[HPforGrownups] Sirius a "pureblood"? - SB's/RL's regret

[Monika Huebner]

No: HPFGUIDX 37214


Grey Wolf wrote:

> We know for certain that James was a "pureblood" (that is, he came from
> a wizard family), that Lily came from a muggle family, that Ron's
> family is pure wizards, etc. However, I'm pretty unsure of Sirius'
> origins. Are his family wizards, muggles or both? (Please give as much
> canon as possible).

Well, I'm afraid we can't give you any canon there, because there is
no canon. We don't know anything about Sirius' family background,
and believe me, if there were the slightest hint to it, I would have
noticed. ;)

> To start you out, the only canon I could recall on the matter is
> Harry's letter to Siruius at the start of GoF, in which he explains:
> (liberal translation) "[...] Dursley threw his console out of the
> window. It's a sort of computer you can play games on" (end of ch. 2,
> GoF) (as always, I'd be grateful if someone could find me the correct
> quote).

The quote is almost correct: "That's a sort of computer thing you
can play games on."

> The first time I read that, I though Sirius had to be from a wizard
> family, or wouldn't have needed explaining. However, I'm not so sure
> about that anymore. First off, Harry explains the videoconsole by using
> an analogy to a computer, which a wizard wouldn't know either, so
> Sirius would have to be from a muggle family

Interesting idea, I haven't thought of the fact that he wouldn't know
about computers, either, so the analogy would be lost on him. A
while ago, I have speculated a bit about Sirius' origins with a fellow
Sirius fan, and I came to the conclusion that he could be at least
half Muggle, because he was able to survive in the woods without
his wand. He must be able to light a fire somehow, and we know from
GoF that pureblood wizards are a bit lost with things like matches.

> Sirius has been out of contact with the muggle world 20 years (since he
> started Hogwats), and out of contact with the rest of the world for 13
> years (since he was thrown into Azkaban). This means that, when he was
> a child (10 years old or so), he could have heard about computers, but
> the first consoles didn't start to appear until 1985-1986 (at the very
> least, I think). By then, he had already been thrown into prison, so he
> wouldn't have known about it.

Sounds reasonable to me. When he was a child, there were no computers.
I think he must have been born around the same year as I was, and there
were certainly no such things when I was a little girl. And then he lost contact
with both the Muggle and the wizarding world because he was in prison.
But there isn't anything in canon that really mentions his family.


lilahp wrote:

>After all, Sirius, while indeed the godfather, is always beating himself up
>about not being around for Harry.

<snip>

>Remus consoles Sirius that Sirius couldn't have done anything different for
>Harry, since he was in prison

I think you are mixing up canon and fanfiction here. Sirius and Remus haven't
had any time yet to talk, they only meet once in canon, in the Shrieking Shack.
And we all know that nothing like that is said there. We know they spend the
summer after GoF together, but since Book 5 isn't out yet, we don't know
what happens during this time, or if we will get any S/R interaction at all.

Monika
who would *really* like to read JKR's notes on Sirius' childhood...

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