Harry Never Howls; Rowena as The Grey Lady; House Ghosts

[Steve Vander Ark]

No: HPFGUIDX 25723

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., magpie1112 at y... wrote:

> 
> > I have been harboring a suspicion that the Grey Lady is Madame 
> > Ravenclaw herself.
> 
> *  Becky - I have to say that I too believe that The Grey Lady is 
> none other than Rowena Ravenclaw protecting her house.  The only 
> description we have in SS/PS is "the ghost of a tall witch", so my 
> mind runs rampant.  And in all honsty, that description may not 
even 
> be about The Grey Lady - we know that other ghosts can be on 
Hogwarts
>  grounds at any given time; 


There are about 25 ghosts at Hogwarts (or there were in 1991). The 
tall witch in SS12 IS the Gray Lady, according to JKR. The idea that 
the Gray Lady is Rowena is interesting. There is nothing in the canon 
to indicate one way or another, but since the other three don't seem 
likely to be Helga Hufflepuff, Godric Gryffindor, or Salazar 
Slytherin (who looks sort of monkey-ish, not at all like the Baron), 
it doesn't seem to be the type of thing JKR is going for with those 
characters. But anything's possible. Well, just about anything. I'm 
fairly certain that the Fat Friar is NOT Helga Hufflepuff.


> party.  I second your cry - are there any L.O.O.N.'s out there who 
> can confirm/deny?


We know absolutely nothing about how long the ghosts have been around 
in the official capacity as House Ghosts, or indeed why a House NEEDS 
a ghost. We do have a sense that they may be many years old, since 
Nick certainly is and the character of a Fat Friar seems like a 
medieval image to me, sort of Robin Hood-ish. As for the Bloody 
Baron, we don't know a thing about him. We only hear his voice once, 
and it's really not his, it's Harry trying to SOUND like him. He is 
covered with blood, of course, but it's described as "silvery." This 
may be simply because he's a ghost and EVERYTHING about him is 
silvery, but on the other hand, we are told in SS that unicorn blood 
is silvery as well. And okay, so that might be because we're seeing 
it in the moonlight, but on the other hand...



> 
> And BTW - do we know how long each house has had its resident 
ghost?  
> Have they always been there, or do they come and go?  I know NHN's 
> 500th deathday occurred in CoS; does anyone know when Hogwarts was 
> established?  Sorry Steve - too terrified I'll lose my post to 
check 
> the Lexicon....

Gee, Denise, I had no idea that I scared you so much! I've always 
thought of myself as rather meek and mild-mannered. :)

Just for the record: If I post links to the Lexicon or the FAQs, I'm 
not meaning it to be critical, just to give people a chance to read 
up on something that interests them. For example, if someone were to 
ask about the Hogwarts ghosts, I might include these links, just to 
be nice and give information junkies a fix:

http://www.i2k.com/~svderark/lexicon/ghosts.html

That page has links to pages about various ghosts and a terrific 
essay by Mike Gray. 


Steve "Fearsome" Vander Ark
The Harry Potter (Whup Upside the Head) Lexicon
http://www.i2k.com/~svderark/lexicon