Greyback's background (was: An Analysis of the Skirmish at Hogwarts)

[Neri]

No: HPFGUIDX 168120

 
> Mike:
><snip>
> For my own perspective, I don't think Greyback was a wizard and 
> therefore not formally a DE. He falls into the category of LV's 
> allies, as LV expounded upon in the Graveyard scene. It has been 
> noted that he doesn't have a wand, and his 'wizard' robes are noted 
> as ill-fitting, as if they aren't his in the first place.
> 

Neri:
I'm sure this was pointed out before, but perhaps not in this context
- the first time we hear Greyback's name is in Spinner's End, when
Snape mentions him together with several prominent DEs including Lucius:

"You ask why I did not attempt to find him when he vanished. For the
same reason that Avery, Yaxley, the Carrows, Greyback, Lucius" — he
inclined his head slightly to Narcissa — "and many others did not
attempt to find him. I believed him finished."

It is obvious from this that Greyback was an important figure in
Voldemort's first circle already during VW1, whether formally or not.
Snape's motivation in this paragraph is showing Bella that he (Snape)
isn't guilty of anything that many other distinguished DEs aren't
guilty of, so it wouldn't be politic of him to mention someone
controversial here, especially not a muggle, which is likely to raise
Bella's blood pressure higher. 

All the two-and-a-half werewolves we know so far in the series appear
to be wizards when bitten (Lupin and Bill were, and there's no mention
of the man in Arthur's ward in OotP being a muggle). Therefore I tend
to think that most or all werewolves were wizards when bitten.
Greyback not using a wand could be a result of him not attending
Hogwarts, if he was also bitten in his early childhood. It appears
that Lupin attending Hogwarts was an unheard-of precedent.

Also, I suspect that Greyback despises using a wand as a part of his
anti-wizard ideology, and it might actually prove effective in battle
as a terror tactics. Normal wizards are used to fighting against other
wand-carrying wizards since their school days, and most jinxes they
normally employ aren't lethal or even very long lasting. From their
point of view a werewolf bite is the unconventional weapon. It has the
added horror effect that in the muggle world anthrax has over just
plain old gunshots.


Neri