Minding your Manors

[serenadust <jmmears@comcast.net>]

No: HPFGUIDX 52608

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "manawydan" <manawydan at n...> 
wrote:
> Nicole wrote:
> 
> >Point taken.  :)  It's just my assumption that it is
> >based on the fact that it's called a "manor" and given
> >the knowledge that there are servants.  The expensive
> >brooms Lucius buys for the Quidditch team also helps
> >me lean towards the idea of the manor being huge.


Manawydan replied:
 
> If it was huge, it wouldn't have been called a manor! Among the 
19th century
> English aristocracy, it was the smaller landowners (the squires) 
who would
> have lived in manors. A house would have been much bigger than a 
manor. And
> if you were right at the top, you would have had a palace...
> 
> Which would lead me to see the Malfoys as being squirearchy rather 
than
> magnate class (if indeed the WW has a magnate class - how would 
they hide
> all that land, after all?)
> 

I'm surprised that you say that a house would be much bigger than a 
manor.  I checked the American Heritiage College Dictionary (which 
is admittedly American) and it defines manor as:
1a. a landed estate, b. the main house on an estate

It defines manor house as:
2. the house of the lord of the manor

This may be a US/UK difference, but since I live in a house, I'm 
having a very hard time believing that it's bigger than the Malfoy 
manor. Surely the quirarchy (I love this term!)would still be living 
on a fairly grand scale. Maybe I'm just misunderstanding what you 
wrote, but wouldn't a manor still be quite large and impressive 
compared to say, Privet Drive (and certainly The Burrow!)?


Jo Serenadust, just wondering

Jo Serenadust