House of the Dragon has finally introduced us to Daemon’s wife, Lady Rhea Royce (Rachel Redford). But, spoiler alert, we don’t see her for very long as Daemon murders her within minutes of her screen appearance. She was the head of House Royce in the Vale and heir to Runestone. In the episode, she wears the traditional armor of the Royces with a rather foretelling runic inscription.
A fan on Reddit has figured out what the runes say. It turns out the inscription is from a real historic document. It is from the Codex Runicus, specifically from the oldest preserved Scandinavian law, called Scanian law. Codex Runicus is a 202-page long document that details many more such laws. Here is what the runes on Lady Rhea’s armor say:
“If a man wounds another man while the king is in the province, he shall pay a fine for the wound in accordance with the law, and 40 marks to the king and 40 marks for breach of the peace to the one who was wounded..”
That is a piece of an excerpt from Scanian laws on wounding others. Here ‘marks’ refer to the Scandinavian currency, widely used in the past. The excerpt details that a man who has injured another shall pay the price, quite literally, as a fine. Seeing as Daemon Targaryen is the one who murders Lady Rhea, is this irony or foreshadowing? Is this a subtle way of letting the fans know that Daemon will not have a happy ending?
As of now, Daemon will inherit Runestone, and he won’t stand trial. But in the long run, Daemon will have to pay the price for his actions. According to the book, it can be many things like losing almost all of his loved ones, losing the battles which mattered, and so on, but that’s a given when you play the Game of Thrones, isn’t it?
How do you interpret this inscription? Comment below.
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