• Food and drinks The aroma of baking pumpkin permeated the air at Hogwarts on Halloween (PS10). Read More
• Event When thirty or forty letters come pouring out of the kitchen chimney at number four, Privet Drive, Uncle Vernon has had enough. He packs everyone into the car and drives around for hours. The family ends up in Cokeworth and stay the night in the Railview Hotel. Read More
• Games, toys, and jokes One of the range of fireworks products offered by Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes (OP28). Read More
• Event The Gryffindor vs Hufflepuff Quidditch game, to determine the Hogwarts Quidditch Cup, is cancelled abruptly by Professor McGonagall. She takes Ron Weasley and Harry Potter to the Hospital Wing where they find that Hermione Granger and Penelope Clearwater are the latest victims to be… Read More
• Event May 1-2, 1998 The climactic final showdown between the side of good and the side of evil. Hogwarts Castle was damaged in this battle and fifty people died defending it, including Fred Weasley, Tonks, Remus Lupin, and Colin Creevey. The Death Eaters enlisted… Read More
• Architecture • Glossary The ‘teeth’ shaped parts on top of a castle, crennalations… Read More
• Timelines and calendars During the Second War, battles were fought between Death Eaters and allies of the Ministry, including Aurors and members of the Order of the Phoenix. Some of these battles were single combats, but others were pitched battles between small groups of combatants. In the end, the final defeat of Voldemort… Read More
• Event While Dumbledore is away, a gang of Death Eaters, led by Draco Malfoy, sneaks into Hogwarts through the vanishing cabinet in the Room of Requirement. They battle the Order of the Phoenix, and when Dumbledore and Harry return, Dumbledore freezes Harry as Draco arrives to Disarm Dumbledore (HBP27). After a… Read More
• Character Herbert Beery was the Herbology Professor sometime during Armando Dippet’s tenure as Headmaster.  He was a theatre enthusiast, and was responsible for Hogwarts’s only attempt at a pantomime.  Beery attempted to put on an adaptation of “Fountain of Fair Fortune,” with himself as director, but the evening ended in disaster… Read More
• Article
Posted by in Essays
Just how big is Hogwarts castle? If the Entrance Hall is big enough to hold an entire house (PS7), and the Great Hall is even bigger, it must be vast indeed. On the other hand, Harry encounters crowds in the corridors, which suggests that the students fill the space inside, and that certainly suggests a fairly… Read More
• Character Binns is the History of Magic teacher and the only professor at Hogwarts who is a ghost. Binns enters the classroom through the blackboard. He is ancient and shriveled in appearance, semi-transparent and a pearly-white color. After living to a great age, Binns died after falling asleep in front of… Read More
• Character Blaise Zabini was a Slytherin in Harry’s year (1991-1998) (PS7). Blaise shares Draco’s prejudice against Muggle-born witches and wizards; he has a contemptuous and arrogant manner. Ginny considers Blaise a “poser.” (HBP7). He is a member of the Slug Club due to his famous mother, who has had seven… Read More
• Wizarding culture The Blood Ball, in the alternate timeline where Lord Voldemort killed Harry Potter (due to the use of an Experimental Time Turner), is a formal dance held at Hogwarts School, much like the Yule Ball. From its name, however, the implication is that only pure-blood students are allowed to… Read More
• Wizarding culture One of the underlying problems in the wizarding world is intolerance and prejudice based on the “purity” of a person’s wizarding blood. Wizards distinguish between purebloods (no Muggle ancestry), half-blood (at least one wizarding parent but at least one Muggle parent or grandparent) and Muggle-borns (both parents were Muggles). Read More
• Character The Bloody Baron is the Slytherin House ghost, a grim, silent, and terrifying specter with a gaunt face and blank eyes. His robes are covered with silver bloodstains. He is never heard to speak, although Harry does impersonate him once, using a hoarse whisper (PS16). A favorite pastime… Read More
• Source Second online chat with JK Rowling for the Barnes & Noble website. Read More
• Character Melinda Bobbin was a Hogwarts student, who in 1996 was chosen as a member of the Slug Club because her family owned a large chain of apothecaries (HBP7). Read More
• Food and drinks The first meal of the day, eaten in the morning. Read More
• Quote “Very well, so you found out where the entrance was — breaking a hundred school rules into pieces along the way, I might add — but how on earth did you all get out of there alive, Potter?”… Read More
• Article
Posted by in Essays
Some American fans have raised the issue of being confused about the British education system. I am a Brit who is exactly the same age as JKR (a mere 5 weeks older) so I can explain, step by step, British schooling as we both knew it in the 1970s. Obviously… Read More
• Hogwarts grounds Located near the Quidditch pitch, the broomshed is where the school brooms are kept. Also, students may keep their private brooms there. It has a wooden door (PS13). Read More
• Event Harry and Hermione lead the hippogriff away while the execution party – an elderly member of the Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures, Walden Macnair (the executioner), Dumbledore, and Hagrid – is busy inside Hagrid’s hut. Prompted by Dumbledore, Harry and Hermione used Hermione’s Time-Turner to return to the time… Read More
• Character Zygmunt Budge is considered to be one of the most accomplished Potioneers the world has ever known (according to him). He is the author of The Book of Potions.  Budge was a student at Hogwarts in the 1500s and excelled at potion making. He was rather boastful and proud, and… Read More
• Character K. Bundy was a Hogwarts student who borrowed Quidditch Through the Ages from the Hogwarts Library one October during Harry Potter’s time at Hogwarts (QA). Read More
• Character Charity Burbage was a professor of Muggle Studies at Hogwarts (DH2). She wrote an impassioned defense of Muggle-borns in the Daily Prophet during the summer of 1997; in retaliation, she was taken prisoner, then killed personally by Voldemort less than a week later at Malfoy Manor, at which point… Read More
• Hogwarts Peeves the poltergeist was lurking in a hallway hoping to drop a bust of Paracelsus on someone’s head, according to Nearly Headless Nick who warned Harry about it (OP14). Read More
• Event At 11 am, the Hogwarts Express departs King’s Cross Station. Ginny introduces Harry and Neville to Luna Lovegood (OP10). After the train arrives at Hogwarts, Harry sees Thestrals for the first time (OP10). At the feast, the Sorting Hat sings a song of warning, and Dolores Umbridge is introduced (OP11). Read More