Hey everyone,
Welcome to another installment of Harry Potter Theory. Today, we’re going to be discussing WHY
ON EARTH the majority of witches and wizards in attendance at the Quidditch World Cup
RAN AWAY from the invading Death Eaters- rather than stay and fight. Why weren’t the
death eaters STOPPED? Yes, some did stay and fight, but of the vast numbers that attended,
only an infinitesimal number stayed. What I wonder is, why?
The International Quidditch World Cup was THE premier Quidditch contest-
hosted every four years since it’s very first contest in the year 1473. The Quidditch World
Cup allowed Quidditch players from all over the globe to find glory for their respective
countries- as it represented the pinnacle of Quidditch competition. For this reason,
it was exceedingly popular, with witches and wizards travelling from all over the globe
to support their nation’s quidditch team. The result? More than a few boatloads of
witches and wizards. We’re first introduced to this spectacular event in the Goblet of Fire:
“Clutching their purchases, Mr. Weasley in the lead, they all hurried into the wood,
following the lantern-lit trail. They could hear the sounds of thousands of
people moving around them, shouts and laughter, snatches of singing.
The atmosphere of feverish excitement was highly infectious; Harry couldn't
stop grinning.They walked through the wood for twenty minutes, talking and joking loudly, until
at last they emerged on the other side and found themselves in the shadow of a gigantic stadium.
Though Harry could see only a fraction of the immense gold walls surrounding the field,
he could tell that ten cathedrals would fit comfortably inside it.
"Seats a hundred thousand," said Mr. Weasley, spotting the awestruck look on Harry's face.
"Ministry task force of five hundred have been working on it all year.”
In Arthur Weasley’s own words- the Quidditch world cup stadium
seated ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND- that’s a lot of magical folk.
But- did that many actually attend? Well- a later passage suggests that this is VERY MUCH the case.
“A hundred thousand witches and wizards were taking their places in the seats,
which rose in levels around the long oval field. Everything was suffused
with a mysterious golden light, which seemed to come from the stadium itself.”
Ok- so now that we’ve established that over 100,000 magical folk were
in attendance at the Quidditch World Cup - I want to ask my question again:
WHY ON EARTH didn’t they fight back against the invading Death Eaters?
To add to this, not only were there just 100,000 people, there was also
the entire Ministry of Magic - INCLUDING the Department of Magical Law Enforcement-
a department RESPONSIBLE for fighting back against these types of dark wizards.
What gives? Couldn’t they have prevented the riot and stopped the blatant torture of muggles?
To refresh your memory, after the match between the Irish and Bulgarians had finished-
the areas surrounding the stadium were popping off with excitement.
The Irish fans were partying loudly, and all of those camping out outside of the stadium
were having a nice time. Harry and his friends stay up late,
but eventually fall asleep, that is- until their rude awakening in the middle of the night.
Quite suddenly, Mr. Weasley was shouting.
"Get up! Ron - Harry - come on now, get up, this is urgent!"
Harry sat up quickly and the top of his head hit canvas.
'S' matter?” he said.
Dimly, he could tell that something was wrong.
The noises in the campsite had changed. The singing had stopped.
He could hear screams, and the sound of people running.
By the light of the few fires that were still burning, he could see people running away into the
woods, fleeing something that was moving across the field toward them, something that was emitting
odd flashes of light and noises like gunfire. Loud jeering, roars of laughter, and drunken yells
were drifting toward them; then came a burst of strong green light, which illuminated the scene. “
“A crowd of wizards, tightly packed and moving together with wands pointing straight upward,
was marching slowly across the field. Harry squinted at them....They
didn't seem to have faces....Then he realized that their heads were hooded and their faces masked.
“More wizards were joining the marching group, laughing and pointing up at the floating bodies.
Tents crumpled and fell as the marching crowd swelled.
Once or twice Harry saw one of the marchers blast a tent out of his way with his wand.
Several caught fire. The screaming grew louder.”
Now, we eventually find out that these masked, hooded wizards were Death
Eaters- launching a haphazard (potentially drunken) attack on the Quidditch World Cup
in order to cause mayhem and (somewhat) portray loyalty to the Dark Lord.
The attack itself wasn’t coordinated, and was more or less the dark wizard equivalent of ‘blowing off
steam’- kind of like when football hooligans take things too far. Still, burning tents and
torturing muggles is alarming to say the least, which is what prompted SOME sort of defence.
"We're going to help the Ministry!” Mr. Weasley shouted over all the noise,
rolling up his own sleeves. "You lot - get into the woods, and stick together.
I'll come and fetch you when we've sorted this out!"
“Ministry wizards were dashing from every direction toward the source of the trouble.”
Okay- so ministry wizards and the Weasleys were making every effort
to confront these ‘Death Eaters’- but what I want to know is why they weren’t stopped.
Based on what I can see from the chapter ‘The Death Eaters’ in the Goblet of fire-
it’s reasonable to deduce that there were only 17 or so Death Eaters at the scene of the crime.
Barty Crouch Jr. Avery
Wormtail Lucius Malfoy
Walden Macnair Crabbe
Goyle Nott
And an unknown number of random Death Eaters. Potentially Alecto/Amycus Carrow,
Rowle, Yaxley, Selwyn, Wilkes, Gibbons, Jugson).
Karkaroff wasn’t there, Snape wasn’t there,
and the rest of the known Death Eaters (Bellatrix, Rodolphus, Rabastan, Dolohov,
Rookwood, Mulciber, & Travers) were all in Azkaban at the time of the Quidditch World Cup.
So- again, what was the big deal about 17, primarily low to mid level death eaters, causing
a ruckus? Why couldn’t they be PROMPTLY stopped? Couldn’t they have been immediately overpowered?
Ok- with some analysis it looks like there are a few things at play here. I’m going to
start with one passage in particular because it feel that it is of particular importance.
“The crowd beneath the Roberts family was larger than ever;
they could see the Ministry wizards trying to get through it to the hooded wizards in the center,
but they were having great difficulty. It looked as though they were scared to perform any spell
that might make the Roberts family fall. “
What this passage suggests is that there was a considerable effort from the Ministry wizards
to reach the death eaters- but that there were so many people in the way that they
simply couldn’t do anything. Furthermore, the Roberts family were being actively tortured,
which meant that Ministry Wizards were hesitant to pull the trigger
for fear that the Roberts family would be dropped from the air. Ok- so that’s ONE
reason that the Death Eaters weren’t stopped in their tracks. Here are some of the others.
Another reason is that no one really knew quite how many Death Eaters there actually were.
The scene was pure chaos- and what started off with fireworks and screams of joy
quickly devolved in to fearful screams and tents being set ablaze.
Amidst the darkness of the campground, how could anyone have possibly known
how many there were? All people were focused on were the pointy hats, the screaming, and the fire.
The attack came out of nowhere! I expect that this lack of information certainly would have
caused the lay witch or wizard to lean towards ‘flight’ rather than ‘fight’. Hence, crowds of
disorganized chaos effectively preventing the real defenders from reaching the Death Eaters.
Another factor to consider is of course the psychological factor. Despite Voldemort’s
downfall, the Death Eaters still inspired a considerable amount of fear in to the hearts
of witches and wizards alike. If you suddenly saw Death Eaters, and you were drunk and unprepared,
you’d probably freeze and just end up running away. Which is what happened en masse.
Lastly, there may have been 100,000 wizards and the entire ministry of magic there,
but what we have to remember is that many of these witches and wizards were ENTIRELY unfit to fight.
A lot of these fans were drunk, scared and completely caught off guard. As for the ministry-
a lot of Ministry workers are simply pencil pushers- how are they supposed to be expected to
navigate a random dark-wizard attack? That’s what the Department of Magical Law Enforcement is for!
We know that eventually the chaos ends with Barty Crouch Jr
Casting the Dark Mark in to the sky, prompting the Death Eaters to disapparate and flee in fear.
This is because these ‘disloyal’ Death Eaters were more than willing to engage in muggle torture,
but not even remotely willing to search for their former master.
And that’s it for this video! Did you guys ever wonder how the small number
of Death Eaters at the Quidditch World Cup were able to get away unscathed?
If you have any Harry Potter questions or video requests please leave a comment down below.
Until next time
Remember
It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live