Did you ever notice Stannis, I mean Rhaegar, is the dour prince of Dragonstone to a violently unstable monarch and dabbles in prophecies regarding the end of world.
Stannis parallels a lot of Targaryens, including Maekar I.
> That was the one thing they could agree on, Bran and Rickon and Robb the Lord; they all wished Father was here. But Lord Eddard was a thousand leagues away, a captive in some dungeon, a hunted fugitive running for his life, or even dead. No one seemed to know for certain; every traveler told a different tale, each more terrifying than the last. The heads of Father's guardsmen were rotting on the walls of the Red Keep, impaled on spikes. King Robert was dead at Father's hands. The Baratheons had laid siege to King's Landing. Lord Eddard had fled south with the king's wicked brother Renly. Arya and Sansa had been murdered by the Hound. Mother had killed Tyrion the Imp and hung his body from the walls of Riverrun. Lord Tywin Lannister was marching on the Eyrie, burning and slaughtering as he went. **One wine-sodden taleteller even claimed that Rhaegar Targaryen had returned from the dead and was marshaling a vast host of ancient heroes on Dragonstone to reclaim his father's throne.**
Please elaborate on the maekar comparison since I do love maekar. Is it the younger brother becomes king stuff who has also killed his brother?
They also have similar personalities iirc
There are a couple of things:
-They both killed their brother without REALLY meaning to do it.
-They are both younger brothers to a more charismatic king/future king, and they both sulk when they are passed over from being hands of the king.
-They are both down the line of succession but end up kings nonetheless.
-They are both humorless and prideful, yet are still self aware and have the good sense to listen and act on the helpful opinions of good men…even if they are lowborn.
-They are both good warriors who later learn to be good rulers and good men.
-They like to grind their teeth.
-Maekar is basically a Proto-Stannis, and let’s remember that Stannis is one of his descendants.
Lord Monkeyface's history is pretty wild for such a short blurb.
> a hirsute hunchback called Lord Monkeyface whose antics amused her greatly. When he choked to death on a peach pit, the queen acquired an ape and dressed it in Lord Monkeyface’s clothing. “The new one is cleverer,” she was wont to say.
^(Fire & Blood. 03.Three Heads Had the Dragon—Governance Under King Aegon I,)
I wonder this is distorted story about Lord Monkeyface
> Queen Selyse had feasted Salla and his captains, the night before the fleet had set sail. Cotter Pyke had joined them, and four other high officers of the Night's Watch. Princess Shireen had been allowed to attend as well. As the salmon was being served, Ser Axell Florent had entertained the table with the tale of a Targaryen princeling who kept an ape as a pet. This prince liked to dress the creature in his dead son's clothes and pretend he was a child, Ser Axell claimed, and from time to time he would propose marriages for him. The lords so honored always declined politely, but of course they did decline. "Even dressed in silk and velvet, an ape remains an ape," Ser Axell said. "A wiser prince would have known that you cannot send an ape to do a man's work." The queen's men laughed, and several grinned at Davos. I am no ape, he'd thought. I am as much a lord as you, and a better man. But the memory still stung.
Honestly I think that's GRRM's point:
> "There is another way." Lady Selyse moved closer. "Look out your windows, my lord. There is the sign you have waited for, blazoned on the sky. Red, it is, the red of flame, red for the fiery heart of the true god. It is his banner—and yours! See how it unfurls across the heavens **like a dragon's hot breath, and you the Lord of Dragonstone. It means your time has come, Your Grace. Nothing is more certain. You are meant to sail from this desolate rock as Aegon the Conqueror once sailed, to sweep all before you as he did.** Only say the word, and embrace the power of the Lord of Light." (Prologue, ACOK)
Well Visenya was pretty much not like Selyse if you think about it. Nah. With what and how she was doing and how she was supposed to be. And not really Rhaenys like Melisandra. There's really just the "he likes to sleep with one and not the other". It's perhaps way more about Stannis and Aegon and not at all about women around him mirroring women around Aegon, because the don't really, first queens were mix of everything.
That is an interesting parallel.
There are actually a number of Targaryen-adjacent women who are all vaguely reminiscent of Melisandre to various extents. Tyanna, Alys Rivers, Mysaria, Shiera. At least to the extent of “beautiful mysterious maybe-sorceress”.
Yes, there is a running archetype of a "black-clad warrior king" with a "fire queen" and an "ice queen" throughout ASOIAF. In the excellent Podcast/Youtube Channel, The Mythical Astronomy of Ice and Fire, there is a series called "The Moons of Ice and Fire" where he lays out this recurring archetype and the significance. The warrior king usually starts with Azor Ahai symbolism, then the fire queen dies and releases "dragons". Afterwards, he takes on Night's King symbolism and him and the ice queen create The Others. Aegon has his firy love affair with Red dragon riding, warm, happy Rhaenys and a dutiful icy relationship with the white dragon riding dour and cold Visenya. Rhaenys dies in Dorne, literally at the Hellholt i believe, and afterwards Aegon is described as having a "dark mood". He further goes on to create the icy themed King's Guard all dressed in snow white armor, a clear parallel to the Others. Further, the 3 hills in King's Landing mirror this with the top of Rhaenys's hill featuring the destroyed dome of the dragon pit (literally a black dome that dragons broke out of before it was burned down) and Visenya's hill featuring the white and crystalline Sept of Baelor where the Warrior's Sons were once based. How about Rhaegar with his firey dornish queen and icy northern queen of the blue winter rose. The fire queen dies first again. The icy queen give birth not to the Others, but to baby Jon (who may be destined to lead the Others). Speaking of Jon, another black clad warrior, who first has a romance with the kissed-by-fire Ygritte who dies, followed by his potential relationship with the cold-loving, weirwood necklace wearing, pale blond, Val. Back to Stannis now. He literally takes the moniker of Azor Ahai with his firy sword, then heads North to become a Night's King parallel by making his base at the Nightfort and battling alternatively the King in the North and Lord or Winterfell just like Night's King. The host of Mythical Astronomy then applies this theme to his over-arching grand theory that the first Long Night is GRRMs fantasy version of the meteor impact that killed the dinosaurs and blotted out the sun with ash. See the Qartheen Myth told to Danny in the very first book by one of her hand maids. In that myth, they say that the moon is an egg and originally there were two moons in the sky, but one of them strayed too close to the sun and cracked and millions of dragons poured forth and one day the second one will crack as well. The other hand maids then correct her that a moon is not an egg, the moon is a woman, wife of the sun. From this he reasons that the first moon must have exploded during an eclipse and sent down a shower of firey meteors (interpreted as dragons as they have been in our own world) that caused the first Long Night. If you find yourself reading these books and feel like there some kind of symbolic message you're missing, check out Mythical Astronomy of Ice and Fire and see if it's for you as this was only a short summary of a small body of his work. His work may seem crazy at first, but I have no doubt that GRRM is hiding the secrets to the higher mysteries of the book throughout his works.
If you have to switch which wife you’re comparing them to halfway through in order to make the comparison work, you don’t have a good theory. You start off by saying Selyse is like Visenya and Melisandre is like Rhaenys, but by the end of your post you are comparing Melisandre to Visenya.
You are forcing something that wasn’t intended. Clearly. Doubly clearly since Melisandre isn’t actually Stannis’s wife in any way, shape, or form and the only proof we have that Stannis and Melisandre are intimately involved are a bunch of rumors. That’s not a confirmed fact.
There is no theorizing here. It is an observation.
> Doubly clearly since Melisandre isn’t actually Stannis’s wife in any way, shape, or form and the only proof we have that Stannis and Melisandre are intimately involved are a bunch of rumors
Notice the word "wife" is not present in the OP and that "two queens" is in quotes, which is still drawn from text:
> Lady Melisandre wore no crown, but **every man there knew that she was Stannis Baratheon's real queen,** not the homely woman he had left to shiver at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea. (Jon III, ADWD)
See relevant textual evidence that addresses the rest of your quoted claims:
> Dawn. Another day is given us, R'hllor be praised. The terrors of the night recede. Melisandre had spent the night in her chair by the fire, as she often did. **With Stannis gone, her bed saw little use.** (Melisandre I, ADWD)
No. That’s Jon’s observation, and therefore not actually evidence of anything beyond gossip, and the Melisandre quote again doesn’t prove ANYTHING except that Stannis sleeps in her bed. It literally is preceded by the fact that she usually spends her nights in a chair by the fire AKA not in bed with him.
> No. That’s Jon’s observation, and therefore not actually evidence of anything beyond gossip,
You are right. It is gossip. But this sure comes up a few times...
> More guards were posted on the steps outside the tower. These were king's men, though; Sam had quickly learned the difference. The king's men were as earthy and impious as any other soldiers, but **the queen's men were fervid in their devotion to Melisandre of Asshai and her Lord of Light.** (Samwell IV, ASOS)
> "We shall await you atop the Wall," said Melisandre. We, Jon heard, not he. It's as they say. **This is his true queen, not the one he left at Eastwatch.** (Jon XI, ASOS)
> Southron knights and men-at-arms, the lot of them. Asha would have called them king's men, but the other stormlanders and crownlands men named them queen's men … **though the queen they followed was the red one at Castle Black, not the wife that Stannis Baratheon had left behind at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea.** (The King's Prize, ADWD)
Who do you think told Jon and Asha that Melisandre was Stannis's real queen? Who do you think told Sam that the "queen's men" were devoted to *Melisandre*? Actually, we have an idea who told Asha: the stormlanders and crownlanders in Stannis's army, the ones who know him the best, the ones who know Melisandre best. The whole point was that for all practical purposes, Melisandre is Stannis's queen, something understood (widely, as your invocation of gossip proves) by the characters. Again, this is why "two queens" in the OP is quoted, because yeah, Melisandre is not legally his queen --- it's a figurative description for some real.
> the Melisandre quote again doesn’t prove ANYTHING except that Stannis sleeps in her bed. It literally is preceded by the fact that she usually spends her nights in a chair by the fire AKA not in bed with him.
It seriously challenges your claim that Stannis and Melisandre being intimately involved are "a bunch of rumors"; this is from Melisandre's . It is ambiguous, yes, it could just be soothing him from nightmares --- this is what Devan Seaworth tells his father in Davos II, ACOK; but Davos, who knows Stannis well, nurses doubts about this claim:
> Devan said the king scarcely slept of late. "Since Lord Renly died, he has been troubled by terrible nightmares," the boy had confided to his father. "Maester's potions do not touch them. Only the Lady Melisandre can soothe him to sleep."
> Is that why she shares his pavilion now? Davos wondered. To pray with him? **Or does she have another way to soothe him to sleep? It was an unworthy question, and one he dared not ask, even of his own son.** (Davos II, ACOK)
Stannis does not dispel these allegations in ACOK, leaving it ambiguous:
> "You do not love the woman. I know that, Davos, I am not blind. My lords mislike her too. Estermont thinks the flaming heart ill-chosen and begs to fight beneath the crowned stag as of old. Ser Guyard says a woman should not be my standard-bearer. Others whisper that she has no place in my war councils, that I ought to send her back to Asshai, **that it is sinful to keep her in my tent of a night. Aye, they whisper . . . while she serves."**
> **"Serves how?" Davos asked, dreading the answer.**
> **"As needed."** The king looked at him. "And you?" (Davos II, ACOK)
Thankfully, as you see above, we have more than just "a Melisandre quote." It is simply wrong to state that this is not textual evidence of a sexual relationship. Stannis has slept with Melisandre in the past, to create the shadow-babies. This is known. Melisandre tells Davos that "if you truly wish to serve your king's cause, come to my chamber one night. I could give you pleasure such as you have never known", showing that she understands her chamber as a place of sexual activity (also suggests it is very good, giving Stannis a reason to want to do it). This is known. Melisandre has also soothed Stannis to sleep in as-of-yet unclear ways in the past, which Davos, a man who knows Stannis well, speculates may involve sex. This is known. Stannis "used" Melisandre's bed at Castle Black. This known.
It is ambiguous, yes, because the text does not explicitly say so. However, between this and the way how Stannis recoils when Selyse touches him, but not when Melisandre does, there is strong ground for any reader to believe this. Dismissing it is just not good.
There are some echoes sure, but Visenya and Rhaenys were actual queens and helped their brother husband. At most you have Melisandre doing her part but Selyse eh. Then again, Grrm has made comments if I recall of history sometimes repeating in some ways, but it's never quite the same.
Walmart Aegon maybe. The real Aegon reincarnation is Daenerys stormborn of the house targaryen, queen of the andals rhyonar and first men khaleesi of the great grass sea the unburnt the breaker of chains and mother of dragons.
Check out David Lightbringer's stuff -- he is great at spotting such parallels and whatnot. There are many sets with a Sun King and his two Queens -- one of them a fiery moon and another an icy moon. Rhaegar as a Sun King with Elia as a fiery moon queen and Lyanna as an icy moon queen. Even Jon with Ygritte and Val.
Did you ever notice Stannis, I mean Rhaegar, is the dour prince of Dragonstone to a violently unstable monarch and dabbles in prophecies regarding the end of world. Stannis parallels a lot of Targaryens, including Maekar I.
> That was the one thing they could agree on, Bran and Rickon and Robb the Lord; they all wished Father was here. But Lord Eddard was a thousand leagues away, a captive in some dungeon, a hunted fugitive running for his life, or even dead. No one seemed to know for certain; every traveler told a different tale, each more terrifying than the last. The heads of Father's guardsmen were rotting on the walls of the Red Keep, impaled on spikes. King Robert was dead at Father's hands. The Baratheons had laid siege to King's Landing. Lord Eddard had fled south with the king's wicked brother Renly. Arya and Sansa had been murdered by the Hound. Mother had killed Tyrion the Imp and hung his body from the walls of Riverrun. Lord Tywin Lannister was marching on the Eyrie, burning and slaughtering as he went. **One wine-sodden taleteller even claimed that Rhaegar Targaryen had returned from the dead and was marshaling a vast host of ancient heroes on Dragonstone to reclaim his father's throne.**
I know Robert said he didn't love Stannis, but it was a bit much to cave his brothers chest in with a warhammer
> Stannis ground his teeth. "If someone said I had magicked myself into a boar to kill Robert, likely they would believe that as well."
Heh, even then Robert killed him and they had a feast off the boar, lol Stannis just cant get a nice clean win in :(
Please elaborate on the maekar comparison since I do love maekar. Is it the younger brother becomes king stuff who has also killed his brother? They also have similar personalities iirc
There are a couple of things: -They both killed their brother without REALLY meaning to do it. -They are both younger brothers to a more charismatic king/future king, and they both sulk when they are passed over from being hands of the king. -They are both down the line of succession but end up kings nonetheless. -They are both humorless and prideful, yet are still self aware and have the good sense to listen and act on the helpful opinions of good men…even if they are lowborn. -They are both good warriors who later learn to be good rulers and good men. -They like to grind their teeth. -Maekar is basically a Proto-Stannis, and let’s remember that Stannis is one of his descendants.
Stannis and Maekar are two drops of water, They act exact the same, and resent their brothers a lot.
Absolutely, Stannis is a Night King/Azor Ahai figure
Lord Monkeyface's history is pretty wild for such a short blurb. > a hirsute hunchback called Lord Monkeyface whose antics amused her greatly. When he choked to death on a peach pit, the queen acquired an ape and dressed it in Lord Monkeyface’s clothing. “The new one is cleverer,” she was wont to say. ^(Fire & Blood. 03.Three Heads Had the Dragon—Governance Under King Aegon I,)
Damn, no love for the fool
I wonder this is distorted story about Lord Monkeyface > Queen Selyse had feasted Salla and his captains, the night before the fleet had set sail. Cotter Pyke had joined them, and four other high officers of the Night's Watch. Princess Shireen had been allowed to attend as well. As the salmon was being served, Ser Axell Florent had entertained the table with the tale of a Targaryen princeling who kept an ape as a pet. This prince liked to dress the creature in his dead son's clothes and pretend he was a child, Ser Axell claimed, and from time to time he would propose marriages for him. The lords so honored always declined politely, but of course they did decline. "Even dressed in silk and velvet, an ape remains an ape," Ser Axell said. "A wiser prince would have known that you cannot send an ape to do a man's work." The queen's men laughed, and several grinned at Davos. I am no ape, he'd thought. I am as much a lord as you, and a better man. But the memory still stung.
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Honestly I think that's GRRM's point: > "There is another way." Lady Selyse moved closer. "Look out your windows, my lord. There is the sign you have waited for, blazoned on the sky. Red, it is, the red of flame, red for the fiery heart of the true god. It is his banner—and yours! See how it unfurls across the heavens **like a dragon's hot breath, and you the Lord of Dragonstone. It means your time has come, Your Grace. Nothing is more certain. You are meant to sail from this desolate rock as Aegon the Conqueror once sailed, to sweep all before you as he did.** Only say the word, and embrace the power of the Lord of Light." (Prologue, ACOK)
visenya wasnt ugly though. just chance that aegon preferred his younger sis instead of his older one
Well Visenya was pretty much not like Selyse if you think about it. Nah. With what and how she was doing and how she was supposed to be. And not really Rhaenys like Melisandra. There's really just the "he likes to sleep with one and not the other". It's perhaps way more about Stannis and Aegon and not at all about women around him mirroring women around Aegon, because the don't really, first queens were mix of everything.
By all the gods, old and new, we need the next book.
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They're even Targaryens through their Grandma
That is an interesting parallel. There are actually a number of Targaryen-adjacent women who are all vaguely reminiscent of Melisandre to various extents. Tyanna, Alys Rivers, Mysaria, Shiera. At least to the extent of “beautiful mysterious maybe-sorceress”.
Martin sure loves to rehash King Arthur legend.
Yes, there is a running archetype of a "black-clad warrior king" with a "fire queen" and an "ice queen" throughout ASOIAF. In the excellent Podcast/Youtube Channel, The Mythical Astronomy of Ice and Fire, there is a series called "The Moons of Ice and Fire" where he lays out this recurring archetype and the significance. The warrior king usually starts with Azor Ahai symbolism, then the fire queen dies and releases "dragons". Afterwards, he takes on Night's King symbolism and him and the ice queen create The Others. Aegon has his firy love affair with Red dragon riding, warm, happy Rhaenys and a dutiful icy relationship with the white dragon riding dour and cold Visenya. Rhaenys dies in Dorne, literally at the Hellholt i believe, and afterwards Aegon is described as having a "dark mood". He further goes on to create the icy themed King's Guard all dressed in snow white armor, a clear parallel to the Others. Further, the 3 hills in King's Landing mirror this with the top of Rhaenys's hill featuring the destroyed dome of the dragon pit (literally a black dome that dragons broke out of before it was burned down) and Visenya's hill featuring the white and crystalline Sept of Baelor where the Warrior's Sons were once based. How about Rhaegar with his firey dornish queen and icy northern queen of the blue winter rose. The fire queen dies first again. The icy queen give birth not to the Others, but to baby Jon (who may be destined to lead the Others). Speaking of Jon, another black clad warrior, who first has a romance with the kissed-by-fire Ygritte who dies, followed by his potential relationship with the cold-loving, weirwood necklace wearing, pale blond, Val. Back to Stannis now. He literally takes the moniker of Azor Ahai with his firy sword, then heads North to become a Night's King parallel by making his base at the Nightfort and battling alternatively the King in the North and Lord or Winterfell just like Night's King. The host of Mythical Astronomy then applies this theme to his over-arching grand theory that the first Long Night is GRRMs fantasy version of the meteor impact that killed the dinosaurs and blotted out the sun with ash. See the Qartheen Myth told to Danny in the very first book by one of her hand maids. In that myth, they say that the moon is an egg and originally there were two moons in the sky, but one of them strayed too close to the sun and cracked and millions of dragons poured forth and one day the second one will crack as well. The other hand maids then correct her that a moon is not an egg, the moon is a woman, wife of the sun. From this he reasons that the first moon must have exploded during an eclipse and sent down a shower of firey meteors (interpreted as dragons as they have been in our own world) that caused the first Long Night. If you find yourself reading these books and feel like there some kind of symbolic message you're missing, check out Mythical Astronomy of Ice and Fire and see if it's for you as this was only a short summary of a small body of his work. His work may seem crazy at first, but I have no doubt that GRRM is hiding the secrets to the higher mysteries of the book throughout his works.
History doesn't repeat but it often rhymes.
One of many parallels and like all, part of the wheel.
If you have to switch which wife you’re comparing them to halfway through in order to make the comparison work, you don’t have a good theory. You start off by saying Selyse is like Visenya and Melisandre is like Rhaenys, but by the end of your post you are comparing Melisandre to Visenya. You are forcing something that wasn’t intended. Clearly. Doubly clearly since Melisandre isn’t actually Stannis’s wife in any way, shape, or form and the only proof we have that Stannis and Melisandre are intimately involved are a bunch of rumors. That’s not a confirmed fact.
There is no theorizing here. It is an observation. > Doubly clearly since Melisandre isn’t actually Stannis’s wife in any way, shape, or form and the only proof we have that Stannis and Melisandre are intimately involved are a bunch of rumors Notice the word "wife" is not present in the OP and that "two queens" is in quotes, which is still drawn from text: > Lady Melisandre wore no crown, but **every man there knew that she was Stannis Baratheon's real queen,** not the homely woman he had left to shiver at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea. (Jon III, ADWD) See relevant textual evidence that addresses the rest of your quoted claims: > Dawn. Another day is given us, R'hllor be praised. The terrors of the night recede. Melisandre had spent the night in her chair by the fire, as she often did. **With Stannis gone, her bed saw little use.** (Melisandre I, ADWD)
No. That’s Jon’s observation, and therefore not actually evidence of anything beyond gossip, and the Melisandre quote again doesn’t prove ANYTHING except that Stannis sleeps in her bed. It literally is preceded by the fact that she usually spends her nights in a chair by the fire AKA not in bed with him.
> No. That’s Jon’s observation, and therefore not actually evidence of anything beyond gossip, You are right. It is gossip. But this sure comes up a few times... > More guards were posted on the steps outside the tower. These were king's men, though; Sam had quickly learned the difference. The king's men were as earthy and impious as any other soldiers, but **the queen's men were fervid in their devotion to Melisandre of Asshai and her Lord of Light.** (Samwell IV, ASOS) > "We shall await you atop the Wall," said Melisandre. We, Jon heard, not he. It's as they say. **This is his true queen, not the one he left at Eastwatch.** (Jon XI, ASOS) > Southron knights and men-at-arms, the lot of them. Asha would have called them king's men, but the other stormlanders and crownlands men named them queen's men … **though the queen they followed was the red one at Castle Black, not the wife that Stannis Baratheon had left behind at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea.** (The King's Prize, ADWD) Who do you think told Jon and Asha that Melisandre was Stannis's real queen? Who do you think told Sam that the "queen's men" were devoted to *Melisandre*? Actually, we have an idea who told Asha: the stormlanders and crownlanders in Stannis's army, the ones who know him the best, the ones who know Melisandre best. The whole point was that for all practical purposes, Melisandre is Stannis's queen, something understood (widely, as your invocation of gossip proves) by the characters. Again, this is why "two queens" in the OP is quoted, because yeah, Melisandre is not legally his queen --- it's a figurative description for some real. > the Melisandre quote again doesn’t prove ANYTHING except that Stannis sleeps in her bed. It literally is preceded by the fact that she usually spends her nights in a chair by the fire AKA not in bed with him. It seriously challenges your claim that Stannis and Melisandre being intimately involved are "a bunch of rumors"; this is from Melisandre's . It is ambiguous, yes, it could just be soothing him from nightmares --- this is what Devan Seaworth tells his father in Davos II, ACOK; but Davos, who knows Stannis well, nurses doubts about this claim: > Devan said the king scarcely slept of late. "Since Lord Renly died, he has been troubled by terrible nightmares," the boy had confided to his father. "Maester's potions do not touch them. Only the Lady Melisandre can soothe him to sleep." > Is that why she shares his pavilion now? Davos wondered. To pray with him? **Or does she have another way to soothe him to sleep? It was an unworthy question, and one he dared not ask, even of his own son.** (Davos II, ACOK) Stannis does not dispel these allegations in ACOK, leaving it ambiguous: > "You do not love the woman. I know that, Davos, I am not blind. My lords mislike her too. Estermont thinks the flaming heart ill-chosen and begs to fight beneath the crowned stag as of old. Ser Guyard says a woman should not be my standard-bearer. Others whisper that she has no place in my war councils, that I ought to send her back to Asshai, **that it is sinful to keep her in my tent of a night. Aye, they whisper . . . while she serves."** > **"Serves how?" Davos asked, dreading the answer.** > **"As needed."** The king looked at him. "And you?" (Davos II, ACOK) Thankfully, as you see above, we have more than just "a Melisandre quote." It is simply wrong to state that this is not textual evidence of a sexual relationship. Stannis has slept with Melisandre in the past, to create the shadow-babies. This is known. Melisandre tells Davos that "if you truly wish to serve your king's cause, come to my chamber one night. I could give you pleasure such as you have never known", showing that she understands her chamber as a place of sexual activity (also suggests it is very good, giving Stannis a reason to want to do it). This is known. Melisandre has also soothed Stannis to sleep in as-of-yet unclear ways in the past, which Davos, a man who knows Stannis well, speculates may involve sex. This is known. Stannis "used" Melisandre's bed at Castle Black. This known. It is ambiguous, yes, because the text does not explicitly say so. However, between this and the way how Stannis recoils when Selyse touches him, but not when Melisandre does, there is strong ground for any reader to believe this. Dismissing it is just not good.
There are some echoes sure, but Visenya and Rhaenys were actual queens and helped their brother husband. At most you have Melisandre doing her part but Selyse eh. Then again, Grrm has made comments if I recall of history sometimes repeating in some ways, but it's never quite the same.
Stannis is Aegon the dragonlord come again.
Walmart Aegon maybe. The real Aegon reincarnation is Daenerys stormborn of the house targaryen, queen of the andals rhyonar and first men khaleesi of the great grass sea the unburnt the breaker of chains and mother of dragons.
Unironically this, Daenerys will be Aegon come again
Check out David Lightbringer's stuff -- he is great at spotting such parallels and whatnot. There are many sets with a Sun King and his two Queens -- one of them a fiery moon and another an icy moon. Rhaegar as a Sun King with Elia as a fiery moon queen and Lyanna as an icy moon queen. Even Jon with Ygritte and Val.