Lily's magical background

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 112552

Hen Wen wrote:
> > Please correct me if I am wrong -- I thought that Lily's 
> grandparents were  wizards.  I got that impression from the FAQ
About the Books section of JKR's website.  Under the question of 
Half-Blood/Pure-Blood she write "Therefore Harry would be considered
only 'half wizard' because of his mother's grandparents."
> > 
> > I take that to imply that Lily's grandparents were wizards.  Their
> > child (one of Lily's parents) must have been a squib.
> > 
> From Karen:
> 
> James Potter is a full-blood.  For Harry to be a half-blood, Lily is 
> a Muggle.  Therefore, Lily's grandparents are Muggles.

Carol:
Not a Muggle (a person with no magical powers) but a Muggleborn, the
witch or wizard child of two Muggles. She still has Muggle blood in
the sense that her parents are Muggles, which explains how Harry can
be a Half-blood despite having a witch and a wizard as parents.

I think the part about "Lily's grandparents" is another slip of the
keyboard; JKR seems to have meant "Lily's parents"/"Harry's
grandparents." At any rate, there's no doubt from the books that Lily
is a Muggleborn. Young Snape calls her a "mudblood"; young Tom Riddle
compares her with his own father, as always equating Muggles with
Muggleborns.

Her parents are Muggles and so is her sister (as we've been told
repeatedly since the first chapter of the first book). Her
grandparents were presumably Muggles as well, but it's her parents who
are important in determining Harry's status as a half-blood, no
different in Riddle!Voldemort's view from himself as far as bloodlines go.

Carol