Where is the bathroom?

[jodel at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 45479

Stever posts a nice puzzle regarding just what floor Moaning Myrtle's 
bathroom is on, touching upon the knotty first floor/ground floor problem 
between British and American usage.

I'm not sure of the actual level of Myrtle's bathroom, but the floor name 
knot unravels a bit when you realize where the terms came from. It's been 
some years, but i think I'm still fairly accurate on this;

The term came from the way castles are built. Traditionally, the people who 
built castles didn't necessarily excavate a hole under them. (Palaces may be 
another issue altogether, but we're talking about castles here.) The 
foundation stones may have been set into the earth, but the outer wall is 
built on top of them with no sub-basement. The dirt-floored "ground" floor 
was actually on the ground, and the entrance was not on that level, because 
it was better and easier to defend an entrance one level up. Ergo, the 
"first" floor = the entry floor. The ground floor is chiefly used for 
storage. 

Of course this is just a castle "keep", not the whole castle complex, which 
includes the stables courtyard and a good deal of other things which are on 
the ground level.

If Hogwarts Castle is built acording to this manner (and it's older than the 
Tower of London, so it ought to be) the dungeons are actually the "ground" 
floor. The "first" floor is the main entry floor and the rest follows. 

Except in a wizarding world, which may have it's own principles of 
architecture.