One of the craziest Game of Thrones fan theories claims that Daario Naharis and Euron Greyjoy
are the same person. And it’s actually kind of possible.
In A Storm of Swords, Daario Naharis is one of three captains of the Stormcrows, a mercenary
company hired by Yunkai to defend the city from Daenerys Targaryen. Daario kills the
two other captains and brings the company to Dany’s side, helping to take Yunkai,
then Meereen. Daario is a great fighter, and a great talker, arrogant, swaggering and
ruthless. He wears colourful Tyroshi clothes with a pointed blue beard, though HBO’s
Daarios look nothing like this. In any case, Dany falls for him, and the two become lovers,
in a relationship that represents the temptation of violence and vengeance – of "fire and
blood”. Daario’s always offering to kill people for Dany, like Jorah, and Hizdahr
zo Loraq, and the Great Masters. He suggests loosing her dragons on her enemies, and doing
what she likes, without care for responsibility, or who might get hurt. Dany’s horrified
by his careless brutality, calls him a monster, but deep down, thinks she’s a monster too.
Daario is the devil on Dany’s shoulder, representing her darker side , so he’s central
to Dany’s internal conflict in A Dance with Dragons. Throughout this book, while Dany
stays to rule Meereen, Daario is sent off on various missions. But at the end of Dance,
and the start of The Winds of Winter, Daario is a hostage of the Yunkai’i, while battle
begins between Dany’s forces, Yunkish forces, and some unexpected visitors – the ironborn.
Euron Greyjoy is brother to Balon, Victarion and Aeron, and an uncle to Asha and Theon.
He’s a wild, scheming, dangerous man, a warrior and a manipulator, widely described
as mad. After being exiled from the Iron Islands for raping or seducing Victarion’s
third wife, he spent several years killing and pillaging across Essos in his ship of
mutes called the Silence. He claims to have been everywhere from Asshai to the ruins of
Valyria, and has knowledge of magic and dragons, apparently having captured Pyat Pree and his
warlock buddies. In a Feast for Crows, Euron returns to the Iron Islands the day after
big brother Balon’s sudden death, and is elected king of the Islands on the promise
that he will conquer Westeros for the ironborn. After taking the Shields, he sends Victarion
and the Iron Fleet off to find Daenerys, so Euron can marry her and capture her dragons
with the magic horn Dragonbinder. We’re led to believe that meanwhile, Euron is raiding
the Reach, but there’s good not to believe that's true. 'Cause Euron’s
not that interested in the Reach – he says “[he’d] bring [the ironborn] dragons,
and they shout out for grapes” – grapes as in the Reach. So his talk of taking the Reach,
even of conquering Westeros, might be empty words to win the ironborn. But even if Euron
does intend to conquer, he clearly plans to do it with dragons. So why would he attack
the Reach and risk the wrath of the Redwyne fleet before he has dragons? There is some
raiding going on along the Mander, but there’s no clear evidence that Euron’s a part of it. It’s
more likely that he’s focussing on his primary goal – Dany and her dragons. Which we’re
led to believe Euron leaves in the hands of Victarion – Victarion, who is “dumb as
a stump”, is only good at fighting, knows nothing about magic or dragons, hates Euron
and plans to take Dany and her dragons for himself. Why would Euron trust Victarion
with this job? Here’s what might be going on – Euron follows the Iron Fleet to Meereen
– or gets there first, in disguise, perhaps – he lets Victarion deal with the Yunkai’i,
lets Victarion’s men blow the deadly horn, which apparently kills whoever uses it , then
Euron can reveal himself and take Dany and her dragons. 'Cause Dragonbinder brings
dragons not to whoever blows the horn, but to the horn’s master. Euron found the horn,
and is manipulating Victarion, surely making Euron the horn’s master. So when Dragonbinder
sounds, dragons will come to the Crow’s Eye – not in the Reach, but in Slaver’s Bay.
Using Victarion like this is exactly the sort of deception and manipulation that
we should expect from the Crow’s Eye, and having him turn up at Meereen would be a pretty
awesome dramatic reveal. So onto the theory – what evidence is there
that Daario and Euron are the same person? For starters, they look pretty similar. They’re
both attractive, they both have smooth, pale skin, they both have beards – Daario a
dyed blue beard, and we’ve already seen dyed blue beards used as disguises. They both
have blue eyes, though Euron is said to have a “black eye” beneath his patch. Euron
also has blue lips from drinking shade-of-the-evening, which could wear off, or be hidden, maybe?
And Daario has a gold tooth, which could possibly be fake? Overall, they look quite similar.
Daario and Euron also have very similar skills and personalities. They’re both good talkers,
good at convincing people. Euron talks his way onto the Seastone Chair, and Daario talks
his way into Dany’s bed – both of which are cases of an outsider getting into a place
they don’t really belong through flattery, the giving of gifts, and overwhelming confidence.
They both have a talent for mocking and belittling people. They’re both endlessly bragging
in fanciful, self-aggrandising monologues, like, Daario says he “would tell you the
names of all the men [he has] slain, but before [he] could finish … winter would come and
go and come again”. Euron says he’s “never known defeat … has never bent his knee … has
sailed to Asshai by the Shadow, and seen wonders and terrors beyond imagining”. But beneath
the bravado, both men are dangerous, brutal, men without conscience, who kill like it
means nothing. They both have a tendency to anger. And they seem to share an interest
in dragons – Euron’s endlessly talking about them, and plans to steal Dany’s, while
Daario brings up dragons many times for someone who only appears in a few chapters. There
are weird connections in the show, too. In Season 3, Daario says he refuses to pay prostitutes,
which is refusing to pay the gold price, which is an ironborn thing. Also, at one point
Daario describes a flower, his gift to Dany, as “beautiful but poisonous” – and we know
that “Euron’s gifts are poisoned”. But thirdly, and most maddeningly, in the show,
Daario captures the ships of the Meereenese navy. “How many ships?” you might ask.
“Ninety-three, your Grace” . Ninety-three ships. That is the same number of ships as
Victarion leaves with to go to Meereen in the books. This is not a coincidence, right?
Either the writers of the show are fucking with us, or the fleet of ships that Daario
gives Dany in the show are somehow equivalent to the fleet of ships Euron sends to Dany
in the books. There are a bunch of different ways that could work but either way, it's
a strong connection between Daario and Euron. And there’s more – Daario wears Tyroshi
clothes, and skilfully wields a Dothraki arakh and a Myrish stiletto, which suggests he’s
pretty well-travelled. We know Euron’s been all over the world. And Daario has “a gift
for sleeping”, he’s able to sleep on horseback during storms, which is the sort of skill
you’d learn spending years at sea. Daario rhetorically asks if he “Would … steal
from [Dany]” when Euron’s plan is to steal dragons from Dany. And Daario and Euron both
have lines describing men as meat. There are also symbolic connections, like, Daario’s
mercenary company is called the Stormcrows, when Euron is repeatedly described as “the
storm”, and his nickname is “Crow’s Eye”. The show changed Daario’s company
to the Second Sons, but for what it’s worth Euron is literally a second son. So Daario
and Euron are similar in appearance and personality and there are lots little hints at a connection
between the two. Nothing that proves they’re the same person, but enough to suggest
that there might be something here. So does it make sense for Daario to be a false
identity of Euron? What does Euron get by pretending to be some random sellsword? Well,
we know Euron wants to marry Dany and take her dragons. By playing the role of Daario,
Euron has won Dany’s love – she wants to marry him, says she’d give up her crown
for him. This explains why Euron is so confident that Dany will marry him, which is ridiculous
otherwise. Being Daario also allows Euron to get an insider’s view of the situation
in Meereen, and what the deal is with the dragons, which would all be very valuable
information to someone planning to make a move there. Being Daario also works with Euron
secretly being in Slaver’s Bay – as Daario, he’s a hostage of the Yunkai’i. So he
just sits tight and waits for Victarion to use Dragonbinder, bringing a dragon to break
Euron out of Yunkish custody, so he can hop on the dragon, maybe kill Victarion while
he waits for Dany to return to Meereen on Drogon, so Euron can be all like ‘Heyy,
it’s’a me, Daario, your dragon seems to like me for some reason, wanna go spread some
fire and blood up in these slavers?’ Admittedly, assuming a false identity on the other side
of the world might not be the best way to achieve all this. But it could make some kind
of sense to a mind like Euron’s. Maybe. Does Daario=Euron fit with what we know of
Daario? Well, we don’t know much about Daario. In the show he says he’s the son of a prostitute,
and as far as we know he has no family, no friends, no gods. What we do know is that
he’s treacherous. Daario first came to Dany by breaking contract with Yunkai and killing
his colleagues. Jorah warns Dany that Daario is not “worthy of trust”, that “Even
his beard wears false colors”. Dany rejects this, saying Jorah’s just jealously pushing
men away from her, which is probably partly true. But, in arguing that Jorah’s warnings
are wrong, she lists them: “Pyat Pree’s a liar, Xaro’s a schemer, Belwas a braggart,
Arstan an assassin”. Thing is – Pyat Pree is a liar, Xaro is a schemer, Belwas is a
braggart, and while Barristan’s not an assassin, he does deceive Dany. As Dany later admits,
“[Jorah] always [gives] good counsel”. And Jorah’s council is that Daario is
untrustworthy. And Barristan agrees. Even Dany thinks Daario is treacherous. He might
fit in to the “three mounts” or “three betrayals” she is prophesied to suffer.
But the bigger issue here is that Daario doesn’t make sense as a person. We’re meant to believe
that Daario is this battle-hardened, self-serving mercenary, who sides with whoever is going
to win. So why's he sticking with Dany, when she’s surrounded by enemies and disease,
and ruin, and other sellswords are abandoning her? Everyone seems to expect Daario to betray
her, even Dany herself. Like, seriously, look how many times Dany thinks that Daario
will betray her. Why doesn’t he? Daario claims that he loves Dany, but even Dany doesn’t
believe that – she says Daario’s only interested in her because she’s a dragon
queen. Daario wants Daenerys for her power and her dragons. And, well, we do know someone
else who wants to get into Dany’s pants for her power and her dragons, don’t we?
Someone else who is treacherous, dangerous, gift-giving, sweet-talking, smooth-skinned
and blue-eyed, of the storm and of the crow. Euron Greyjoy and Daario Naharis are very
similar, and being Daario could help Euron, and the character of Daario doesn’t make
a lot of sense on his own… Daario=Euron actually seems pretty believable.
But let’s address the elephant in the room. How could all this work? How can Euron and
Daario be the same person when Daario is in Slaver’s Bay, and Euron’s half a world
away, in the Iron Islands? Thing is, Daario spends most of A Dance with Dragons away from
Meereen, and we only actually see Euron a few times, in A Feast for Crows. We don’t
know exactly how the timings of these two books line up, but based on the best guesses
we have, PrivateMajor’s Timeline, and the Boiled Leather Merged Reading Order,
we can get a rough idea of how they fit together. At the start of A Feast for Crows, Euron has
recently returned to the Iron Islands, and he stays there until the Kingsmoot in the
Drowned Man. At this same time, in A Dance with Dragons, Daario is away on a mission
to ally with the Lhazarene, and Dany notices that he’s been away for a worryingly long
time. By the way, Daario is given gold and treasure to give the Lhazarene, and at the
Kingsmoot that follows, Euron gives a bunch of gold and treasure to the ironborn. Funny
coincidence, right? So Daario gets back to Meereen after the Kingsmoot, but he only stays
long enough to have sex with Dany before he’s sent away again in the same chapter. We see
Euron on the Shields a while after that, in the Reaver, and that’s the last time we
see Euron. We’re then cryptically told by Moqorro that Euron is coming for Dany at the
same time that Daario is sailing to Dany. So the times do seem to line up, though the
absences are still kind of a problem – Euron leaving the Islands after the Kingsmoot seems
like a very bad idea – shouldn’t he be consolidating his power? And shouldn’t Daario be leading
the Stormcrows on their missions? There might be time for both, but if Euron is Daario,
he’s a very busy man. He’s also very bloody quick – it’s a
long trip from the Iron Islands to Meereen, and Euron-slash-Daario must have made it like four
times in one book, albeit a very long book that is actually two books. There are a bunch
of reasons why this speed is not a problem. Firstly, Euron is a pirate King, who’s spent
years on the sea, sailing all over the world – if anyone can sail a ship fast, Euron
Greyjoy can. Especially with the help of the warlocks and wizards he’s hanging with.
It’s hinted several times that Euron uses magic to sail fast. Euron mockingly implies
that he can “command the winds” and “sail wherever [he] like[s] and never be becalmed”
A later passage directly suggests that Euron controls the winds with blood magic, and
we know Euron’s ship’s deck is soaked in blood. There’s evidence that Melisandre’s
blood magic can command the winds, so why not Euron’s? It seems likely that Euron
is using magic to sail fast, and as best we know, Euron is never in Westeros at
the same time that Daario is in Meereen. So it does seem possible that Euron travels between
Westeros and Slaver’s Bay to play the role of both the Crow’s Eye and the Stormcrow.
But there are still are problems. Like, if Daario is Euron, how does he keep his double
identity a secret? Euron has a crew of mutes, but Daario has a company of mercenaries who
he trusts “as far as [he] can spit”, “Five hundred sellswords of uncertain loyalty”
who would notice that their captain keeps going off on long voyages rather than, y’know,
doing his job, and leading the company. And surely someone would notice Euron’s infamous
ship lurking near Meereen, or reaving for supplies along the way. However the logistics
work, there are lots of problems like this, that make it very hard to believe that Daario=Euron
could be kept secret. So… where does this leave us? There are
lots of little connections and similarities between Euron and Daario. Being Daario probably
could fit into Euron’s plan, and it would explain what Daario’s deal is. It does seem
possible that Euron could travel the world fast enough to play both parts, but it’s
hard to see how he could keep it secret. So based on what we know, Daario=Euron does seem
possible. But there’s a simpler explanation – Daario and Euron are similar because they
represent similar ideas of violence and self-interest and their conflict with compassion and honour
and doing the right thing, which A Song of Ice and Fire is all about. Every character
falls somewhere between two extremes. So in a world with thousands of characters, we
can’t assume that every suspicious similarity hides a secret identity. So Euron’s plan
can still work fine without him being Daario, and Daario might have his reasons for sticking
with Dany, maybe he really does love her in some way, or maybe he’s got something else
going on that we'll find out about later. So as much as we’d all like to see Daario with an eyepatch bursting out of Yunkish custody
on the back of Rhaegal, high-fiving Dany on Drogon as they fly off to spread “fire and
blood” across Slaver’s Bay, the most reasonable conclusion is that Daario and Euron are probably
not the same person. But it’s still fun to think about.
There are links to the Timeline and the Merged Reading Order in the description if you wanna
check those out. If you’re not already aware, the Song of Ice and Fire subreddit,
and Westeros.org are really cool places to discuss A Song of Ice and Fire, it’s where
most of these fan theories originate. So you should definitely have a look if you haven’t
already. Thanks for watching.