AKOTSK: Why Does the Seven Kingdoms Have Nine Kingdoms?

This article contains spoilers for A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms episode 6.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms season 1 couldn’t end without one last jape.

After all the violence and heartbreak of the once-in-a-century trial of seven, Dunk (Peter Claffey) and Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell) ride off onto their next adventure. But where will they go? As Dunk muses that there are still so many places he hasn’t seen in the Seven Kingdoms, Egg immediately corrects him with “Nine.”

“What?”
“There are nine kingdoms, ser.”
“Of what?”
“The realm.”
“Are you mad?”
“Is that relevant?”
“There are seven kingdoms of the realm, boy, everyone knows that.”
“Then everyone is wrong.”

Wait… what is that little bald-headed runt on about? Aren’t there, you know, seven kingdoms in the geopolitical entity known as the Seven Kingdoms? The short answer to that is no. The longer answer to that is “it’s complicated.” Truthfully, there is only one “kingdom” on the continent of Westeros and it just so happens to be called the singular “Seven Kingdoms.” That name is akin to collective country titles like the United States of America or the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

But while the U.S. and U.K. don’t contain numbers in their names, the Seven Kingdoms does and it has now outgrown that initial number. Here is how that happened and why the Seven Kingdoms could more accurately be described as “One Kingdom Consisting of Nine Regions.”

There Were Seven Independent Kingdoms Before Aegon’s Conquest

Before Aegon Targaryen, his sisters, and their dragons landed on the shores of Westeros, the continent was divided into seven independent kingdoms. These kingdoms were:

The Kingdom of the North, ruled by House Stark in Winterfell
The Kingdom of the Mountain and the Vale, ruled by House Arryn in the Eyrie
The Kingdom of the Isles and Rivers, ruled by House Hoare in Harrenhal
The Kingdom of the Rock, ruled by House Lannister in Casterly Rock
The Kingdom of the Reach, ruled by House Gardener in Highgarden
The Kingdom of the Storm, ruled by House Durrandon in Storm’s End
Dorne, ruled by House Nymeros Martell (which styles themselves as princes, not kings) in Sunspear

While everyone else saw seven independent kingdoms, Aegon saw just one landmass ripe for the taking. So he set out from his seat on the island of Dragonstone and took it! Some kingdoms (including the North, the Vale, and the Rock) understood they couldn’t win a fight against three dragons and laid down their arms. The ruling houses there were subsequently awarded positions as “wardens” of their respective regions – swearing fealty to King Aegon I as the one true king of all seven kingdoms while maintaining some power and autonomy of their own. Others foolishly tried to fight and had their whole lines extinguished (including House Hoare of the Iron Islands and Riverlands, House Gardener of the Reach, and House Durrandon of the Stormlands).

Only Dorne and its favorable geography proved successful in repelling the dragon threat, remaining independent until King Daeron II brought them into the realm via marriage later on. Still, despite not having actual control of Dorne, King Aegon I styled himself as the “Lord of the Seven Kingdoms” to establish his dominion over the continent. The name “Seven Kingdoms” stuck throughout the years even though there was but one king and one kingdom, give or take a Dorne.

There Are Now Nine “Regions” in the Seven Kingdoms

Egg doesn’t expect Dunk to just take him at his word that there are really nine kingdoms in the seven kingdoms, he goes ahead and lists them out: “Crownlands, Westerlands, Stormlands, Riverlands, the Iron Islands, the North, the Reach, the Vale of Arryn, and Dorne.” Egg’s list makes it pretty clear how seven kingdoms became nine regions. Simply put: one region was added and one other kingdom was split into two regions.

The added region is the Crownlands, which resides along Westeros’ eastern coast by Blackwater Bay. Once disputed territory between the Storm King and several petty kings, the Crownlands became Aegon’s new home upon his landing. In fact, he built a city there you might be familiar with called King’s Landing. Nowadays, the Crownlands operates like the District of Columbia in the United States: all of the vassal lords there pay their tithes directly to the Iron Throne and are ruled by the Lord of the Seven Kingdoms.

Meanwhile the Kingdom of the Isles and Rivers became the Iron Islands and the Riverlands. Throughout Westeros’ long history, riverlanders rarely had a kingdom of their own and instead were often exploited by their more powerful neighbors. The neighbor who just happened to be holding the Riverlands hot potato when Aegon arrived was an Iron Islander known as “Black” Harren of House Hoare. Just about everyone loathed Black Harren, most of all the riverlanders. So after Aegon roasted Harren’s whole line to ashes in Harrenhal, he then graciously handed his allies in Riverrun the Riverlands by naming Edmyn Tully as Lord Paramount of the Trident.

Recognizing that the Iron Islands now needed some local governance as well, Aegon allowed the ironborn to choose a new lord amongst themselves as long as they relinquished all claims to the Riverlands. New wardens House Greyjoy repaid this magnanimity by occasionally raiding and pillaging the Westerosi mainland for 300 years.

There you have it. That’s how A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms briefly became A Knight of the Nine Kingdoms.

All six episodes of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms are available to stream on HBO Max now.