[HPforGrownups] Hogwarts numbers

[manawydan]

No: HPFGUIDX 51881

Trond:

>manawydan wrote:
>> "Prisoner", Chapter 15 says of the Quidditch final: "Three quarters of
the
>> crowd were wearing scarlet ... two hundred people were wearing green..."

>Does it say that there are only students in the crowd?

I'd be interested in your speculations about who else might be there (apart
from the faculty, of course).

>> I don't pretend to be an expert at maths, but that sounds to me very much
>> like a total of 800.

>Sure. about 800 people are watching the final.

I can conceive that a small number of students would not have been there
(those who were ill, or possibly those who hated Quidditch and wouldn't turn
up even for the final) but context suggests that they were few - no one's
ever mentioned as being uninterested in the game, even soccer follower Dean.

>It's just that the only spectator that is identified in this crowd is
>Snape. The crowd could include wizards from Hogsmeade as well.

We don't of course have any information about the possible population of
Hogsmeade. One little line of speculation (which would resolve the other
problem in this thread about the faculty) is that there are a lot of
teachers whom we have not met yet (where does Grubbly-Plank appear from, for
example? And who teaches the other options, like Muggle Studies, Runes,
etc?). It's been pointed out somewhere (can't remember where) that the
teachers all appear to be unmarried. Possibly the ones who live on the
premises are the unmarried ones and the married teachers live somewhere else
with their spouses and families (eg in Hogsmeade). This would indeed allow
for a slightly larger number of spectators at the game.

>Now, to be honest, I don't have any strong feelings about the total
>number of students. My gut feeling tells me that 1000 students is way
>too many, but if the number is nailed down in one of the future books,
>then I'll accept it. (It'll be worse if James and Lily turns out to be

One possible reading of the "1000" would be that it's the potential number
rather than the actual number at the time of the books.

Cheers

Ffred

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