My weekly catch-up post: scroll through it for topics/names

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

No: HPFGUIDX 58614

"Jennye" wrote:

<< BTW, is there a typo in this quote? It says he is the *ancestor* 
of Salazar Slytherin. Wouldn't he be the descendant?  >>

This is a topic that has been MUCH discussed. If it's true that 
Voldemort is "the last ancestor" of Salazar Slytherin, that suggests 
that Voldemort travels back in time to become SS's ancestor. However, 
saying "ancestor" for "descendent" is a common error in Muggle USA. I 
used the Goat Pad http://www.geocities.com/aberforths_goat/ to find 
the JKR interview 
http://www.scholastic.com/harrypotter/author/transcript2.htm in which 
JKR was asked that question:

Q: Harry Potter for grownups again! Is Voldemort the last remaining 
ancestor of Slytherin, or the last remaining descendent of Slytherin?
JKR: Ah, you spotted the deliberate error. Yes, it should read 
"descendent." That's been changed in subsequent editions. (Keep hold 
of the "ancestor" one, maybe it'll be valuable one day!) 

Some Brits on this list have explained that "deliberate error" is 
Brit-speak for "big huge howlingly obvious error that I can't believe 
I was ever stupid enough to make".

By the way, another question is that interview is relevant to another 
topic recently discussed on list:

Q:   Will you ever include more illustrations?
JKR: I don't like too many illustrations in novels; I prefer to 
use my imagination about what people look like. So the answer is, 
probably not.

It seems to me that her reason for not liking illustrations also 
applies to detailed descriptions of what characters look like.

Steve bboy_mn wrote:

<< Would seem to imply that the complete blood lines of many old 
wizarding families are hanging by a thread. >>

I believe that is due to a couple of factors. First, that wizarding 
couples have few children. I've argued that they *could* have three 
or four children despite raising each of them as an only child (cf. 
Steve bboy_mn's post 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/58162 ), but I 
suspect that most wizarding couples have only one or two children. 
They feel like they have LOTS of time, so they postpone child-bearing 
until they're financially settled and no longer want to spend all 
their time partying or establishing their careers, and they're so 
accustomed to a physically comfortable life (achieved by use of 
magic) that they are turned off by the noise and dirtiness and burden 
of raising children, and they have magical contraception that is 
100% reliable if used ... *waves at Patricia Bullington-McGuire's 
excellent post 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/58136 *

Second, it seems likely to me that Slytherin heirs would have a 
tendency to murder each other, siblings fighting for the inheritance, 
children in a hurry to inherit from their parents, parents who find 
their children unsatisfactory...

Altho' I would prefer a Potterverse in which TMR was NOT the last 
descendent of Salazar Slytherin, as I like to imagine the Potterverse 
with MANY people bragging that their families are descended from 
Salazar Slytherin, including the Malfoys and the Snapes. *waves at 
Linda KidAtHeart's post 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/58256 *

Third, surnames travelling through the male line: while TMR 
proclaimed himself the last descendent of Salazar Slytherin through 
any line, male or female, I think it is very possible that 
Dumbledore's statement: "Your Dementor has just destroyed the last 
remaining member of a pure-blood family as old as any" applied only 
to people with the surname Crouch, so Barty Sr could have been 
survived by a sister who had taken a husband's surname.

Darrin wrote:

<< me thinking about who was in which house when they went to 
Hogwarts. (snip) Trelawney - Make her a Ravenclaw,>>

I feel sure that Trelawney was a Slythie. I'm not sure whether her 
goal is that she wants to be esteemed as a Divinator or she wants to 
keep that job as Divination Professor, but she doesn't like little 
things like truthfulness, kindness, or personal dignity keeps her 
from what she does to meet that goal.

I like to believe that Hooch was a Hufflepuff. Of course, I also like 
to believe that her name is Hieronyma Horacia Hooch, and there's no 
canon for that, either.

bowlwoman replied:

<< Well, there are lots of wizards/witches mentioned as minor 
characters, but I'm sure they would fall into the "not enough known" 
category (Rita Skeeter, Amos Diggory, Ludo Bagman, Mad-Eye Moody and 
the Longbottoms, etc) >>

Rita Skeeter is another one (like Lockhart) whom I'm convinced was a 
Slythie. They get income, fame, admiration (from middle-aged ladies, 
to Lockhart) and power (by threatening to write articles against 
people, to Skeeter) from their writing, and (again) don't little 
things like truthfulness or kindness interfere.

I believe that Amos Diggory was a 'Puff. I base that more on my idea 
that Cedric was in Hufflepuff by family tradition than by examples of 
Amos being loyal to his son (by singing his praises) and his friend 
(arranging to protect Mad-Eye from punishment for the dustbin 
incident).

I believe that the Longbottoms were Gryffies. Again, no good reason 
except family tradition. I imagine that Auror is a Gryffie line of 
work, but I can't use that as a reason because I am almost convinced 
by Barb's suggestion that Mad-Eye Moody was a Slythie ... set a Slyth 
to catch a Slyth.

As for Ludo Bagman, it makes a difference whether he's just an idiot 
who happens to be good at Quidditch or he's a Death Eater or what.

Valky wrote:

<< By the way I always pictured Godric gryffindor with Red Hair. It 
was just the image his name conjured up. How many of us can honestly 
say that we didn't hmmm? >>

I always pictured Godric Gryffindor with black hair, but that may be 
fanfic contamination. I picture Salazar Slytherin with black hair 
also, and a resemblance to Snape, not Draco, and Rowena with red and 
Helga with blonde. While I'm babbling, these are the ages I picture 
them as being at the time of the Founding: Godric and Helga are 
middle-aged i.e. over 100. Rowena is very young, 20 to 25. Salazar is 
*centuries* old: he made or stole a Philosopher's Stone, depending on 
how spiritually advanced the maker has to be in the Potterverse.

danielle dassero wrote:

<< Where does it say that Mcgonagall is the only Animagi. Hermione 
says there is only 7 registered ones. Mcgonagall being one of them, 
who is the other 6?? >>

In the fanfic that I wrote, 2 of the other 6 are the Prewetts, who 
were mentioned by Hagrid as people killed by Voldemort: " he'd killed 
some o' the best witches an' wizards of the age -- the McKinnons, the 
Bones, the Prewetts" In my version of the Potterverse, they were 
Hufflepuffs, so they followed the rules and registered. Btw, I assume 
that Prewett is pronounced "Pruitt", but I keep seeing a pre-wet 
(before wet) pun in it.

Innermurk wrote:

<< If so, I wonder if Flitwick is part House Elf instead of part 
Goblin like some have speculated. >>

IF Flitwick is half-House Elf OR half-Goblin, is employing him at 
Hogwarts and making him Head of Ravenclaw House another example of 
Dumbledore making room for society's rejects?

"tristhe Andromeda" wrote of Lucius Malfoy's name:

<< Lucius--(adj) pleasing, seductive, luxurious; obscenely so. (snip) 
from dictionary.com: lus.cious (adj) loo-shus >>

I totally agree about "Malfoy" meaning "bad faith", and am fascinated 
by the info about the word "luscious", but Lucius is not named 
"luscious" (despite the number of Jason Isaacs fans who call him 
that). The name "Lucius" refers to Light, and JKR probably intended 
to remind us of Lucifer (which means "light bearer" because it was a 
title of the Morning Star).

Annemehr wrote:

<< Does anyone else besides me think that Dobby would actually have 
been quite happy (as the kitchen elves are) to act like a "normal" 
house elf, except that his life with the Malfoys pushed him past his 
limits? >>

Yes! Me!

Except I am slightly troubled by Dobby's statement that during the 
VRoT, House Elves were treated like vermin, as Dobby still is. 1) 
Wouldn't being treated like vermin have made some other House Elves 
think subversive thoughts? 2) Surely half-way decent people (even 
Crouches) wouldn't treat their House Elves like vermin just because 
Voldemort had a lot of followers, 3) maybe it was only the Voldemort 
followers who treated their House Elves like vermin, and they stopped 
doing so when the MoM got free time to enforce (hypothetical) laws 
against cruelty to House Elves, and only Lucius kept it up because 
only Lucius is above the law.  

Finchen wrote:

<< I do not think you would find something about a vampire in any 
book about magical creatures except for it would be a part of an 
anthology about DADA. So one better trys out that section to find 
out anything about one and not a book used in CoMC. >>

But I really do believe that (the hard-cover and non-abridged edition 
of) FABULOUS BEASTS *was* the DADA textbook the year Lupin taught -- 
it has all the creatures that PoA mentioned that they studied, 
including Werewolf at the End of the Book. Except it doesn't have 
Vampires (who are Beings not Beasts) so I don't know how Lupin 
assigned a Vampire essay. As for why they bought it for first year, 
maybe Snape was right (despite his nastiness) that they were a bunch 
of third-years doing work from the first-year curriculum, because 
neither Quirrell nor Lockhart had Taught the first-year curriculum.

Linda wrwote:

<< would an ISP for wizards be called WOL? >>

Especially because Wol is the name of the Owl in Winnie-the-Pooh.

Vivamus wrote:

<< Has anyone noticed that there are 24 hours missing from the 
time Hagrid picked up Harry and the time he delivered him to the 
Dursleys'? >>

Here is a FAQ about it: 
http://www.i2k.com/~svderark/lexicon/timeline_potters2.html#Hagrid

Eric Oppen wrote:

<< Hogwarts is different is that it ignores, as much as possible, the 
British class system. >>

It always seemed to me that JKR put Justin Finch-Fletchley (cliche 
of upper-class character) in Hufflepuff and the Creevey brothers 
(whose father is a milkman, a working-class job) in Gryffindor to 
emphasize that the wizarding folk do not care a bit about the Muggle 
class system. Because they have their own class system, not because 
they're so enlightened and liberal. But she blurred that message by 
using the class traits that Muggle readers would recognize when she 
depicted class in the wizarding world: Malfoys as upper class and 
Stan Shunpike as lower-class.

Anita Saithe wrote:

<< the King of Eagles, Garuda that he mentions, is the vehicle of 
Vishnu, the protector God. The Ravenclaw symbol is the Eagle (Padma's 
house). >>

I thought Garuda was the vehicle of Indra, sky/storm god called King 
of the Gods, but not as high a god as the Three (called Trimurti?). 
Shiva's vehicle is Nandi the bull, but I can't remember whom I was 
told was Vishnu's vehicle. 

<< Padma: This is Sanskrit for 'lotus', another character named after 
a flower. A huge lotus is what Brahma, the Creator rests on. >>

I think of Padma as a Vishnaiva name, because as Vishnu sleeps on the 
coils of the cosmic serpent (is that his vehicle?) with his feet 
resting in the lap of his wife Lakshmi goddesss of wealth and beauty 
(he is the Preserver, she is goddess of some things that people are 
eager to preserve), there is a Lotus growing out of his navel. That 
Lotus, sometimes personified as a goddess Padma, is the entire 
physical world, the illusory material world that we experience, 
also called Maya ('illusion', a related word to 'magic') and Lila 
('play'). So sometimes it is said that Padma, Maya, and Lila are 
junior wives of Vishnu and sometimes that they are additional aspects 
of Lakshmi.

It originally struck me as strange that twin sisters had one a 
Vishnaiva name and the other a Shiva-ist (what is that called?) name, 
but listie Madhuri567 commented that that is not unusual, in her own 
Vishnaiva family, one of her siblings has a Shivite name.

<< the Gujrathi community, from the state of Gujrath. A popular last 
name found in this community is 'Patel'. These people are primarily 
businessmen by profession and very good ones too. They also form a 
large part of the country's immigrants and it's become quite common 
to find them in the US and UK. I won't be surprised if any of you 
know more than one Patel. (snip) Patil is a surname found commonly in 
the 'Marathi' community, from the state of Maharashtra, that's where 
I come from, many of my friends are Patils! >>

I hesitate to disagree with someone who lives in the relevant place, 
but I was under the impression that here in USA, Patel and Patil are 
interchangeable spellings of the same name. Last year I heard a news 
story about 90% of motels and small hotels in USA are owned by 
Gujrathi immigrants named Patil and Patel. 

<< I wonder if the Patil sisters too come from an old wizarding 
family and may play a larger role in the future. I mean, of all the 
Indian last names - wonder why she picked Patil? >> 

I kind of assumed that JKR just picked a South Asian surname that 
she'd encountered from someone she'd met, and then picked Indian 
first names that alliterated with it. Some listie was arguing that 
many people named Patil or Patel are Muslims, and I said Muslims 
wouldn't name their daughter after a Hindu goddess, and the other 
person said JKR might not even know that those names are Hindu, only 
that they're names of people she's met from India.

Anita again:

<< What do you mean everything about Neville screams working class?>>

I didn't know it myself, but IIRC a listie said that surnames like 
Longbottom are characteristic of North-eastern England, and in that 
area, Neville and Algernon (the uncle who gave him the toad) used to 
be very common names in the working class. 

Joe S wrote:

<< Would anyone like to hazard a guess as to the exact ages of Arthur 
and Molly Weasly? I haven't been able to find reference to their age 
anywhere in canon or on reference sites. I'm thinking mid forties to 
early fifties, judging merely by appearences, but then that could be 
off, as wizards seem to age quite gracefully and live longer then the 
average human. >>

I believe that they're 70-ish, a little older than McGonagall (who 
was stated by JKR to be 'a spritely 70' and drawn by JKR looking 
30-ish), but were at Hogwarts with McGonagall and Riddle. I haven't 
decided whether it would more dramatic if Arthur missed out on being 
Head Boy because Riddle got the job, or if Arthur was Head Boy (by 
being a different year than Riddle) but has such a dreary job history 
as an adult.  

Huggs!Becky wrote of Lockhart's claim of Homorphus Charm:

<< The spell's effects only work at that time. Even then, since they 
know when he's going to transform, somebody like Dumbledore I'm sure 
wouldn't find it too much trouble to cast it on him so that he could 
remain human and continue to function. It seems to me if there is a 
magickal cure for warewolves, be it temporary or permenent beyond the 
partial cure of the potion, it would have been used. >>

It seems to me that the Homorphus Charm only turns him back into 
human form for 30 seconds. That's long enough for the villagers to 
recognise one of their neighbors, so in the future they can deal with 
him. Ideally, they would deal with him by chaining him up securely 
every month just before Full Moon, but I sadly expect that they dealt 
with him by killing him when he was in human form in mid-month, 
probably when he was asleep so he was even less able to defend 
himself. Anyway, not even Dumbledore can reasonably commit to cast 
a spell on Lupin every 30 seconds all night, possibly all day and 
night. 

Another theory is that the Homorphus Charm has terrible side-effects, 
such as that it burns out the victim's brain, leaving him in a coma 
for life, or at least profoundly brain-damaged and mentally disabled. 
No one who cares about Lupin would wish that on him.

Ali wrote:

<< In Britain there is no equivalent of a successful completion of 
studies at school. We move up a year whether we have been 
outstandingly successful or can't read or write (usually). >>

Remember what Hermione and Ron's conversation about the end-of-year 
exams in PS/SS?

<< "Hermione, the exams are ages away."

"Ten weeks," Hermione snapped. "That's not ages, that's like a second 
to Nicolas Flamel."

"But we're not six hundred years old," Ron reminded her. "Anyway, 
what are you studying for, you already know it all."

"What am I studying for? Are you crazy? You realize we need to pass
these exams to get into the second year? They're very important, I
should have started studying a month ago, I don't know what's gotten
into me...." >>

"You realize we need to pass these exams to get into the second 
year?" I've always imagined that Hermione didn't really say that, 
because I cannot believe that her self-doubt is so extreme that she 
can even imagine that she might not pass the end of year exams (after 
getting A+ 100% on her homework all year!). However, it suggests that 
Hogwarts doesn't have the move-up-regardless method you mentioned. 
Backed up by this other quote: "They had hoped that Goyle, who was 
almost as stupid as he was mean, might be thrown out, but he had 
passed, too."

Aaah. All caught up, and it's only 12:55 in the morning.