R+L=J v.95

[Alia of the knife]

A quick question, and out of curiosity, did the Valaryons of Driftmark ever practice incest?

[Ellfoy]

"At her throat, her ruby gleamed, a third eye glowing brighter than the others. Jon had seen Ghost's eyes blazing red the same way, when they caught the light just right."

I think this gives us a connection between Melisandre, Ghost and Jon. What else is deep red, like rubies? Blood. What kind of blood does Melisandre harp on and on about? King's blood. What is steaming - smoking - as it runs from Jon's stab wounds? Blood. King's blood.

King's blood is mentioned about a thousand times by Mel, and the extreme power it contains. If R+L=J is true, she will have the purest K B there is. What power it possesses I don't know, but it's the biggest cliffhanger ever. Thoros is a huge hint here. He's bringing Lord Beric back, as a servant of R'hllor, so we know that Red Priests/Priestesses can restore life to the slain.

Also, when Jon was born, the snow-white cloaks of the KG guarded him, and laid down their lives for him. Ghost is snow-white and ever vigilant in guarding Jon, loyal. If Jon is to be reborn, he will have a white guardian, his Kingsguard - Ghost. Will Ghost die so that Jon can live? Much has been made of the presence of the KG at Jon's birth. . .I think this parallel is much overlooked!

A little help ? ;)

ADWD Chapter 2, Dany:

"Dany glimpsed Ser Barristan sliding closer, a white shadow at her side."

ADWD Chapter 7, Jon:

"Ghost padded after him, a white shadow at his side."

All credits to Ser Creighton and his thread http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/105591-the-sun-and-the-moon-a-look-at-the-parallels-and-symbolisim-of-jon-and-dany-section-3-update-be-like-water/?p=5523808

[BearQueen87]

A little help ? ;)

ADWD Chapter 2, Dany:

"Dany glimpsed Ser Barristan sliding closer, a white shadow at her side."

ADWD Chapter 7, Jon:

"Ghost padded after him, a white shadow at his side."

All credits to Ser Creighton and his thread http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/105591-the-sun-and-the-moon-a-look-at-the-parallels-and-symbolisim-of-jon-and-dany-section-3-update-be-like-water/?p=5523808

nice! Poor Ghost puppy. He's totally going to bite it

[sj4iy]

nice! Poor Ghost puppy. He's totally going to bite it

But Ghost will always be a part of him :)

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Ghost is not going to die.

/denial.

(no, really. We need a scene of Jon riding Rhaegal with Ghost next to him because Unicorns and Krakens http://www.digitaljournal.com/img/6/6/8/5/5/9/i/1/5/9/o/Finn_Jones_on_a_unicorn.jpg).

[UnmaskedLurker]

Ghost is not going to die.

/denial.

(no, really. We need a scene of Jon riding Rhaegal with Ghost next to him because Unicorns and Krakens http://www.digitaljournal.com/img/6/6/8/5/5/9/i/1/5/9/o/Finn_Jones_on_a_unicorn.jpg).

Maybe you need to change your avatar to Cleopatra (Queen of . . . Denial).

[Kingmonkey]

What they want (Jon on the throne) is not and cannot be what the usurper's second in command is likely to concede. Even in the most optimistic scenario.

If they fight, then even in the most optimistic scenario, they're not going to get Jon on the throne. Firstly, he's a baby. Secondly, there's 3KG against the combined armies of the Stormlands, Westerlands, Riverlands, North and Vale. Everyone else has capitulated. What they want is Jon's survival, at least for now. So the question remains: what is so different about what the 3KG want (Jon's survival) and what Ned wants (Jon's survival -- remember, Ned hates the idea of killing Targ kids and has chosen to go to the ToJ with only a small number of his most trusted men) that they have to fight about it?

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Maybe you need to change your avatar to Cleopatra (Queen of . . . Denial).

Well, Connington is kinda the Queen King of Denial as well, so...

[Ellfoy]

nice! Poor Ghost puppy. He's totally going to bite it

Well, I just wanted to emphasis that Ghost is Jon's very special Kingsguard, I don't think that this imply that Ghost would be sacrified to save Jon, even if protecting Jon is kind of Ghost job...

Ghost is not going to die.

/denial.

(no, really. We need a scene of Jon riding Rhaegal with Ghost next to him because Unicorns and Krakens http://www.digitaljournal.com/img/6/6/8/5/5/9/i/1/5/9/o/Finn_Jones_on_a_unicorn.jpg).

That would be badass but well they would not really fly high in that case... I'm happy to see that someone else thinks that if Jon will ride a Dragon, it would be Rhaegal and not Viserion. Rhaegal is so much cooler that Viserion !

[BearQueen87]

Maybe you need to change your avatar to Cleopatra (Queen of . . . Denial).

ba dum dum dum tsssssssh (cymbal clash)

[keira_targaryen]

You take all the evidence from one side and it proves??

You ignore Brynden Rivers - which is interesting since he's from a House not far from the Tullys. It's a bit of a stretch but those genes didn't overwhelm the Targ ones. Obviously, you aren't "ignorant" just willfully blind to other possibilitie

Hello I am new to the fóruns and this thread. :)

Well, since you pointed out Brynden Rivers(the coolest name ever!!!) Lets talk about jon's Wolf. Albino with red eyes just like Brynden Rivers. That might say something or not but its a hell of coincidence.

[BearQueen87]

Hello I am new to the fóruns and this thread. :)

Well, since you pointed out Brynden Rivers(the coolest name ever!!!) Lets talk about jon's Wolf. Albino with red eyes just like Brynden Rivers. That might say something or not but its a hell of coincidence.

Welcome to the forums and to our happy thread!

And yeah. I don't think it's a coincidence.

[UnViserion]

Hello I am new to the fóruns and this thread. :)

Well, since you pointed out Brynden Rivers(the coolest name ever!!!) Lets talk about jon's Wolf. Albino with red eyes just like Brynden Rivers. That might say something or not but its a hell of coincidence.

Welcome, My Lady.

We can always stand to gain more Targaryen's round these parts.

edit - and yes, there very well may be something to the red eyes. I try to avoid seeing too much symbolism in everything in the books, but I don't think it's too big a stretch to see a possible connection between Ghost and Bloodraven.

[Kingmonkey]

This is a recurring dream for Ned, not a one-time fever dream. Ned and his companions ride up, as they had in life.

Recurring does not mean true. "I might mention, though, that Ned's account, which you refer to, was in the context of a dream... and a fever dream at that. Our dreams are not always literal." - SSM

I'm inclined to believe GRRM's hint on this one. Trying to pick apart exactly what happens in this scene assuming that it's what actually took place rather than being a version filtered through Ned's unconscious strikes me as making some risky assumptions.

(textual analysis snipped)

Nothing there to disagree with, but read the way that passage is written, not line by line, but as a whole. Doesn't it strike you that there's something rather ritualistic about the language? The repetition of the question and answer format, the way Ned is giving the 3KG an opportunity to validate themselves and their honour in each step of the story?

Ok, this probably needs a thread all of its own to cover properly, but I have a theory that Ned's dream scene may be written as an intentional inversion of the Celtic storytelling tradition of the gatekeeper/porter tale. This crops up for example in Culwch ac Olwen (Culwch and Olwen) in the White Book of Rydderch and Pa gur yv y porthaur? (What man is the Gatekeeper) in the Black Book of Caermarthen. In these stories, a king / hero (and retinue) approaches a fortress (possibly his own) and asks for admission. Despite being a famous king/hero, the porter at the gate claims not to recognise him, and asks him to pronounce his deeds to prove he is worth the honour of admission to the fortress (or tower...). The format generally involves the Porter challenging the Hero with a series of questions, for which the Hero must provide an example of his (and his retinue's) honour and heroism to persuade the Porter to admit him/them.

Short version: this might not be representative so much of what actually happened, but rather of how Ned views the honour of 3KG in retrospect.

(talking of porter scenes, "Stark hath murdered sleep?" I want to see a Shakespearean bawdy ToJ scene!)

It seems that even facing the odds that they do, the Kingsguard should prevail. Something odd happened, and I really look forward to GRRM telling us about it.

However good someone is one-on-one -- or however effectively the perform in a battle where they're in full plate armour and lots of people are poorly armoured if at all, -- when 3 are facing 7 prepared, presumably well equipped and experienced even if inferior fighters, they're probably stuffed. They may be the best, but they still only have one sword each. They may have hoped, even expected to win, but losing certainly wouldn't be a shock, and winning without losses would be very unlikely.

Ned knows the outcome, and he regrets that he had to kill the three finest knights in the kingdom, even years later. If Lyanna had been kidnapped or mistreated while they were present Ned would not have that favorable view of these men. These three Kingsguard are undoubtedly living up to their "vow to guard the king", in Hightower's own words, to gain Ned's greatest respect. As fate has it, because these men were so honorable, on both sides of this meeting, they were fated to fight to the bitter end, for honor’s sake.

Absolutely agreed, there's a tragedy of honour taking place. My point of contention is that fighting Ned wasn't the best way for them to protect the king. The fact that Ned turns up with just six of his own most trusted men rather than an army very strongly indicates that Ned also wanted to protect the king, so why fight?

Of course if Ned's dream is indeed an inverted porter scene rather than a literal description of what happened, we've got room for a great bit of tragedy there -- that the fight indeed didn't need to happen, and there was a failure of communication that lead to 8 honourable people dying unnecessarily. That way, Ned's remembrance of the honour of the 3KG is enhanced by his guilt at having not found a way to avoid those pointless deaths, and the dream is essentially his own internal accounting of the honour of the three men he respected yet reluctantly killed.

[Kingmonkey]

Hello I am new to the fóruns and this thread. :)

Well, since you pointed out Brynden Rivers(the coolest name ever!!!) Lets talk about jon's Wolf. Albino with red eyes just like Brynden Rivers. That might say something or not but its a hell of coincidence.

Welcome!

"And suddenly Ghost was back, stalking softly between two weirwoods. White fur and red eyes, Jon realized, disquieted. Like the trees . . . " - GoT ch. 48

"Red eyes, Jon realized, but not like Melisandre's. He had a weirwood's eyes. Red eyes, red mouth, white fur. Blood and bone, like a heart tree. He belongs to the old gods, this one. " - SoS ch.79

Perhaps the question is whether it's a coincidence that Brynden Rivers looks like a weirwood, too.

[BearQueen87]

Welcome!

Perhaps the question is whether it's a coincidence that Brynden Rivers looks like a weirwood, too.

Seeing as Bloodraven is basically an Old God at this point, I'm going to go with no

[Ser Creighton]

Hold the phone Ser Me never said Ghost was going to die. He might but I can't prove that. Though here is the thing, I actually have a lot more on that particular theory, several pages of, dozens actually, I just don't post that stuff as the idea of the concept is established on that thread and can be applied by anyone.

Dany and Jon do run parallels and they are the Dancing Dragons in Dance. Though some want to claim Aegon or Varys, or some Tyrion, though I would Tyrion shares some parallels with both of them and even Bran has parallels with Dany. It's not a singularly limited concept, but you can use it all over the books. In the case of life death and rebirth their are things. You know the sun and the moon are opposites despite the moon sometimes kissing the sun or swallowing the sun. But life death and rebirth between them is not an uncommon theme. But it does not always play out the same way.

Drogo/Yigritte. Interesting parallel Drogo the slaver and Yigritte of the Free Folk. There we see the inverse symbolism and a Husband and a wife, male and female and so on. Both dead do to betrayal, I know people don't like to hear that word with Jon but you know it was and shit happens. In truth though she more stole Jon than Jon stole her, the whole cave and underground stream. Dany and Drogo outside next to a stream. Both dead though. Literal Husband and Symbolic Spearwife so to speak.

So you look at lets say Jon Snow dying, supposed death. But you look at the books and many people think Dany is dead. Selmy tries not to think about it but many think she died. But what you have is the inverse of Dany' rebirth, in this case it's not the much more literal magical rebirth from thrones. But more of a metaphorical one. You have an inferno in a pit, Selmy yelling for her/Mormont, a literal flaming mount, remember the flaming horse. So she flies off on Drogon, you can probably relate that to Ghost and Jon in the Books, if one is literal the other will be symbolic. Jon would not ride Ghost of course but he would leave with him.

So if you just follow her arc which is ahead of his you can kind of get a general idea of what should happen with Jon, and if his arc is ahead of hers it should play out the same way. So I give you this quote.

“She talks of prophecies...a hero reborn in the sea, living dragons hatched from dead stone ... she speaks of signs and swears they point to me. I never asked for this, no more than I asked to be king. Yet dare I disregard her? ”

Well Dany is not in the sea, she is in a symbolic sea or a metaphorical sea, the Dothraki sea. And of course she is going through what appears to be a symbolic rebirth. She pretty much had her ultra magical literal rebirth. So if hers is symbolic, then Jon' should be? Dany will return to Meereen at some point and that rebirth will be complete and people will see she is alive. So when Jon returns to his body I am guessing his much more literal rebirth should occur shortly after. The getting up is not the magical part, that tends to follow the getting up part just like when Dany got up. Though it does not have to be perfect, just kind of that know it when you see it thing. Maybe the Wall will be Jon' sea it does seam an Ice shelf and it is made of sea water. Or perhaps he ends up at the sea, I don't know.

I can't speak to what either will be like after this but changes happen. So I do not know if Ghost and Selmy will die, they may. But Selmy and Ghost are not Parallels they share an occasional parallel. Martin does things like that for the bigger POV characters. Not the only white Shadows in the books. Loyal companions no question.

Lets take Mormont, one died not both. Though both are gone, one is trying to come back to Dany so if the Old man shows up, be worried for Jon. Though Dany did have another old Bear that died. It's really better to focus on the main POV's in this case, Martin will and does create the parallels with stuff that is around them. Like at one point you can see he draws a parallel to Ghost and Selmy, but later he creates that parallel with Ghost and Drogon. Like Ghost is not going to lead an Army against the Night's watch or the Free Folk, he can't really write that. "Rooo Rooo Roooo the Rammer and the Ranvil."

[keira_targaryen]

Thank you for the welcoming BearQueen and King Rhaegar! :)

[keira_targaryen]

Welcome!

Perhaps the question is whether it's a coincidence that Brynden Rivers looks like a weirwood, too.

Thank you for the welcoming too!

Nope not a coincidence, IMO

I think we can see a link between Brynden Rivers and Jon Snow.

[BearQueen87]

Hold the phone Ser Me never said Ghost was going to die. He might but I can't prove that. Though here is the thing, I actually have a lot more on that particular theory, several pages of, dozens actually, I just don't post that stuff as the idea of the concept is established on that thread and can be applied by anyone.

No you didn't. I stuck that in there. (though I do think both Ghost and Selmy will die for their respective "owners")

Drogo/Yigritte. Interesting parallel Drogo the slaver and Yigritte of the Free Folk. There we see the inverse symbolism and a Husband and a wife, male and female and so on. Both dead do to betrayal, I know people don't like to hear that word with Jon but you know it was and shit happens. In truth though she more stole Jon than Jon stole her, the whole cave and underground stream. Dany and Drogo outside next to a stream. Both dead though. Literal Husband and Symbolic Spearwife so to speak.

Very interesting.

Do you more on this? You should post your whole theory.