In House of the Dragon, Paddy Considine’s King Viserys is a ruler whose heart is usually in the right place — even if he isn’t the best at his job — but nevertheless carries out his duties in the face of a mysterious degenerative illness. What is the disease the king has and was there a real-life historical figure who had a similar condition?
It turns out, Considine has revealed that Viserys actually suffers from “a form of leprosy,” which causes his body to deteriorate to the point that he is completely bedridden in episode eight. Following a six-year time jump from the previous episode, Viserys is also disfigured to the point that he is missing an eye and part of his cheek that he covers up with a metal mask most of the time.
Though leprosy was largely thought of as a death sentence to many during medieval times, it doesn’t always immediately kill people who suffer from it. Such was the case for Baldwin IV, who was diagnosed with leprosy at age nine. Despite the diagnosis, Baldwin would go on to become the King of Jerusalem from 1174 until his death in 1185, at the age of 24.
It would seem that the “leper king” may have been the historical figure who inspired King Viserys as he not only suffered from leprosy for years but also struck a delicate balance of settling quarrels within the nobility and trying to negotiate the ambiguity of his own succession, much like Viserys.
Having taken the throne at just 13 years old, following the untimely death of his father, Baldwin was almost immediately flung into a conflict with Sultan Saladin and even joined in on battles, despite his illness, according to All That’s Interesting. Having reported a lack of feeling anything in his right arm at a young age, Baldwin “could only hold the reigns of a horse with one hand,” but nevertheless became victorious in a number of decisive battles during the Crusades.
Baldwin is also frequently depicted as wearing a metal mask, somewhat similar to Viserys’ partial mask, such as Edward Norton‘s portrayal of the historical figure in Ridley Scott’s 2005 epic Kingdom of Heaven. However, there is no evidence that the real leper king Baldwin ever wore such a mask. As the ATI article explained,
“In fact, during the early years of his reign, he showed no outward signs of the disease at all, although toward the end of his life he had developed multiple ulcers and gone blind because of the bacteria from the disease.”
Also like Viserys, Baldwin’s increasingly deteriorating health contributed to “power struggles among the nobility” owing to the leper king “requiring periodic appointment of other regents” as his condition worsened, according to Encyclopedia Britannica.
Though there was a brief two-year truce that was established in 1180 soon after Baldwin defeated Saladin at a decisive battle, the latter broke the truce shortly after it expired by capturing the city of Aleppo in June 1183.
Shortly after this, the childless Baldwin also scrambled to secure a successor, a struggle not dissimilar to what Viserys has gone through in the first season of House of the Dragon. Baldwin eventually crowned his own nephew as King Baldwin V in Nov. 1183.