Let’s Get Super Nerdy About The Missing Sigils In Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms
Including one oversight the showrunner admits is a mistake.
One of the best parts of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is its focus on honor. When Ser Duncan the Tall defends Tanselle from Aerion Targaryen, it’s not because he thinks it’ll help him make a name as a knight, but because it is the right thing to do. In fact, as Episode 4 showed, that act may result in Dunk losing his life before he could even fight in his first tourney.
This focus on the medieval codes of honor reflects the time period that this era of Westeros takes inspiration from — a chapter of history that is full of chivalry and pageantry. So why, then, does some of that pageantry get noticeably excluded from the show? Turns out it’s an oversight — one that even the showrunner admits was a mistake.
Warning! Spoilers for A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms ahead!
What Do Sigils Mean In Westeros?
Sigils are a big part of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, with Ser Duncan designing his own as a hedge knight.
We’ve learned a lot about sigils over the past few episodes. We’ve met the apple-loving Fossoways, Lyonel Baratheon and his antler helm, and, of course, Dunk’s own sigil that he got the opportunity to design himself: a strong elm at sunset, with a shooting star above. But one of the most interesting sigils was the most well-known: the three-headed red dragon of the Targaryens, meant to represent Aegon the Conqueror and his two sister/wives, Visenya and Rhaenys.
However, this sigil is only meant to represent the house, and in the books, each Targaryen has their own personal sigil as well. This is most useful in instances of inter-house conflict, like the Dance of the Dragons. In the books, Aegon fought under the banner of a golden dragon on a black background, meant to represent his dragon Sunfyre. However, in House of the Dragon, the background was green since his side was colloquially known as the “Greens,” after his mother Alicent’s house.
In the series, Rhaenyra simply keeps the black-and-red sigil of House Targaryen, since her side is known as the “Blacks.” But in the books, her personal sigil is much more complicated: it’s divided into quarters, with two quarters showing the Targaryen dragon and the other two displaying the sigils of House Arryn after Rhaenyra’s late mother, Aemma Arryn, and House Velaryon, after her late husband, Laenor Velaryon.
The Case Of The Missing Targaryen Sigils
Personal sigils also don’t appear in A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. In A Hedge Knight, Aerion is said to fight under a three-headed dragon but with each head colored red, orange, or yellow. This is a reference to his self-given nickname of “Aerion Brightflame” and his general obsession with fire. It’s even taken a step further in the books, with Aerion’s helm described as including red enamel flames and his horse bedecked in fabric strips in flame colors.
He may have been the Targaryen who went the most #aesthetic with his sigil, but his family had their own too. His party animal brother, Daeron, had a sigil that was simply the mirror image of the house sigil, with many speculating it represented him turning his back on his responsibilities. Even his dad, Maekar, had a sigil: the three headed dragon repeated four times, representing his status as the fourth son.
Aerion Targaryen’s getup was supposed to be a lot more colorful.
So how come none of these made it into A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms? One fan asked that exact same question of showrunner Ira Parker, and his response was surprisingly honest. “So far I’ve seen fans point [out] two mistakes in this show that I was unaware of,” he posted during a Reddit AMA. “This is one of them. Definitely should have had Maekar’s…that would have made it soooo easy to distinguish him in the fog. Whoops.”
As Episode 4 — and presumedly Episode 5 — proves, an all-out fight between two teams of seven knights can get confusing, and it can be difficult to figure out which Targaryen is on Aerion’s side, like Maekar, and which is on Dunk’s side, like Baelor, when they’re all dressed in the same black armor and carrying the same sigil.
With Season 2 of Knight of the Seven Kingdoms already on its way, maybe we’ll see these sigils in future tourneys, and the Targaryens just forgot to pack their own personal kits this time. But this wasn’t just another casualty of adaptation: it was just a detail that slipped through the cracks.
