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Liam Cunningham said about the character to SFX magazine, ‘Davos Seaworth aka – he’s probably got the unsexiest title of them all – the Onion Knight. He finds himself in a bizarre position because he was a criminal. Seventeen years before we meet him, there was a battle raging, and Stannis and his associates, family and everybody else, were under siege, starving, literally on death’s door, and Davos came in and saved the day with a large boat full of onions and meat. Stannis took him into his employ, made him a knight – hence the Onion Knight – but also he’d broken the law smuggling, so Stannis got out the cleaver and chopped off four of his fingers.’

He continued, ‘In a bizarre way, Davos has a certain amount of respect for that. He has a vein running through him of honour and duty and loyalty, and saw the right of that and has become Stannis’ right-hand man.’

His heroic gesture happened during Robert’s Rebellion. The Storm’s End siege took place over a year, and his act allowed Stannis’ men to survive until Eddard Stark arrived. Davos agreed to Stannis’ punishment as long as Stannis swung the blade himself, and kept the bones in a pouch around his neck as a good-luck gesture, believing it was what had given his family a future.

During Stannis’ attempts to overtake King’s Landing, Davos becomes part of the Battle of the Blackwater. Stannis’ army is destroyed by wildfire, and he is thrown from the boat into the sea, feared dead. However, he is washed up and stranded on the Spears of the Merlin King. When he is rescued, he attempts to kill Melisandre, blaming her for the defeat. Fearing that she would kill another of King Robert’s bastards, Edric Storm, as a sacrifice, he smuggled the young one out of Dragonstone.

It was feared that he was captured on the order of Cersei Lannister, with rumours that parts of his body were displayed for all to see. However, a lookalike prisoner was executed in his place.

Fan favourite Davos Seaworth is played by Irish actor Liam Cunningham.

Cunningham is a softly spoken actor but has an authoritative tone and commanding presence. It’s no surprise, then, that the Game of Thrones bosses were desperate to have him on the show.

‘I actually met them the first time around – for various reasons of timing it didn’t work out,’ he said to SFX. ‘But they did say, “Look, we’ve got some really interesting guys coming in next year, please come up and talk to us.” Then Davos Seaworth came up and I said, “You bet ya, I’ll have some of that.” He’s not one of the grunts, anything could happen – who knows where this thing is going to go – but at the moment, I spend a lot of time talking and arguing, and trying to be diplomatic. It’s slightly more cerebral for the moment.’

Cunningham hinted at what is to come: ‘Things do get a little physical towards the end of this season, but I don’t want to give too much away,’ he said. ‘There’s an extraordinary climax that comes towards the latter half of the series (two), and the entire front of the series is building up this paranoia. We’ve got some great stuff coming up, certainly towards the end – Tyrion starts using his noggin that much more, not just to protect himself but to protect the kingdom and protect the throne. As the poster says, war is coming!’