- What is a pure-blood wizard?
- Attitudes
- Traditions, customs, religions
- Sacred 28
- Known (canon) pure-blood families and status
- Political influences and war/Death Eaters
- In Hogwarts
- In other schools
- Status in modern day

Jan 2023 recs

- Squibs: still useful or not?
- Pureblood exposure to mugglekind

History.

The universally accepted definition for "pure-blood' today is an individual whose parents and grandparents aren't muggles or muggle-born wizards, but this was not always the case.

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Views on blood-purity have experienced massive fluctuations throughout Britain's history. The concept of having "pure blood" dates back—at the very latest—to the tenth century and was popularized from the writings of Salazar Slytherin, Hogwarts founder notorious for his refusal to teach students of non-magical parentage. Even so, his beliefs were unpopular among the general public during his time; evidence suggests that the majority of people back then not only accepted muggle-born wizards as equal counterparts but also considered them particularly gifted, for their magic was believed to have sprung out of nowhere.

This camaraderie between wizards and muggles would not last. During the early fifteenth century, the persecution of wizards and witches began to take place all over Europe, and by the seventeenth century, wizard-Muggle relations were at their worst. To protect themselves, wizardkind first attempted to ally with the Muggle British Monarchy (then ruled jointly by King William III and Queen Mary II) for the support of wizards under Muggle law. When this failed, wizards in Britain had no choice but to go into hiding and established the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy in 1689. As a result, opinions on muggles and muggle-born suffered a negative shift, and the rate of wizard-Muggle intermarriages plummeted.

Blinded by fear and resentment, wizards began to cling to the pure-blood doctrine initially proposed by Salazar Slytherin and other scholars. An increasing number of wizards preached that marrying muggles not only risked infraction of the new statute, but was also shameful, unnatural, and would lead to the total eradication of magical blood. Those who began to self-describe themselves as "pure-blood" did so not as an acknowledgment of their biology (in truth, they weren't any purer than anyone else), but rather as a political statement that they would not marry or befriend muggles.

Over time, wizard-only marriages became the new norm in magical society. By the 1900s, "pure-blood" was no longer regarded as a mere political stance, but now falsely as a concept in the genetic sense. Families who were able to maintain a long enough line could easily erase any muggle, muggle-born, or squib relative out of their records. By emphasizing that the family tree only contained wizards, a family or person could boast their perceived superiority for being genetically pure-blooded, or as some liked to call it, "trueblood." This new discourse would only cause more strain for wizardkind in the years to come.

Attitudes & Customs.

Like all cultures, British pure-blood society and those who are raised within it hold unique sets of ideas, practices, social standards, and attitudes towards themselves and others.

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>class

Contrary to the stereotype that they are usually well off, pure-bloods can derive from all economic classes; from lower, middle, and upper. However, similar to muggles, wealth remains highly regarded among wizardkind. Class discrimination still runs rampant. Such attitudes are most common among upper-class pure-bloods, whose families have amassed large fortunes due to influence and longevity.

To pure-blood families that can afford it, hosting balls...

>religion

Pure-bloods can belong to any religion.

>marriage

The Wizengamot has clear betrothal (semi-binding, defined as intent to marry) and marriage ages. In British wizarding society, adulthood is legally defined as age seventeen. With parental consent, two minor individuals may betroth at age fourteen minimum. Without parental consent, individuals may only betroth at age seventeen minimum. The minimum marriage age is seventeen for both with and without parental consent. These laws do not vary between region and apply evenly throughout the UK and Ireland.

*These are not only IC laws, but also OOC rules.

>supremacy

Many works remark on the supposed indicators of pure-blood status. Studies conducted by the Ministry of Magic have proven these hallmarks to have little basis in fact, but that hasn't stopped many wizards today from expecting these signs in the pure-blood individual:

• Onset of magical ability before the age of three
• Prowess on a broom before the age of seven
• Striking physical attractiveness
• Oustanding intelligence
• Resistance to common childhood illnesses
• An aversion to muggles
• An aversion to particularly non-magical animals such as the pig

.

>muggle-born/half-bloods

Although pure-blood attitudes on muggles, muggle-born, and squibs are well documented as discriminatory, their opinions on half-bloods may be more forgiving.

>non-humans

[insert stuff about giant, dhamp, veela, goblins/wizard relations] House elves have different experiences. Traditionally, many ancient pure-blood families owned house elves.

>technology

.

The Sacred Twenty-Eight.

In the early 1930s, a Pure-Blood Directory, widely believed to have been written by Cantankerus Nott, compiled the twenty-eight British families that were still truly pure-blood to help them maintain their status.

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Abbott	Fawley	Malfoy	Selwyn**
Avery	Flint	Nott	Shacklebolt
Black**	Gaunt**	Ollivander	Shafiq
Bulstrode	Greengrass	Parkinson	Slughorn
Burke	Lestrange**	Prewett**	Travers**
Carrow**	Longbottom	Rosier	Weasley
Crouch**	Macmillan	Rowle**	Yaxley**

Extinct in the male line, as of 2022**

Responses to the Pure-Blood Directory varied wildly from the families involved. For instance, the Weasleys publicly objected their inclusion on the directory due to their ancestral interest in Muggle society, effectively granting them the epithet of "blood-traitors" by followers of the pure-blood doctrine. On the other hand, the Malfoys were proud to be a Sacred Twenty-Eight family and held the title in high esteem. Among non-pure-bloods, the Pure-blood Directory was criticised as a means of contributing to pure-blood supremacy.

In present day, most of these families are either no longer extant or no longer pure-blood. Nearly half are extinct, but may still have living relatives through the female line. There have been efforts from excluded families to label themselves as the twenty-ninth sacred family, but these attempts were in vain—the official Pure-Blood Directory has never surpassed twenty-eight entries.

Due to the nature of the Pure-Blood Directory, it was not uncommon for these families to intermarry, and in extreme cases, resort to inbreeding (most often between cousins) in an effort to preserve their blood-purity status. As a result, many of the Sacred Twenty-Eight families were related to some degree.

Politics and War.

The pure-blood doctrine has been the source of many conflicts in wizarding Britain's history.

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The Death Eaters were a group of pure-blood supremacists that followed Lord Voldemort. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

In Hogwarts.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

Elsewhere.

(durmstrang institute, ilvermorny) Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

Modern Day.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

You're doing great so far Phaedra!

I have one or two minor notes right now. I can share them with you right away or simply wait til you have finished the article? Just let me know which way you'd prefer.

@Caradoc Browne Feel free to leave them now

the two points I had were:

1st is simple, you point out the families that are extinct with * but Gaunt is not given a *. I thought they were all dead by now?

2nd is that you mention the concept of pure blood comes from Salazar. Not sure if he'd be the first to arrive with that concept as I always thought it would go further down history than that. But this can me a misconception by me.

1. I also was wondering about that. Turns out relatives for many of these families are still around, which is why I didn't mark the Gaunts extinct, but those relatives are only through the female line. I will mark them now.

2. I got the Salazar Slytherin info from here.

"The term ‘pure-blood’ refers to a family or individual without Muggle (non-magic) blood. The concept is generally associated with Salazar Slytherin..."

I could rewrite it to say the idea wasn't necessarily invented by Salazar but that he popularized it, if that's better?

EDIT LOG

May 30th 3:53 PM CT

I labelled the following families as extinct:

• Black
• Crouch
• Gaunt
• Lestrange
• Prewett

Source: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Pure-blood. Please lmk me if there's more.

June 2nd 3:49 PM CT

Changed "originated from the writings of Salazar Slytherin" to "was popularized from the writings of Salazar Slytherin."

June 12th 4:34 PM CT

Added the following families as extinct, thanks to the help of Pendrast:

• Avery
• Carrow
• Fawley
• Rosier
• Rowle
• Selwyn
• Shafiq
• Travers
• Yaxley

Popularized sounds good to me!

Regarding the extinct pure-blood families of the Sacred 28:

All known Averys (father and son) were Voldemort followers, and they both either died or were sentenced to Azkaban for life (which means no kids).

For the Rosiers Evan was killed by Alastor Moody and his father, like the Averys, either died as well or went to a lifetime of prison.

Rowle, Selwyn, Travers, and Yaxley are in the same boat. All their known, male, family members were followers of Voldemort.

Crabbe: Vincent killed himself with his own Fiendfyre. His father either died or was sent to Azkaban. It's unlikely that the family is still extant given that he had no siblings.

Carrow depends on if we believe in movie canon or not. Amycus and Alecto were sentenced to life in Azkaban after the Battle of Hogwarts, but the movies have the twins Flora and Hestia Carrow (Hogwarts students) in the Sixth movie, they re-appear in the 7th and 8th movies. If we assume they were the kids of a relative (cousin, sibling) of Amycus and Alecto and said male person was still alive the family would be extant.

Neville Longbottom had no kids. If he died the Longbottoms are extinct as well.

Fawley and Shafiq we don't know if they were still extant by the time the books began. Since they were never mentioned that's unlikely, however, or means they only exist int he female line. Furthermore, Umbridge claimed relation to the Selwyns to boast her claim of magical blood, implying that there weren't many people alive to deny her claim (as she wouldn't have made it otherwise).

The Ollivanders are no longer pure-bloods. Garrick was born in the late 19th or early 20th century, meaning his pure-blood father was still alive when Nott wrote about the Sacred 28 in the 1930s. Whether a line that has only non-pureblood members left counts as extinct is anyone's guess. (Garrick's son is still alive.)


Nerd out.

All known Averys (father and son) were Voldemort followers, and they both either died or were sentenced to Azkaban for life (which means no kids).

Not necessarily. Like you said, we do not know if there were any descendants. The Avery II is also assumed to be the son of the Avery I. There's no mention of first names for either of them, only their last name. I do not think this is enough evidence to write them down as extinct.

For the Rosiers Evan was killed by Alastor Moody and his father, like the Averys, either died as well or went to a lifetime of prison.

Same here, not enough evidence. It's even said they branched out to France. Which is an entire line of them that could decide to move back to the UK.

Rowle, Selwyn, Travers, and Yaxley are in the same boat. All their known, male, family members were followers of Voldemort.

Again for Rowle, Selwyn, Travers and Yaxley. There's too little information. Especially since there's no mention of them being the only ones out there. We've also used the Yaxley name for the main plot. As it was their vault that has been robbed.

Crabbe: Vincent killed himself with his own Fiendfyre. His father either died or was sent to Azkaban. It's unlikely that the family is still extant given that he had no siblings.

Can be disputed. But I would go with extinct here. Just to avoid anyone going too near to being family of Vincent Crabbe.

Carrow depends on if we believe in movie canon or not. Amycus and Alecto were sentenced to life in Azkaban after the Battle of Hogwarts, but the movies have the twins Flora and Hestia Carrow (Hogwarts students) in the Sixth movie, they re-appear in the 7th and 8th movies. If we assume they were the kids of a relative (cousin, sibling) of Amycus and Alecto and said male person was still alive the family would be extant.

Completely agree with this one.

Neville Longbottom had no kids. If he died the Longbottoms are extinct as well.

The boy could have had kids by now, but we're not allowing any of the players to be hsi close relative. So no Longbottoms!

Fawley and Shafiq we don't know if they were still extant by the time the books began. Since they were never mentioned that's unlikely, however, or means they only exist in the female line. Furthermore, Umbridge claimed relation to the Selwyns to boast her claim of magical blood, implying that there weren't many people alive to deny her claim (as she wouldn't have made it otherwise).

Would keep them on active as we have both of those names walking around somewhere.

The Ollivanders are no longer pure-bloods. Garrick was born in the late 19th or early 20th century, meaning his pure-blood father was still alive when Nott wrote about the Sacred 28 in the 1930s. Whether a line that has only non-pureblood members left counts as extinct is anyone's guess. (Garrick's son is still alive.)

Completely agree here again. Also just don't want any Ollivanders walking about.