James gave his life, why no protection from him?

[mad_maxime]

No: HPFGUIDX 106578

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "coderaspberry77"
<rhinobabies at h...> wrote:
> > > (1) Lily must have done something more than just give her life 
> for 
> > > HP, becaue James did that and nothing happened.
> > > 
> > > or 
> > > 
> > > (2) there something about Lily that allows her to do this.
> > > 
> > > Thoughts?
> > > 
> > > Jake
> > 
> > Max responded:
> > 
> > I don't have the links where this was discussed before, but a 
> > number of us believe that Lily actively conjured the ancient magic
> > that saved Harry's life, and she probably did so before Voldemort
> > even entered the room. In order for the 'spell' to be activated, 
> > Lily knew that she would have to sacrifice herself for Harry. 
> 
> coderaspberry77 wrote:
 
> This is possible, but then again, at this point aren't James and 
> Lily 5 years removed from Hogwart's, at the most?  Would she have 
> learned this type of ancient magic in her studies or training for 
> whatever she did? <snip>  

Max responds:

We do know that she was skilled at Charms and her wand was well suited
  to charm work. But otherwise we know very little about Lily at this
point. It's possible that she was uniquely gifted with charms.

> coderaspberry77 wrote

> I am hoping we find out what the Potters did, but I have an inkling
> that either there's something very special about Lily, or else Becki
> was right in her earlier response to this post: That it was simply 
> undiluted, unadulterated, and purely unconditional love that 
> protected Harry. <snip> 

Max responds:

Something special about Lily is certainly possible, but I can't buy
this whole selfless sacrifice for love automatically means ancient
magic protection. If that were true people would have heard about it
before. There would be stories and legends about it. Lily could not
possibly be the first person to sacrifice herself for someone she
loved in the wizarding world, after all.  Yet we know from reading
PS/SS that Harry surviving the AK curse was unheard of.

So something is up there as far as I'm concerned. It makes no sense
that this type of protection would occur automatically.