Johanna Westerling
Johanna Westerling was Lady of Casterly Rock at one of the lowest points in House Lannister's history, and it fell to her to bring back the weight the house had lost.
She was not born a Lannister: she came to lead the house through marriage, at a time when the whole realm was tearing itself apart over the Targaryen throne.
Chapter 1
The widow of Casterly Rock
Books only
Aegon II TargaryenLord Jason Lannister, son of Gerold, married Johanna Westerling, daughter of Lord Roland Westerling. When the throne split between the supporters of Aegon II and those of Rhaenyra Targaryen, Jason and his brother Tyland threw in with the Greens.
Jason gathered the lords of the Westerlands and marched off to fight Aegon II's war. With Casterly Rock left thin of swords, Lord Dalton Greyjoy, the Red Kraken, seized the chance to fall on the western coast and lay it waste.
The war ended with Jason dead at the hands of Pate of Longleaf, and Johanna left a widow in command of a castle badly battered by the fighting.
Chapter 2
The woman who gave the Lannisters back their weight
Books only
With Jason dead, Johanna was left in charge of Casterly Rock and set about rebuilding what the war and the Greyjoy raids had torn down.
To stand against Dalton Greyjoy she looked for allies, and found one in Ser Leo Costayne, with whom she fought the ironborn still harrying the coast.
When one of Dalton's saltwife sons fell into her hands as a hostage, Johanna did not stop at locking him away: she had him gelded, and years later put him to serve as her own son's fool.
Some say, though the source is not one to be taken as certain, that Johanna went so far as to lend gold to King's Landing to help rebuild what the civil war had knocked down.
