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Lord Quellon Greyjoy is a posthumous character in the A Song of Ice and Fire novel series. He was the Lord of the Iron Islands, Lord Reaper of Pyke, and head of House Greyjoy up until Robert's Rebellion, which was during the final years of the reign of Aerys II Targaryen. Quellon, by his three wives, fathered nine sons, most notably Balon Greyjoy and his brothers, Euron Greyjoy, Victarion Greyjoy, and Aeron Greyjoy. He is also the grandfather of Asha Greyjoy and Theon Greyjoy.
Personality[]
Quellon Greyjoy is considered to be one of the wisest Greyjoys in his family, as he sought to put an end to the ironborn's traditional practice of the Old Way and strengthen the Iron Islands' ties with the rest of the Seven Kingdoms in Westeros, the green lands.
Biography[]
Not much is known about Quellon Greyjoy's early life prior to being the Lord of the Iron Islands and head of House Greyjoy but all that is known during his youth, he fought corsairs and slavers in the Summer Sea. During the War of the Ninepenny Kings, he commanded a fleet of a hundred longships against the Band of Nine at the Stepstones. It was said by a semi-cannon source that Quellon's ironborn attacked Lord Farman's fleet and sacked Faircastle, the seat of House Farman, as Lord Tytos Lannister, the father of Tywin and Kevan Lannister, was a weak and poor liege lord of the Westerlands.
Though Lord Quellon is an ironborn, as he was meant to be a seafaring reaver, he was, however, a peaceful man who made reforms to try and reform the ways of the ironborn and become with one with the realm of Westeros, which used to be under the reign of House Targaryen. Quellon had thralls freed, forbade most reaving, discouraged the taking of salt wives, encouraged marriages with the mainland, as well as bringing maesters to the Iron Islands. Quellon himself did not believe in polygamy, unlike the rest of his people, and had taken a Lady of House Stonetree, a greenlander of the mainland, for his first rock wife and sole wife overall. His second wife was an ironborn lady of House Sunderly, and his third wife was another greenlander from House Piper, from the Riverlands.
By the time of Robert's Rebellion, he is now in his old age and his health is failing. After the Battle of the Trident which resulted in the death of Prince Rhaegar Targaryen at the hands of his own cousin, Lord Robert Baratheon, Quellon was convinced by his three eldest sons, Balon, Euron, and Victarion, to join with the rebels as soon as possible or else lose all spoils, even though their father desired for the ironborn to remain neutral.
While leading a navy of 50 longships against the Reach, he left behind most of the ironborn to guard the Iron Islands from House Lannister. As the Greyjoys raided the Reach, Tywin Lannister decided to side with the rebels and leads an army of westermen to King's Landing, which would then lead to the savage sack of the capital.
While raids were taking place in the Reach, House Greyjoy was unexpectedly met by longships from the Shield Islands. In a battle at the river Mander, the Greyjoys were victorious, unfortunately, however, Lord Quellon was killed during the battle. Following Quellon's death, Balon Greyjoy, who is his father's eldest son and heir, decided to return to the Iron Islands and claim the Seastone Chair, as well as initiating the construction of the Iron Fleet, a private navy directly sworn to the islands' rulers, planned to be made into the royal navy, with warmongering purposes.
Legacy[]
Quellon Greyjoy's legacy is not well-liked by his successor Balon, who proceeded to reverse most of his father's reforms after ascending the Seastone Chair. Quellon's legacy was further damaged when Balon Greyjoy made it his goal to break away from the realm and secure independence for the Iron Islands, declaring himself king of the Iron Islands, Balon IX. However, it was somewhat mended after House Greyjoy's rebellion was crushed by King Robert I Baratheon and his newly-formed dynasty, which forced Balon to bend the knee, allowing the Iron Islands to be brought back into the realm. In addition, his last surviving son Theon, after his two older sons, Rodrik and Maron were killed in the rebellion, was taken hostage by Lord Eddard Stark to serve as his ward, to ensure Balon's obedience and loyalty to the Iron Throne, thus bringing peace to the Seven Kingdoms and allowing King Robert's claim to the Iron Throne to be fully secured.
Nine years later, after Robert's death, no efforts to integrate with the rest of the realm have been made by House Greyjoy, despite Quellon's wishes. Instead Balon crowned himself once more during the War of the Five Kings, leaving the Iron Islands still independent to this day. However, Balon's first rebellion also brought more ironmen to integrate with the culture and religion of the southern mainland as Quellon would have wanted, as Lord Baelor Blacktyde, whose father died during Greyjoy's Rebellion, spent eight years as a hostage in Oldtown (possibly as a ward of the Hightowers), and converted to the Faith of the Seven, resenting Balon's policies. Baelor's former ward, Tristifer Botley, as well as Lord Rodrik Harlaw and Princess Asha Greyjoy, also follow similar ideologies as Quellon's and were more interested in integrating the ironborn with the mainland, but such ideologies remained opposed by Quellon's other fanatical sons, Victarion and Aeron, and by the even worse and more extreme ambitions of his son Euron III, the current king of the Iron Islands.
Because out of all Quellon's children from his three marriages, only his five "pure ironborn" children from his second wife survived past childhood (although his adolescent son Urrigon died of infection just shortly after Quellon himself died), the now drowned priest Aeron "Damphair" Greyjoy sees this fact as a sign of how only "pure ironmen" are strong and worthy enough to rule the Iron Islands. It is implied by Aeron that even under Iron Throne rule, the Greyjoy Lords of the Iron Islands still wore their own crown, the driftwood crown, as he mentions Balon's crown as having been his father Quellon's crown as well.
The Lord Quellon, one longship of the Iron Fleet, is presumably named after Quellon Greyjoy, and it is captained by Ralf the Limper.
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