The Iron Islands form one of the nine constituent regions of Westeros. They are a group of seven small rocky islands clustered far off the western coast of the mainland of the continent, in Ironman's Bay. The Iron Islands are ruled from Pyke by House Greyjoy.
They are the smallest and among the least-populous of the regions of Westeros, but the naval skills of their population are unmatched and they enjoy great mobility due to their ships. The people of the Iron Islands, the ironborn, have a unique culture centered on maritime raiding and pillaging other peoples. However, they were forced to stop these practices when they were conquered by the Targaryens, or at least, to stop raiding shipping around Westeros itself.
Before the Targaryen Conquest the Iron Islands were a sovereign kingdom, along with the other "Seven Kingdoms". For the three generations immediately preceding the Conquest, the ironborn also controlled the Riverlands (which also included pieces of the future Crownlands at the time), which they had conquered in turn from the Stormlands.
Bastards born in the Iron Islands are given the surname Pyke.
