Skip to main content

What are the costs of books and materials in Harry Potter?


In the first book, Harry sees his Gringotts vault for the first time.


(Quotes thanks to Slytherincess!)



Griphook unlocked the door. A lot of green smoke came billowing out, and as it cleared, Harry gasped. Inside were mounds of gold coins. Columns of silver. Heaps of little bronze Knuts.


"All yours," smiled Hagrid.


All Harry's -- it was incredible. The Dursleys couldn't have known about this or they'd have had it from him faster than blinking. How often had they complained how much Harry cost them to keep? And all the time there had been a small fortune belonging to him, buried deep under London.


Hagrid helped Harry pile some of it into a bag. "The gold ones are Galleons," he explained. "Seventeen silver Sickles to a Galleon and twenty-nine Knuts to a Sickle, it's easy enough. Right, that should be enough fer a couple o' terms, we'll keep the rest safe for yeh."


Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - pages 58-59 - US Hardcover Edition




Jk Rowling posts in the Harry Potter Lexicon



JKR has stated in an interview (Comic Relief 2001) that she estimates the value of one Galleon to be "about five pounds," which works out to around US$9.75 (the exchange rate at the time of the interview was US$7.33). In the introduction to both QA and FB, US$250-million is stated to be the equivelent of 34 million Galleons. That also works out to a value of £5 to the Galleon, at the exchange rate of the time. The price listed on the back of the books, however, is not correct, since US$3.99 would equal less than half a British pound, or 8 sickles and 15 knuts. The book instead incorrectly lists US$3.99 as being equal to 14 sickles and 3 knuts. (Unfortunately, CNN.com uses this incorrect value for their Knuts-to-dollars converter.)


This gives us approximate values as follows:


1 bronze Knut = £0.01 (US about 2 cents)


1 silver Sickle = £0.29 (about US$0.57)


1 Galleon = £5.00 (more or less US$9.75)


These rates vary as the exchange rate fluctuates - see the Wizarding World Currency Converter for the current rate.




Now looking at the quote



Hagrid helped Harry pile some of it into a bag.



and



Right, that should be enough fer a couple o' terms, we'll keep the rest safe for yeh.



Obviously "some" is unspecified, but presuming the costs of school textbooks...




Typical elementary-school textbooks cost more than $100 each



He would be carrying at least 10 galleons for each school book, and going by the list of books just for his first year,


(Thanks Ibid!)



COURSE BOOKS


All students should have a copy of each of the following:



  • The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) by Miranda Goshawk

  • A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot


  • Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling

  • A Beginners’ Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch

  • One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore

  • Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger

  • Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander

  • The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection by Quentin Trimble


(Harry Potter and Philospher's Stone, Chapter 5)



That's 80 Galleons just for books. This does not include the list of other expenses Harry has for his school years (wand, potion reagents, etc.)



How many Galleons is "some" or is Diagon Alley selling supplies for third world prices?


Sidenote, is this just a case of bad JK maths?



Answer



The old PS2 Pottermore site included a 'moment' where you could take a trip to Flourish and Blotts. Not only could you review the books available in the Wizarding World but, helpfully, they were also priced for sale. As you can see, they were most inexpensive.


enter image description here



A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration (1 Galleon)
Magical Drafts and Potions (2 Galleons)
One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi (2 Galleons)
The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1 (1 Galleon)

The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection (1 Galleon)
A History of Magic (2 Galleons)
Magical Theory (2 Galleons)
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2 Galleons)
Break with a Banshee (5 Galleons)
Gadding with Ghouls (5 Galleons)
Holidays with Hags (5 Galleons)
The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 2 (1 Galleon)
Travels with Trolls (5 Galleons)
Voyages with Vampires (5 Galleons)

Wanderings with Werewolves (5 Galleons)
Year with the Yeti (5 Galleons)
The Monster Book of Monsters (4 Galleons)
Unfogging the Future (2 Galleons)
Intermediate Transfiguration (2 Galleons)
The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 3 (1 Galleon)



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Did the gatekeeper and the keymaster get intimate in Ghostbusters?

According to TVTropes ( usual warning, don't follow the link or you'll waste half your life in a twisty maze of content ): In Ghostbusters, it's strongly implied that Dana Barret, while possessed by Zuul the Gatekeeper, had sex with Louis Tully, who was possessed by Vinz Clortho the Keymaster (key, gate, get it?), in order to free Big Bad Gozer. In fact, a deleted scene from the movie has Venkman explicitly asking Dana if she and Louis "did it". I turned the quote into a spoiler since it contains really poor-taste joke, but the gist of it is that it's implied that as part of freeing Gozer , the two characters possessed by the Keymaster and the Gatekeeper had sex. Is there any canon confirmation or denial of this theory (canon meaning something from creators' interviews, DVD commentary, script, delete scenes etc...)? Answer The Richard Mueller novelisation and both versions of the script strongly suggest that they didn't have sex (or at the very l...
1 comment
Read more

Why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize Missy right away?

So after it was established that Missy is actually both the Master, and the "woman in the shop" who gave Clara the TARDIS number... ...why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize her right away? I remember the Tenth Doctor in The Sound of Drums stating that Timelords had a way of recognizing other Timelords no matter if they had regenerated. And Clara should have recognized her as well... I'm hoping for a better explanation than "Moffat screwed up", and that I actually missed something after two watchthroughs of the episode. Answer There seems to be a lot of in-canon uncertainty as to the extent to which Time Lords can recognise one another which far pre-dates Moffat's tenure. From the Time Lords page on Wikipedia : Whether or not Time Lords can recognise each other across regenerations is not made entirely clear: In The War Games, the War Chief recognises the Second Doctor despite his regeneration and it is implied that the Doctor knows him when they fir...
Post a Comment
Read more

story identification - Animation: floating island, flying pests

At least 20 years ago I watched a short animated film which stuck in my mind. The whole thing was wordless, possibly European, and I'm pretty sure I didn't imagine it... It featured a flying island which was inhabited by some creatures who (in my memory) reminded me of the Moomins. The island was frequently bothered by large winged animals who swooped around, although I don't think they did any actual damage. At the end one of the moomin creatures suddenly gets a weird feeling, feels forced to climb to the top of the island and then plunges down a shaft right through the centre - only to emerge at the bottom as one of the flyers. Answer Skywhales from 1983. The story begins with a man warning the tribe of approaching skywhales. The drummers then warn everybody of the hunt as everyone get prepared to set "sail". Except one man is found in his home sleeping as the noise wake him up. He then gets ready and is about to take his weapon as he hesitates then decides ...
Post a Comment
Read more

warhammer40k - What evidence supposedly supports Tau as related to the Necrontyr?

I've heard of rumours saying that the Tau from Warhammer 40K are in fact the Necrontyr. Is there anything that supports this statement, in WH40K canon? I just found this, on 1d4 chan 1 : Helping Necrons? Or are they Necrontyr descendants? An often overlooked issue is that Tau have no warp signatures, just like Necrons, hate Warpspawns and Warp in general, just like Necrons, have the exact same skull shape,stature and short lives, and the overwhelming need for Technology and beam weapons, JUST LIKE NECRONS. GW may have planned a race that simply prepares a pacified, multiracial galaxy for Necrons to feast upon, supported by Ethereals that have a C'tan phase blade. Then there is a reference of "dark seed in east" by the Deceiver, so the tricky C'tan might give Tzeentch the finger in the JUST AS PLANNED competition. Or maybe GW just has so little creativity that they simply made a new civ conforming to an Old One's standards without knowing it. Is this the connec...
Post a Comment
Read more