This post contains minor spoilers for House of the Dragon season three, episode five. If you want to avoid them like a Northern avoids the Dornish heat, you can instead check out our coverage of episode four.
Lord Ormund Hightower thinks the Realm has long been under the thumb of outsiders with tainted blood. The Seven Kingdom’s newest super villain believes dragons are abominations denying smarter, superior, more noble, holier people from their rightful ruling spot. He’s not just a supremacist, though, he’s also a misogynist. He’s determine to see his nephew named King, because the “brutes” who raised a woman to the Iron Throne are guilty of a “desecration” that violates both “reason” and “propriety.” But in episode five from House of the Dragon‘s third season, Ormund shared his admiration for a single woman in all of history.
What makes this one legendary Princess of Dorne, who died almost 130 years before Ormund’s history less, aworthy of even a pig’s respect? Because Meria Martell is a true icon who showed not everyone had to succumb to the very same family Lord Hightower hopes to now destroy. He believes if a woman could stand against Aegon the Conqueror, he can stand against a Queen of House Targaryen.
Aegon never conquered the Seven Realms when he united the continent under House Targaryen. He only conquered six of them. (A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms already let us nerd out over the semantics of what he did accomplish.) Aegon never ruled over Dorne.
As the words of the Dorne’s ruling family reminds everyone, the realm remained “unbent, unbowed, unbroken” when dragons came to Westeros. Not that Aegon and his two sister-wives didn’t try for many years. His younger sister-wife, Rhaenys, died in Dorne after it shot down her dragon with a scorpion bolt. Many kings of House Targaryen who followed also attempted to subjugate Dorne. Outside of some brief successes by Targaryen forces, Westeros’ southernmost kingdom remained independent for nearly two hundred years. That didn’t change until a marriage between Houses Targaryen and Martell formally brought Dorne under the rule of the Iron Throne.
(Even then, it was allowed to maintain its practice of naming sons and daughters prince and princess rather than lords and ladies. That unique tradition has its roots in Queen Nymeria’s famous arrival in Dorne with her thousand ships long before.)
Ormund Hightower told his ward, Prince Daeron Targaryen, all about Meria Martell. The nearly 80-year-old princess ruled Dorne during Aegon’s conquest. She kept him from ever claiming it. Her success is why the smug misogynistic Lord said Meria was “the only woman ever to be gifted with a truly military mind.” But because Ormund is Ormund, he also said the gods “divested her of beauty in turn” for granting her a wisdom only men should possess.
When he said Meria was “a blind princess, hideous, hairless, thick of waist” he wasn’t lying about her nickname or her appearance later in life. That’s actually how history remembers the cunning and fearless woman dubbed the Yellow Toad. But how she looked is a footnote to what she did and who she was. She devised a plan of resistance not even dragons could overcome with fire and blood.
Ormund’s history less to Daeron neatly summed up Meria’s victory, a battle she won with unconventional methods. She refused to face Aegon’s army and dragons on the battle field like others had tried (and failed). She also refused to bend the knee without fighting as the King of the North had done. Instead, Dorne opposed House Targaryen indirectly. It poisoned its own wells and had all the men of Dorne going into hiding. Meria left nothing for her enemies to find, fight, or use. Her soldiers instead hid in the sand to engage in guerrilla warfare. It only struck when its opponents least expected.
Meria never ran, though. When Rhaenys first came to claim Sunspear, seat of House Martell, the castle was empty… except for Meria herself. In one of the coolest moments of the Conquest, Meria told Rhaenys, ” I will not fight you, nor will I kneel to you. Dorne has no king. Tell your brother that.” She then told Rhaenys she returned at her own peril, a promise the Yellow Toad kept.
Daeron wanted to know if Meria, whose men killed members of House Hightower who fought for Aegon the Conqueror, was a hero or a villain. That should be an obvious answer for a literal prince of House Targaryen currently being groomed to claim the Iron Throne. But for Ormund Meria was not only a hero, she was an inspiration. Lord Hightower believes dragons alone give House Targaryen its seemingly impossible strength. Meria proves intelligence, something he believes he has while Targaryens do not, can defeat any enemy no matter how powerful. Here’s what he told Daeron about why he admires Meria:
The Targaryens knew nothing of our civilization. The Faith, the Citadel. But they had, what they still have, is strength. Their armies, the obscenities of their dragons, Meria Martell outwitted her enemies. A cunning can resist the most savage of beasts. And Dorne remains unbroken even today.
Ormund might think he’s smart, but he’s not smart to realize the big difference between him and the Yellow Toad. What she did she did for her people, not her own glory. And she wasn’t fighting fire with fire. In the Dance of the Dragons, fire and blood is fighting fire and blood. He needs dragons as much as Rhaenyra. And like the Queen, he ultimately wants a Targaryen to rule. Meria Martell never wanted to bend the knee to that family.
Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist. He still loves Meria Martell even if Ormund also does. You can follow him on Bluesky at @burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.