Skip to main content

harry potter - Are all the ghosts at Hogwarts former students/teachers?


There are a number of other ghosts at Hogwarts who aren't the well-known "house" ghosts, such as Professor Binns and Moaning Mertle. We know there are a lot more, as a lot turn up to Sir Nicholas' death-day party.



So, who are all these ghosts? Were they all former teachers or students at the school?



Answer



I agree with Anthony Grist -- I think many of the ghosts who were at Sir Nicholas's Deathday Party came in from other places.


In Philosopher's Stone, as Harry is waiting to be Sorted, "about twenty" ghosts appear, including the house ghosts (as an FYI, here the Fat Friar confirms he was indeed a Hufflepuff while at Hogwarts -- this is all in chapter 7, The Sorting Hat). However, at Sir Nicholas's Deathday Party, it is described as having "hundreds" of ghosts in attendance, plus Peeves the poltergeist.


Now Peeves would not have been a student anywhere, for poltergeists do not spawn from the spirit of a person who has died, like a traditional ghost; a poltergeist is an evil or malevolent energy that forms from negative or tumultuous feelings or vibes from a living person. Peeves is a bit of an exception, for he is corporeal. Traditionally, poltergeists are not (they knock on things and make scary noises, and seem to exhibit the most activity in relation to one specific person whose energy the poltergeist is feeding off). So Peeves could not have been a spirit that had once been a person.


There may have been ghosts in attendance who were older than Hogwarts and thereby would not have had the chance to attend. Some of the ghosts were nuns. At least one was a knight (with an arrow through his head). One female ghost was a (wailing) widow. Of course the Headless Hunt was made up of the ghosts of those who had been decapitated, who shared a love of hunting (Chamber of Secrets - chapter 8, The Deathday Party). Sir Nicholas was a member of the royal court during his day (Tales of Beedle the Bard) So, there's a brief summary of the occupations of some of the ghosts we meet in the books.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Do the Kwikspell courses work?

In Harry Potter we are introduced to Kwikspell course in The Chamber of Secrets (and never hear about it again). We see Filch taking courses, presumably by mail. The descriptions of Kwikspell make me think it is for people who are weak in magic (kind of like how Neville was supposed to be when he was younger), but had magic in them nonetheless. However, Ron's comments later in the chapter make it sound like it is mainly for Squibs to learn magic. However, it is strongly implied through out all the books that Squibs are essentially Muggles, and will never be able to do magic. How then is a Kwikspell course supposed to work? Do we have any information to know if it works at all? Is it a scam? An answer from any level of canon is welcome. Answer Kwikspell courses are (probably) useful to some wizards, but not to squibs. The Kwikspell course literature comes with two testimonials. Madam Z. Nettles of Topsham writes: ‘I had no memory for incantations and my potions were a family joke...
Post a Comment
Read more

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

star wars - What "exactly" happens when someone turns to the Dark Side?

When I saw the original Star Wars saga as a kid, the concept of the Dark Side imprinted in me was quite simple. You did a bad thing, so you're a bad person so you go to the Dark Side and keep doing bad things. Now, obviously this doesn't hold true in reality. In my mind it is perfectly reasonable for Luke to kill the Emperor and Vader and then just flee the Death Star and rejoin the Alliance. After all they are at war, those are enemy officers that have captured him and are taunting him by threatening with death of all loved ones and the whole operation was intended to kill the Emperor anyway. The same would hold true for Anakin. He could have killed Mace Windu to save the Chancellor and Padme but that doesn't mean he's going to then go mad and kill all Jedis including children. It doesn't add up from a merely psychological point of view. He had a set of objectives and that made him want to keep the Chancellor alive (quite valid by the way, Mace Windu is quite clums...
Post a Comment
Read more

star trek - Warning regarding forward saucer section in Nemesis?

In Star Trek: Nemesis , just before the Enterprise rams into the Scimitar, Picard sends a text message from his captain's chair arm pad to Troi — who is manning the helm in lieu of the crewman who was just blown out through what was once the view screen — indicating that she should put full impulse on standby. (Literally, if you watch the scene closely, Troi's console prefaces the order with "TXT MSG" !) My question is: Did Picard also somehow warn crew members in the forward saucer section about what was about to happen? The ramming of the Scimitar was a heat of the moment decision. Considering that he also resorted to calling the auto-destruct sequence shortly after (which ended up being offline), he probably was of the mindset that any losses would be acceptable in order to hault Shinzon's march to Earth. Still, I'm curious. Answer The original script indicates that he called for the crew to " brace for impact ". Whether that call (or the comma...
Post a Comment
Read more