Over View
Harry James Potter (b. 31 July, 1980) was a half-blood wizard, the only child and son of the late James and Lily Potter (née Evans), and one of the most famous wizards of modern times. In what proved to be a vain attempt to circumvent a prophecy that stated a boy born at the end of July of 1980 could be able to defeat him, Lord Voldemort attempted to murder him when he was only a year and three months old. Voldemort murdered Harry's parents as they tried to protect him, shortly before attacking Harry himself. This early, unsuccessful attempt to vanquish Harry led to Voldemort's first downfall, marking the end of the First Wizarding War and to Harry henceforth being known as the "Boy Who Lived". One consequence of Lily's loving sacrifice was that her orphaned son had to be raised by her only remaining blood relative. Harry was raised by his Muggle aunt Petunia Dursley in a home where he was neither welcomed nor nurtured, but would be protected from Lord Voldemort, at least until he was seventeen years old only because of a powerful charm Albus Dumbledore made. As the only known survivor of the Killing Curse (up to that point) Harry was already famous before he arrived at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in 1991.
Early on his eleventh birthday, Harry learned that he was a wizard via Hagrid, keeper of the keys. He began attending Hogwarts in 1991 and was Sorted into Gryffindor House. While at school, Harry became best friends with Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, and later became the youngest Quidditch Seeker in over a century and eventually the captain of his house's team, winning two Quidditch Cups. He became even better known in his early years for protecting the Philosopher's Stone from Voldemort, saving Ron's sister Ginny Weasley, solving the mystery of the Chamber of Secrets, slaying Salazar Slytherin's basilisk, and learning how to produce a corporeal stag Patronus at the age of thirteen. In his fourth year at Hogwarts, Harry won the Triwizard Tournament, although the competition ended with the tragic death of Cedric Diggory and the return of Lord Voldemort though the Ministry refused to accept it. The next school year, Harry reluctantly taught and led Dumbledore's Army and fought in the Battle of the Department of Mysteries, during which he lost his godfather, Sirius Black.
Harry played a significant role in many other battles of the Second Wizarding War and hunted down and destroyed Voldemort's Horcruxes along with Ron and Hermione. During the Battle of Hogwarts he personally witnessed the deaths of Severus Snape and Fred Weasley, and learned that Remus Lupin, Nymphadora Tonks, Colin Creevey, and many others had fallen in battle as well. He encountered Voldemort and sacrificed himself, knowing that his doing so was the only way to destroy the fragment of Voldemort's soul that was inside of him. In limbo, after Voldemort cursed him in the forest clearing, Albus Dumbledore gave Harry advice and background information on the Dark Lord. When told he could choose to live or to "move on", Harry chose to live. After he awoke he confronted Voldemort and defeated him once and for all.
Harry was also notable for being the only known Master of Death, having united the three Deathly Hallows at the mere age of seventeen.
After the war, Harry became an Auror and helped reform and revolutionise the Ministry of Magic. At some point he married Ginny Weasley, with whom he had three children: James Sirius (named after his father and godfather), Albus Severus (named after Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape), and Lily Luna (named after his mother and Luna Lovegood). He was also named the godfather of Edward Remus Lupin. In 2007 Harry was promoted to Head of the Auror Office at the record age of 26, and occasionally delivered Defence Against the Dark Arts lectures at Hogwarts. Harry is currently the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and has been since 2019.
Family lineage
The Potters were an old and wealthy pure-blood family, descended from their founding patriarch Linfred of Stinchcombe. Harry inherited much wealth from his father James and his grandparents, Fleamont and Euphemia. The Potters were also descended from the Peverell family, through Ignotus Peverell, (one of the Three Brothers that created the Deathly Hallows) who passed the Cloak of Invisibility down to his descendants. The Potters were related to the Gaunts (and by extension Lord Voldemort), who were the descendants of the second brother Cadmus. From him, the Resurrection Stone was passed down to his descendants as a family heirloom, set in a signet ring.
Conversely, Harry's mother Lily Evans was a Muggle-born, the first witch in her family. Lily had an older sister, Petunia, who was forced to raise Harry alongside her son, Dudley Dursley.
As the Potters were considered a pure-blood family, Harry may have been related paternally to various other wizards and witches through families like the: Blacks, Malfoys, Weasleys, and Longbottoms (as well as many other pure-blood families). Harry's only known maternal relatives were the Evans and Dursley families, who were Muggles.
Early life (1980-1981)
Harry Potter was born on 31 July, 1980 to Lily and James Potter, members of the original Order of the Phoenix at the height of the First Wizarding War; he was born only hours after his classmate-to-be Neville Longbottom. From birth, he lived in hiding with his parents after Voldemort marked them for death. They lived in the village of Godric's Hollow in a home put under the Fidelius Charm by Albus Dumbledore to keep them hidden. They also had planned to make Sirius Black their Secret Keeper, but on his advice, changed this designation to Peter Pettigrew, whom they thought would be less suspicious. In a terrible turn of fate, it happened that Pettigrew was a spy for Voldemort. He betrayed James and Lily, then faked his own death, and framed Sirius for both.
When Harry was born, Lily held a christening; it was quiet and quick. Only James, Lily, Harry, and Sirius were there. For Harry's first birthday, Sirius bought him a toy broomstick. The Potters also owned a cat, but it is unknown what happened to it after Voldemort's attack.
On the evening of Hallowe'en in 1981, Lord Voldemort arrived at Godric's Hollow and murdered James and Lily. He murdered James first, who tried to act as a distraction to the Dark Lord; unfortunately he did not have his wand with him and was killed immediately. Voldemort then advanced on Lily, who died trying to protect Harry. Her sacrifice prevented the Killing Curse from working on Harry, resulting in her love for Harry becoming a barrier protecting him. When Voldemort attempted the curse on Harry it backfired on the caster and instead of murdering Harry, Voldemort lost all his powers and his physical form was obliterated, but was saved from death by the five Horcruxes he had made up to that point. These included his diary, Gaunt's ring, Slytherin's locket, Hufflepuff's cup, and Ravenclaw's diadem. Later, this also included Harry himself because Voldemort not only gave part of his abilities to Harry, he also accidentally gave Harry part of his soul. This event made Harry the only person to have survived the Killing Curse, thus giving him the title the "Boy Who Lived". The failed curse left a lightning-bolt scar on his forehead. The scar would be a bane and also a blessing to Harry in the years to come, as it opened a telepathic link between Lord Voldemort and himself.
Rubeus Hagrid rescued Harry from the house, (destroyed by Voldemort's faulty killing curse) and was given specific orders from Albus Dumbledore to take him to his aunt and uncle, but he was intercepted by Sirius Black, a close friend of the Potters, who pleaded for Hagrid to give the baby to him, as he was the chosen guardian in the event of James and Lily's death. Hagrid refused, saying that he was under orders from Dumbledore to get Harry to his relatives as quickly as possible. When Harry was found by Hagrid in the destoryed Potter Cottage, it is described that his cot and himself radiated of pure light.
Sirius, though reluctant, relented and gave Hagrid his flying motorcycle to take Harry to Privet Drive. Dumbledore left a letter of explanation to the Dursleys, but they never relayed it to Harry. Instead, Harry spent the next decade of his life in their strict and miserable home without knowing that he was a wizard.
Life at Privet Drive (1981-1991)
As Harry's aunt and uncle, the Dursleys, were Muggles, they had no understanding of magic, and even though his aunt and uncle knew about his lineage, they wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. The Dursleys proudly considered themselves a "normal" family and despised anything out of the ordinary. They lied to Harry about his parents, claiming they had died in a car crash and that James was an unemployed drunk. They also claimed that the lightning-bolt scar on Harry's forehead (which he had received from Voldemort's failed Killing Curse, and could vaguely recall as if he 'strained his memory' a green flash of light and a high, cold, laugh.) was from the same car crash. He tried to understand what it was, or if it was from the car crash, but he simply could not. Petunia and Vernon forbade Harry from asking questions, particularly those regarding his parents. In addition, the Dursleys refused to have pictures of Lily and James, and did their best to avoid the subject of Harry's parents altogether.
They resented Harry for his magic, which was sporadic, but evident. They strongly discouraged any sort of imagination. The Dursleys also verbally and emotionally abused Harry — sometimes by depriving him of meals — whenever something "unusual" occurred. The way he was treated bordered on abuse, but was left unreported to authorities. In his youth, Harry could make strange things happen without understanding why he could, as no one had told him that he was a wizard. For instance, after Petunia had sheared off all of his messy hair using a pair of kitchen scissors in her fury that it would not lay flat, leaving him almost completely bald with only the fringe at the front, it had grown all the way back, and to its previous messy state at that, by the next morning. Harry was punished, even though he had not done anything on purpose. Another time, Dedalus Diggle bowed to him in a shop, and Petunia ferociously interrogated Harry as to how he knew the man before leaving the shop very quickly.
The Dursleys spoiled and pampered their son Dudley and paid almost no attention to Harry; indeed, what little attention they did pay to him was negative in its entirety. All his clothes were hand-me-downs from Dudley and were far too large for Harry. He was made to sleep in the cupboard under the stairs, while his cousin got two bedrooms to himself (one for sleeping in, one for storing all his toys).They also made Harry do household chores for them, such as making food and getting the post. In time, Dudley started bullying Harry. The Dursleys took Dudley and Piers Polkiss to someplace spectacular every year for his birthday, but the only thing Harry ever got for his birthday was one of Vernon's old socks. The Dursleys also hid evidence of Harry's existence by not having pictures of him in the house. During the times that Harry was not being made to work or bullied, he was provided with little entertainment and sometimes tried to entertain himself by playing games such as solitaire.
Harry's hardship, however, was highly necessary as by returning to live with his mother's only living blood relative, the protection that Lily gave Harry would continue. While Harry could call that place home he could not be harmed. However, the Bond of Blood charm would be broken when Harry turned seventeen years old, or when he no longer called 4 Privet Drive his home.
Unknown to Harry, one of his neighbours, Arabella Figg, was a Squib. Unfortunately for Harry, to maintain favour with the Dursleys, she was forced by Albus Dumbledore to give him a lousy time whenever she had to look after him, as the Dursleys would never have let him go if they knew Harry was enjoying himself, a possibility that infuriated them. Harry discovered her connection to the wizarding world when it was revealed during the summer before his fifth year that she worked undercover for the Order of the Phoenix to keep tabs on Harry's suffering.
On Dudley's eleventh birthday, the Dursleys went to the zoo with Dudley's best friend Piers Polkiss. Unfortunately for the Dursleys, they had to take Harry with them, as Mrs Figg had broken her leg and there was no one to take Harry, and they refused to leave him alone in their house. At the zoo, Harry unintentionally made the glass of an enclosure containing a boa constrictor disappear. This allowed the snake to slither out of his cage which scared Dudley into thinking it was after him. Harry was able to communicate with the freed boa in Parseltongue, which thanked Harry briefly, then slithered out of the reptile house calmly. After this incident, the enraged Dursleys sentenced Harry to his cupboard until the beginning of the summer holidays.
Wand
As is the case with most wizards and witches, Harry's wand is among his most valued magical possessions. His wand is made of holly, a wood with the powers to repel evil. The wand is in deliberate contrast to the wand of Lord Voldemort, which is yew: a wood with the powers of evil. Harry's wand shared a twin core with Voldemort's wand, as both contained phoenix feathers from the same phoenix, Fawkes. Harry's wand broke in 1997 during a skirmish with Nagini in Bathilda Bagshot's house due to a stray spell cast by Hermione Granger. Later he used the Elder Wand to repair it.
Luna Lovegood (b. 13 February, 1981) was a witch, the only child and daughter of Xenophilius and Pandora Lovegood. Her mother accidentally died while experimenting with spells when Luna was nine and Luna was raised by her father, editor of the magazine The Quibbler, in a rook-like house near the village of Ottery St. Catchpole.
