The AFH-P Harry Potter FAQ

Klaus Winkler <klauswinkler@foni.net>

Version 0.11 --> Sep 23, 2001

2.General Questions

 

2.1 Common Abbrevations

HP    Harry Potter
JKR    Joanne K. Rowling
PS  HP1 Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone
SS HP1 Harry Potter and the Sorcerors Stone (=American Edition)
CoS HP2 Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
PoA HP3 Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
GoF HP4 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
QttA   Quitdditch through the Ages
FBawtft or FB   Fantastic Beasts and where to find them
DADA   Defense Against Dark Arts
DE   Death Eaters
MoM   Ministry of Magic

 

2.2 What will be the title of the next book and when will it be available?

The working title is "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", which means this title could still be changed. There is no date set yet, and according to JKR, it will not coincide with the release of the movie.

 

2.3-Has anyone noticed that the name of "X" means "Y"?

A lot of people have noticed that there are hidden meanings to names and spells used in the books. The most frequently mentioned or asked are: Some of those might give hints about the story of the books. In this case they will be explained  in  "Book Questions"

 

Albus Dumbledore - Albus is Latin for "white", Dumbledore is an old English word for "bumblebee".

Lord Voldemort - "Vol de mort" is French for "flight of death".

Avada Kedavra - A phrase in Aramaic which means "may this thing be destroyed".

You can find a lot more at

http://www.networkcablestore.com/wizwords.asp 
http://www.rudihein.de/hpewords.htm
http://www.harrypotterfans.net/potterica/index.html 

2.4-How is "x" pronounced?

The one everyone seems to wonder about: Hermione is pronounced "her-MY-oh-nee".

 

There are more extensive pronounciation Guides at: 

http://www.scholastic.com/harrypotter/books/index.htm 

http://www.theblanchards.com/hp/index.html 

 

2.5 How many students are in Hogwarts?

According to an interview with JKR there are approximately 1000 students in Hogwarts. In PoA during the Quidditch Final, three quarters of the crowd were supporting Gryffindor while there were 200 Slytherins. This would mean there were 800 Students. However this number creates a few consistency problems with the books. If we assume, that those 1000 students are evenly distributed to the seven years, there would be 140 students per year. This doesn't really fit with the fact that in PS the flying lessons (Gryffindor AND Slytherin) there were only 20 students. There could, however, be more than one class per day with first year students.

 

2.6 Muggles, Mudbloods, Purebloods and Squibs

Muggle - Non Magical People

Squib - According to Ron (Para.) "someone who was born into a wizarding family but hasn't got any magic powers" It could be argued what constitutes a "wizarding family", and whether they are basically muggles.

Unfortunately Purebloods and Mudbloods aren't defined as well. Their meaning probably varies with the user.

Mudblood - Wizard with two Muggle Parents (Very Insulting Term) Again a quote from Ron (Para.): "Mudbloods a really foul name for someone who was muggle-born - you know, non-magic parents "

Pureblood - Wizard with both Parents from the wizarding world

Halfblood - Wizard with mixed Parents Some People for example the Malfoys would probably consider everyone a halfblood or even Mudblood who hasn't only wizard ancestors for at least three generations.

 

2.7 Which House was Hagrid in?
Hagrid was a Gryffindor. This was confirmed by JKR during a Chat (B&N, 20.Oct 2000)

 

2.8 What was Lily Potter's Maiden name?

As stated by JKR in one of her interview, her name was Evans.