehaerys and Alysanne’s siblings as well as a court ritual.

Ceremony and Public Recognition

When the rites concluded, bells rang throughout the city and ravens flew to every corner of the realm to announce the union. These outward signs carried the wedding beyond the witnesses inside the Red Keep. The marriage had not begun that day, but its public declaration made the relationship visible as a settled fact of the royal household rather than a secret known through rumour.

The wedding was followed by a formal bedding. Alysanne later said that she had insisted on it because she wanted no further doubt about whether she was truly married. The account presents this as an important distinction between the couple’s earlier secret marriage and the public ceremony: the second wedding supplied the visible confirmation she wanted. The record does not treat the bedding as a private detail alone; it forms part of the event by which the union was recognized before witnesses.

Dynastic and Political Meaning

The marriage joined a king and queen who were also siblings. Its public confirmation therefore concerned both their relationship and the standing of their union within the ruling dynasty. The ceremony brought religious officiation, royal space, family witnesses, and public proclamation together. Each element reinforced the others: Septon Barth performed the rite, the Iron Throne provided its setting, relatives attended, and the city and realm received the news through bells and ravens.

The wedding also contrasts with marriages arranged between houses to link distant parts of the realm. Jaehaerys and Alysanne’s union was internal to the Targaryen family, while the royal household elsewhere encouraged marriages between noble families as a means of binding the conquered kingdoms together. Here, the emphasis was instead on formally affirming the king and queen’s own dynastic bond. The restrained scale did not make the occasion inconsequential: the ceremony converted a widely known but concealed marriage into an officially celebrated union.

The End of Secrecy

With the public rites complete, secrecy was no longer the condition of the marriage. The king and queen had been apart, observed a moon of separate sleeping, and then stood together before a thousand witnesses; the city’s bells and the ravens’ flight carried the announcement outward. The wedding thus served as a transition from private knowledge to public confirmation, while its modest attendance and setting reflected the Crown’s financial limits. Its decisive outcome was the recognition of Jaehaerys and Alysanne as husband and wife in a ceremony staged at the heart of royal authority.