very basic confusion

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 163738

Inge wrote
<snip> one answer still remains - "why did it take so long, more than
a year after Harry's birth, before the Potters set up their protection?"
>
Carol responds:
I was going to raise the same question, but I didn't want to stray to
far from Aki's original post. 

At any rate, I do have some thoughts on the subject. It may have taken
some time for Spy!Snape, who probably was not always in Voldemort's
company, to realize how Voldemort was interpreting the Prophecy and
what he intended to do--or maybe it took him a while to get up the
courage (or just find the opportunity) to talk to Dumbledore. It's
also possible that neither the Potters nor the Longbottoms had yet
defied Voldemort three times, so Voldemort (and therefore Snape) was
still not sure that their one of children might be the Prophecy Boy.
(I suppose that Voldemort could have had additional reasons for the
delay but I can't think of any. There was no Fidelius Charm hiding the
Secret for most of the fifteen months between Harry's birth and his
parents' death.)

As for Dumbledore, unless he interpreted the Prophecy as Voldemort
*chose* to do and was consequently watching the Daily Prophet
announcements for children born at the end of July, he would not have
known that the Potters (and Longbottoms) were in danger until Snape
told him, and we don't know when that happened. We know that Snape
began spying for Dumbledore not only before Godric's Hollow but before
he became Potions master two months earlier, but he could have begun
doing so at almost any time between early August 1980, shortly after
Harry's birth, to a few months before he applied for a teaching post
at Hogwarts (July or August 1981). There had to be sufficient time for
young Snape to place himself at "great personal risk," but whether
that risk lasted twelve months or two we have no way of knowing. So we
don't know when Snape told Dumbledore that the Potters were in danger.

Later, while Snape was spying on Voldemort, trying to deduce his plans
and perhaps to ascertain the identity of the spy (neither of which the
secretive Voldemort would have divulged to a twenty-two-year-old Death
Eater), Dumbledore could have been gathering information on Harry's
relatives (he would have known who the Longbottoms' relatives were).
He certainly knew where he wanted Harry to live *before* he sent
Hagrid to Godric's Hollow, and he knew that Petunia was Lily's only
survivng relative (baby Dudley, of course, didn't count). So I think
that DD was seeking information from various sources and making what
plans and preparations he could to protect the Potters (and probably
the Longbottoms) from the time he first realized they were in danger.
He would also have informed both families that they were particularly
at risk. He may have spoken to individual Order members, certainly to
the Potters and the Longbottoms, about the danger to the group as a
whole and the likelihood of a spy in their midst.

At any rate, I think that DD, and the Potters themselves, knew that
they were in danger from the time that Snape first reported what he
knew of Voldemort's interpretation of the Prophecy, but neither Snape
nor DD may have realized that the danger was immediate, that Voldemort
intended to commit infanticide to thwart the Prophecy rather than
waiting to see which boy presented the greater threat (as Harry
himself considered the sensible course). And after September 1, Snape,
teaching at Hogwarts and supposedly spying on Dumbledore, could no
longer provide information on Voldemort. 

Maybe Dumbledore, still not knowing the identity of the spy but
fearing that the Potters were in increasing danger, provided the
Potters with a hiding place in Godric's Hollow months before
Voldemort's attack. When it became clear that a hiding place was not
enough because the spy was someone close to the Potters, he suggested
the Fidelius charm and offered himself as Secret Keeper. Since James
rejected that offer, wanting his friend Sirius Black as SK, he must
have wanted to perform the charm himself or, more likely, have Lily do
it (we know that Dumbledore didn't). It could have taken some time for
her to research and practice such a complicated spell to be sure that
it would work. Meantime, she would have kept it secret from everyone,
even their closest friends. (PP could not have known or he'd have
taken preemptive measures by telling Voldemort of the Potters' plans.)

I used to think that Lily had made Black the Secret Keeper before
Black changed his mind and they switched over, which would have given
the Potters a few additional weeks or months of safety, but now I
think that PP was the only one. Otherwise, Dumbledore would have
stopped knowing the Secret more than a week before Godric's Hollow
(and McGonagall, IIRC, says that they were killed only a week after
the charm was cast).

Two last thoughts regarding the Potters themselves and especially
James--maybe they took no action when they thought that the danger was
chiefly to themselves and it took DD's telling them about the Prophecy
and the danger to Harry to persuade them that they needed something
along the lines of the Fidelius Charm that he had suggested. Or maybe
they didn't believe that one of their friends could be supplying
information to Voldemort until PP, oh, so subtly, persuaded them (or
persuaded Black) that Lupin was behaving suspiciously and that he
could well be the spy. When Dumbledore suggested the Fidelius Charm
and insisted that they really were in danger from someone they
trusted, they decided to perform the Fidelius Charm themselves using
Black as the SK and (apparently) excluding Lupin from the Secret. So,
IMO, it would have taken a combination of two things--being convinced
that there really was a spy and that Harry was in as much danger as
themselves, to convince them to try the Fidelius Charm. And even then,
being twenty-two, they wanted to take matters into their own hands
rather than trusting them to the old man who had waited overlong to
tell them about the Prophecy. (Just speculating!)

Carol, who would welcome additional suggestions for the lengthy
interval between Harry's birth and the Fidelius Charm