Corlys Velaryon

Corlys Velaryon was born in 53 AC and made his house the second mightiest in the realm without ever pressing a claim to a throne. From the deck of his ship, the Sea Snake, he sailed nine great voyages beyond the maps of Westeros — to Yi Ti and Asshai and the Jade Sea — returning each time with holds that made Driftmark wealthier than any lord in Westeros but the crown itself.

He wed Princess Rhaenys Targaryen, the queen who never was, and bound House Velaryon to the royal line by blood and ambition. When the Dance came, his fleet, his gold and his sons went to Rhaenyra: his trade ships strangled the Green coast, his captains carried the war to the Stepstones and the Gullet, and his counsel held the Black faction together through its worst year.

The end of the war tested him. Arrested after Rhaenyra's fall, he was put on trial for treason and stripped of everything, yet survived it — living to stand as one of the regents for the boy-king Aegon III from 131 AC. He died on the sixth day of the third moon of 132 AC, collapsing while climbing the serpentine steps of the Red Keep, and was buried at sea aboard the ship that had made his name.