A varied post on Latin

[Jim Flanagan]

No: HPFGUIDX 3089


> I thought Avada Kedavra was intended to be interpreted as the un-
garbled, original form of the standard "magic word" abracadabra. 
<snip>
> --Amanda

When I first heard it I thought abracadabra, too.  But Rowling 
studied French, and probably built in a bilingual pun:

Avada - sounds like "avoir," Fr. for "to have"
Kedavra - sounds like cadaver (cadavre, Fr.), a dead body

Thus Avada Kedavra sounds like "to have the dead body."

-Jim Flanagan