George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire saga features a large cast of characters. The series follows three interwoven plotlines: a dynastic war for control of Westeros by several families; the rising threat of the Others beyond the northern border of Westeros; and the ambition of Daenerys Targaryen, the exiled heir of the previous ruling dynasty. In Martin's fictional world, the Great Houses of Westeros represent the Seven Kingdoms which exist on the continent: the North, the Iron Islands, the Vale of Arryn, the Westerlands, the Stormlands, the Reach, and Dorne. A massive wall of ice and old magic separates the Seven Kingdoms from the largely unmapped area in the most northern portion of the continent.

Each chapter is narrated in the third-person limited point of view through the eyes of a single character. Beginning with nine POV characters in A Game of Thrones (1996), a total of thirty-one such characters have narrated over the course of the first five volumes of the series.

House Stark

House Stark is described as one of the Great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms and the principal house of the North. Its seat is at Winterfell, one of the oldest castles in the Seven Kingdoms. Its coat of arms displays a grey direwolf running on a white field, and its words are Winter is Coming. Bastards born in the North are given the surname "Snow". House Stark ruled as the Kings of the North for thousands of years until House Targaryen conquered Westeros, after which the Starks were known as the Lords of Winterfell and Wardens of the North. For prizing honor and devotion to duty, House Stark is the closest of the noble houses to heroism.

Descended from Bran the Builder, the architect of the Wall, House Stark is the leading First Men dynasty in Westeros because of its successful resistance to the Andal invasion. It became the ruling house in the North after defeating the Barrow Kings and gradually unifying the region into one kingdom, competing for dominance with House Bolton of the Dreadfort, the second most powerful Northern house known for its sinister flaying tradition. Its expanding dominion would also repel incursions of pirates and raiders and secure control of the Neck through its vassals of House Reed. It would also gain a new vassal from the Reach after House Manderly was exiled, granting House Stark White Harbor in exchange for protection against piracy.

House Stark would eventually unite the North and repel the Ironborn, making an enemy of House Hoare and gaining a new vassal in House Mormont of Bear Island, just as the Andals arrived in Westeros and began conquering every kingdom the First Men had built and converting them to the Faith of the Seven. The Starks made peace with the Boltons, finally unified the North, and began opposing the Andals as one force instead of as individual houses like the rest of the First Men, sacking Andalos and driving them back from the fortress of Moat Cailin. House Stark would lose its strength at sea after a failed voyage across the Sunset Sea ended with all its ships being torched. House Stark would also aid the Night's Watch several times against wildling raids, defeating many Kings-beyond-the-Wall, and forming a second branch, House Karstark.

During Aegon's conquest of Westeros, the Starks intended to oppose the Targaryens, unwilling to bow to an outsider, but King Torrhen Stark knelt after hearing of the scorching of Harrenhal and the devastating outcome of the Field of Fire caused by the Targaryen dragons. The result was his becoming the first Warden of the North and forming a marriage alliance with House Arryn to keep the realm together.

Over the course of the novels, the Starks are scattered by the War of the Five Kings, and the fate of the House remains uncertain, as most characters believe that all the legitimate Stark sons are dead.

Family

Eddard Stark Eddard "Ned" Stark is the Lord of Winterfell, Warden of the North, and briefly serves as Hand of the King to Robert Baratheon. He is executed, by King Joffrey's order, on the steps of the Great Sept of Baelor. He serves as a point-of-view (POV) character for 15 chapters in A Game of Thrones.

Catelyn Stark Catelyn Stark () is the Lady of Winterfell, wife of Lord Eddard Stark, and mother to his children Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, and Rickon. She is the daughter of Lord Hoster Tully of Riverrun, niece to Ser Brynden Tully (also known as the legendary "Blackfish"), and sister to Lysa Arryn of the Vale of Arryn and Edmure Tully. She is murdered during the Red Wedding and later resurrected as an undead, vengeful killer under the name "Lady Stoneheart". She serves as a POV character for 25 chapters throughout A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, and A Storm of Swords.

Robb Stark Robb Stark is the eldest child of Eddard and Catelyn Stark and the heir to Winterfell. He is not a POV character, but he appears in the POV chapters of his family members in the first three novels of the series. After his father's arrest and execution, Robb rebels against the Crown and seeks to secede the North from the Seven Kingdoms. Robb is also slain at the Red Wedding alongside his mother.

Sansa Stark Sansa Stark is the second child and eldest daughter of Eddard and Catelyn Stark. She serves as a POV character for 24 chapters throughout A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, and A Feast for Crows. Sansa is introduced as beautiful and demure.

Arya Stark Arya Stark is the third child and younger daughter of Eddard and Catelyn Stark. She serves as a POV character for 33 chapters throughout A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, A Feast for Crows, and A Dance with Dragons. She is the only character to appear as a POV character in all five published books.

Bran Stark Brandon "Bran" Stark is the second son and fourth child of Eddard and Catelyn Stark. He serves as the third-person narrator of twenty-one chapters throughout A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, and A Dance with Dragons. In A Game of Thrones, he witnesses Queen Cersei and her brother Jaime Lannister committing incest, and Jaime pushes Bran out of the window to keep the relationship secret. Bran survives but loses the use of his legs. While comatose, Bran dreams of a three-eyed raven. Slowly, he develops the ability to assume his direwolf Summer's consciousness, making him a warg or skinchanger. After his eldest brother, Robb, is crowned King in the North, Bran becomes Robb's heir and the acting Lord of Winterfell. In A Clash of Kings, Jojen Reed teaches Bran how to use his telepathy correctly and directs him beyond the Wall. In A Dance with Dragons, Bran meets the Three-Eyed Raven: an alias of the last trained clairvoyant.

Rickon Stark Rickon Stark is Ned Stark's youngest child and is three years old in A Game of Thrones. When Theon Greyjoy captures Winterfell in A Clash of Kings, Rickon hides in the crypts. After Winterfell is sacked, he and the wildling woman Osha travel through the North. In A Dance with Dragons, he is said to be on an island of cannibals, presumably Skagos.

Jon Snow Jon Snow was raised as Ned Stark's illegitimate son and serves as the POV character in 42 chapters throughout A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, and A Dance with Dragons. He shares the Stark family values of honor and strives to remain morally upright and honest, even when forced to act otherwise. He is roughly the same age as Robb and was close with Robb, Bran, and Arya, with his strongest bond seeming to be with Arya, who openly regarded him as her brother. Jon's mother remains unknown, and the mystery of who his mother is has generated significant debate and theorizing within the fandom, with the prevailing theory being that he is the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark, thus making him the true heir to the Iron Throne. This theory, while established for his television counterpart, remains unconfirmed in the novels, leaving his mother unresolved in the series. In A Dance with Dragons, Jon is slain by members of the Night's Watch, much like his television counterpart. Unlike his television counterpart, however, the Jon of the novels currently remains dead, with his ultimate fate unknown.

Benjen Stark Benjen Stark is Ned Stark's younger brother and a First Ranger of the Night's Watch. He appears briefly at the start of A Game of Thrones, first in Winterfell and then later on the Wall at Castle Black, where he travels with his bastard nephew Jon Snow. Benjen is sent on a mission into the lands beyond the Wall to search for a missing ranging party, but he and his men also disappear. The bodies of two of his men are later found and brought back to Castle Black; they reanimate as undead wights and kill several men before they are destroyed, but no trace of Benjen has yet been found.

Lyanna Stark Lyanna Stark is Eddard Stark's younger and only sister. She has been deceased for 14 years at the beginning of A Game of Thrones but is mentioned in every published book in the series. She died at the age of 16 and was said to have been very beautiful by all who knew her as "a child-woman of surpassing loveliness" and "a wild beauty". She was also remembered as being headstrong and for having a touch of the Starks' fabled "wolf blood", and she was one of the best horse-riders in the North. She was betrothed to Robert Baratheon, who was deeply in love with her, but she was unimpressed by Robert's reputation for infidelity. Her life's tales are mainly told through the words of Eddard Stark and Meera Reed (via Bran Stark's viewpoint chapter), with some passing commentaries from other people, such as Barristan Selmy, Cersei Lannister, Roose Bolton, and Kevan Lannister.

During the Tourney at Harrenhal, the greatest tourney in Westerosi history, Lyanna rescued Stark bannerman Howland Reed by beating away three bullying squires. She was later chosen by the eventual jousting champion, Crown Prince Rhaegar Targaryen, as the tourney's "Queen of Love and Beauty". Because Rhaegar was already married, and Lyanna was a maiden betrothed to Robert Baratheon, Rhaegar's wooing of Lyanna was considered an outrageous scandal at the time. One year later, she was said to have been abducted and raped by Rhaegar, triggering a civil war that resulted in the overthrow of House Targaryen. At the end of the war, Eddard and six of his companions ventured to the Tower of Joy within Dorne, where Lyanna was located and guarded by three of the most prominent Kingsguard knightt—the "Sword of the Morning" Ser Arthur Dayne, Ser Oswell Whent, and the "White Bull" Ser Gerold Hightower, the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. After a fierce skirmish that left everyone except Eddard and Howland dead, Eddard entered the tower and found Lyanna dying in a "bed of blood". Before she died, she asked her brother Eddard to make a promise, something that Eddard regarded as a price he paid that haunted him day and night for 14 years.

Eddard later takes her body home to be entombed in Winterfell's crypt, and installs a stone statue in her likeness in front of her sarcophagus. When he returns, he also brings back a newborn boy named Jon Snow, whom he claims is his own bastard by a woman named Wylla, who was later implied to be a wet nurse serving House Dayne of Starfall. Although Jon Arryn persuaded Robert to marry Cersei Lannister, Robert greatly mourns Lyanna for over a decade, causing great strain in his marriage with Cersei.

Jeyne Westerling