It gets a little confusing once you start counting their limbs, doesn’t it?

What has House Targaryen always been famous for? Their dragons. What’s depicted on their sigil, banner, and merch shields? A dragon. What are the magnificent beasts we’re eager to watch take flight in every House of the Dragon episode? Also dragons… Or so we’ve been told. Are they really what we call them?

While dragons haven’t exactly existed in our world, we still do have a certain classification in place for all scaly things from fables, and it doesn’t all add up.

What Are House Targaryen’s ‘Dragons’?

Right off the bat, let’s eliminate any discordance. According to the most common definition, a dragon has four legs and two wings which is something the “dragons” of George Martin ’s universe totally don’t qualify for. Wyverns, on the other hand, have two legs and two wings — and that’s exactly what we see in Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon.

George Martin, an author famous for his meticulous research that can sometimes take upwards of 13 years, has addressed this issue. According to him, he knows the difference perfectly well, but to him, large fire-breathing lizards with six limbs don’t feel realistic, so he opted for the wyvern design with his dragons. Everything else about large fire-breathing lizards felt realistic enough.

But with the definitions so obvious and George Martin himself admitting that he took the wyvern design, can we truly call the Targaryen dragons wyverns? Not really.

Wyverns Are Entirely Different Species

You see, in George Martin’s world, the term “wyverns” is already booked by different creatures — which, too, fall under that definition. Those wyverns are similar to dragons as in they are large lizards that can fly but can’t breathe fire… And are way angrier to make up for it. Also, there are firewyrms — other large lizards that can breathe fire but can’t fly. Do you see where we’re going with this?

A common theory claims that Valyrian bloodmages bred wyverns and firewyrms together to create their dragons, thus creating a new species — and named their creations “dragons.” This was likely the case, so in the World of Ice and Fire, it makes perfect sense that House Targaryen’s pride and joy are called dragons.

The term “wyverns” was already taken, and the Valyrian bloodmages came up with a new name. They didn’t have to deal with our real-world definitions, after all.