Timeline of the Wizarding World

The Wizarding World has a long, interesting history which is revealed in the various canon sources. This timeline details every known event in that long history, from the opening of Ollivanders to the Battle of the Department of Mysteries. We have split the timeline into a number of separate pages to make them a bit less cumbersome to load and view. This page serves as an introduction to the timeline, an index of the individual pages, and a guide to the annotations and icons you'll find.

Index
history until 1900
The Beginning of the Tale (1900-1950)
The Middle Years (1950-1970)
The First Rise and Fall of Voldemort (1970-1990)
Harry Potter Comes to Hogwarts (1990-current)

Annotation Guide:

Descriptions of events are annotated and listed with the following conventions:
 

c. Y-55 (c.1925) MM=0  AD=80 Minerva McGonagall born (Sch2). JKR said in an interview that McGonagall was "a sprightly 70" years old. Using that information, we can determine the year in which she was born by subtracting 70 years. As with Dumbledore's birthyear, the trick, of course, is knowing what year to subtract that 70 years from. If we assume that Rowling was saying that McGonagall was 70 years old at that point in the stories, which was summer of Y15, then she was born in Y-55 (Y15 minus 70 years). According to the official timeline, Y-55 is 1925.

The c. in front of the year indicates that we don't know it exactly, that it's an approximate date. Many dates do not have this notation, of course.

The designation beginning with Y indicates a date relative to the main events of the story. Year zero is Harry's birth, so as shown above we can see that McGonagall was born 55 years before Harry was. A date given with a standard calendar year, in this case 1925, indicates the calendar year which corresponds to the relative year on the official timeline found on the DVD version of the second book.

Years which are known exactly, not inferred from the official timeline but stated outright, can be identified by the fact that they will not indicate a relative date.

Following the date are several abbreviations in red with numbers following them. These give the ages particular characters turn during that year. In the example above we see that Minerva McGonagall is just born and Albus Dumbledore is 80 years old. A list of character abbreviations can be found below.

The icon indicates a particular category for this event. In the case above, we see that this event is an important one in the life of a major character. A table of icons and their meaning can be found below.

The reference in parentheses, in this case (Sch2), indicates where this information is found. For more detailed descriptions of these sources, see Sources of Lexicon Information.

The small text in blue annotates the entry with information about how the date is derived and with background details.

Icons:

1269	events in the Wizarding World
1066	events from Muggle history
	indicates events in the development of broomsticks and Quidditch
	indicates events related to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
	indicates important events in the history of magic
	indicates important events in the lives of main characters
	indicates important events in the battle against the Dark Arts
	indicates important events concerning Potions, medicine, and Herbology
	indicates important events concerning magical creatures
	indicates important events in the history of the Ministry of Magic

Character abbreviations:

AD	Albus Dumbledore
MM	Minerva McGonagall
TR	Tom Riddle
RH	Rubeus Hagrid
M	The Marauders and those of their year, including James, Lily, Remus, Sirius, Wormtail, and Snape.
BW	Bill Weasley
CW	Charlie Weasley
PW	Percy Weasley
FGW	Fred and George Weasley
HRH	Harry, Ron, Hermione, Draco, and the others of their year
GW	Ginny Weasley