Hey everyone,
Welcome to another installment of Harry Potter Theory. In this video we’re going to be
discussing the 4 Hogwarts houses- Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff, in relation
to the evil witch and wizard population. More specifically, we will be discussing whether
or not Death Eaters have ever come from a house other than Slytherin.
Hagrid once remarked to Harry:
"Better Hufflepuff than Slytherin," said Hagrid darkly. "There's not a single witch or wizard
who went bad who wasn't in Slytherin. You-Know-Who was one."
And as far as dark witches and wizards go, the worst kinds were death eaters - followers
of Lord Voldemort who obeyed his bidding in an effort to ‘cleanse’ the wizarding world.
The death eaters were a group of pure-blood radical supremacists, ever-bloodthirsty and
always more than eager to incite fear in the hearts of their enemies. The Death Eaters
were originally formed while a young Tom Riddle attended Hogwarts between 1938 and 1945. But
at that point they were not yet known as ‘Death Eaters’, they were called the Knights of
Walpurgis. The Knights of Walpurgis was a group formed by Slytherin students exclusively,
as many of their core goals and perspectives as a group coincided with the beliefs of Slytherin
House. These students were certainly a bit morally dubious, and Dumbledore once described
Riddles gang as “a mixture of the weak seeking protection, the ambitious seeking glory, and
the thuggish seeking a leader who could show them more refined cruelty”.The key phrase
that sticks out to me here is ‘the ambitious seeking glory’, as I feel that this almost
directly resonates with one of the key characteristics involved with being a Slytherin student. Core
aspects of each of the four houses can be very broadly summed up in the Sorting Hat’s
own words, which are as follows:
“By Gryffindor, the bravest were Prized far beyond the rest;
For Ravenclaw, the cleverest Would always be the best;
For Hufflepuff, hard workers were Most worthy of admission;
And power-hungry Slytherin Loved those of great ambition.“
Ambition. Great ambition. This is the characteristic that I feel best addresses the core similarities
between Slytherin students and Death Eaters, and this is why I think that so many Death
Eaters ended up coming from Slytherin. It’s not that students from other houses aren’t
ambitious, it’s just that ambition is extremely closely rooted to the very existence of students
that end up getting sorted there.
One thing that I feel should be addressed however, is that ambition isn’t bad- I know
that the connections to Slytherin and the Death Eaters sort of make it feel that way,
but ambition is a wonderful thing if the right person possesses it. Another thing that I
feel needs to be mentioned is that Slytherin students aren’t inherently bad or evil.
Yes, one of their core characteristics matches one of the core characteristics of the death
eaters, but there are also plenty of Slytherins that never turned evil. Most of their bad
rep comes from founder Salazar Slytherin’s perspective on muggle-borns and half-bloods.
When he founded the house, Salazar Slytherin imbued the belief in his students that muggle-borns
and half-bloods were not worthy of practicing magic. His perspective made an impression
on some of (but not all of) the students of his house, and the poisonous ideologies that
he introduced were subsequently passed on from generation to generation:
Ron once remarked: "I always knew Salazar Slytherin was a twisted
old loony, but I never knew he started all this pure-blood stuff. I wouldn't be in his
house if you paid me. Honestly, if the Sorting Hat had tried to put me in Slytherin, I'd've
got the train straight back home..."
But in truth, Slytherins aren’t always just the one-dimensional evil villains that they’re
always painted out to be. The house is comprised of all sorts of complex characters that are
far more deserving of a label that isn’t just ‘evil’. Slytherins are often very
clever, very resourceful and very determined- but, in Dumbledore’s own words, usually
also possess ‘a certain disregard for the rules’. In addition to the above qualities,
they are also often very strong leaders- as shown with Tom Riddle and even Salazar Slytherin
himself.
I think that one the main issues with the house, however, is that it does sort of foster
pureblood supremacist ideals to some degree, and this is perhaps why it ends up producing
the largest amounts of dark witches/wizards when compared with the other houses.
With all of that being said, there are a LOT of death eaters- so, surely some of them must
have come from other houses, right?
The obvious exception to a Death Eater that came from another house is of course Peter
Pettigrew, as mentioned in the title. One important detail worth mentioning, however,
is that Peter Pettigrew was a hatstall, meaning that he very nearly ended up in Slytherin.
A hatstall is a very rare event, and it occurs when, during the sorting ceremony, the hat
needs additional time to come up with a decision. It occurs when a student has a personality
that could be considered equally suitable for multiple Hogwarts houses. In Pettigrews
case, the very-rare hatstall actually occurred, and the hat deliberated for 5.5 minutes on
whether Pettigrew should be placed in Slytherin or Gryffindor. When Peter was sorted in to
Gryffindor, he was overjoyed, and it was in Gryffindor that he was able to make friends
with the Marauders. However, whether he was a proper fit for Gryffindor or not is unclear-
as later in life he exhibits many traits that are very unlike a student of gryffindor. The
hat is quite stubborn, and maintains that it has never made a mistake, but in the case
of Pettigrew, I’m not so sure of that. In fact, I don’t know WHERE Pettigrew actually
fits. Gryffindor is meant to attract the courageous, which Pettigrew certainly isn’t, and Slytherin
is meant to attract the ambitious- which I’m not sure Pettigrew was either. He seemed content
to be a pawn that served a greater power, and I guess that is consistent with Dumbledore’s
previous statement where he remarked that some of the original ‘Knights of Walpurgis’
were “the weak seeking protection”.
Other than Pettigrew, it certainly looks as though no Death Eaters have ever come from
another Hogwarts house- and this is only further supported by Hagrid’s statements to Harry.
Hagrid is an active member in the Order of the Phoenix, which means that he’s been
quite involved with the war, and I feel that his belief that no Dark wizard or witch had
come from a house other than Slytherin strongly suggests that all the Death Eaters he was
aware of had been Slytherins. This also suggests that the Death Eaters whose houses we are
not provided were probably also Slytherins.
However, this is somewhat contradicted by a statement that Rowling made in an interview.
Rowling was once asked why Slytherin continues as a house if it is the primary breeding ground
of evil witches and wizards- fair question. To this, she responds that Death Eaters also
have connections in some of the other houses.
“But there aren't a lot of Death Eater children in the other houses, are there?”
“You will have people connected with Death Eaters in the other houses, yeah, absolutely.”
So, while she doesn’t explicitly say here that there are actual fully-fledged Death
Eaters in the other houses, she does assert that some connections certainly exist. This
leaves things quite wide-open to interpretation, as it could
Mean that Death Eaters have historically come from other Hogwarts houses, and that other
houses have the capacity to produce Death Eaters
Or
Mean that only ‘connections’ exist, and that no other Hogwarts house actually has
the capacity to produce one, though they are still ‘connected’ in some way, whatever
that means.
From Rowling’s statement, I’m certainly leaning more towards option a- and I say this
because more often than not, people from the same family end up in the same houses. If
‘connections’ do in fact exist, I’m going to assume that these are familial connections,
which in my opinion only vastly increases the likelihood that some of these other houses
have produced death eaters. We aren’t ever actually given the houses of many of the Death
Eaters, even the named ones. Barty Crouch Jr, Rookwood, Yaxley, and Rowle are some of
the Death Eaters whose houses are never mentioned, and this just leaves everything wide open.
What do you guys think? Have death eaters come from the other houses as well? Or just
Slytherin? Let me know down in the comment section below.
Until next time
YER A WIZARD ARRY