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harry potter - Where is Durmstrang located?


What country is Durmstrang in? There are certainly a lot of mentions of aspects of the school (especially how cold it is) but the books and movies never actually say what country it is in. For example:





  1. Krum is from Bulgaria and plays for the Bulgarian national Quidditch team but that doesn't necessarily mean that the school is in Bulgaria.




  2. Krum mentions to Hermione that it is "over the mountains" but doesn't specify which mountains.




  3. In the movie, Dumbledore introduces Karkaroff and the Durmstrang students as his "friends from the North" (Bulgaria is far to the South of Scotland).





  4. Ron says in the book that he wished Malfoy went to Durmstrang because it would be easy to push him off of a glacier.




  5. Fur coats are a standard dress item of the Durmstrang students.




So where is Durmstrang? It's said to be "unplottable", like Hogwarts, but at least we know that Hogwarts is in Scotland.



Answer



According to an attendee report of "J.K. Rowling's reading for Maggie's Cancer Caring Centre" in December 9, 2000;




Jo [JKR] thinks that Durmstrang is in northern Scandinavia - the very north of Sweden or Norway and that Beauxbatons is somewhere near Cannes in the south of France. She says she doesn't know for certain because, of course, the exact whereabouts of these schools is a closely- guarded secret to which she is not privy!



Please note that this is a report. No official transcript exists, however this report has been confirmed by several people who were in attendance.


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