Why Did Aerys Ii Order The Burning Of King'S Landing?

I've spent more evenings than I'd like to admit leafing through dusty tomes and arguing in threads, so here’s the historian-style take I cling to: most of what people call Aerys II's royal sigils and treasures were secreted within the Red Keep itself. The vaults beneath the castle—stone rooms and hidden chambers that predate even some of the newer wings—were the obvious places a paranoid king would use. Chroniclers in 'A Song of Ice and Fire' and the histories that accompany it hint that Aerys grew increasingly distrustful, moving regalia and valuables away from public display and into private strongrooms behind the Throne and under the King's solar. But it wasn’t just a single stash. Aerys dispersed things: some items were locked in the Tower of the Hand and in private vaults of trusted councilors; others were likely shipped to Dragonstone or hidden in the libraries and reliquaries of old septs. There are also plausible whispers that certain banners and personal sigils were destroyed rather than surrendered—mad kings burn symbols as easily as parchment. When Tywin marched into King's Landing, much of what Aerys had hoarded was either seized by the Lannisters or scattered; that chaotic seizure explains why the trail grows cold in the chronicles. If you’re curious and want primary-source flavor, skim through 'Fire & Blood' and the annotated histories—there’s a lovely mix of fact, rumor, and the kind of court whispering that makes tracing a hidden hoard fun. Personally, I like imagining the Red Keep as a maze of secrets; it fits the mood of a king who never trusted his own shadow.

I get the chills every time I reread this part of the story — the evidence that Aerys II plotted against those around him is scattered through the narrative like broken glass, and it’s impossible to miss once you start collecting the pieces. First and most damning: the executions of Rickard and Brandon Stark. Their deaths weren’t mere formalities or battlefield casualties; they were cruel, theatrical, and politically charged. The way Ned and others remember the events in 'A Game of Thrones' makes clear these were acts of a paranoid king lashing out, not the impartial justice of a ruler listening to counsel. Then there’s the wildfire plot, which is the smoking dragon in the room. Jaime Lannister’s confession — the turning point — tells us how Aerys had caches of wildfire hidden under the city and planned to ignite them rather than let the rebels take King's Landing. Jaime’s account of finding Aerys by the levers and the king’s cry to 'burn them all' is direct testimony that Aerys intended mass murder, and crucially, it shows he was willing to destroy his own capital (and thereby betray or eliminate any advisors who might oppose him) rather than surrender. Barristan Selmy and other recollections back up the pattern of delusion: Aerys withdrawing from counsel, growing distrustful, and making catastrophic secret preparations. Finally, look at behavior towards his supposed advisors. He verbally humiliated and suspected Tywin, ignored sober counsel, and surrounded himself with those who fed his fears. The combination of political murders, secret preparations for catastrophic action, and testimony from people who witnessed him planning the city’s destruction forms a coherent picture: Aerys wasn’t just capricious — he plotted against the very people and institutions that should have guided or restrained him in 'A Song of Ice and Fire'. It feels tragic every time I think about how many lives that madness ruined.

I still get chills thinking about how tangled loyalties were during Robert’s Rebellion — it wasn’t a clean split of good guys vs bad guys. If you look at the people who quietly backed Aerys II, the safest, most concrete answer is that his inner circle supported him: the Kingsguard and his small council loyalists held to the crown. Men like Jaime Lannister and Barristan Selmy were sworn to the king, and Varys, as Master of Whisperers, was actively working in Aerys’s interests behind the scenes. Those weren’t secret so much as institutional loyalties, but they’re the backbone of who stuck with him when the realm split. Beyond that obvious layer there’s a messier, political web. Tywin Lannister’s role gets talked about a lot — he moved his forces toward King’s Landing and negotiated with Aerys, and while he ultimately betrayed the king, his early maneuvers looked like support or at least protection. Other houses with longstanding ties to the Targaryens, and minor bannermen who feared retribution if they switched sides too early, also quietly favored the crown until events forced them to pick a side. I like to revisit these bits when rereading 'A Song of Ice and Fire' because the gray motives — fear, honor, ambition — make the whole rebellion feel messy and real, not a black-and-white tale of heroes and villains.

The way I picture Aerys II after rereading bits of 'A Song of Ice and Fire' and watching 'Game of Thrones' is almost like comparing a whispered rumor to a punchy stage performance. In the books he’s mostly a ghost made of other people’s memories — a man everyone around the court feared, described in shards by servants, knights, and Jaime. Martin layers his decline: paranoia, cruelty, and a creeping obsession with fire that shows up in small details (hidden caches of wildfire, whispered orders, strange fits). That fragmented presentation makes Aerys feel less like a cardboard villain and more like a tragic collapse of a dynasty; you see the Targaryen court rot through a dozen different perspectives, and his madness is a pattern you piece together rather than watch unfold directly. The show, by necessity, simplifies and amplifies. Television needs faces and scenes, so Aerys becomes much more immediate — a snarling, theatrical presence in flashbacks. The iconic “burn them all” vibe is emphasized visually; pyro-themes are dramatized and made literal for impact. That changes how we judge Jaime too: in the books Jaime’s slaying of Aerys is wrapped in moral ambiguity and tons of inner conflict, whereas the show gives that moment sharper cinematic clarity — we see the imminent threat and the heroism of stopping it more plainly. What I love about the book approach is the lingering unease. You can chew on the hows and whys: Was Aerys always mad? Did court politics accelerate him? The show gives you a cleaner beat and a more memorable villain, which is great if you want instant dramatic payoff, but I’ll always prefer the book’s starker, messier portrait for the way it makes the tragedy feel systemic rather than simply theatrical.

The short, messy version is that a string of humiliations and conspiracies slowly rewired his mind. I’ve always been struck by how one clear wound—being taken prisoner at Duskendale—seemed to open the rest of the infection. That siege lasted months, and for a king used to being feared, being helpless while his bannermen dithered or schemed left a mark. He was supposed to be the centre of power, and instead he spent long nights imagining how close everyone had come to grabbing the crown. After Duskendale the little things started to look like treason to him: nobles who hesitated to rally troops, Hands who whispered behind closed doors, and the way Tywin Lannister grew colder and more distant in court. Then there were the noises from the tourney circuit and the court—the way Rhaegar’s actions at Harrenhal and his odd, distant bearing fed gossip about kingship and prophecy. When Brandon Stark rode to King’s Landing and the whole affair ended with Rickard and Brandon’s deaths, Aerys’ reaction wasn’t just cruelty, it was a king who’d convinced himself betrayal lurked in every face. Once paranoia set in he began to test loyalty in brutal ways: public insults, dismissals, secret punishments, and leaning on pyromancers. That mixture of personal humiliation (Duskendale), perceived slights from great lords (the coolness of houses like Lannister and the Starks’ defiance), and ominous rumours about his own family and heirs pushed him from distrust into outright mania. I still get chills thinking how quickly a ruler can go from commanding an army to fearing even those who kneel to him.

I still get a chill thinking about that moment in the story — the Mad King's last orders are basically the clearest evidence of how far gone he was. When Jaime tells the tale in the books, the king's final words are him shrieking about fire: he kept screaming something along the lines of "Burn them all!" as he ordered his pyromancers to light the caches under King's Landing. Jaime says Aerys wanted the city destroyed rather than let Robert take it, and those frantic commands to ignite the wildfire are what pushed Jaime to act. Reading Jaime's recollection in 'A Game of Thrones' (and later echoes in the TV version) left me torn; on one hand it’s horrific to imagine a ruler ordering wholesale slaughter, on the other hand Jaime’s choice to kill his king haunts him as a betrayal of his vows. The phrase "burn them all" becomes shorthand for Aerys' obsession — he wasn't just mad in a private way, he was willing to annihilate thousands to stoke vengeance or paranoia. Of course, we're getting the event through Jaime's lens, and memories can be self-serving or distorted. Still, whether word-for-word or as a paraphrase, the gist is the same: Aerys' last coherent speech was a command to incinerate his own people, which is as terrible and dramatic an ending as any tragic ruler could have.

I’ve always been fascinated by how quickly kings can unravel, and Aerys II is one of those cases that makes my brain race with possibilities. On the surface there’s the old, almost folkloric explanation: the Targaryen line carries a genetic predisposition toward mental instability because of centuries of keeping the bloodline pure. That’s the easy storytelling shorthand in 'A Game of Thrones' and 'Fire & Blood'—it explains why cousins and siblings intermarried and why lords later whisper about “the black blood.” To me this genetic theory fits because Martin sprinkles hints of family madness throughout Targaryen history, but it doesn’t feel sufficient on its own. Another layer I always chew on is trauma. Aerys got kidnapped in Duskendale, humiliated and possibly tortured, and came back a different man. Trauma like that can flip a ruler’s psychology overnight—paranoia can be rational when your bannermen are scheming. Add years of being surrounded by sycophants and people who feed his worst fears (not to mention the pyromancers and their temptations), and you get an echo chamber where small slights become treason. The burning obsession—both literal and symbolic—feels like someone latching onto a single, destructive answer to every problem. I also suspect a political logic: by the time rebellion is brewing, Aerys had real reasons to fear. He’d been betrayed by nobles before, and power politics make even sane men cruel and suspicious. Lastly, I can’t ignore the role of narrative—histories written after the fact, especially by the winners, amplify the “mad king” myth. I keep coming back to those chapters in 'Fire & Blood' and thinking: there’s madness, yes, but there’s also a messy cocktail of genetics, trauma, paranoia, cynicism, and some very bad counsel. When I curl up with those books I notice details that make me sympathize a little, even as I shudder at what he did.

The Mad King did more to unravel House Targaryen than any enemy army ever could. I’ve always been drawn to the messy politics in 'A Song of Ice and Fire', and Aerys II’s reign is a masterclass in how personal madness becomes institutional collapse. He started as a king with fragile legitimacy—Targaryen dragons and centuries of rule—but his paranoia, cruel punishments, and alienation of the great houses stripped that legitimacy away. The executions of Rickard and Brandon Stark, the cruel mockery of his council, and the whispered plots he imagined made every lord around him see the crown as dangerous rather than sacred. What really tipped the balance was how his behavior interacted with succession. Rhaegar was a clear heir, but Rhaegar’s death at the Trident left a vacuum that Aerys couldn’t fill because he’d already burned through the goodwill of his barons. Instead of restoring confidence, Aerys’s orders—like the plan to burn King’s Landing with wildfire—proved he trusted fire more than counsel. Jaime’s murder of Aerys was both the final break of royal continuity and the signal that bloodlines alone couldn’t guarantee the throne. Practically, that meant surviving Targaryens—Viserys and Daenerys—were reduced to claimants in exile, with sparse support and a tarnished dynasty name. Generations later, you can still see the echo: houses remembered the Mad King more than any peaceful tradition, and that memory shaped who would back a claimant. It’s tragic, but also a reminder in fiction and in history that succession is as much about legitimacy and institutions as it is about birthright. I always come away from that era thinking how fragile authority becomes when rulers lose the trust of their people.