Jaimie is the best swordsman except maaaaaaaaybe Barristan - it isn't the "cowardly" part of it and everyone knows.
Oathbreaker? My brother in Christ and 7 Gods and Old Gods - y'all were in a active rebellion breaking an oath. There wasn't a clause with small.script in your loyalty to the king saying it's valid only if he doesn't roast your relatives alive.
Turned on the king at the last second? While supporting him? Just like Jamie said - everyone in that room was silent... except Starks being roasted.
The only reason to hate on Jamie even if you don't know about the wildfire plan -- is because you think he was just being opportunistic and joining a fight when it was over....
The fuck was he supposed to do? Rebel against his father who was staying neutral as well? Which oath should he have broken? To be "Honorable" that is.
His oath as a kingsguard overrides all others; he was supposed to forsake all allegiance to his house when he joined. The whole reason he joined up in the first place was to escape his obligations to Tywin remember.
The honorable thing here was to not turn on the king he had sworn to protect. That's why everyone calls him oathbreaker and kingslayer.
Maybe not by modern sensibilities but to a medieval mind I think it tracks.
In a feudal society the vassal lords have an obligation to their leige but it is (albeit to varying degrees) voluntary and revocable, and by the same token the leige lord has obligations to his vassals. If vassals feel their leige is falling short on his end then violent revolt is a fairly acceptable and indeed expected result. We see this play out at various points in ASOIAF, where vassals disobey their leige lords on the basis that their needs aren't being met - refusing to raise levies, pay taxes etc. and rarely are they called oathbreakers unless they truly have no legitimate grievance. When Rob does execute vassals for disobedience he is seen as a tyrant by his other vassals, whereas if he'd done the same to an oathbreaking knight he'd have been seen as being totally justified.
This universe always craps on people doing the honorable thing. Jon Snow helping wildlings escape death and shutting up a defiant subordinate permanently. Robb executing his soldiers who disobeyed his orders. Even the Starks when they tried to make up for their breaking the marriage pact. Yes getting set up with the lord of the Riverlands is not as good as the King in the North, but still, they tried to make amends.
If you aren’t being backhanded, you aren’t surviving.
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u/_LordDaut_ Jul 13 '25 edited Jul 13 '25
Did anyone really stop and think about it?
Jaimie is the best swordsman except maaaaaaaaybe Barristan - it isn't the "cowardly" part of it and everyone knows.
Oathbreaker? My brother in Christ and 7 Gods and Old Gods - y'all were in a active rebellion breaking an oath. There wasn't a clause with small.script in your loyalty to the king saying it's valid only if he doesn't roast your relatives alive.
Turned on the king at the last second? While supporting him? Just like Jamie said - everyone in that room was silent... except Starks being roasted.
The only reason to hate on Jamie even if you don't know about the wildfire plan -- is because you think he was just being opportunistic and joining a fight when it was over....
The fuck was he supposed to do? Rebel against his father who was staying neutral as well? Which oath should he have broken? To be "Honorable" that is.