Xenophilius Lovegood
“The Quibbler’s rubbish, everyone knows that.”
— Hermione to Ron (OP10)“Merlin’s beard, what is Xenophilius Lovegood wearing? He looks like an omelet.”
— Great Auntie Muriel (DH8)
On this page:
Name
origins:
“Xenophilius”=derived from the word “xenophile,” denoting
a person attracted to that which is foreign or alien, and derived from
the Greek root forms “xeno,” meaning “alien,” “strange” or “guest,” and “philia,”
meaning “friendship,” “fondness,” “affection.”
Last name meaning: “Lovegood”=A simple compound
word, love+good, connoting the simple and true quality of their affections.
Birthdate: Unknown.
FAMILY
Ancestry: ?
Residence:A "great black cylinder" that "looks
like a giant rook" on the top of a hill a several miles to the north
of the village of Ottery
St. Catchpole, where the Weasley family lives
at The Burrow.
Spouse: Deceased c. 1990, when her daughter Luna was
nine years old. First name unknown.
Child: Luna Lovegood.
APPEARANCE
Eyes: Slightly cross-eyed (DH8),
with one eye pointing inward at his nose and one good eye with normal movement
(DH20).
Hair color: “[S]houlder-length white hair the
texture of candy floss” (DH8).
SKILLS, ETC.
Career: Editor of The
Quibbler.
Avocation: Questor after fantastical magical objects and
creatures, inventor and collector of things that don’t quite work or
aren’t exactly what he thinks they are.
Incarceration: Captured 27 December 1997 by Death
Eaters he summoned to seize Harry, who was then
visiting Mr. Lovegood at his home in the hills outside Ottery
St. Catchpole (DH20). Presumably
imprisioned in Azkaban shortly
thereafter and subsequently released at the fall of Lord
Voldemort.
Profile
of Xenophilius Lovegood by Paula Hall
Editor of The Quibbler,
father of Luna Lovegood; widower since c.
1990. Unusually open-minded, to the point where The Quibbler is not taken
seriously, he agreed to publish Rita Skeeter’s
exclusive interview giving Harry Potter’s
version of the events surrounding Voldemort’s
return in June 1995 (OP25).
After the Ministry of Magic and
the Daily Prophet changed
their tune about Voldemort’s
return in June 1996, Mr. Lovegood sold the interview to the Daily
Prophet for a very good price. Later, during Voldemort’s
second rise in the Wizarding World, The
Quibbler’s editorial policy was to steadfastly support Harry,
to impress upon the Wizarding World that it’s everyone’s first
duty to help Harry.
He appears to be something of a naturalist, because he apparently used the money from the sale of the Harry Potter interview to The Daily Prophet to finance a trip to Sweden with his daughter to try to catch a Crumple-Horned Snorkack (OP38), and in general his magazine seems to expend a lot of effort on stories about—unusual—magical beasts. He obtained what he believed to be the horn of a Crumple-Horned Snorkack, “an enormous, gray spiral horn, not unlike that of a unicorn.” Hermione recognized that this horn was in fact an Erumpent horn, a “Class B Tradeable Material” prone to “explode at the slightest touch.” Unfortunately, Hermione was right; a poorly-aimed Stunning Spell from Xenophilius hit the Erumpent horn, setting off an explosion that demolished his home.
It is from the mouth of Xenophilius that we first hear of the Deathly Hallows, identified as such (DH20). Harry, Ron and Hermione go to visit Mr. Lovegood a couple of days after Christmas, 1997, to ask him to explain the the symbol he was wearing on his egg-yolk-colored cloak at the wedding of Bill Weasley and Fleur Delacour, and which Viktor Krum denounced as “Grindelvald’s sign” (DH8). Mr. Lovegood explained that the symbol, an eye circumscribed by a triangle with a single vertical line through it, was worn by believers in and seekers of the Deathly Hallows to identify themselves to one another (DH21). He encourages Hermione to read aloud from the book The Tales of the Beedle the Bard, her inheritance from Dumbledore, the “Tale of the Three Brothers,” which sets forth the myth associated with the Deathly Hallows. An in-depth discussion amongst the Trio and Xenophilius ensues, about the three Deathly Hallows, their nature, provenance and possible locations.
Xenophilius’s daughter, Luna Lovegood, was kidnapped on the Hogwarts Express on her way home for the Christmas holidays (DH25) because of what Mr. Lovegood had been writing in The Quibbler. She was imprisoned in the basement of the Malfoy mansion, joining Ollivander, who was also imprisoned there. In an attempt to ingratiate himself with her captors and secure his daughter’s release, Xenophilius summoned Death Eaters to his home hoping to exchange Harry for his daughter. The Death Eaters Travers and Selwyn failed to capture Harry, Ron and Hermione, and before the Trio’s escape Hermione used the Obliviate charm to wipe Mr. Lovegood’s memory of their visit, in anticipation of his likely interrogation by the Death Eaters.
Hermione devised for the Trio a plan of escape that allowed the Death Eaters a glimpse of Harry before they disapparated out of the ruins of Mr. Lovegood’s home. Hermione hoped that the glimpse of Harry would convince the Death Eaters they had not been summoned to the Lovegood home on a wild goose chase, and therefore inspire their leniency towards Xenophilius. Mr. Lovegood ended up captured and imprisoned, as confirmed on Potterwatch, likely incarcerated in Azkaban, a repository for Voldemort’s enemies since his take-over of the Ministry of Magic, and subsequently released at Voldemort’s fall.