• Place After taking Harry to Diagon Alley for the first time, Hagrid dropped him off at Paddington Station so he could catch a train back to the Dursleys (though this scene was skipped in the film). While they waited for Harry’s train, Hagrid gave Harry his ticket for the Hogwarts Express… Read More
• Place The “village pub” in Little Hangleton, this is the place where the villagers gathered the night Tom Marvolo Riddle killed his father and grandparents, to gossip about the murders. Among the villagers present that evening were the Riddles’ cook and Dot, who remained permanently convinced that gardener Frank Bryce was… Read More
• Towns Little Hangleton is a small village located somewhere in Yorkshire or Lancashire. A town of massive importance to recent wizarding history and yet unknown to most modern wizards, Little Hangleton is found about six miles from its neighbor, Great Hangleton, and is the location of the Riddle House, where Tom… Read More
• Churches and graveyards After Voldemort killed his father and paternal grandparents, they were buried in the graveyard by the church in Little Hangleton (GF1). This, then, is also where Harry was taken by Portkey, saw Cedric Diggory killed and Voldemort reborn, and duelled Voldemort in 1995 (GF34). Read More
• Event This is the worst birthday that Harry can remember. The Dursleys have completely forgotten that today is Harry’s birthday, and he ends up having to spend it doing chores in preparation for a very important dinner party hosting one of Uncle Vernon’s clients, Mr. Mason, and his wife, Mrs. Mason. Harry is… Read More
• Event After the Dursleys leave Harry near the clearly marked Platforms 9 and 10, he decides to ask the guard about the train to Hogwarts but refrains from asking about the apparently absent Platform 9 3/4. The guard gets annoyed with Harry when it turns out he doesn’t even know where… Read More
• Event Harry attends primary school beginning in 1985. He is laughed at because of his oversized, hand-me-down clothes and taped glasses, and ostracized because none of the other kids will brave Dudley’s gang to befriend him. On one occasion he turns a teacher’s wig blue. On another occasion he inexplicably finds… Read More
• Rooms, chambers, and floors Harry’s bedroom is the smallest bedroom at number four, Privet Drive. Until the end of July in 1991, the bedroom was Dudley’s second bedroom, where he stored all his toys, games, and books when he’d finished with them (or, in the case of the books, discarded them unread). Harry’s room… Read More
• Wizarding culture The wild state of Harry’s hair was a constant irritant to Vernon Dursley: About once a week, Uncle Vernon looked over the top of his newspaper and shouted that Harry needed a haircut. Harry must have had more haircuts than the rest of the boys in his class put together,… Read More
• Event In disguise, Harry and Hermione visit Godric’s Hollow on Christmas Eve. First they see a statue of baby Harry with his parents (disguised to Muggles as a war memorial) and visit James’ and Lily’s graves, where they also see the Deathly Hallows symbol on Ignotus Peverell’s grave and the graves of… Read More
• Event Harry is punished by being locked in his room and only allowed out to use the bathroom twice a day (CS2). Furious with Harry for Dobby’s effect on the Dursleys’ dinner with the Masons and newly aware that Harry cannot legally use his magic to avoid punishment, Uncle Vernon… Read More
• Event First, Harry and Dumbledore briefly discuss Mundungus and Draco, and Dumbledore discusses Merope Gaunt with Harry again. Together, they then view a memory of Dumbledore’s, in which he visits Tom Riddle’s childhood orphanage to invite him to Hogwarts. Dumbledore learns Riddle’s history and discovers that he has already been using magic, hates… Read More
• Event When a letter arrives addressed to Harry in the cupboard under the stairs, Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia realize that Dumbledore knows how they’ve been treating the boy. In response, they move Harry into Dudley’s second bedroom, much to Dudley’s chagrin. The next letter, which arrives to following day, is… Read More
• Character Harry Potter is the Boy Who Lived, the Chosen One, the hero of the Wizarding world. He grew up with Muggles, and then came to Hogwarts where he faced dangers and terrors beyond his years. He, along with his friends Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley and Neville Longbottom, destroyed Voldemort’s Horcruxes. Read More
• Source Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone is the first in the series of Harry Potter novels by J.K. Rowling. It was published in the U.S. as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone a year after being published in the UK. First British printing: July 1, 1997, Bloomsbury Books First American printing: September 1,… Read More
• Source Harry attends his first lesson with Albus Dumbledore, who explains that they will be delving into Lord Voldemort’s past via the Pensieve. In Bob Ogden’s memory, they go to Marvolo Gaunt’s house to see about his son, Morfin, who has broken wizarding law… Read More
• Source The Muggle Prime Minister recounts his encounters with Cornelius Fudge. Fudge visits him again with Scrimgeour, and we learn that Scrimgeour is the new Minister for Magic. We also hear of the wizarding world’s open war with Voldemort – dozens of Muggles have been killed along with Amelia Bones and Emmeline Vance, the Dementors and giants have joined Voldemort, and the… Read More
• Source The wizarding public’s perception of Harry and the steps the Ministry of Magic has taken to provide safety in the war has been written up in the Daily Prophet. Albus Dumbledore returns to Privet Drive to collect Harry. Before leaving, Dumbledore sits with Harry and… Read More
• Glossary A helter-skelter is an amusement park ride, often in the form of a lighthouse, which consists of a spiral slide running around the outside of a whimsical structure. Riders sit on burlap sacks or other simple things like that and slide down. Read More
• Character Henry is Jacob Kowalski’s assistant in the bakery that Jacob opens at the end of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Read More
• Character Henry Shaw Jr. was a United States senator from New York in the 1920s. He was killed by an Obscurus at a campaign event in 1926 (WFT). Read More
• Character Henry Shaw (Sr.) was a powerful 1920s media titan based in New York (WFT). Read More
• Gardens and farms A medieval monastery in Worcestershire had this ‘Herbe Garden,’ where Brother Benedict, a Muggle Franciscan monk, was attacked by a Jarvey, though he supposed it to be a giant talking ferret (FB). Read More
• Character Herbert Chorley was a Junior Minister to the British (Muggle) Prime Minister… Read More
• Article
Posted by in Canon discussion / Essays
I do know that many people have theorized about how Muggle-borns get their Hogwarts letters (and take them seriously), or are taken to Diagon Alley for the first time, or how they are able to adjust. Even with Rowling’s recent comments on this topic, we’re still left with a lot… Read More
• Character Resourceful, principled and brilliant, Hermione Jean Granger is easily the brightest witch of her generation. She, along with Ron Weasley, is one of Harry Potter’s closest friends. She is also Muggle-born (her parents were dentists – PS12), and so is a living, breathing example of the fallacy of pureblood… Read More
• Character Mrs. Hetty Bayliss was a Muggle woman who noticed the Weasley Ford Anglia flying over Norfolk (CS5). Read More
• Character The Muggle man that Iola (Black) Hitchens marries, which gets her disowned from the Muggle-hating, prejudiced Black family. Her face is burned in the tapestry of the Black Family Tree. (BFT)… Read More
• Spells Morfin Gaunt cast a spell on Tom Riddle Sr. out of spite because he knew his sister Merope was infatuated with him. The spell left Riddle covered in hives. Read More
• Character Hope Howell Lupin was the mother of Remus Lupin. She was a ‘beautiful Muggle girl’ who met her husband Lyall Lupin when he protected her from a Boggart in a forest (Pm). Read More
• Buildings The Hut-on-the-Rock is a small, broken-down, two-room hut on a rocky island just off the British coast. It’s hard to say exactly which sea the Hut-on-the-Rock rests in, as really any body of water other than the English Channel would have been quite a drive from Little Whinging. However, the… Read More