[HPforGrownups] Re: Official Philip Nel Question #9: House Elves (include...

[ladjables]

No: HPFGUIDX 39195


--- dicentra63 <dicentra at xmission.com> wrote: 
> I ran across this in a recent re-reading of CoS
> (Scholastic 29, emphasis mine):
> 
> "Yeah, Mum's always wishing we had a house-elf to do
> the ironing," said George. "But all we've got is a 
> lousy old ghoul in the attic and gnomes in the 
> garden. House-elves *come with* big old manors and
> castles and places like that; you wouldn't catch one
> in our house..."
> 
> Do house-elves "come with" mansions and castles the
> way roaches come with cheap motels?  Is the mansion
> the house-elf's natural habitat? George certainly 
> seems to imply it.  Maybe if you build a mansion you
> automatically get house-elves.  Whether it's their
> choice (of sorts) or they're magically or 
> psychologically drawn to mansions, I can't
> say: we simply don't know enough.
> 
> At any rate, it does answer the question of why the
> Weasleys don't have a house-elf, even though you 
> don't have to pay them: they don't have the right 
> kind of house. 
 

I've also been mulling over the historical attachment
of house-elves to castles and mansions.  Could
"house"-elf have originally referred to the noble,
pureblood, wizarding family the elf serves, as in
House of Windsor, House Atreides, etc.?  Maybe
house-elves came with ancestral manors because these
properties were owned by old families such as the
Crouches and Malfoys, although I don't know if they
qualify as the royal dynasties of the WW.  

Perhaps, as society changed, pureblood families
disintegrated and some house-elves were displaced, so
the Relocation Office was established to redirect
house-elves.  Or, maybe these mansions became the
homes of the nouveau-riche, and house-elves were
retained, prized as signifiers of "old-wealth".  
Assuming though the attachment to property or person
may have blurred over time.  Does this make a lick of
sense?  Still giggling at the roach motel comparison
though!
Ama


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