Number 12, Grimmauld Place
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Number twelve, Grimmauld Place, London is the address of a fictitious house in the Harry Potter books. This mansion is the ancestral home of the the Black family, an ancient, pureblood line of (traditionally malevolent) wizards. It first appears in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Grimmauld Place seems to be within easy walking distance of the King's Cross railway station, placing it, most probably, in the London Borough of Camden.
"Grimmauld Place" is a pun on "grim old place". It may also be derived from the Grim, an omen of death in the shape of a black dog that closely resembles Sirius' Animagus form. Another influence on the name may be the word "mold", referring to the dilapidated condition of the house.
The last Black
With the death of its last mistress, Walburga Black, Grimmauld Place passed into the hands of Sirius Black, the "white sheep" of the Black Family and its last heir. The house fell into disrepair while Sirius was incarcerated in Azkaban prison for twelve years. When he later returned to the old family home, it was a gloomy and unpleasant dwelling teeming with dust, decay and various dangerous magical objects, pests, and hexes. As Hermione Granger says darkly, "Stuff's been breeding in here".12 Grimmauld Place housed an illustrated Black family tree on a wall-hung tapestry; an enchanted portrait of Sirius Black's mother Walburga, which portrayed the woman's deep-seated hatred for non-Purebloods and which was given to screaming when disturbed; and an ancient and deeply mad house-elf named Kreacher who was loyal to the portrait of Mrs. Black. There were other portraits of dead Blacks, including a portrait of Phineas Nigellus, a scion of the Black family and former headmaster of Hogwarts, who along with Sirius's deranged mother, issued orders to the deranged house elf. The main corridors were lined with the heads of beheaded former house elves, which were mounted onto the walls as trophies, and as a not-so subtle visual warning to Kreacher.
Headquarters of The Order of the Phoenix
There were many security measures in place at Grimmauld Place. For example, in order to disguise the house from Muggles and other interlopers, it may have been enchanted to appear small and modest, as on several occasions, the interior appeared quite large and opulent (if decaying) in comparison with the descriptions of other properties on the square. It is as secure as any magical dwelling can be, and can accommodate a considerable number of people. For this reason, it was chosen as the headquarters of the reorganized Order of the Phoenix, when Sirius offered it to the Order. Thereafter, its location was further hidden through the use of the Fidelius Charm with Albus Dumbledore as the Secret Keeper. As revealed by J. K. Rowling on her website on February 21 2006:
- :"When a Secret-Keeper dies, their secret dies with them, or, to put it another way, the status of their secret will remain as it was at the moment of their death. Everybody in whom they confided will continue to know the hidden information, but nobody else."[#endnote_secrets]
Dumbledore used the portrait of Phineas Nigellus that was displayed in the house for communication with the Order of the Phoenix, as a second, linked portrait of Nigellus was hung in the headmaster's office at Hogwarts.
The new owner
Harry inherited the house at the beginning of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince after the death of Sirius Black at the hands of his cousin, Bellatrix Lestrange. Dumbledore had removed the Order of the Phoenix until he could be sure that Harry really owned it. Although Sirius left everything to Harry in his will, the spells put in place by Sirius' family might have ensured that their home could only pass to family members or to pureblood wizards, in which case it would have belonged to Sirius' closest living relative (and his murderer): Bellatrix Lestrange. Dumbledore tested Harry's ownership of the house by having Harry give orders to Kreacher, the house-elf servant, reasoning that if Harry had truly inherited Kreacher that would indicate that he had truly inherited the house as well. Kreacher, who hated Harry, was nevertheless forced to follow Harry's orders as he was bound to his new master by magic, so it was clear that Harry did in fact own Number 12, Grimmauld Place.Harboring no great love for the place that held so many terrible memories, Harry immediately gave the mansion to the Order to use as Headquarters. This does not mean that there was a transfer of ownership - while Harry owns the property, he does not live in it.
Current fan speculation is that an unopenable locket, found during the cleanup of the house in book 5, once belonged to Salazar Slytherin, and may be one of Voldemort's Horcruxes.
After Sirius's death, a thief and Order member named Mundungus Fletcher stole several Black heirlooms, most notably goblets made of the finest sixteenth century goblin wrought silver and embossed with the Black family crest. Harry was enraged when he found that his godfather's house was being robbed, and caught Fletcher at Hogsmeade, but he escaped. Fearing Dumbledore's anger, Fletcher then went into hiding, before being arrested and sent to Azkaban for impersonating an Inferius.
Architecture
There is some debate as to the actual size and design of the house. From its description, it may have been a 19th-century townhouse, which would seem to imply that the Blacks had come into possession of it relatively recently. While there are no definite indications that the house and its facilities exceed those that would be typical of a townhouse, some of the features in the kitchen suggest that it is not this type of property, as does the fact that it is one storey taller than most such houses in modern London.Alternatively, the house, and indeed the square on which it is situated, may have been part of a more rural community that was absorbed by London's expansion. Magic could have been used to change its outward appearance to suit its surroundings as they changed. This would allow the possibility that the house had been in the family for much longer, and that (at least on the inside) it may be a manor house or mansion rather than a townhouse, which would be more in keeping with the style expected of the aristocratic Blacks.
It appears that grand mansions are the favored homes among the wizarding world's old pureblood families. The Malfoys have an old family mansion in Wiltshire, and the wealthy pureblood witch Hepzibah Smith (a descendant of Helga Hufflepuff) lived in a similar dwelling.
See also
References
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