Silly question

[Carol]

zanooda:
> > Here is a sentence: "The graveyard is full of the names of ancient magical families, and this accounts, no doubt, for the stories of hauntings that have dogged the little church for many centuries".
> >
> > My question may seem a little silly, but since there is an argument, I have to ask: what exactly "have dogged" that church, stories or hauntings :-)?
> > Thank you!

Ali replied: 
> Not a silly question at all!!!  I've rewritten many a sentences at work just to clear up such problems (and it is an unclear sentence if one thinks about it).  :)
><snip>
> It could also reasonably be read as the hauntings dogged the little church and there are many stories.  Either way, though, I think the results are similar (because there are both hauntings and stories and both have dogged the church).
> 
> In short, I vote for the stories dogging the church.
<snip>

Carol responds:
I agree with Ali that it's not a silly question (your never are, zanooda!) and that the sentence is rather poorly written. Either reading or both could be correct. However, the sentence structure suggests that the stories, not the hauntings, have "dogged" the church, and it makes more sense that stories (rumors) would (figuratively) follow the church or its parishioners around like a pesky dog than that "hauntings" would. Also, I'm pretty sure that most of the Muggles in the area would dismiss the "hauntings" as imaginary (whereas we, as loyal HP fans, can be pretty sure that the ghosts are as "real" [within the context of the story] as Nearly Headless Nick or Moaning Myrtle).

So I also vote for "stories" despite initially having the opposite reaction. Still, though, I have trouble conceiving of either stories or hauntings "dogging" a church.

I was trying to account for the verb tense and the Dumbledorish style; I just realized that it must be a passage from Bathilda Bagshot's "History of Magic."

Carol, whose spell check doesn't mind "hauntings" but rejects "Dumbledorish"