The Iron Islands

House Greyjoy rules the Iron Islands from the Seastone Chair in the castle of Pyke on the island of the same name, their golden kraken on black flying over a seat carved from a single massive block of oily black stone whose origin no one has satisfactorily explained. The Greyjoys claim descent from the Grey King of the Age of Heroes -- a legendary figure who is said to have slain Nagga, the sea dragon, built his hall from her bones, and taken a mermaid to wife. Whether any of this is literally true is a question the ironborn consider impolite. What is not in dispute is that the Greyjoys have held the Iron Islands since Aegon the Conqueror let the ironborn choose their own lord after the extinction of House Hoare, and the choice fell to Vickon Greyjoy.

 

The ironborn are not like other Westerosi. They are shaped by their islands -- rocky, barren, cold, wind-scoured places that produce little of value and require their inhabitants to take what they need from elsewhere. The Old Way is the ironborn philosophy made explicit: what is won by force has worth, what is bought with gold does not. They pay the iron price. They do not sow. They reave and raid and drown and are reborn, because the Drowned God pulled the first ironborn from the sea and breathed life back into them, and What Is Dead May Never Die.

 

The recent history of House Greyjoy is the recent history of the Iron Islands in miniature -- spectacular, catastrophic, and ongoing. Lord Dalton Greyjoy, the Red Kraken, was the most celebrated ironborn lord in living memory -- reaving from the age of ten, fighting in the Stepstones as a sellsail at fifteen, and declaring for the blacks during the Dance to sack Lannisport, burn the Lannister fleet, seize Kayce and Fair Isle, and take hundreds of women as salt wives. He was murdered in 133 AC at Faircastle by his salt wife Tess, who cut his throat and threw herself into the sea. He left no rock wife and no legitimate heir.

 

What followed was chaos. Dalton's eldest salt son Toron was not yet six -- too young to rule and his mother too lowborn to act as regent. His aunts seized him immediately. His father's cousins and the lords of Harlaw and Blacktyde raised his half-brother Rodrik as a rival claimant. On Great Wyk, a man called Sam Salt rose claiming descent from the extinct House Hoare. The islands tore themselves apart for six months before Johanna Lannister sent thousands of westermen with Ser Leo Costayne's fleet to invade. Costayne was eventually killed by Arthur Goodbrother on Great Wyk and most of his army destroyed, but the damage was done -- ironborn villages burned, men killed, the succession struggle settled by foreign steel. Rodrik was taken captive, gelded, and made a court fool for young Lord Loreon Lannister at Casterly Rock.

 

Toron's defenders held Pyke. He sits on the Seastone Chair still.

 

By 140 AC, Lord Toron Greyjoy is twelve or thirteen years old, Lord Reaper of Pyke, ruler of islands that have been bled nearly dry by the Red Kraken's ambitions and the war that followed his death. The fleet is largely destroyed. The villages are burned. The men who went reaving with Dalton are mostly dead. The ironborn are a proud people in a humbled position, which is precisely the kind of combination that festers.

House Blacktyde holds the northernmost of the Iron Islands -- a cold, exposed place at the edge of the archipelago, with nothing between it and the open sea to the north. They are among the foremost bannermen of House Greyjoy and among the oldest families on the islands, their royal history reaching back to the Age of Heroes. King Joron I Blacktyde -- called Maidensbane -- captured King Gyles II Gardener of the Reach when their fleets clashed off the Misty Islands, tortured him to death, cut his corpse to pieces for bait, and raided the Arbor carrying off its women. The Blacktyde name has carried that reputation across the centuries without apparent embarrassment.

 

Their sigil is vairy green and black -- an unusual choice for an ironborn house, a heraldic pattern rather than a creature or weapon. Whatever it originally meant, it has become simply the Blacktyde mark, recognizable across the Iron Islands and wherever ironborn ships have sailed.

 

The recent succession crisis put the Blacktydes on the wrong side of its resolution. When Dalton Greyjoy died in 133 AC and the islands erupted into a bloody struggle for the Seastone Chair, the Blacktydes and the Harlaws backed Rodrik Greyjoy against Toron -- the losing claimant, as it turned out, when Johanna Lannister's invasion settled the matter by force. Rodrik is now gelded and a fool at Casterly Rock. Toron sits the Chair. The Blacktydes remain on Blacktyde, living with the consequences of having backed the wrong salt son.

 

By 140 AC, the island holds its cold northern position, the vairy banner flying over a house that is prominent, proud, and somewhat chastened.

House Botley holds Lordsport, the largest town on the Iron Islands and the closest thing the archipelago has to a proper port. It sits on the island of Pyke at the opposite end of the island from the Greyjoys' own castle, which means the Botleys control the point where the outside world enters the Iron Islands -- the docks, the trade, the travelers, the news. Their sigil is a shoal of silver fish on pale green, which suits a family whose seat has always faced the sea and looked outward rather than inward.

 

They are among the foremost bannermen of the Greyjoys, and their position at Lordsport has historically made them somewhat more commercially minded than most ironborn houses -- not soft, but aware that a port town runs on trade as much as on iron prices. The drowned priests have never entirely approved of the Botleys, and the Botleys have returned the sentiment with practiced indifference.

 

The Lannister invasion of 134 AC hit Lordsport hard. Westermen landed on Pyke and the lord of the house was killed in the fighting -- one of the named casualties of Johanna's campaign, a death that left the lordship to whoever survived the chaos of the succession. The town itself was damaged. The docks, which are the point of the whole enterprise, survived because docks are useful to any invader who needs to leave again.

 

By 140 AC, Lordsport is rebuilding. The new lord holds the port and watches the sea, which is all any Botley has ever really done.

House Goodbrother rules Great Wyk -- the largest of the Iron Islands -- from Hammerhorn, a keep set inland in the Hardstone Hills rather than on the coast. This is itself unusual for an ironborn house. The Goodbrothers' wealth comes from their mines rather than from the sea, which gives them a different relationship to the Old Way than most of their neighbors. They reave because they are ironborn and it is what ironborn do. They do not depend on it the way houses whose only resource is their longships must. 

 

They are among the oldest families on the islands, claiming descent not from the Grey King himself but from his loyal eldest brother -- a lineage that sets them apart from virtually every other major ironborn house and that they have maintained with some pride across the centuries. Only House Greyiron produced more kings at the kingsmoot than the Goodbrothers. The gold-banded black warhorn on red is one of the most recognizable banners in the archipelago.

 

Their cadet branches spread across the islands -- Corpse Lake, Crow Spike Keep, Downdelving on Great Wyk, Shatterstone on Old Wyk, and Orkmont -- which gives the Goodbrother name a reach on the Iron Islands that no single seat could provide.

 

The Lannister invasion of 134 AC tested the islands and the Goodbrothers rose to it. When Ser Leo Costayne led the western fleet against Great Wyk, Arthur Goodbrother killed him -- the death that broke the invasion's spine and scattered what remained of the Lannister force. It did not prevent the overall damage to the islands, but it is remembered on Great Wyk as the moment the westermen learned what arriving on Goodbrother land costs.

 

By 140 AC, Hammerhorn stands in its hills, the mines run, and the warhorn on the banner has been answered more recently than most would have preferred.

House Harlaw rules the island of Harlaw from Ten Towers -- a castle that looks like exactly what it is, ten different keeps connected by wallwalks and covered bridges, built by a lord who changed his mind nine times and kept building anyway. It is the largest and newest castle in the Iron Islands, and it sits on the richest and most populous island in the archipelago. The Harlaws control Harlaw entirely -- the other houses on the island, the Kennings, Myres, Stonetrees, and Volmarks, all answer to Ten Towers.

 

They are one of the oldest families on the islands and one of the few that rivals House Greyjoy in genuine power. Several Harlaws were elected High King of the Iron Islands through the kingsmoot in earlier ages, and the silver scythe on black is one of the most recognized banners in the archipelago. The island itself is renowned for its shaggy ponies and its mines of lead, tin, and iron, a wealth that has never depended entirely on reaving, which has always given the Harlaws a slightly different relationship to the Old Way than houses with nothing else to fall back on.

 

They have cadet branches spread across Harlaw -- Harlaw Hall, the ancient original seat; Grey Garden; Harridan Hill; and the Tower of Glimmering -- each held by a branch of the family, each adding to the reach of the Harlaw name on the island.

 

The succession crisis after Dalton Greyjoy's death placed the Harlaws on the wrong side. They backed Rodrik Greyjoy alongside the Blacktydes, and when Johanna Lannister's invasion came, the Lord of Harlaw was among those put to the sword by westermen landing on the island. The house survived. It always does. But there is a new lord at Ten Towers.

By 140 AC, Ten Towers holds its island, the scythe still on the banner, the ponies still on the hills.

House Saltcliffe rules the island of Saltcliffe, which they share with House Sunderly -- an arrangement that has required ongoing negotiation across the generations and has never been entirely comfortable for either party. Saltcliffe is among the less notable of the Iron Islands, neither the largest nor the wealthiest nor the most strategically significant, which has given the Saltcliffes a particular motivation to be useful to whoever holds the Seastone Chair.

 

Their sigil is a nine-headed serpent on silver -- a creature with more heads than any single enemy can easily watch, which suits an island house that has survived by being attentive rather than powerful.

 

By 140 AC, Saltcliffe holds its island and its arrangement with the Sunderlys and keeps its head down in the aftermath of everything the last decade brought to the Iron Islands.

House Stonehouse holds Old Wyk -- the holiest of the Iron Islands, where Nagga's hill rises from the ground and the ruins of the Grey King's Hall still stand, where the ironborn have held their kingsmoots since before memory began. It is not the largest island or the richest, but it is the one that matters most to the faith of the Drowned God, and the Stonehouses have lived in its shadow long enough to be shaped by it.

 

Their sigil is a black brazier on grey masonry -- fire contained in stone, burning on a dark island at the edge of the sea. Their seat is one of the oldest structures on the Iron Islands, built in stone at a time when most ironborn still built in timber, which is itself a statement about the family. They claim the brazier at the top of their highest tower has burned since the Age of Heroes. Whether this is literally true or simply what the Stonehouses prefer to believe, it has served as a lighthouse for ships navigating the treacherous waters between Old Wyk and Great Wyk for as long as anyone can remember.

 

The Lannister invasion of 134 AC reached Old Wyk and cost the house its lord -- he was among those put to the sword by westermen during Johanna Lannister's campaign. A new lord holds the seat now.

 

By 140 AC, the brazier still burns on the high tower, the kingsmoot ground lies empty on Nagga's hill, and Old Wyk keeps its cold and holy character.

House Sunderly shares the island of Saltcliffe with House Saltcliffe, an arrangement that has required negotiation and occasional friction for as long as both houses have existed. They are among the more devout of the ironborn houses -- their sigil says as much. A drowned man, pink and pale, floating upright in a blue-green sea, his hair streaming upward as fish nibble at his limbs -- it is not a sigil that hedges. It is a direct statement of faith. What is dead may never die. The drowned man in the water is not a warning. He is a promise.

 

The Sunderlys have historically been close to the drowned priests, their seat on Saltcliffe a house of ironborn piety in a faith that does not always produce polished lords. They reave because reaving is what ironborn do and because the Drowned God demands the iron price. The fish on their banner are fed by the faithful and feed the faithful in return, which is the kind of theology that makes perfect sense on a cold island in the Sunset Sea.

 

By 140 AC, the island of Saltcliffe holds both houses in their uneasy coexistence, the drowned man floating on the Sunderly banner as he always has.

House Tawney holds lands on Orkmont -- a centrally placed island in the archipelago, with Blacktyde to the north, Harlaw to the southeast, and Pyke to the south. It is historically significant ground. The extinct Houses Greyiron and Hoare, both of whom ruled the Iron Islands as iron kings, came from Orkmont. The Tawneys are not those houses, but they have lived in their shadow long enough to know what it looks like when great power rises and falls on a small island.

 

Their sigil is a scourge of nettles, red and black, on white -- not a creature, not a weapon, but a plant that stings without warning and leaves a mark that lingers well past the moment of contact. It is an unusual choice for an ironborn house and a quietly pointed one.

 

They are among the strongest sworn to Pyke and have backed the Greyjoys consistently enough that their loyalty is considered reliable rather than merely obligatory.

By 140 AC, Tawney holds its Orkmont lands, the nettle banner flies, and the islands around them are picking up the pieces of everything Dalton's ambitions cost them.

House Wynch holds Iron Holt on the northernmost shore of Pyke itself -- the same island as the Greyjoy seat of Pyke castle, which puts them in closer proximity to the Lord Reaper than any other principal house. That proximity has shaped them. The Wynches have historically been among the Greyjoys' most reliable bannermen, and their seat's position on Pyke means they are among the first called and the first to answer.

 

Their sigil is a bloody moon on purple -- a night sigil, lunar and red, which suits a house whose seat watches the dark northern waters of Pyke island. The moon rises red over the sea and the Wynches are already on their longships.

 

The succession chaos after Dalton's death left marks on the house. Alester Wynch held Faircastle on Fair Isle alongside Gunthor Goodbrother in the immediate aftermath of the Red Kraken's murder -- and was then killed by Gunthor in a feud over Lysa Farman, one of Dalton's salt wives. The Wynches have not forgotten this. The Goodbrothers of Hammerhorn have not apologized. The distance between Pyke and Great Wyk is not large enough to make either house comfortable.

 

By 140 AC, Iron Holt holds the northern shore of Pyke, the bloody moon on the banner, and a grievance against the Goodbrothers that has been quietly simmering for seven years.

The following houses are the remaining vassal houses of the Crownlands. Please click a house's box for additional known information such as existing characters (canon or custom), house words, and who a house's liege lord might be.