Skip to main content

harry potter - How many wands did Ollivander need?


For reference, here are two questions that deal with wizarding population: What is the total wizarding population during the events of the Harry Potter series and How many people worked for the Ministry of Magic?


The British Wizarding population seems rather small. Apparently the entire student body of Hogwarts is able to fit into the Hogwarts Express (According to Pottermore -- 1, 2 -- the Hogwarts Express is the only way to Hogwarts; it's not like some students ride the train and some students are dropped off by their parents for the school term.).


How many wands would Ollivander have to keep on hand at any given time? We know Harry tried out a lot of wands before his wand finally chose him. Maybe some kids need five tries; maybe some get the right wand on the first try. And there are broken and lost wands that need replacing to take into consideration.


I don't consider the movies canon, but as they're JKR approved, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone shows Ollivander has a pretty significant number of wands in stock for what is a smaller Wizarding population (see pics). Is there a canonical way to estimate how many wands Ollivander would need to keep in stock?


I'm looking for an answer grounded in canon, meaning the novels, interviews with J.K. Rowling, or information from Pottermore or the like. Barring that, a speculative answer in the spirit of canon is absolutely welcome, including alternative sources of information. ETA 12.21.14


Ollivanders 01


Ollivanders 02


Ollivanders 03



Answer




Ollivander is the primary wand maker for the United Kingdom. JK Rowling is on record as saying there are 1,000 students at Hogwarts at any given time. If you believe there are roughly 36 new students per house per year that means he needs to supply around 144 wands per year to new students. The cited article says there are likely significantly less students per year, and Rowling has admitted to being poor at math, but she is on the record...


Now some poorer families don't necessarily buy a new wand right away (such as Ron Weasley), but they probably buy a new one at some point. And wands can be damaged and destroyed (such as Harry's), so that probably evens out.


The other consideration is that the "wand chooses the wizard." Other than when specifically directed to make a wand for a person (such as the replacement wand for Peter Petigrew) he needs to manufacture lots of wands hoping that one of them will choose each prospective customer.


Now he probably spends most of the year constructing wands, builds up a huge inventory before the start of a new school year, and subsequently has it depleted.


So if you count the incoming students for Hogwarts and assume some kind of 0.5% wand loss / replacement for the UK wizard population at large (3000) you'd be looking at Ollivander needing 160 odd wands in stock for the start of term each year.


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 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

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