[HPforGrownups] Sirius's Bike - Serverus - Homorphus - Draco/Dragon - Map - Loyal Servant - Paintings

[Susan Hall]

No: HPFGUIDX 19916


>It was Arthur who wrote the law about not using enchanted Muggle
>artifacts. Maybe it hadn't been enacted yet in 1981.

The International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy dates from 1692 and s.13 bans
conspicious magical activity  which risks attracting Muggle notice.  Under
the predecessor statue conspicious Qudditch playing was banned as early as
1362.  Flying Carpets ceased to be legal after Barty Crouch Senior's
grandfather's day, but probably before Crouch's father inherited the family
Axminster.  The law that Arthur Weasley was trying to get through (in 1992)
was a Muggle Protection Act which may be a different law  to the law he
drafted with built in loophole to allow him to enchant the Ford Anglia (but
not, of course, to fly it), which we have no date for.   In any event, the
mischief aimed at by these laws seems to be putting enchanted objects into
Muggle circulation, not making yourself magically noticeable.  So Sirius
might not have committed an offence by enchanting the motorbike (if he did -
and I'm sure few motorbikes could resist) but would certainly have committed
a section 13 offence by flying it.

Susan