Witch
Books and Writing Dumbledore's Army Gryffindor Nineteen years later Notable Witches and Wizards Quidditch Slug Club

Ginny Weasley

"The thing about growing up with Fred and George is that you sort of start thinking anything's possible if you've got enough nerve."
-- Ginny Weasley to Harry Potter (OP29)

Ginny Weasley

Ginevra Molly Weasley (Ginny) is the youngest child of the Weasley family and the only daughter.

Ginny is the youngest child and only daughter of Arthur and Molly Weasley (CS3), and the first girl born to the family in several generations (JKR). Though consistently underestimated by her family, she is a powerful witch (OP6) and also quite popular (HBP24). She has bright brown eyes (CS3) and vivid, flaming red hair, worn as a long mane (OP4, very apt for a lion-hearted Gryffindor). When her jaw is set, her facial resemblance to the twin brothers Fred and George is striking (OP33).

Though she had been anxious to go (PS6), Ginny’s first year at Hogwarts School was a stressful one, as she was regularly possessed by Tom Riddle and forced to open the Chamber of Secrets (CS18). At the end of the year she was taken into the Chamber, with the intent that she would be sacrificed to make Riddle’s memory fully human, until Harry Potter destroyed the diary – a Horcrux – with a fang from Salazar Slytherin’s basilisk, and she was revived (CS17).

From her first meeting with him, Ginny was quite taken with Harry (CS2), and according to her it was a romantic interest she never lost (HBP30). Relationships with Michael Corner (OP16) and Dean Thomas (HBP6) didn’t work out, and when she finally caught Harry’s eye, it was for good – they began dating (HBP25) and, though separated for a year while Harry hunted down Lord Voldemort’s remaining Horcruxes (HBP30, DH7), they were eventually married (DH/e, BLC, CC1.1).

Ginny is all at once savvy, snarky, and very self-confident. She once told Harry that she believes almost anything possible, “if you’ve got enough nerve” (OP29), and follows through on that belief. Despite being perpetually “too young” and overprotected by her mother, Ginny also flatly refused to be left behind, either when Harry took off for the Department of Mysteries (OP33) or when Voldemort announced his intention to attack Hogwarts (DH31). She named ‘Dumbledore’s Army‘. She is a wicked mimic, skewering everyone from Dolores Umbridge to Fleur Delacour to her brother Ron.

Ginny’s sixth year at Hogwarts must have been a nightmare. Muggle-born students were excluded, Severus Snape was headmaster and avowed Death Eaters given professorships. Ginny worked with Neville Longbottom to revive Dumbledore’s Army and organize the student resistance (DH16). During her sixth year at Hogwarts, Ginny, Luna Lovegood and Neville tried to steal the Sword of Gryffindor from Headmaster Snape’s office; for punishment they were told to help Hagrid with something in the Forbidden Forest (DH15). During her Easter holidays, Death Eaters discovered that Ron was not sick in bed with spattergroit and the whole family moved to Aunt Muriel’s house where it was safer (DH24, DH29). Ginny didn’t return to school until it was attacked by Voldemort in May.

As Ginny was underage, she was supposed to stay in the Room of Requirement during the Battle of Hogwarts. When Harry needed the room to look for the Ravenclaw tiara, however, Ginny joined the fray. Later, when she was attacked by Bellatrix Lestrange, Ginny’s mother counterattacked and killed her psychopathic cousin (DH36).

After leaving Hogwarts, Ginny went on to play Quidditch professionally for the Holyhead Harpies, later retiring and settling down as a Quidditch senior editor for the Daily Prophet, which better allowed her to care for a family (BLC). Ginny married Harry Potter, and she and Harry have three children: James Sirius, Albus Severus, and Lily Luna, who made both their parents and their grandparents proud (DH/e, YL, CC1.1). Ginny is the editor of the Sports Pages of the Daily Prophet by the time their son Albus is in his fourth year at Hogwarts (CC1.12).

Family

Birthdate: August 11, 1981 (JKR website calendar, 11 Aug 2004).
Ancestry:
Pure-blood.
Mother: Molly (Prewett) Weasley.
Father: Arthur Weasley.
Maternal grandparents: Molly and Sirius Black are "cousins by marriage," (OP6) so Molly's parents are probably related in some way to the Prewetts listed on the Black Family Tree (BFT and notes).
Paternal grandparents: Septimus and Cedrella Weasley (BFT and notes).
Aunts & Uncles:

  • Weasley: Arthur had 2 brothers, but we don't know their names (JKR). According to Jo, Ginny is the first female to be born into the Weasley family in generations, so we can deduce that Arthur had no sisters (JKR).
  • Prewett: Molly's brothers Gideon and Fabian Prewett (OP9).
  • Surname unknown:

Cousins: Mafalda, a cousin who never made it into the books (JKR) and her father the Muggle accountant (PS6).
Siblings: Bill, Charlie, Percy, Fred, George, and Ron.
Spouse: Harry Potter (DH/e, CC1, CC2, CC3, CC4).
Children: James Sirius, Albus Severus, and Lily Luna DH/e, YL, CC1, CC2, CC3, CC4)).
Additional notes: Seventh child and only daughter of Molly and Arthur Weasley (PS6, CS3). Ginny is the first Weasley girl in several generations (JKR).
Location of childhood home: "The Burrow" near Ottery St. Catchpole, Devon.
Pet: Arnold, a Pygmy Puff (DH6).

Skills

Even Fred and George are impressed by her power, particularly her Bat-Bogey Hex (OP6); her poetry (as shown by her valentine to Harry) is pretty awful. Ginny is the only person Harry knows (now, besides himself) who has been possessed by Voldemort and lived to tell the tale (CS, OP). Ginny also has considerable acting ability (OP4, OP16, OP32 - able to convince Mrs. Weasley that Crookshanks was responsible for the Dungbombs outside the kitchen in Grimmauld Place; imitating Umbridge; the Garroting Gas scam). She is also an excellent Quidditch player - as both a Chaser and a Seeker, joining a professional team after leaving school.

Other canon notes and references

Ron tells his sister that their brothers Fred and George "ran a book" on whether Ginny would be sorted into Slytherin (CC1.2) rather than Gryffindor.

Ginny Weasley
Gender Female
Species / Race Witch
Blood Status Pure blood
Other Names Ginny
Hair Vivid flaming red
Eyes Bright brown
Distinguishing Features Short, similar to Fred and George.
Patronus horse
School Hogwarts - Gryffindor
Profession Quidditch player Holyhead Harpies; later senior Quidditch correspondent and Sports Page editor for the Daily Prophet

Commentary

Etymology

Ginevra is the Italian form of Guinevere ("fair one"), the name of King Arthur's wife (JKR); also Italian for the Swiss city of Geneva.

Weasley is a close match to the word weaselly, which refers to someone who is "a deceitful or treacherous person" or who "achieves something by use of cunning or deceit" (Oxford English Dictionary). However, if it is taken to mean "like a weasel", that genus also includes animals such as stoats, polecats, ferrets, mink, wolverines, badgers, skunks and otters. Furthermore, on her old website, J K Rowling commented:

"In Britain and Ireland the weasel has a bad reputation as an unfortunate, even malevolent, animal. However, since childhood I have had a great fondness for the Family Mustelidae; not so much malignant as maligned, in my opinion" (JKR)

Notes

Related images:

Ginny fights with Ron.  

Rowling on the relationship between Ginny and Harry:

... the plan was, which I really hope I fulfilled, is that the reader, like Harry, would gradually discover Ginny as pretty much the ideal girl for Harry. She's tough, not in an unpleasant way, but she's gutsy. He needs to be with someone who can stand the demands of being with Harry Potter, because he's a scary boyfriend in a lot of ways. He's a marked man. I think she's funny, and I think that she's very warm and compassionate. These are all things that Harry requires in his ideal woman. But, I felt — and I'm talking years ago when all this was planned — initially, she's terrified by his image. I mean, he's a bit of a rock god to her when she sees him first, at 10 or 11, and he's this famous boy. So Ginny had to go through a journey as well. And rather like with Ron, I didn’t want Ginny to be the first girl that Harry ever kissed. That's something I meant to say, and it's kind of tied in.

One of the ways in which I tried to show that Harry has done a lot of growing up — in “Phoenix,” remember when Cho comes into the compartment, and he thinks, ‘I wish I could have been discovered sitting with better people,’ basically? He's with Luna and Neville. So literally the identical thing happens in “Prince,” and he's with Luna and Neville again, but this time, he has grown up, and as far as he's concerned he is with two of the coolest people on the train. They may not look that cool. Harry has really grown. And I feel that Ginny and Harry, in this book, they are total equals. They are worthy of each other. They've both gone through a big emotional journey, and they've really got over a lot of delusions, to use your word, together. So, I enjoyed writing that. I really like Ginny as a character. (TLC)

From the Web

MuggleNet:

The Rowling Library, TRL Magazine Issue #44: article on page 19: Genuinely Ginny by Jessica Minneci

Live Journal: Why Harry Picked Ginny, Rather Than Hermione, As A Romantic Partner by gowdie

YouTube: Who is Your Ginny Weasley? from Harry Potter and the Sacred Text

WizardsandWhatnot (Fansided): Harry Potter and the Order of Archetypes: Ginny Weasley, the Girl Next Door by Katie Majka

Writing by J K Rowling on Imgur (Daily Prophet coverage of the 2014 Quidditch World Cup, originally from Pottermore):

Harry Potter Wiki: Ginevra Weasley

DwellingOnDreams blog and podcast: S2 Ep6: Girlfriends, Crushes, and Dramatic First Kisses

WizardingWorld (Pottermore) features:

Pensieve (Comments)

Tags: bravery brown funny Ginny Remembrall red romance short strong

Editors: , and

Timeline
Family