Wizard Baruffio and the Wingardium Leviosa Charm Revisited

[secca_pk]

No: HPFGUIDX 160031

msmindfunk wrote:

> I really do think it's a bit of silliness on JKR's part rather 
than a
> random fact. She likes to make a play on words, and the
> Baruffio/buffalo thing was probably too much for her to resist.
> 
> Maybe someone will ask her at an interview and you'll finally have 
a
> difinitive answer!

Secca adds: 
Well, it is entirely possible that the whole thing is no deeper than 
that -- simply a surface play on words with no 'backstory'. She has 
used 'broad strokes' to describe other things that have not been 
necessarily 'logical' when put under the microscope; i.e. the size 
of the student population at Hogwarts...

What's funny, is how difficult it is to keep straight what fufills 
the variables of the problem. What is needed is:

1) The intended word, with 'f' in it. 
   (something a wizard might want to say)
2) Now change the 'f' to an 's'.
3) Now the word means (or conjures) a buffalo!

I, and others all over the web have looked for a meaning 
for 'bussalo'. But 'bussalo' doesn't work! As I researched, I kept 
doing this, looking for words that meant buffalo with an 's' in it. 
Which is exactly opposite what is needed! My earlier example 
of /Accio Bussola/ is reversed as well! I found this in 
Latin: /sardo/ means 'dirty, shabby' /fardo/ means 'a pregnant cow' -
- this is reversed!!

Anyway -- 
Here's *one* word that works by the rules. I *very, very* much doubt 
this is what Jo meant... but, here it is regardless...

The Wizard Baruffio, who lived circa 777, was reading a scroll. He 
mistook his own scribed 'f' to be an 's'. He was meant to say "Accio 
bifon" -- but instead came out with "Accio Bison" -- and found 
himself on the floor with a North American Buffalo on his chest.

/Bifon/ is an Anglo-Saxon word that can be used as a noun 
meaning 'case' (though the main meaning is as a verb meaning 'to 
grasp'.)