Neville/ DeadMothers/ Pansy/ Geography of Founders/ Wizard Plumbing

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

No: HPFGUIDX 150753

pippin_999 wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150556 :

<< I wonder if Snape finally found out that the Lestranges knew
nothing of the prophecy when they  attacked the Longbottoms, and
that's why he's no longer picking on Neville in HBP? >>

Do we know that Snape is no longer picking on Neville in HBP? We
didn't see much of DADA class taught by Snape.

Tonks wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150627 :

<< First we have LV's mother who dies to give him life.
Then Harry's mother who dies to save Harry from death.
And Barty Jr's mother who died in her son's place.

It is always a mother dying for her son. Do we see a father dying for
a child?  Do we see anyone dying for a daughter? I can't remember but
if not, then there seems to be a theme here. But what is it, and why?

I hope this doesn't mean something bad for our beloved Molly. >>

The great Elkins posted long ago (after GoF) about a JKR trend of
idealizing sainted, spotless, dead mothers, while having comical and
vulgar types do the actual diaper-changing. Actually, the latter
referred only to Winky, whose motherly role to Barty Jr Elkins
carefully listed word by word. We have no evidence that perfect Lily
didn't change baby Harry's nappies for his first year and a half,
altho' it was vulgar, comical Petunia who got stuck with
toilet-training him. From HBP, we know that Merope was far from
perfect, but Mrs Cole was comically vulgar. As dear Molly is also
comically vulgar, this theory suggests she's safe. (But I don't doubt
that she'd rather die to save any of her children than live without
him/er.)

Betsy Hp wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150642 :

<< Quick_Silver [wrote]: << She sort of comes across as a female
Peter. >> Except she gets the guy she's panting after. <g> >>

This is a totally forbidden LOL post.

Nikkalmati wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150658 :

<< Pansy (snip) would be content to be Mrs. Draco for the rest of her
 life - not a very high ambition. >>

Marrying all that Malfoy money IS a pretty high ambition. It's not
easy to achieve, partly because there will be lots of other beautiful
gold-diggers competing once they get out of school, and it pays quite
well.

a_svirn wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150651 :

<< A propos of the history. Have we discussed the meaning of
the "geographical background", so to speak, of the four founders? If
there is any meaning, that is? I got the feeling that that Slytherin
was even geographically alien of some sort. Both ladies are
obviously from Scotland, from "glen" and from the "valley broad" â€"
Highlands and Midland Valley, I take it. "Wild moor" can be
anywhere, of course, but the most likely choice is North Yorkshire.
And "fen" is obviously Fen Country, which makes him the only
southerner among the northerners. That would have made a huge
difference a millennium ago. >>

Hi, a_svirn, I think you've been around long enough that you were here
the last time I got verbose about the geography of the Founders.
Unlike those who suggest that 'glen' MUST mean Scotland or 'valley
broad' MUST mean the Rhondda Valley in Wales, I think the geographical
features mentioned in the Sorting Hat's song are meaningless and
they're only there for rhyme. Helga is a Scandinavian name, so I say
she was of Scandinavian extraction and blonde and came from the
Danelaw, so she's the one who should be said to be coming from fen. 

Rowena and Godric are both Saxon names, but I say Rowena is the Saxon
(and red-haired because Rowena sounds like 'rowan') from South England
and Godric is the Welshman. I'm so pleased someone already pointed out
that a group of Saxon men-at-arms leavened with a Norman or three
trying to pronounce a name like 'Gryffydd Glyndwr' could come out with
something like Godric Gryffindor (okay, the Saxons say Godric
something I haven't figured out yet and the Normans say Gervais
Gryphon d'Or, and our Gryffydd put them together). The Godric
Gryffindor in my mind would have been amused to adopt this nomme de
guerre that had been bestowed upon him, and even to adopt the symbol
of a golden gryffin on a red field in its honor, while he was having
adventures in disguise as a Muggle.

(Yes, there were a few Normans wandering on Britain before the Norman
Conquest, according to Regia Anglorum at http://www.regia.org/  ) 

The name 'Salazar', however, doesn't come from the British Isles at
all. It comes from Iberia, where IIRC there is a Salazar Valley, and
last time around, I found sources that said 'Salazar' came from Basque
for 'old hall' from 'sala', hall or palace, and zarra, old. But other
listies claimed that 'sala' couldn't possibly be a Basque word....
Anyway, that would make Salazar Slytherin a foreigner, which would
make him even more of an outsider than one southerner among three
northerners.

Catherine Higgins said in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150652 :

<< I believe JKR had each of the founders come from each of the 4
Brittish isles: Scotland, Ireland, England and Wales. >>

I also think she had each of them come from a different ethnic group,
but I don't think there was one from Ireland -- there were enough
ethnic groups without leaving the big island. I mentioned Dane, Welsh,
and Saxon above, and there must have been one from Scotland,
considering that they put their school in Scotland. I kind of think
there should be two from Scotland, a Scot and a Pict.

IIRC, in the 900s, Scotland was named 'The Kingdom of the Scots and
Picts', in which the Picts were the people who were already there when
the Scots came over from Ireland. (I found some support for my
opinions in Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Scotland
which has a paragraph saying "In the wake of the Roman withdrawal
Scotland's population comprised two main groups:
	1. the Picts, a people of uncertain origin (but possibly a Brythonic
Celtic group) who occupied most of Scotland north of the Firth of
Clyde and the Firth of Forth: the area known as "Pictavia"
	2. the Britons formed a Roman-influenced Brythonic Celtic culture in
the south, with the kingdom of Y Strad Glud (Strathclyde) from the
Firth of Clyde southwards, Rheged in Cumbria, Selgovae in the central
Borders area and the Votadini or Gododdin from the Firth of Forth down
to the Tweed
	Invasions brought three more groups, though the extent to which they
replaced native populations is unknown
	1. the Old Irish-speaking Scotti (Irish) or more specifically, the
Dál Riatans, arrived from Ireland from the late 5th century onwards,
taking possession of the Western Isles and the west coast in the
Kingdom of Dál Riata."

Donna wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150724 :

<< I just realized that the entrance to the chamber[of Secrets] is a
large pipe located under a sink complete with water taps.  Now, my
question is:  did people living over a thousand years ago have sinks
and water taps for plumbing?  >>

Thank you for giving me an excuse for my rant.

I always say, in the Potterverse, the wizarding folk had indoor
plumbing with hot and cold running water and flush toilets ever since
Atlantis. All the various Muggles who 'invented' indoor plumbing
(Minoans, Romans, 18th century, etc) were really trying to copy what
they had seen when a guest in a wizarding home. Also, the wizarding
folk had elaborate castles ever since Atlantis, so it doesn't matter
that Muggle 'castles' were IIRC wooden huts surrounded by a muddy
ditch and a picket fence at the time of the Founders.

(I personally don't believe in Atlantis or primordial matriarchies,
but I also don't believe in flying carpets or House Elves. A large
part of the gimmick of the Potterverse is that many things which are
familiar folklore or fantasy motifs which every reader *knows* aren't
real, *are* real (altho' often garbled) in the Potterverse. So I think
I'm tremendously amusing to add Atlantis and primordial matriarchies
to the list of things that Muggles are too stupid to believe in.)

I believe that their plumbing empties into the lake via a magical
cleaning spell that transmutes all the waste products into pretty
flowers or such, but I fear that that mgical cleaning spell was put in
place by the lake's inhabitants, such as the merpeople, rather than by
the castle's occupants. Even tho' I believe that wizards have had
indoor plumbing with hot and cold running water and flush toilets for
over nine thousand years, I have no evidence that medieval wizards had
a higher concern for clean drinking water and pleasant smelling
surroundings than their Muggle contemporaries did.

I believe that Potterverse wizarding folk's late twentieth century
indoor plumbing and Renaissance 'replica' castles didn't need wizards
to know any plumbing, hydraulics, metallurgy, stonecarving, or
architecture because they made their bathrooms and castles by MAGIC!
However, Muggles who visted wizards and saw the nice things the
wizards had, had to invent all that technology in order to imitate the
wizarding goodies. There is a long history of Muggles trying to
imitate wizarding plumbing: Minoan, Classical Roman, etc.
 
The wizarding folk teach their children a lot of self-enhancing
falsehoods. One is that they teach their children that Muggles use
technology to imitate what wizards do by magic. Technology probably
*started* that way, Muggles trying to figure out how to make bathrooms
and castles and swords like the wizards had ... this may have remained
true up to the Steam Age, with Muggles inventing railroads to imitate
wizarding self-propelled wagons like at Gringotts, gaslight to imitate
the magical self-lighting candles on the wall of wizarding houses ...
but by then the discovery and invention of science and technology had
become self-propelling themselves, and with Electricity, Muggles went
on to invent things that the wizarding folk copy. The Wizarding
Wireless Network is obviously an imitation of Muggle radio, because
it's named after "wireles", the British Muggle name for radio. The
wizarding folk would have no other reason to name it "wireless",
because they didn't have a preceeding technology named "wire" (the
telegraph).

The kindly condescension to Muggles shown by the older Weasleys IS a
little off. They say, isn't it marvellous that Muggles and their cute
little toys are able to make do without magic? One common Muggle cute
little toy, the telephone, can send a message a great deal faster than
an owl! Other listies have mentioned Muggle bombs that blow up a great
deal more than one street and twelve people.