Editor’s note: The below contains spoilers for Season 1 of the House of the Dragon.
The premiere season ofHouse of the Dragonbegan and ended with a grisly, gory, and nightmarish birth scene. In the first episode, we bore witness to a birth so gruesome that many viewers felt rightfully outraged, questioning the necessity of the sequence. But in the context of what is to come, Aemma’s (Sian Brooke) brutal death foreshadows Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) and Laena’s (Nanna Blondell) battle for agency in a patriarchal order asking them to sacrifice their bodies to produce heirs. The season’s several birth sequences illuminate the painful reality of the dangerous fight for control that took place in the home, each depicting the war birth rages on the body with the brutality typically reserved for battle scenes. While we have long seen the bravery and bloodshed of men in combat, these scenes shed light on the battle we don’t see on screen as often.
Aemma spells this fight out plainly in the first episode of the season. Before the birth, she has a conversation with young Rhaenyra (Milly Alcock) that foreshadows what is to come. She tells her that “this discomfort is how we serve the realm,” and Rhaenyra shrugs at this, much preferring to be a knight who receives honor and glory. The act is just as dangerous as going to battle, but women do not receive the same honor and glory that comes with being a man going to war. She states to Rhaenyra that “the childbed is our battlefield,” a statement that rings more true than ever during Rhaenyra’s stillbirth in the Season 1 finale. Soon enough, Aemma’s birth sequence is intercut with a tourney; within the castle walls, Aemma screams, and bloodshed ensues without the honor and glory the knights receive outside.
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Aemma’s Birth Scene Depicts the Control Men Have Over Women’s Bodies
As Aemma struggles to give birth, the maester puts the choice of what will happen to her body in the hands of the father, King Viserys (Paddy Considine). Aemma is pinned to the bed as she cries and pleads, a visual that makes it achingly clear she is not consenting to have the child cut from her body. Despite this, the maester performs the procedure — with Viserys’ approval. This isanother decision we will see occur once againwhile Laena gives birth in Episode 6, and it is a situation that would have likely been posed once again in the finale if Rhaenyra had not refused the interference of the maester and maidens. Viserys’ choice to kill Aemma in an attempt to save the heir willhaunt him until his dying words, a fatal consequence of his stripping the agency from his wife for an heir that would have died regardless. Aemma’s death in childbirth is undoubtedly a driving force in Rhaenyra’s choice to rebel against tradition and reclaim her agency in her own births later in the season.
Our introduction to an older Rhaenyra is in the midst of her giving birth. “The Princess and the Queen” marks the series’ first major time jump from Rhaenyra as a child to a woman and mother. The episode opens with the sound of strained groans before revealing Rhaenyra, a close-up of her face sheened with sweat as she gives birth. While she once wished to be a knight and forego the duty of birth, this scene demonstrates that she is indeed reluctantly fulfilling the duties that come with entering womanhood in a royal order that demands male heirs. The sequence also depicts the enduring effects that come after birth. Rhaenyra walks in agony to show her baby to Alicent (Olivia Cooke) at the queen’s behest, with one shot lingering on the trail of blood left behind that marks her steps.
Laena Is Forced Into the Same Situation as Aemma, But Chooses Her Own Fate
Laena’s birth scene is another brutal sequence showcasing men prioritizing the male heir over the mother and the woman’s fight for agency in a patriarchal order that aims to control their bodies. As she fights to deliver, her child is revealed to be in the breech position and unable to turn. The maester goes to the father to make the decision, presenting Daemon(Matt Smith)with the same choice given to his brother.
While Aemma did not see the maester and Viserys converse, Laena watches intently as the maester approaches Daemon. Her expression reveals that she knows exactly what is about to happen and will do whatever it takes to avoid the horrific death. Getting up from her bed, she limps outside to stand before Vhagar, desperately commanding the dragon to breathe fire on her. The image of the flames engulfing her is an immensely tragic and startlingly powerful sequence, depicting Laena’s wish to control her fate in her final moments. Although she dies in her battle to produce a male heir for their house, Laena goes out in an act of rebellion, choosing death on her terms rather than at the hands of men.
Rhaenyra’s Finale Birth Shows Her Fight to Retain Autonomy
The season finale, “The Black Queen,” is in many ways a culmination of the series’ realistically gritty portrayal of birth as a woman’s battlefield. Rhaenyra goes into labor at the most inopportune time imaginable, just learning her father has died and her throne has been usurped. The men plot around the table, defying Rhaenyra’s request to make no decisions without her. As they strategize, Rhaenyra’s moans and screams echo in the background. Mirroring Aemma’s birth sequence happening during the tourney in the first episode, this scene cuts between the birth and men making war moves. As Daemon threatens the knights that they will “die screaming” if they don’t bend the knee for Rhaenyra, the scene then cuts to Rhaenyra screaming in labor. The moment echoes the way her mother died screaming at birth and her determination to avoid the same fate. As men plot for war outside, she is at war with her own body in her chambers. As the midwives watch in horror and plead to offer assistance, Rhaenyra refuses, pulling the child out of her body herself. In her refusal of interference from midwives who are tasked to prioritize the male heir over the life of the mother, Rhaenyra likely saves her own life, a rebellious and empowering decision.
This sequence lends justification for Aemma’s birth sequence in Episode 1, showing that Rhaenyra has learned from what happened to her mother and knows she must fight to retain her autonomy while fulfilling her royal duties. While Aemma was not able to fight back against men’s control over her body, Laena and Rhaenyra reclaim the agency she lost. When men ask them to sacrifice their lives to save the potential of an heir, they fight back against this tradition. The birth sequences illuminate the central themes of this season, as women must navigate the patriarchal order that sees them as unequal. While the world of Westeros is known for its brutal wars and bloodshed on battlefields, Season 1 ofHouse of the Dragonsheds important light on the battle being waged on women’s bodies in the confines of their chambers.
