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Game of Thrones: Jon Snow's Parents 100 Percent, Totally, Without A Doubt Confirmed

Sorry, Robert fans

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Alexander Zalben

Warning! This article contains spoilers for Game of Thrones Season 6. Read at your own risk!

When Game of Thrones aired its sixth season finale, "The Winds of Winter," on Sunday, fans were blown away by its epic scale, stunned by the shocking deaths, and... mildly confused over the reveal around Jon Snow's (Kit Harington) parentage.

For those who had read the books, the flashback moment, where a time-traveling Bran Stark (Isaac Hempstead-Wright) witnesses the birth of tiny behbeh Jon Snow was pretty darn clear, and a long time coming. Finally, we found out that that Jon wasn't the bastard son of Ned Stark (Sean Bean) and some random lady. Instead, he was the son of -- as some commenters put it -- a "random lady in a tower."

First of all, that random lady was Lyanna Stark (Aisling Francioso), the sister of Ned Stark and the reason for Robert Baratheon's (Mark Addy) rebellion, the events that preceded the whole series. We got a small glimpse of the climax of that rebellion when young Ned (Robert Aramayo) attacked the Tower of Joy where his sister was being held captive... or at least he thought she was a prisoner. Turns out, she was actually giving birth to lil' Jon.

But, to borrow from Maury Povich... Who's the father? The confusion came because of this moment, where show creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss decided to get a little subtle:

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Ned Stark and Lyanna Stark, Game of Thrones HBO

What was she whispering? Was it Jon's true name? The identity of his father? A warning to not be a dummy and try to outplay Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) in a few years? Like how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll pop, we may never know.

That said, we do know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, who Jon Snow's parents are. Thanks to the sleuths at Nerdist, and a helpful infographic created for HBO's Making Game of Thrones blog, we can confirm the info that both the show and the books have held back for decades: Jon's parents are Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen.

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HBO

There are a few details that aren't confirmed by this graphic, like the firmly-believed fan theory that Rhaegar neither imprisoned nor raped Lyanna, but they were, in fact, in love. In fact, according to the graphic, Lyanna was abducted by Rhaegar, so there may be a few twists coming that fans weren't expecting.

It's also interesting who is left off of the graphic. Since it focuses solely on characters involved in the Tower of Joy scene, we don't know if another parentage theory -- that Tyrion Lannister (Peter Dinklage) is the son of Mad King Aerys and Joanna Lannister -- is true.

That said, we can put to rest all the other R+L=J conspiracy theories. R=Rhaegar Targaryen, L=Lyanna Stark, and J=Jon Snow. Sorry, everyone who thought the below was true:

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HBO

Also, anyone who believed that? Gross, guys. Gross.