Lily's magical background

[kmcbears1]

No: HPFGUIDX 112585

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "justcarol67" 
<justcarol67 at y...> wrote:
> 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.
> 
Karen:

Thanks for the correction on the Muggle vs Muggle-born.  I don't 
think JKR made a slip with "grandparents".  I think she wants us to 
know that all 8 of Lily's and Petunia's great-grandparents are 
Muggles.   Forgive me if I don't have the proper numbers but I seem 
to remember from an American history class that it requires 1/32 part 
of your background for a person to claim a ethnic connection.  

Using that 1/32 as my number for this discussion:

If Lily's grandparents were Muggles, a person would have to go back 9 
generations to find a non-Muggle ancestory of Lily.

I think this is JKR's point to keep us from being disappointed when 
Petunia and Lily do not have any "magical" ancestorys or affairs or 
step-relatives appearing in books 6 & 7.

- Karen