A street located in Clapham, London, which at number two is home to Sturgis Podmore (OP14).

There are two streets by this name in London - one is in Enfield, while the other is in Croydon. (Clapham Common is in Lambeth.)

"Loch" is a Gaelic word meaning "lake", that usually is applied to lakes in Scotland.

lakes and lochs found in the series:

• Lake Windermere
• Loch Lomond
• Loch Ness
• the Hogwarts lake
• Voldemort's Inferi-filled lake in a seaside cave
• An unnamed Scottish loch with a tiny island, where Harry and Hermione spend a night while on the run from Death Eaters (DH16)
• A small lake which Harry, Hermione, and Ron plunge into after riding a dragon safely out of Gringotts (DH27)

(For lochs used as locations in the films, see About the Films.)

See also: islands, oceans, rivers, seas.

When slandering Elphias Doge in a newspaper interview, Rita Skeeter claimes that he's gone completely crazy, and thought that he was sitting at the bottom of Lake Windermere, and that she should watch out for trout (DH1).

Lancashire was the site of a Quidditch match in 1385 that didn't go too well for the local team; a team from Cork beat them soundly and the fans of the Lancashire team chased them out of town (QA8). Lancashire is a county in northwestern England, which contains Blackpool Pier and is quite possibly where the Longbottoms are from.

A street in the ficticous town of Millburn and, at number seventeen, home to Stuart Jones - an eight-year-old Muggle fan of J.K. Rowling, who writes to her in the FAQ - Other Stuff section of her website.

"A famous place," the Leaky Cauldron is a wizarding pub located on Charing Cross Road in London (more...)

Hogwarts has a library of course, but it isn't the only one that Hermione visits. While searching for Horcruxes, she, Harry, and Ron come to London in search of Tom Riddle's orphanage. There, Hermione sneaks into a Muggle library, where she discovers that the orphanage has been demolished (DH15).

A tiny, mountainous country located between Austria and Switzerland, Liechtenstein is home to only about 33,000 people. Though it has not played a central role in Muggle history, it did have a place in wizarding history: the warlocks of Liechtenstein refused to join the International Confederation of Wizards at its first forming. Harry's History of Magic O.W.L. asked why this was the case, though he never did come up with the answer (OP31).

A hamlet in Hampshire which was blown up by Archibald Alderton when he tried to mix a birthday cake (fw40).

A town of massive importance to recent wizarding history and yet unknown to most modern wizards, Little Hangleton is found about six miles from its neighbor, Great Hangleton, and is the location of the Riddle House, where Tom Marvolo Riddle killed his father, Tom Riddle, and his grandparents in the summer of 1944 (HBP10). It is also the location of the graveyard where Voldemort regained his body in 1995 (GF32).

Nearby, in a copse on the hillside, was the Gaunt House, wherein lived the Gaunt family, the last remaining descendants of Salazar Slytherin (HBP10).

There is an actual place called Hangleton, in a place called Hove, near Brighton on the East Sussex coast. It's located far too near to Privet Drive to be the "real" Hangleton, however (thanks to Greg McAusland on the Lexicon Forum for this information).

Locations in Little Hangleton:

• churchyard
• the Gaunt House
• graveyard
• the Hanged Man
• the Riddle House
  

Known inhabitants of Little Hangleton fifty years ago (c. 1940):

• Bryce, Frank - the Riddles' gardener
• Cecilia (Tom Riddle's female companion on a summer afternoon).
• Dot
• Gaunt, Marvolo & children Morfin & Merope
• Riddle, Mr., Mrs., & son Tom (father of Voldemort)
• landlord of the Hanged Man
• the Riddles' cook
• the Riddles' maid

At a 1980 Hobgoblins concert in Little Norton church hall, lead singer Stubby Boardman was hit in the ear by a turnip, prompting him to retire (OP10). There are at least four Nortons in the U.K.; we have no way of knowing which is the exact location of this town.

A quiet, perfectly normal suburb of London, where the houses are large and square (OP1), and where you'll find the perfectly normal residence of number four, Privet Drive.

Locations in Little Whinging

• alley between Wisteria Walk and Magnolia Crescent
• Grunnings Drill Firm (probably)
• Magnolia Crescent
• Magnolia Road
• number two, Magnolia Crescent
• number four, Privet Drive
• number six, Wisteria Walk
• number seven, Privet Drive
• Privet Drive
• Wisteria Walk
• zoo

Residents of Little Whinging

• the Dursley Family
• Lisa Smith
• Mark Evans
• Mrs. Figg
• Mrs. Next Door
• Mrs. Number Seven
• Harry Potter (through 1997)
• Mr. Prentice

A famous port town on the western coast of England, Liverpool was the site of a Celestina Warbeck concert in 1999 (DP). As late ticket-holders raced to the event, there was a three-broom crash over the Mersey River, which runs through Liverpool.

See lakes and lochs.

Perhaps the most famous loch in Scotland, we know that Loch Lomond is home to merpeople because Mirabella Plunkett fell in love with a merman from Loch Lomond (fw65).

Loch Ness is, of course, the home of the Loch Ness Monster - actually a kelpie that prefers to take the form of a sea serpent. Loch Ness is the largest loch in Scotland, and its famous monster has gotten the Ministry of Magic in trouble for repeatedly breaking the International Code of Wizarding Secrecy (FB). In fact, the Ministry has been looking to relocate the monster - so far the only known wizard to offer a habitat was Rubeus Hagrid, who offered the Hogwarts lake (DP).

Located in southeastern England, London is one of the largest and most famous cities in the world. For Muggles, it is the center of British commerce and government, and for wizards and witches things are no different. We know of more wizarding places in London than anywhere else in Britain, and after Hogwarts and Privet Drive, it is the place where Harry spends the most time.

Major locations in London

• Diagon Alley & Knockturn Alley
• King's Cross Station & Platform 9 3/4
• the Leaky Cauldron (including the alley behind it)
• Ministry of Magic Headquarters
• number twelve, Grimmauld Place
• Tom Riddle's orphanage
• St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries

Other wizarding places in London

• Charing Cross Road
• Gladrags Wizardwear
• Grimmauld Place & Grimmauld Square
• Museum of Quidditch
• STV Head Office

London neighborhoods

• Bethnal Green
• Clapham, including Laburnum Gardens
• Elephant and Castle
• West Ham

Muggle places in London

• number ten, Downing Street
• Paddington Station, including a hamburger restaurant
• post office tower
• private hospital
• Purge and Dowse, Ltd.
• underground stations
• Vauxhall Road, including a newsagent's

A fictitious town in Scotland, Lowercroft is the home of Nicola Wells, a fifteen-year-old Muggle fan of J.K. Rowling who writes to her in the FAQ - About Me section of her website.  Nicola lives at number 25, Wildbrook Crescent.

On a hillside not far from the Burrow lies a cylindrical house shaped like a giant chess rook - the home of Xenophilius and Luna Lovegood, and also the main office of the Quibbler. Predictably, the place is rather, er, eccentric, with perfectly circular rooms and curved furniture painted in "bright primary colors." The first floor is the kitchen; the second, a living room (DH20); and at least part of the third floor is Luna's bedroom (DH21). Harry, Ron, and Hermione visited Xeno here in 1998, where they learned about the Deathly Hallows (DH20). When Xeno tried to turn them in, though, his Stunning Spell hit an Erumpet horn instead and all but blew the place apart (DH21).

A tiny European country sandwiched between France, Germany, and Belgium, Luxembourg had a Quidditch team that slaughtered Scotland's team in the World Cup playoffs of 1994, according to Charlie Weasley (GF5). Bigonville is also located in Luxembourg.