Why RAB should be Regulus Black

[Kevin Furey]

No: HPFGUIDX 153352

On 6/3/06, Randy <estesrandy at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I know this has been discussed and is no longer a mystery to most people,
> but there is another reason why RAB is probably Regulus Black.
>
> Regulus is Latin for Prince (or Little King), and Regulus Black would be
> the Black Prince.  If you remember the Chess board from the first Book in
> the Chapter called "Through the Trapdoor", Harry,Ron and Hermione become
> chess pieces for the Black side.  Ron becomes a Knight and Harry becomes a
> Bishop and Hermione becomes a castle (or Rook).
>
> In other words, the threesome perform service for the Black King.  In fact
> Ron says:
>
> "I suppose we've got to take the place of three of the black pieces..."
>
> As an analogy, Harry takes on the role that Regulus Black started to
> destroy the Horcruxes of Voldemort. <snip>


Very good points Randy, and while I agree that RAB is likely to be Regulus
Black, I do have a couple of thoughts to confuse the issue.

In monograms, it is quite common to put the initial for the last name in the
center, slightly larger than the other two initials, a first last middle
order to them.  If the author of the note was trying to confuse the reader
or obfuscate his identity, he (or she) could easily have used the
convention, one of the tale-tell bits being the intertwining of the left and
right initials under the middle initial, giving it a slightly superior point
of place in the signature.  Thus the initials translated to normal first
middle last usage would be RBA.  I have no clue as to who RBA would be.

The other question I have is why, if a wizard as powerful as Dumbledore
needed a second person to assist in making his way through the traps, would
someone not known to be anywhere near as highly skilled be able to make that
journey alone?  Could RAB stand for R and B?  Perhaps Regulus had a partner,
one who survives to this day, if it was Regulus to begin with.  Yes, I know
much of this has been mentioned before.

The question as to who took the missing horcrux remains unsolved as far as I
can see.  The initials on the note could also have been a sly way to point
at someone already dead, and thus beyond retribution or questioning from
Lord Voldemort.

- Kevin