R+L=J v.16

[Jem]

As much as I like R+L=J, I'm not entirely convinced that R+L was fully consensual, or that Rhaegar was as noble as everyone thought.

I agree. Not that I want to see Lyanna as being raped, but I would love to have the "R+L=TrueLove" idea debunked. It is almost impossible to do though, because everyone is such a big bunch of Sansas, sighing and swooning over the Rheagar and Lyanna love story.

[Alia of the knife]

I agree. Not that I want to see Lyanna as being raped, but I would love to have the "R+L=TrueLove" idea debunked. It is almost impossible to do though, because everyone is such a big bunch of Sansas, sighing and swooning over the Rheagar and Lyanna love story.

I don't think thats the case.

(and as for "Sansas," you know sometimes, reality is stranger than fiction).

I think R and L's relationship was unclear until ADWD, where Martin is clearly using Selmys voice and character to peel away one layer of this mystery, and clarify that yes, it appears the man loved her.

Now, as to her feelings, it's not that clear, but my guess is that she probably did love him, or at least initially started to fall for him, but was more realistic about the fultility of their situation, and perhaps chose to move on, whereas he couldn't.

As far as this being a "swooning" love story, I can already tell you, (without this being Martin), that this was not going to end well- for either of them.

And I have to tell you, Martin really is not that original, and has borrowed bits and pieces from real history, myths and legends, as well as other Authors- and thats okay, because he's probably one of the best storytellers of our age.

At this point in time, it really is hard to be totally original, and I would not hang that responibility on him.

If he's a little cliche', so what as long as it's done well?

I'd rather see a well done cliche' than an attempt at "being original," and have it fall flat.

People will want to hear and read a good story over and over again.

An "original," but bad storyline, no one will ever want to hear again.

But of course, you are entitled to your opinion. :)

[Son of Jon Snarkgaryen]

I agree. Not that I want to see Lyanna as being raped, but I would love to have the "R+L=TrueLove" idea debunked. It is almost impossible to do though, because everyone is such a big bunch of Sansas, sighing and swooning over the Rheagar and Lyanna love story.

So, do you think he abducted her? Do you think he seduced her? How do you think it went down?

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

It'd only be a swooning Sansa-ish story if they'd gotten away with it and lived happily ever after. I think it's fitting with Martin's style that it could be consensual, so long as it had the proper disastrous ending that you'd reasonably expect it to.

[Jem]

So, do you think he abducted her? Do you think he seduced her? How do you think it went down?

My crackpot theory is that he kidnapped her for political reasons - to prevent, or at least delay, the Stark-Baratheon and Stark-Tully marriage alliances. I think that Lyanna was easy to take because she liked Rhaegar and didn't really want to marry Robert, but she didn't really consider the full implications of what she was doing.

[Jem]

It'd only be a swooning Sansa-ish story if they'd gotten away with it and lived happily ever after. I think it's fitting with Martin's style that it could be consensual, so long as it had the proper disastrous ending that you'd reasonably expect it to.

Maybe it is not a very Sansa-ish story, but people behave in a very Sansa-ish way about this story, all gooey-eyed and love-struck and completely unable to even consider an alternative to the True Love version of Rhaegar and Lyanna.

Maybe it is just because most other parts of this series are so bleak and cynical, so R+L stand out as this shining beacon of love - however tragic and shortlived that love may be. So I don't want to disillusion anyone with my alternate versions, so may be I will shut up about it, but personally I think GRRM is pulling the wool over our eyes (but then again I am pretty paranoid! When it comes to GRRM, question everything!)

[Son of Jon Snarkgaryen]

My crackpot theory is that he kidnapped her for political reasons - to prevent, or at least delay, the Stark-Baratheon and Stark-Tully marriage alliances. I think that Lyanna was easy to take because she liked Rhaegar and didn't really want to marry Robert, but she didn't really consider the full implications of what she was doing.

No offense, but that doesn't really make much sense to me. Why would he feel he had to prevent those alliances unless he already felt as if those alliances would create threats for his House? The only reason they did end up creating threats was because he did take Lyanna. So the political move he made to avoid the trouble you suggest was what caused the trouble you say he was trying to avoid in the first place.

[Jem]

No offense, but that doesn't really make much sense to me. Why would he feel he had to prevent those alliances unless he already felt as if those alliances would create threats for his House? The only reason they did end up creating threats was because he did take Lyanna. So the political move he made to avoid the trouble you suggest was what caused the trouble you say he was trying to avoid in the first place.

I haven't got much time to respond to this today, so I will get back to you on this tomorrow!

Yes, I think Rhaegar was in a total panic about Rickard Stark's 'southron ambitions' ie marrying his heir and his only daughter into other Paramount families.

Rhaegar took Lyanna just before Brandon was due to marry Cat. Taking Lyanna also makes her a less desirable bride for Robert.

Of course it backfired and actually caused the very situation he was trying to prevent - but hindsight is 20/20 as they say.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

I haven't got much time to respond to this today, so I will get back to you on this tomorrow!

Yes, I think Rhaegar was in a total panic about Rickard Stark's 'southron ambitions' ie marrying his heir and his only daughter into other Paramount families.

Rhaegar took Lyanna just before Brandon was due to marry Cat. Taking Lyanna also makes her a less desirable bride for Robert.

Of course it backfired and actually caused the very situation he was trying to prevent - but hindsight is 20/20 as they say.

I can't say I really agree with this. I also want to point out that Brandon was on his way to marry Cat when he found out that Lyanna had been kidnapped. I'm not sure it's clear how long she'd been "missing" before he found out, or if it had anything to do with the "abduction." It could be correlation vs. causation fallacy. As SoJS said, you're putting the cart before the horse: There was no immediate threat from a Stark/Tully/Baratheon alliance until Rhaegar and Lyanna ran off together. Rickard having "southron" ambitions doesn't necessarily have to mean that he wanted to overthrow the Targs or that Rhaegar could've foreseen that even if he did.

[Alia of the knife]

Maybe it is not a very Sansa-ish story, but people behave in a very Sansa-ish way about this story, all gooey-eyed and love-struck and completely unable to even consider an alternative to the True Love version of Rhaegar and Lyanna.

Maybe it is just because most other parts of this series are so bleak and cynical, so R+L stand out as this shining beacon of love - however tragic and shortlived that love may be. So I don't want to disillusion anyone with my alternate versions, so may be I will shut up about it, but personally I think GRRM is pulling the wool over our eyes (but then again I am pretty paranoid! When it comes to GRRM, question everything!)

I don't think anyone should be made to feel like they have to shut up, but I just think that Martin probably initially wrote this story about Jon, and the mysterious back-story just took off.

As I said, Selmy is basically being used as a "voice" for Martin to finally start clarifying things.

It's just taken so long for him to do so, his long-term fan base have already formulated their own theories, and are suspicious that Martin is baiting and switching, which is a danger for him, because now peope aren't taking his clarifications seriously.

So, this isn't just theory, or conjecture because people like R+L.

Given the grey, shady areas his characters exist in, Martin may have intended for Rhaegar to be the only pure character whose noble intentions and broken heart, destroyed his family, Lyannas family, and a Kingdom.

Doesn't sound sappy to me.

[corbon]

Maybe it is not a very Sansa-ish story, but people behave in a very Sansa-ish way about this story, all gooey-eyed and love-struck and completely unable to even consider an alternative to the True Love version of Rhaegar and Lyanna.

No, its that the evidence is overwhelmingly against a violent or non-consensual abduction by Rhaegar.

Everything we hear about Rhaegar, even from people who will criticise Aerys in the same breath (so not an apologist, Barristan) or fought against him (Ned Stark, Howland Reed), or is effectively neutral (Jaime) adds weight of evidence that Rhaegar wasn't the sort to either make rash and irresponsible moves, or take a woman against her will.

And there is a fair amount of evidence of attraction from Lyanna's side as well. And evidence she was not the sort to take an abduction against her will easily. Think of Arya's response, not just immediately, but over time. Arya is very like Lyanna...

And really, the only evidence that it wasn't consensual is Robert's 'belief' (note that Bran doesn't have a clue other than repeating Roberts' 'official' history). And Robert wasn't there, never spoke to anyone who was (other than in the midst of mortal combat) and is demonstrably irrational where the Targaryens are concerned, not to mention the most blindly gullible mental pygmy imaginable.

Weighing the evidence, its about 20-1 odds at least, with the '1' being provided by the least reliable source.

So it isn't that people won't consider an alternative, its that they've considered the evidence, and the sources, and emphatically rejected the alternative.

So I don't want to disillusion anyone with my alternate versions, so may be I will shut up about it, but personally I think GRRM is pulling the wool over our eyes (but then again I am pretty paranoid! When it comes to GRRM, question everything!)

You do realise that the first, time we are presented with the story, the only actual statement about the abductions and the 'official' story are all abduction and rape?

So if he is pulling the wool over our eyes its a double twist, with the 'truth presented as one thing, the evidence saying another. Then your claiming that he's pulling the wool over our eyes with the false evidence and that the evidentially unsound original 'truth' really is the truth?

[Jem]

Look, I don't disagree with any of this. I just think that it is fun to come up with new alternatives. Otherwise we will all just be sitting here nodding our heads up and down and agreeing with each other.

And there is isn't anything wrong with believing in a love story, not at all, I am a romantic myself. I also think that it is funny when you see some usually fairly cynical people almost burst into tears when you try and tell them that Rhaegar and Lyanna were not love birds. It is nice, really, that people are so committed to a love story. And I hope it is a love story, too, I especially don't want to think of Lyanna as being raped.

As to the rest, I think it is entirely possible that Rhaegar thought that Rickard Stark was up to something. It is unusual for the Great Houses to intermarry and here Lord Stark was marrying not one, but two of his children into other Great Houses. And not just his 'lesser' children, but his heir to the eldest daughter of a Great House, and his only daughter to another Lord of a Great House. I think Rhaegar was very worried that the nobles were ganging up against House Targaryen.

Plus we know that Rhaegar was worried about his crazy dad. And we know he was concerned about this prophecy he had been studying and we know he thought he needed another child and it was likely his wife couldn't give him one.

So poor Rhaegar has three really pressing, really stressful, really urgent problems he needs to deal with. One way of breaking up the Stark-Tully-Baratheon alliance is to take off with Lyanna right before Brandon's marriage. Granted, it may not be the best way, it may not be a subtle way, but it is a way. Maybe Rhaegar hoped that with Brandon being a well-known hot-head that he would take off in pursuit of Lyanna. Rhaegar could stash Lyanna somewhere remote and then double back to Kings Landing and take care of his father. Then, once Rhaegar is king, he can take a second wife to mother his third child and he can ban the Stark-Tully-Baratheon marriages and hopefully win them back into loyalty to the crown. Problems solved.

Unfortunately it didn't work out that way. Brandon went to KL and provoked Aerys etc, etc, etc, and voila we have war. Sure, it sounds like a bad plan when you hear about it in retrospect, but it could have worked. It just didn't.

[Son of Jon Snarkgaryen]

Bottom line: I think that Lyanna went willingly with Rhaegar at first, until she found out that his father (Aerys) killed Brandon. She has always been described as strong-willed, as having the wolf-blood. She wasn't a wallflower. I think she would have demanded that Rhaegar release her. What began as a romantic get-away or eloping marriage became something else - and Rhaegar was purportedly obsessed with the prophecy. He may have used her pregnancy to keep her against her will in the Tower of Joy.... I don't see Lyanna, who may have been the Knight of the Laughing Tree, a strong-willed girl who was all about family and friends (a she-wolf who stuck to her wolf-pack, as it were), simply sitting by with Rhaegar after hearing that her father and brother had been murdered and her other brother was going to war. There was likely some forced containment of Lyanna going on at some point. Maybe the the KG at the ToJ were there to serve two purposes: to act as both bodyguards and jailers for Lyanna and unborn Jon.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

Bottom line: I think that Lyanna went willingly with Rhaegar at first, until she found out that his father (Aerys) killed Brandon. She has always been described as strong-willed, as having the wolf-blood. She wasn't a wallflower. I think she would have demanded that Rhaegar release her. What began as a romantic get-away or eloping marriage became something else - and Rhaegar was purportedly obsessed with the prophecy. He may have used her pregnancy to keep her against her will in the Tower of Joy.... I don't see Lyanna, who may have been the Knight of the Laughing Tree, a strong-willed girl who was all about family and friends (a she-wolf who stuck to her wolf-pack, as it were), simply sitting by with Rhaegar after hearing that her father and brother had been murdered and her other brother was going to war. There was likely some forced containment of Lyanna going on at some point. Maybe the the KG at the ToJ were there to serve two purposes: to act as both bodyguards and jailers for Lyanna and unborn Jon.

I don't agree with this. I think Lyanna would have had the good sense to put the blame for her father and brother's deaths where it belonged: on Aerys.

[Son of Jon Snarkgaryen]

I don't agree with this. I think Lyanna would have had the good sense to put the blame for her father and brother's deaths where it belonged: on Aerys.

I totally get that. But you're missing the point. From what few descriptions we've gotten of Lyanna, I imagine she would've been proactive in trying to see Ned, or go to Winterfell, or hell, maybe even tell Robert that she didn't love him.... She knew Rhaegar didn't kill her father and brother, but I still don't see their last few days together at the ToJ before he left for the Trident being all happy and argument free. My money is on Lyanna being in a rage or wanting to be allowed to go home.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

I totally get that. But you're missing the point. From what few descriptions we've gotten of Lyanna, I imagine she would've been proactive in trying to see Ned, or go to Winterfell, or hell, maybe even tell Robert that she didn't love him.... She knew Rhaegar didn't kill her father and brother, but I still don't see their last few days together at the ToJ before he left for the Trident being all happy and argument free. My money is on Lyanna being in a rage or wanting to be allowed to go home.

Except that she would have been very, very pregnant in the middle of nowhere. Even if she'd wanted to leave (which there's really no way to ever know, even if the mystery itself is "solved"), where was she supposed to go and how was she supposed to get there? The pregnancy/delivery is likely what eventually killed her, so it's possible that it was difficult all along, meaning she would've been unable to travel at all.

I try to base my assertions on R+L=J and the Tower of Joy stuff on what I find in the text. I don't think there's any way to tell, one way or the other, how Lyanna was behaving toward the end of the war. Everything I've seen in the books suggests that Lyanna at least liked/admired Rhaegar, and Rhaegar was in love with her. Based on that, I have to think that the "abduction" was consensual, and if it deteriorated later — if — Lyanna would have been in such a precarious physical condition that it wouldn't have mattered anyway. That's the crux: In the end, it doesn't matter. Whatever happened, happened, Lyanna and Rhaegar both died and Ned took Jon away. Does Lyanna's mindset and whether she argued with Rhaegar really change anything? No, it doesn't.

[SFDanny]

I had always assumed warging is a First Men/CotF thing...

We certainly have evidence that a few descendants of the First Men have this ability. I don't know that we can say that only a few of the descendants of First Men/CothF, and no other people, have the ability to "warg." My guess is that that is why the Targaryens have the sibling marriage tradition. It makes much more sense if this is based on a need to maintain traits in the bloodline that are much more critical than hair and eye color. Certainly the ability to control dragons through a special species specific type of warg would explain a lot about the Targaryens. Regardless, the dragons were dead to the world for a century and a half and no one now really knows how to control them when they are most needed. I think it is fairly obvious that is what the "Song of Ice and Fire" is all about. The melding of the abilities of the Starks with their "warging" capability and the ability to bring back the dragons from the dead that we see with Daenerys. Just how that works out is still up in the air, but it sure looks like Jon and Daenerys are going to get to together as allies/lovers/whatever.

[Alia of the knife]

I totally get that. But you're missing the point. From what few descriptions we've gotten of Lyanna, I imagine she would've been proactive in trying to see Ned, or go to Winterfell, or hell, maybe even tell Robert that she didn't love him.... She knew Rhaegar didn't kill her father and brother, but I still don't see their last few days together at the ToJ before he left for the Trident being all happy and argument free. My money is on Lyanna being in a rage or wanting to be allowed to go home.

I think both you and Apple Martini are correct here.

I do think she was fair enough to place the blame where it belonged, BUT, I can also see her being in a high rage, a la Brandon style, and needing to be calmed just for the sake of the baby.

She probably had the frustrated need for action and to "do something," since we know she was a woman who didn't wait around for things.

(I'd say it's quite possible that they may have even tried to keep the news from her, because of the risk to her and the baby).

That said, I would not be surprised to find out that this was finally the thing that caused Rhaegar to do something with his Father as I don't doubt that while Lyanna didn't blame him, she still wanted her pound of flesh in some form, or another.

[SFDanny]

Rhaegar was right because Rhaegar created the conditions where PTWP was necessary. All the prophecies in ASOIAF are self fulfilling, so I think that it would be utterly awesome and fitting for the main prophecy to end that way. Yes, Rhaegar's relationship with Lyanna led to the PTWP and created the conditions where Jon happened to be in the right place and the right time to assume that mantle. However, Rhaegar also created great instability in the kingdom by running off with Lyanna and ignoring the political realities of the situation before it was too late.

Kind of an amazing conclusion if you ask me. Just what did Rhaegar have to do with the rise of the Others as a threat to humanity? These are beings who have not been seen for thousands of years, but Rhaegar somehow created the situation North of the Wall where they return and pose a threat some fourteen to fifteen years after his death? Just how does that work? How does running off with Lyanna or abducting her have anything to do with that? The need for the Prince that was promised to come again seems all bound up in the rise of the Others, and their existence, or the timing of their proliferation North of the Wall, can't be reasonably tied to anything Rhaegar did or did not do.

As to the political instability of the story present when this threat is manifest, just how can anyone blame Rhaegar for that? Rhaegar, having been dead for the aforementioned decade and a half, had nothing whatsoever to do with it. Robert ruled a unified kingdom for that time period and did nothing to prepare for the Others. Ned ruled the North for the same period and did next to nothing to prepare for the Others. Just how does Rhaegar have anything to do with any of the inaction of people he fought against long ago? If the threat had come during Robert's Rebellion, you might have some small point, but as it is this doesn't make sense.

What Rhaegar and Maester Aemon and very few others did was to take seriously warnings by others through prophecy of a threat that most people thought was nonexistent. So, if you mean "self-fulfilling" means heeding the threat and believing it was important to find a way to bring back the dragons and use them against the Others, then I think you're stretching what "self-fulfilling prophecies" means when applying it to this situation.

Rhaegar's actions during the rebellion were the "for want of a nail" in the whole situation.

Not even sure how this old adage applies. As I understand it it means but for a seemingly minor happenstance history would have been vastly different. Not sure what minor happenings this would refer to in Rhaegar's actions during that time.

IMO, Rhaegar gets too much of a pass among some book fans. His actions running off with the high lord's daughter from one of the most traditional families in Westros were incredibly rash.

It could have been, or it could have been necessary. Suppose Rickard is told by Lyanna she doesn't want to marry Robert. Not unlikely given we know she raises her concerns with Ned, and we know her reputation of defying her father's orders on other concerns. If she was as headstrong as we are told, I find it likely she lets her father know she wants no part of marrying Robert. Now, we know these wedding plans go ahead whether or not Lyanna told her father about her objections, so let's look at what little history we know of during the time period. We know Ned and Brandon's locations during part of this period. Brandon and his party are on their way to Riverrun when they hear the news of Lyanna's abduction. Given the composition of Brandon's party it is likely they are riding from the Vale when they hear this news. We know Ned is in the Vale when Aerys's calls for his head. We also know Robert is there. What seems to me, and to others before me, as likely, is that Ned, Brandon, and Lyanna are all together in the lead up to the wedding and it is possible that either Rickard or Benjen is with them as well (remembering the caution that there must always be a "Stark in Winterfell.") So, let's suppose Rickard plans on doing something about getting his headstrong daughter married while they are about this trip. Why not a double wedding? Would it be rash of Lyanna or Rhaegar to do something quickly to stop this plan from being implemented? I don't think so. It would be moving quickly to avoid a marriage that couldn't then be undone, but that's not the same thing as being rash.

I also don't think either Lyanna or Rhaegar would have run off thinking there would be no consequences. No consequences, doesn't, however, mean anticipation of, or responsibility for, other people's rash or insane actions. They have to know Aerys, Robert, Rickard, Brandon, Doran, Oberyn, and possibly Elia and Ned might be upset, even very angry for doing so. It doesn't mean they think any of these people is going to be so foolish to challenge the Crown Prince to a duel in his father's hearing. Or that they should think that even a paranoid man like Aerys is going to decide burning one of his high lords to death and forcing his son and heir to strangle himself is a good idea. These are other people's rash and insane actions, and they are responsible for them, not Lyanna and not Rhaegar.

Ned was the second son. He would inherit nothing when Rickard died. I highly doubt that Tywin to go from insisting that Cersei be queen to being okay with marrying his precious prized pawn to a second son.

Who then? Who are the candidates you think Tywin would consider for Cersei? He certainly considers many when he talks of marrying her off before Joffrey's wedding. So, if it's not because Ned is unworthy, but rather what would he gain in such a marriage? My supposition is based on Tywin thinking of joining into a anti-Targaryen conspiracy of high lords after his split with Aerys. In such a move, having the leader of the opposition as a father-in-law to his daughter has its advantages. Including the possible restoration of his ancestral kingdom. Not an altogether insignificant inducement, especially if his own aspirations to have a grandson on the Iron Throne are ripped away.

Lord Tully did have ambitions in my opinion... He wanted to be a major player in Westros affairs; however, I don't think that he cared whether the Targaryens or the Baratheons were kings. He just wanted a seat at the big table, which is something that he felt the Tullys had been denied. Additionally, given how vulnerable the Rivelands are to invasion, marrying his children off to other great houses was a wise strategic decision on Lord Tully's part. Lord Stark might have been thinking the exact same way. He had two very good game pieces, so why not get better marriage alliances than a bannerman's daughter. And I do think that the personalities of Brandon and Lyanna helped secure the marriage contracts. Someone like Lord Tully might decide that Brandon Stark was a good bet despite being from the North because he was a charismatic fellow. Tully was looking to expand his influence in Westros as a whole and was more apt to go for a young man who he thinks might be a powerbroker in the future. So yes there was politics involved, but I highly doubt that there was a grand conspiracy to overthrow the Targaryens as a whole although Rhaegar was likely planning something against Aerys. Aerys was just that paranoid that he took the normal wheeling and dealing that nobles do to secure their territory and expand their influence at court and decided that it was a plot to overthrow him. Rhaegar was off obsessing about his prophecy rather than getting rid of his father and let him.

Here I think you are missing too many clues that much more than the usual is going on here. The maester's conspiracy, Lady Dustin's talk of southern ambitions, the lack of dragons to back up Targaryen rule, etc. etc. all point to much more in my opinion.

1. Rhaegar is the one who ultimately created the chaos, so Rhaegar is the one who is ultimately responsible.

Nonsense, this is post hoc, ergo proctor hoc thinking and is as flawed as that logical fallacy. People are responsible for their own actions. Because Rhaegar did one thing does not mean he is responsible for all the decisions of others who follow him.

2. There would be no need for dragons if there had been stability in Westros. There is a huge magical Wall up North protecting Westros from the Others as well as the Stark family.

As I said above, there was stability in Westeros for almost the entire period of time of Robert's rule, other than the Greyjoy rebellion. Rhaegar had absolutely nothing to do with the instability that follows Robert's death. Littlefinger, Varys, Cersei, Ned, Catelyn, Tywin, and many others could be blamed for it, but not Rhaegar. As to the Walls ultimate effectiveness, I have my doubts. It's coming down, IMO, and not because of anything Rhaegar did or didn't do.

3. I do think that the masters are trying to banish magic from Westros and likely killed off the dragons. But I don't think that is a bad thing. Dragons can be used for great evil as well as great good. The dragons basically died out after the Dance of the Dragons, which consumed the Targaryens and probably ruined Westros. Perhaps the masters weren't too keen on another Targaryen civil war with both sides ravaging the countryside with the medieval equivalent of nukes. I think that the masters, like most of Westros, fails to realize that dragons are now needed. But I think that it is difficult to ascribe an evil motivations to their "conspiracy." I also don't think that we can say that they cooked up some grand conspiracy to overthrow the Targaryens based on the words of a spurned woman. It's more likely that Lord Stark was making the sorts of alliances that lords routinely made during the Middle Ages.

It is not just Lady Dustin's quote that talks about the maester's conspiracy. We are introduced to the idea by Archmaester Marwyn, who might just have some inside knowledge of the political leanings of the people he calls the "grey sheep." Lady Dustin only helps to confirm its existence and by doing so helps to lend credence to her own claims of southern ambitions on the part of Lord Stark. I don't think the conspiracy is necessarily a "bad thing" in an of itself. Kind of partial to a scientific view of the world myself, but in a world were dragons and ice demons bent on killing all humanity are real, then one has to question the conspiracy's helpfulness.

[MrSafe]

Hello Folks,

Long time reader first time poster (hell I just registered recently =D ).

A lot of interesting theories. I personally picked up on the R+L=J theory a little bit slower than I wanted to but I didn't have enough on the table to convince myself initially. Something about Jon being a bastard and how honorable Ned was didn't add up.

The scene with Ned and the Tower of Joy was all I needed until I could be proven wrong. The thing that really did it for me was the "Prince that was promised" and Ned promised Lyanna as far as I am concerned Jon is the prince that was promised. Anyways that's my insane evidence that I am throwing into the fire.

Another theory someone brought up was Jon could be "the great other" based on Mel's vision of Jon and skulls around him.