HBP - spoilers - that textbook

[eloise_herisson]

Careless Kneasy asked,

> Which calendar year is HBP set in?
> '94? '95?, '96?
> Can someone remind me please.

Oh Kneasy, that's what the Lexicon's for. 1996-97. Does it matter?

> 
> Getting careless - had to delete this and re-post.
> I'd forgotten the spoiler spaces. Apologies.
> 
> Getting careless - had to delete this and re-post.
> I'd forgotten the spoiler spaces. Apologies.
> 
> Getting careless - had to delete this and re-post.
> I'd forgotten the spoiler spaces. Apologies.
> 
> Getting careless - had to delete this and re-post.
> I'd forgotten the spoiler spaces. Apologies.

Hee, I just noticed you disapparate! So did I on my last, but I don't 
think it's really a spoiler. Is it?

> It's that Advanced Potion-Making thing:
> 
> "It was nearly fifty years old. Neither his father, nor his father's
> friends, had been at Hogwarts fifty years ago."
> 
> But Tom was there in the mid-40's, and Tom was a brilliant student.
> I haven't heard anyone say the same of Sevvy, have you?

No. Hence my speculations about Lily.
But that was the *publication date*. Now granted we don't know that 
the others weren't using textbooks with further edition dates, but 
you can't say how old a particular copy of a book is by its 
publication date, particularly a standard text.

> 
> We've been told that Voldy isn't the HBP. Has is actually been 
spelled
> out that Tom isn't either? 'Cos unless it has Jo might be doing a 
Dobby.

I'm pretty sure that she covered that one, but I could be wrong.

> 
> If it did belong to Tom and Sevvy 'inherited' or otherwise acquired 
it
> during his time at Hogwarts, what would be the significance?
> Oh, while I'm here, does anyone know of a description of Snape's
> handwriting that is his for sure?

I asked that and Phyllis answered above. It's described as cramped on 
his exam paper in OoP. Though it *could* just be one of her 
adjectives, used to emphasise just how much he'd written on the exam 
paper whilst you'd expect book annotations to be rather cramped. But 
I think I'm clutching at straws over the writing, to be honest. I 
still reckon there's a Lily connection there somewhere.

Of course we've seen Tom's handwriting and *that* wasn't described as 
cramped AFAIR (I've unfortunately mislaid my COS).


~Eloise