Hey everyone,
Welcome to another installment of Harry Potter Theory. In this video, we’re going to be
discussing Hermione Granger, The Time Turner, and the absurd amount of coursework that she
was taking on in her third year. But more specifically- we will be tackling the question-
did it AGE her? Time travel is not to be toyed with so-were there any lasting detrimental
effects?
A time turner is a magical device manufactured by the department of mysteries that is used
for time travel. Given the potential usefulness of a time turner, which allows for TIME TRAVEL,
one might expect that this technology would have been used more in the fight against evil-
but in reality it was mainly used by Hermione so that she could take on MORE coursework.
In the 1993 school year, Mcgonagall gifts a time-turner to Hermione so that she is able
to attend additional classes.
"Hermione's immense workload finally seemed to be getting to her. Every night, without
fail, Hermione was to be seen in a corner of the common room, several tables spread
with books, Arithmancy charts, rune dictionaries, diagrams of Muggles lifting heavy objects,
and file upon file of extensive notes; she barely spoke to anybody and snapped when she
was interrupted." —Hermione's workload due to her Ministry
Time-Turner
And on each time turner there is an inscription which reads as follows:
“I mark the hours, every one. Nor have I yet outrun the sun.
My use and value unto you, Are gauged by what you have to do.”
So, a time-turner allows you to go back in time- but, you may be asking-what are the
long term implications of time travel? Using a device that allows you to relive moments
in the past and then jump back right to the future? The answer to this is of course that
your ‘present’ self would have aged-depending on how long you went back in to the past.
If you went 5 years back in time and stayed there for 6 months, when you returned to the
present you would be 6 months older than you were before, but everyone else would have
remained the same age. This means that for every minute someone in the present aged,
Hermione’s time travelling self would age 2 minutes. So, given that Hermione uses a
time turner for a good portion of the school year- how much did he she actually age?
First of all, it’s never explicitly stated how many courses she doubles up on- and we
have no information about how long they were or how long the terms were, so all we can
do is estimate based on what we DO know.
In her third year, there were 12 possible classes that she could have been taking (7
core, 5 elective). Given Hermione’s nature and the fact that she was in possession of
a time travelling device, let’s assume that she took all of them.
However, it’s revealed that Hermione later drops two classes - Divination and Muggle
studies. She dropped Divination because she was NOT a fan, and she dropped Muggle Studies
because she was a muggle born, and didn’t really get anything out of the class. However,
she did attend these classes for a portion of the year- which means that she did still
age quite a bit.
We know that the Hogwarts school year begins in September, and ends at the last week of
June. There are also approximately two two-week holidays that occur during the school year,
which we need to factor in to this equation.
So the Hogwarts school year starts on 1 September and ends at the last week of June, with two
approximately two-week holidays (one in winter for Christmas and one in early spring for
Easter) during that time. September to July is approximately 43 weeks of classes- however,
if we deduct the 2 two-week stints of vacation time, then that leaves us with 39 weeks of
classes in total.
Hogwarts courses are generally 90 minutes, however, students have the option to double-up
on these courses if they so desire- making them 180 minutes in total, or three hours.
Hermione’s REGULAR 10 course schedule (without the addition of Divination and Muggle Studies),
would put her at 2 courses a day at 3 hours each. This would mean that she spent approximately
30 hours per week in class. And this was doable for Hermione, but what wasn’t doable was
trying to incorporate ADDITIONAL classes in to this already heavy schedule.
If Hermione were to have taken Divination and Muggle studies for the entire year (which
she didn’t), in addition to her regular courselead, then she would have taken approximately
6 hours of extra courses per week, for a 39 week duration.
6 hours x 39 weeks = 234 hours, which equals 9.75 days. So, if Hermione were to have done
it for a whole year, she would have aged an additional 9.75 days. BUT- she didn’t take
them for the duration.
Hermione Dropped Divination around Easter, which we’ll just round off to April 1st.
This means that she took Divination for a total of 30 weeks. If we deduct 2 weeks of
christmas holidays from this, then I think that it’s safe to say that she would have
aged an additional 3 hours per week for 28 weeks- 84 hours.
Hermione didn’t drop Muggle studies until much later in the year - the third week of
June. This puts the duration of her Muggle Studies period at 42 weeks, and if we subtract
both the Christmas and Easter holidays, we’re left with 38 weeks. This means that she took
an additional 3 x 38 hours of coursework in Muggle studies, or approximately 114 hours.
Hermione also spent about 3 hours helping to save Buckbeak.
If we add 84, 114 and 3, we get 201 hours, which equates to 8.375 days.
So, at the end of the day, Hermione finished the school year a whole 8.375 days older than
her peers, which is really nothing in the grand scheme of things. I may have made a
miscalculation SOMEWHERE, but I feel like this answer has got to be at least somewhat
correct. What do you guys think? Is this something that you ever even considered? Let us know
down in the comment section below.
Until next time
YER A WIZARD ARRY