Dining at the High Table / the Black family tree

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

Dumbledad wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter/message/29528 :

<< I cannot resist a quick gloat because I am sooooo excited about my
dinner engagement tonight. 
My boss ( http://research.microsoft.com/~krw/ ) has just been made a
Senior Member of High Table at Corpus Christi College in Cambridge
UK. This means he can invite people along for dinner there, and he's
taking me along as his first guest! >>

I am very excited and envious to hear it! But I'm also cynical: is the
conversation wonderfully intellectual and witty or profound, or is it
all people bragging about who got the best deal on refinancing their
house?

<< Unfortunately I do not have a gown, but most of the people there
will be in them. >>

Did anyone offer to lend you a gown?

<< You can see the hall I think we'll be eating in if you pan left on
this ( http://www.corpus.cam.ac.uk/about/virtualtour/02e.htm )
panorama of the Corpus Christi College New Court. Corpus Christi was
founded in 1352. Wow, this is great. >>

My old college (Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, I flunked
out) had buildings that looked like those (it was founded in
1890-something, not 1350-something). While it was famous that Thomas
Hall was copied from some building at Oxford (sorry, I've forgotten
which one), Pembroke Hall resembled this photo, especially Pem Arch. I
also couldn't help noticing the scaffolding and green net....

Phil Vlasek wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter/message/29537 ;

<< Author J.K. Rowling would be donating an item to auction in order
to help Book Aid International (snip) Reader Tony let us know that it
is the Black Family Tree, with a portion of the names showing in a
photo. (snip) "There are several familiar names visible, (snip)
http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org

Michael Chance wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter/message/29538 :

<<for those of you haven't seen them yet, JKR draw a diagram of the
Black Family Tree, for a charity auction. Two pictures from the front
of the latest issue of the UK Telegraph can be found here -
http://chance.slashcity.net/blackfamilytree.html One is a picture of
the whole page, with the drawing by JKR on the top right, the 2nd
picture is a close up of what is shown of the actual family tree. >>

Thanks to both of you, Phil and Michael, for the heads-up. The
slashcity one accessed a *lot* faster than the Leaky Cauldron one. I
hope we will see the whole document sometime. Until then, I feel some
disappointment; I thought it would be cute if the Black family arms
was solid black, or at least a black image on a black background
(which violates the color-on-metal/metal-on-color law of heraldry, but
since when Dark Wizards care about laws?). 

Also, the astronomical naming thing. It perhaps came in with Ursula
(Ursus Minor) Black nee Flint, whose son was named Arcturus (the
bear-herder IIRC), but his sister Belvina and daughter Callidora and
Charis aren't known to me as stars, constellations, planets, or moons.