Intro from Alferian and Avalon Center

[James Maertens]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "justcarol67"
<justcarol67 at ...> wrote:
>
> 
> Carol responds:
> Hi, Alferian. Welcome to the group. This isn't a magical education
> question, but I'm wondering if you have any thoughts on the Veil in
> the Death Room of the Ministry of Magic of the Department of Mysteries
> in general. I was wondering specifically if you thought there might be
> some connection between the veiled archway, which seems like a portal
> to the afterlife, and Druid ritual. I've wondered whether the Ministry
> might be built on the site of an ancient Druid site.


Ha!  Interesting idea.  Myself, I wish there were more druids in HP,
but they only get one or two mentions, I believe.  Rowling avoids
referring directly to druids or Wiccan witches probably to keep her
world separate from the real world of druids and witches.  Essentially
druis are wizards and the doorway does have some likeness to a
trilithon (the two upright stones and one on top as at Stonehenge),
but, no I don't see any overt connection there.  

London was a Celtic city before it was a Roman one, IIRC, and of
course is famous as the place where the Head of Bran was deposited to
forever guard Britain from invaders.  But there's little of Celtic
lore and the old divinities in Rowling, alas.  The way she has used
the Faerie folk is mostly as monsters and comic relief, which can't be
earning her any "brownie points" with the Brownies in Scotland.

Of course, the robes, the similarities between Dumbledore and Merlin
-- those are connections to the druids and the old British legends.