Seeds in Game of Thrones

     It is very apparent that women have always been inferior in the eyes of men, even in our current present day. Tracing back to Medieval times, women's bodies were considered deformed, polluted, and especially, disgusting. In an article titled, Woman Defamed and Woman Defended, Alcuin Blamires discusses two specific theories. These theories are called the one and two seed theory. Blamires details the one seed theory, stated by Aristotle, as men giving the vast majority of uniqueness to their children. Mothers are known as the vessels for children, while fathers contribute the children's overall being. As opposed to the one seed theory, the two seed theory, described by Galen, states that a child receives two seeds, but one is stronger than the other. Both theories degrade women to the bottom of the gender totem pole, but how do these theories pertain to certain instances like incest, heirs, and power, which all connect to a simple character from the Game of Thrones, Cersei Lannister.

Cersei is the widowed wife of Robert Baratheon, the Queen regent of the Seven Kingdoms, mother of Joffrey, Myrcella, and Tommen, and shares a incestuous relationship with her twin Jaime Lannister. Cersei’s role as Queen Regent to guide her sons as they take the throne and be a mother queen as the new queen steps in line. Cersei demands power in the Seven kingdoms because she has suffered throughout her life and has pushed her way to get to the top and does everything she can to remain there. Cersei considers herself Tywin’s best son due to the fact that she is the only child who takes her father’s advice and does what she’s told. Although Cersei is the only female child of Tywin, she stands as the most masculine in the sense that she uses her knowledge and gender role to get her to the throne. Another spin to Cersei’s character is that she not only has an incestuous relationship with her twin brother Jaime, Cersei’s children are also fathered by Jaime.

Pertaining this back to the seed theories, how does Cersei relate to both or one of the theories and how can that reflect on women from Medieval times? Looking at the one seed theory, our present day Biology tells us that men determine the sex of children. Comparing this to the one seed theory, since men give the vast majority of uniqueness to their children, that would mean that when females are born, the mother’s seed was stronger than the father’s. This can relate back to Cersei being Tywin’s best son because her seed was able to beat out Jaime’s seed. But if you look at the two seed theory, Myrcella would be considered a deformed, mutilated man and Cersei’s seed was stronger in the sense that it deformed one of her children. So which theory would Cersei follow? Cersei shared a womb with her twin brother, so why would her blood be different than Jaime’s? Just because her body is different to her brother’s does not mean she did not contribute the same characteristics to her children. Cersei is a great example to test the contradictions within these theories because it allows the readers to look at the one sided views on women and how those views can’t follow that men create the children and women are just the vessel.