[HPforGrownups] 382 BC (Ollivander's)

[eloiseherisson at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 46666


> Audra:
> 
> >I'm not a history buff, so I don't know exactly what was going on in the
> >world in 382 BC when an Ollivander supposedly started making wands.  I
> >wonder if there was any significance to that specific year?  I was able to
> find a
> >few sources that say that say (in the real world at least) that the Druids
> in
> >Britain were the first to use wands, and they go back as early as 500 BC.
> >This means that the original Ollivander was probably a Druid.
> 

(Staying in the real world for the time being.)

Well, I don't want to open the whole Druid can of worms. It's one of those 
problematical concepts, like the idea of the Celts, which have both popular 
academic meanings and whose original significance is fraught with uncertainty 
and controversy. At least for academics. I'd better stop there, I think. ;-)

But....I just wonder *where* the original Ollivander started making wands. If 
the date is recorded, it is unlikely to be in pre-Roman, or 
pre-Roman-discovered Britain.
In 382 BC, we're in the realms of British pre-history and before the Romans 
even started expanding out of Italy. It's even before the Greek Pytheas wrote 
his account (in about 320) of his voyage in which he quite possibly 
circumnavigated Britain and which is probably the first direct encounter 
between Britain and the Classical world.

This isn't to say that Britain was totally out of touch with continental 
Europe. That's not true at all. But there IMHO, there's considerable doubt as 
to whether it would have been possible to assign a precise date to the 
setting up of a British wand-makers back in the pre-Roman Iron Age as Britain 
had no direct connection with a literate, calendar-using society which could 
have recorded this.

Either Ollivander wasn't British, or the British wizarding community was in 
much closer contact with the wizarding communities of other, more civilised 
societies than the rest of the population.

Eloise



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