I believe this is just a matter of GRRM not having much experience with children, so he ended up making them mature for their age.
Or it could reflect a medieval mindset. Children were regarded as small adults, and when you reached puberty or even before you were expected to take on adult responsibilities. Kids started working as soon as they were physically able to handle the tools. Obviously the appropriate responsibilities would be different for a lord or lady vs a peasant or artisan. Young noble boys became pages at 7, farm kids started pulling weeds when they were old enough to walk.
Robert could still have had as many affairs as he wanted, so long as he put any effort into being a good king. He was completely neglectful of his duties, and setting up the dominos himself for others to knock over.
Yeah, they’d been boning since hitting puberty.
Yeah, he wasn’t exactly administrator of the year, was he?
According to “Time Traveller’s Guide to Medieval England” by Ian Mortimer, this is indeed the case- children were generally considered responsible by 7 or 8, and by 14-15, were pretty much considered adults.
Robert’s incompetence as a king certainly weakened the realm, but it was really Cersei’s incest that caused the rift. If she hadn’t dallied with Jaime - or heck, as long as the kids were actually Robert’s and not Jaime’s - you don’t have Jon Arryn discovering the secret and getting killed*, Ned Stark doesn’t come in, discover the secret and get killed, and Stannis (and possibly Renly) don’t try to angle for the throne with legitimate heirs in existence.
Book spoiler:
*It’s revealed that Lysa killed Jon Arryn because she didn’t want him sending their kid away, not that the Lannisters killed him because he discovered the incest/illegitimacy. But Arryn only intended to foster his kid with Stannis because he intended Stannis to take the throne, so, it is still kinda Cersei’s fault.
Catelyn Stark started the entire war.
Certainly she set off the chain of events that resulted in Ned’s death, but given what Littlefinger had already done, I think the war of succession was going to happen anyway. But Ned might have been alive for it.
I think the point of the show is that everyone all the time is playing the “game of thrones”. It is the constant jockeying for position, power and wealth that drives these characters.
What Puzzles me is why the Lannisters didn’t just put Jaime on the throne directly after the murder of the Mad King. Messing around waiting a generation to get their own incestuous bastard Joffrey on the throne instead seems like a singularly bad idea.
The driving forces behind the war were Robert Baratheon, Ned Stark and Jon Arryn. The Lannisters stayed loyal to the crown until the last moment - they actually appeared at the gates of the Red Keep and convinced the Targaryens they were there to help them, then raided the city when they were let in. And no way they could’ve put Jaime Lannister, the Kingsguard who broke his oath and stabbed his king in the back, on the throne. They’re lucky Stark didn’t push for his death.
In actual history there is a long tradition of killers of kings becoming the king and as I understand it the lannisters were in possession of kings landing at the time.
And Robert’s army held the rest of the country. If the Lannisters had crowned one of their own, they would have found themselves at war with the combined Baratheon-Stark-Arryn-Tully host.
Besides, I can’t think of any killers of kings taking the throne in Western or Central Europe. The powers that be generally preferred to keep up the appearance of clean hands.
Furthermore, a very short time elapses between Jaime doing his kingslaying and Ned Stark coming into the castle with his army. Jaime kills Aerys and sits on the throne, and Ned walks in while he’s still there. I can’t imagine more than say an hour passing by at the outside. There simply wasn’t time for the Lannisters to make a play for the throne; Jaime’s was a spontaneous act that hadn’t been talked over with his father.
Yes, I was wondering what coremelt had in mind.
Jaime didn’t have any bloodline claim to the throne - Robert did, although it was a tenuous one.
William the Conqueror
Richard III (still debatable)
Henry VII
Oliver Cromwell (de facto)
I’m not convinced this even mattered. Fact is, the Lannisters rallied the rebellion at the last moment, while Robert had been leading it.
Also, while it is bad form to kill the King, it would have likely been much worse if Jaime renounced his vows as a Kingsguard (I mean even though he killed the King, he remained a Kingsguard… which sounds like a bad idea, but you gotta respect some oaths I guess) and decided, well he would like to be ruler after all.
None of those killed their predecessors with their own hands.