#&. meta: regulus black.

[my-castles-crumbling]

no, you don't understand. that depressed, traumatized mf is my emotional support character and I would die for him

[fandoomrants]

No but Barty could still be a Ravenclaw AND share a dorm with Regulus and Evan... Just because he'd spend time there 24/7.

[forestdeath1]

Regulus wasn't forced by his parents to join the Death Eaters

What do we know about the Black family? I'll write a post about this because there's quite a bit we know if we read the canon in depth.

But the main point for this post is that for the Blacks, the survival and prosperity of their lineage were critically important.

The survival of their surname was in a precarious state at that time because women did not keep their surname nor pass it on to their children. Only two people could continue the line – Sirius and Regulus.

Preserving their lineage was so crucial for the Blacks that they didn't officially disown Sirius after his escape, or they reinstated him after Regulus's death. Because Sirius was the last Black. The last one who could carry on their line. Even if he was a rebellious Gryffindor who liked "mudbloods," he was still a Black.

When Sirius died, even the portrait was upset, although it's not alive. It's simply a reflection of the Blacks' attitude towards the survival of their lineage.

Am I to understand,’ said Phineas Nigellus slowly from Harry’s left, ‘that my great-great-grandson – the last of the Blacks – is dead?’

‘Yes, Phineas,’ said Dumbledore.
‘I don’t believe it,’ said Phineas brusquely.
Harry turned his head in time to see Phineas marching out of his portrait and knew that he had gone to visit his other painting in Grimmauld Place. He would walk, perhaps, from portrait to portrait, calling for Sirius through the house ...

By the time Regulus was 16, Sirius had already run away from home.

Now, explain to me, all you fans of the "Regulus was forced" idea, what would be going through Orion and Walburga's heads to make them push their last hope for the continuation of their lineage into joining a combat organization where people are constantly being killed?

Considering they didn't join themselves because they disliked the methods and probably understood Tom's real goals.

Walburga was in school with Tom Riddle and was two years older than him. Orion Black was also in school with Tom, but he was two years younger. By that time, Tom Riddle aka Voldemort, hadn't yet changed his appearance to the point of being unrecognizable. They all knew who Voldemort was. Tom Riddle. An orphan boy. Likely, they knew he was the heir of Slytherin, which was important for the Blacks because, for them, it wasn't about money but about blood. True nobility and dignity are in the blood, not wealth. The Blacks aren't the Malfoys. And as Sirius said, at some point, they were inspired by Tom's ambition to change the situation in their country, although Sirius obviously knew very little about Voldemort, as he was hardly discussed in front of the children. But initially, the Blacks were inspired because he was worthy, the heir of Slytherin, right?

Probably Orion, Arcturus/Pollux realized that Tom didn't care about blood purity. He cared about his own power. By the time they understood this, Tom's power was already too strong, and he had won much support among the pure-blood society, who believed he genuinely cared about pure-blood wizards.

Why did Sirius say he was sure their parents were proud of Regulus?

Because most likely, not both parents were proud, as Sirius doesn't mention the father at all, and Walburga had an irrational desire to see her son as a hero. Sirius – the lineage's continuer, and Regulus – a brave and courageous warrior for blood purity. Because being a Death Eater was seen as brave and cool. They were revolutionaries. Chosen warriors.

Moreover, Bella was already in the organization and could influence Walburga's opinion against Orion and Arcturus's wishes. Playing on Walburga's emotional irrationality wasn't very hard, especially for Bella and Rodolphus.

Bella was in love with Voldemort. Rodolphus was devoted to Voldemort from the start, as Lestrange Sr. had been a supporter of Tom since their school days. The Rosiers fall into the same group. Surprise, surprise, Bella's mother – Druella Rosier, was likely the sister of that very Rosier who was with Tom from the start and who was Evan Rosier's father. Cygnus Black is open for interpretation, but my headcanon is that from a young age, he was a bit more aggressive than the others and didn't quite fit into the family dynamics and control (and Bella took after him in part).

Who convinced Regulus to join the organization, even knowing Orion and the Blacks were against it?

From the little we know about Regulus, it's clear he was a maximalist inclined to broad "heroic" actions, with his own understanding of honor. He had been committed to the idea of blood purity from childhood, believing it to be truly noble and important. He wanted to be a hero and admired Voldemort. Also, always being second to Sirius, he wanted to prove his worth. That he too was strong and brave and capable of significant, but correct actions. And, our beloved Bella was there. She helped him join the organization at 16.

If you want tragedy in Regulus Black's story, here it is:

Regulus Black went to his death knowing he was the last of the Blacks. He destroyed his family. His lineage. Put an end to it. Even for Sirius, running away was easier because Regulus was still there. When Regulus went to his death, Sirius had already run away from home.

There's much more interesting stuff here than "Regulus was forced." But who cares, right? Fuck canon, live fanon.

[regheart]

i'm thinking about how the characterisation of the black family tends to be really difficult to get right and one of the reasons that i can think of is that we don't know enough of wizarding culture, so we try to convey the atmosphere and the dynamics through codes that are familiar to us

that's why they are so victorian in so many fics. they act and speak like they're inside a victorian novel, they only ever wear black and dark green, the high society/pure blood circle is also composed by meeting for tea, and having balls, and discussing politics, and arranged marriages

and that's not bad!!! i read and love some fics like that, but i think this is an aesthetic that completely ignores some of the things we know about wizards and about the blacks

first of all, the clothes. wizards wear robes. not late 19th century clothes, robes. and they're most often dramatic and colorful. this is something easily observed in the very first chapter of PS. so i think the blacks should wear deep purple and emerald green and silver and burgundy and turquoise, make outfits fun!!!

second, grimmauld place tells us some things about its inhabitants. the fact that it's a muggle house in a muggle neighborhood shows that they must have some level of cognitive dissonance in terms of what elements of muggle culture and lifestyle they hold (but i don't think that applies to holding the same patterns of views and behaviors of high society, again, it's about how the writers tries to convey "rich and uptight" with codes that are familiar to them). the decoration choices for the house are also very telling, family heirlooms, big clocks, tapestry... troll leg and house elf heads??? that's morbid. that's camp.

and my point is, black family characterisation lacks on campiness. wizards are inherently weird. anything in which they're overly polite and too aristocratic is inaccurate. they are bigots and lobbyists and one of them was literally headmaster of hogwarts. they are into the dark arts but they don't torture their children. make them funnier and messier and weirder and more like real people instead of a bunch of lines from downton abbey glued together

[madamewalburga]

*clears throat* My personal headcanon is that Sirius used to be Walburga’s favorite son.

The moment he was born, she already knew he was special. Her firstborn. She always tells people that stars started dancing in the sky when Sirius first cried as a baby. Sirius was a happy and smart child. He learned the spells much quickly than kids his age. Put him in a room full of kids and he will come out as the ringleader. He always covers for Regulus, and she lets him, because she likes seeing how responsible her baby is becoming. Charming, regal, powerful. The perfect Black. The perfect heir.

But also, Sirius had a streak of rebelliousness (just like her!). He knew the rules, he knew how to play with it, and in it. But he also did not want to bow down to anything, never wanted anybody to be his equal. Sirius accepts others, but also never forgets that he’s above everyone. The perfect Black.

She gives him everything. The best robes, best quills, best paints. She lets him access the forbidden books because she has no doubt in his intellect, or his self-preservation. She lets him go to the Muggle hunts because she knows Arcturus loves Sirius and she knows how happy her son is when Grandfather and Father acknowledge him. (She earns a slap when she questions him what happened, why did Sirius come home so quiet.) She leaves Regulus with him often, and her heart breaks a little at how Regulus shrinks himself (just a little!) but that is how it should be and she’s proud of him. Regulus is the second son. He should understand as early as he can that he is and should never be Sirius’ equal. She brings him to Pureblood gatherings and her heart swells with pride every time a child excuses themselves with a forlorn expression, realizing that they are nowhere near her baby boy’s level. The perfect Black.

She sees him sit beside a bespectacled boy on the Hogwarts Express. The boy waves to Euphemia Potter, and though they are not her family of choice, the Potters are purebloods and that boy will do. Her darling boy will soon ignore him after the usual pleasantries. And if he does not, he will be forgotten once Sirius is in Hogwarts.

That night, she bites her lip through Orion’s Cruciatus (Didn’t I tell you all your coddling would make him weak! How much shame should I have to endure due to your rebelliousness?) after news of Sirius’ sorting has reach 12 Grimmauld Place. Regulus is asleep and Orion Black is not the man who will finally make her scream. She writes to the Headmaster. There has been a mistake! No Black has ever been sorted outside of Slytherin and it certainly would not be her firstborn. The perfect Black! She writes to Sirius, telling him to go to the Headmaster and the Head of House Slytherin. She tells him everything will be fine.

Two days later, she receives Sirius’ reply. “Everything is fine, mother. I like it here. The first Gryffindor Black!” She’s torn between disgust and pride. How did this happen? Sirius knew how to play within in the rules. Is he making his own rules? Is this what it was?

The ladies in society mock her as they pass. Hushed whispers of “I told you so” floated around her for weeks. She tightens her grip on Regulus’ wrist as she quickens their pace. A warning. A protection. She tells him over and over again to not make his brother’s mistake. A warning. A protection. (Regulus has always seen it as a threat.)

Sirius goes home for the holidays a completely different person. He talks about James and Remus (half-blood!) and Peter (another half-blood!). He talks about James and Quidditch. He talks about James and Evans (mudblood!!!!). He tells Regulus all these stories about Hogwarts and the Red House and Walburga wants to blast that blasted castle to ash. He’s talking with his hands moving and his legs spread too far apart. She sees him sit up straight when he catches her glaring. Orion yells at her every night, blaming her for everything that Sirius has become. She curses the Potter boy under her breath. Curses the Sorting Hat. Dumbledore. Everyone. They have corrupted her boy. The perfect Black.

She sends him off to the Express once more after the Holidays are over. He kisses her cheek and says he’ll miss her. “I know you’re not happy with this, Mother, but I am. And I truly am sorry to break your heart, please know that.” She squeezes his hand and she swallows the tightness in her throat as she bids him goodbye.

She received so many letters of his troublemaking tendencies the following year. And the year after that. And the year after. She has written so many letters as well, with hands still shaking from anger, shame, or Orion’s last curse, reminding Sirius of who he was. The Black heir. The one set to stand over everyone in the Noble and Most Ancient House.

Her nails started digging itself deeper on Regulus’ skin. Reminding him not to make the same mistakes his brother did. He didn’t and Walburga loved him so, so much for that.

12 Grimmauld Place is always loud when Sirius is home for the holidays. So many arguments due to his behavior. Sirius has always talked back and Walburga has always been proud of him when he does it, but now he’s defending mudbloods in her house, asking if his half-blood friends can come over and she wonders since when did she start resenting the sound of her firstborn’s voice.

Since when was Sirius a complainer? Could he not see that he was given everything? That he had it easy? That she has protected him from everything, every evil his father could do to him? He used to be the most perfect son, how did this even happen? Did he not realize how many times Walburga gritted her teeth to protect him? How much she has endured to make sure he would grow up differently and less painfully?

It turns out her firstborn would be finally be the man to make her scream.

And Walburga screamed and screamed and screamed. She cursed him and shamed him and belittled him. And Sirius screamed back. As expected. He cursed her and shamed her and belittled her.

The baby boy she raised so carefully, broken to pieces by her.

Years later, Orion is dead and she believes she is free. The war is still raging and she is scared Regulus would soon be dead after defecting. She allows herself to believe in that freedom.

She reads the Prophet everyday, hoping she does not see certain names in the Obituaries.

Regulus knocks on her door and tells her he will be missing dinner and to not wait up for him. She does not reply. She continues to stare blankly at the window when her secondborn kneels beside her. He holds her hand and kisses her cheek and apologizes for breaking her heart.

She blinks away memories of an eleven year old at Platform Nine and Three-Quarters telling her the same thing. She slowly turns to Regulus and asks, for the first time ever, “Where is your brother?”

Regulus smiles softly. “I don’t know. Though he is in a happier place, I’m sure.”

“Was he unhappy here?”

Regulus takes a while before replying. “Not always. But he was always lonely.”

Walburga struggles to believes that, but Regulus does not have to hear it.

Two years later, she receives boxes of Sirius’ belongings after he was sent to Azkaban and she screams again. Out of despair, shame, frustration, she does not know. She wanted to burn every single one of those and she would have, had Kreacher not opened a box and a framed photo of Sirius in a wedding sat on top of that pile. Did he get married? She did not even know. She realizes the Potter boy is also in the picture and remembers the first time Sirius yelled at her (Why are you friends with someone in love with a Mudblood— / Don’t call her that! Don’t you dare call her that!). He reaches for Sirius’ face in that photo and oh... She remembers how her baby boy used to smile like that. He used to smile at her like that.

“He was always lonely.”

She commands Kreacher to close the boxes and take it up Sirius’ old room.

Walburga Black would really rather not rethink all her choices in life but alas, all there is for old people waiting to die is time. She would never admit to it, not that there are people left alive for her to admit her guilt to.

And if she visits both her sons’ rooms and silently grieve all the love she spent and lost, no one would have to know.

[juniperpyre]

i think my key issue with the sanitization of death eater characters is that it feels like people do not see their stories as tragic or empathize with the characters until we have a hc that's like "actually they were morally good the whole time!"

regulus black and severus snape are tragic characters and child soldiers no matter what side they were "really" on. even barty crouch jr, who may not have been groomed into being a death eater, is tragic when you spend a second to consider his relationship with his father. there are plenty of death eaters who we know are taking after their fathers in joining the cult. lucius malfoy, who was a prefect when the marauders enter hogwarts, most likely spread the death eater ideology, since the ideology is just a more extreme version/logical endpoint of what already existed in the wizarding world.

to me, these ideas are not headcanons, because they are heavily implied by the text. when jkr mentions malfoy in the deathly hallows that is not for no reason.

mallfoy's acceptance of snape and position of power are both highlighted in this sentence. we can infer that snape felt a sense of community for the first time in Slytherin. with malfoy as a prefect we can infer that the culture of Slytherin house lifted up bigots and those with an important family name.

this is a culture that breeds more bigotry. we know that Dumbledore did not step in to stop this cultural development in the 90s, after already seeing what it could do!!! so we can infer that he did not in the 70s. so a bunch of children were left alone in an echo chamber of hate. of course some of them became fanatics!!!

this doesn't mean they shouldn't be held accountable. but we cannot expect children to overcome cultural and political hegemony all alone. like.... that's just not how the world works. and it's tragic that children are fodder for fascist's wars, especially when the fact that the children were abused or neglected makes them more vulnerable to be fodder.

regulus and severus weren't treated as people, their humanity was denied by the fascist they served, bc that's how fascism works. exploring their characters as they are in canon, with full humanity, without needing to change their stories to see that humanity, is much more interesting to me. it is much more in the spirit of redemption and restoration.

[dinarosie]

Please do not change the characters based on personal preferences and instead see them as written:

I see bizarre fan theories and headcanons about Severus Snape every day that never happened in the books. The problem is, these headcanons are repeated so often that some Harry Potter fans believe them and forget that they are just fan fiction and not the truth. Therefore, I am sharing this old interview with Rowling to remind of some facts.

1. Like many insecure, vulnerable people (such as Wormtail),Snape craved membership in something big and powerful, something impressive: It’s interesting that 17 years have passed since Rowling's response, yet many people still believe Snape joined the Death Eaters because he was a sadistic, racist, antisocial person who wanted to harm people and use dark magic to destroy Muggles and Muggle-borns.!!! However, the writer believes Snape's goal was not to kill and torture Muggle-borns, nor was it racism. He was a poor, insecure, and damaged youth who had never known security or peace in his life. His childhood was a nightmare, and his adolescence was filled with humiliation and bullying. He was seeking acceptance and thought that becoming a Death Eater would give him power, attractiveness, and a family that he never had. However, it is clear that these factors led him to make a big mistake.

2. He never really understood Lily's aversion: Severus Snape didn’t want to harm or retaliate against her. He was simply blinded and misled, so foolish and ignorant that he didn’t realize how deep and serious Lily’s hatred for dark magic and the Death Eaters was. He believed that becoming a Death Eater would make him so powerful and captivating that Lily would be influenced and change her beliefs, convinced that dark magic was extremely attractive, potent, and intriguing.

3. Given his time over again, he would not have become a Death Eater: This sentence shows that he has truly changed. Rowling claims that if Snape had a second chance, he would never join the Death Eaters again. Snape's genuine regret is that, starting at the age of 20, he attempted to make amends for his past actions until the time of his death. He refused to make the same mistake again, unlike Wormtail, who eagerly returned to serve Voldemort when given the opportunity.

4. Like Snape, Harry is flawed and mortal: Do those who see Snape as the story's villain and an unforgivable character understand that, in the author's opinion, Harry is also like Snape? Do they understand that Harry can be flawed and potentially harm others? Harry is never described as a saint. He tortures someone and uses unforgivable curses; he can be arrogant and aggressive while remaining brave and heroic. Snape is flawed and mortal, just like Harry. He makes many mistakes, but in the end, he remains brave and self-sacrificing, and, like Harry, he saves many people's lives.

5. James always suspected Snape harbored deeper feelings for Lily, which was a factor in James' behavior toward Snape: Listen, this is one of the reasons James Potter had for bullying Severus Snape for seven years. Please refrain from saying things like, “Snape was bullied because he joined the Death Eaters” or “because he was interested in dark magic,” as none of these reasons are canonical. These reasons belong to James Potter’s fans, not James Potter himself. The author of the book has clearly explained James Potter’s motives. James Potter had two childish reasons for tormenting a person for many years:

_He existed (in a way that was ugly and poor). _He was close friends with Lily Evans.

6. It was Voldemort's attempted murder of Kreacher that really turned him: Isn't a change to save a living being's life familiar? I don't understand why Snape's change for Lily's salvation is seen as demonic motivation, whereas Regulus's change for Kreacher is considered epic. Recently, in fan fiction, Regulus has become the little knight of the Black family, whose parents tortured him so much that he is forced to join the Death Eaters and then rebel against Voldemort's ideology to eradicate racism in the wizarding world. But Snape's efforts, sacrifices, loyalty, and spying over the course of 19 years are reduced to being a loser obsessed with a dead woman!!! Such double standards are embarrassing. I'm curious: If Regulus Black were not Sirius Black's brother and not from a pureblood family, and Voldemort had killed Kreacher while Regulus survived and fought Voldemort, how would fans react to Regulus? How ridiculous would it be to say, "Oh, Regulus Black? He is simply a deviant who was obsessed with his dead elf"?

"Please do not change the characters based on personal preferences and instead see them as written. The writer uses Lily's and Kreacher's salvation as symbols of redemption to demonstrate the characters' growth and maturation. If the concept of love, loyalty, and friendship has changed over time among new generations, this is not the fault of Severus Snape."

[iamnmbr3]

So it seems like in the period before his fall in 1981 Voldemort had begun a period of rapid escalation in the intensity/violence of his activities.

In book 5 Moody shows Harry a picture of the original Order. Most of the people in that picture ended up dead. Since Lily and James are in the picture (and are both Order members and not in hiding or still in school) we know the picture was taken no later than 1980 and no earlier than 1978. Thus, all the people in the picture who ended up dead (Benjy Fenwick, Caradoc Dearborn, Dorcas Meadows, Gideon and Fabian Prewett, Edgar Bones and his family, Marlene McKinnon etc.) died in a relatively short period of time. (In fact we know from Lily's letter in book 7 that the McKinnons died only shortly before Lily & James were killed).

Furthermore, we know from Sirius that when Regulus joined the Death Eaters, Walburga and Orion were both very happy because at the time they supported Voldemort. However, Sirius says they later got cold feet when they saw "what Voldemort was prepared to do to get power." Clearly they didn't renounce their blood supremacist ideology. But probably plunging the whole of the wizarding world into a bloody civil war in which even purebloods who didn't offer total loyalty and compliance. were at risk, wasn't something they approved of. Regulus died in 1979, having presumably come to a similar conclusion to his parents and consequently turned against Voldemort. Since Regulus would have joined up in 1977 or 1978 this suggests that when he joined, Voldemort hadn't yet begun his escalation but by 1979 it was in full swing.

Going back even further, based on Dumbledore's memory of Tom returning to apply once more for the DADA job, it seems that at that time Tom was already using the title "Lord Voldemort." However clearly at that point he wasn't a wanted man as in the memory he doesn't seem to be hiding his identity at all and clearly has no concern that Dumbledore is going to summon the Aurors and shout, "seize him!" So even if Voldemort was already a rallying point for blood supremacists that early on, he certainly wasn't yet involved (openly anyway) in any type of illegal activity.

So it seems that Voldemort started off slowly, perhaps even as the head of an extremist but still legally legitimate political faction, maybe with his Death Eaters secretly engaging in some illegal activities and then around 1978 or 1979 he initiated a rapid and violent escalation aimed at totally crushing all his opposition and seizing total control by force. (And he may well have been very near to succeeding in that goal when he lost his powers in 1981).

(I will also add that from a shipping perspective there's something else really interesting about this timeline. Alphard died around 1977. Now I'm not saying that Alphard was the last restraining factor that held Tom even somewhat in check or that when he died the last piece of Tom's humanity went with him or that Tom went mad with grief and fully succumbed to his darkest impulses or that he no longer saw any reason to hold back. But also I'm not, not saying that. Alphalord is totally canon.)

[saintsenara]

I come to you with this question because, having read all your other metas, I think you'd be the right person to ask. Id love to know what you think about Regulus because I have a very hard time understanding his character. Partly because of fanon characterization of him makes him seem like some secret rebel against Voldemort and partly because I just can't really understand any of his motivations. But regardless, I think what we know about him in canon is so interesting - i just can piece it all together. I'd love to know what you think!

(Sorry for the longish ask)

thank you very much for the ask, @hauntingpercival! regulus is a character i also find a bit of a mystery, and so thinking through this answer was really fun.

i'll start by being clear that i'm certainly not a regulus fan. by which i not only mean that i don't vibe with the fanon!regulus of the marauders fandom, who is essentially an original character - and you can read my views on jegulus here... [spoiler alert: i do not back it] - but that when he appears in my own writing in ways i'd like to hope feel influenced by his canon form, i always find myself focusing on aspects of his character which are rather unlikeable.

there is a little bit of a discourse-y reason for this, which will be pertinent to the rest of this answer...

i really don't like the sort of "omg aristocracy is so hot and sexy and interesting" tropes which are so prevalent in writing around the black family. this is firstly because i don't think that aristocracy is in any way these things - and i find it distasteful to imply otherwise - which is because i'm a prole who lives somewhere still bearing the scars of british colonisation who also went to the sort of university where one sometimes encountered aristocrats and they were all cringe and unbearable.

but it's also because it's not - and i will genuinely die on this hill - an accurate reflection of how the blacks are presented in canon. not only does it take sirius' comment that his parents considered themselves "practically royal" to be a statement of fact [sirius is quite clearly taking the piss out of his parents' pretensions], but it also misses that the purpose sirius' discussion of orion and walburga's politics serves in the narrative of order of the phoenix is to show how mainstream their blood-supremacist views were.

sirius tells us that his parents were not death eaters, but that they nonetheless thought voldemort's overtly sectarian political aims were correct. in this, they hold the political views order of the phoenix emphasises belong to cornelius fudge - unimaginative, deferential to the class system, casually prejudiced, and so on. orion and walburga function as a way of showing us just how entrenched the death eaters' manifesto is, how close voldemort came to winning the first war, and what an uphill struggle the order faces to unravel the roots blood-supremacy has in the wizarding world.

[and they also show that the baffling vibes of grimmauld place - while these are made worse by it being three different gothic literature tropes in a trenchcoat - are wizarding norms, rather than evidence that the blacks were uniquely immersed in dark magic. the decor at grimmauld place - and the family's collection of dark artefacts - is the same as that found in malfoy manor, even at a time when lucius malfoy is considered eminently socially respectable. this is a point we will come back to...]

i think, then, that it's crucial to approach regulus not as a swaggering aristocrat, but as someone from an upper-class background which - while still posh, rich, inferring enormous social capital, well-connected - was unremarkable within the circles in which he moved.

by which i mean that hogwarts is based on real-world institutions - britain's elite boarding schools - which are so exclusive and expensive to attend that the student body are from a class-background which seems inhumanly exclusive, affluent, and powerful from an outsider perspective [i.e. from the perspective of someone from the majority middle- and working-classes] but which seems completely normal within the student body itself.

[i.e. nobody at eton with princes william and harry will have been astonished to have been at school with a royal, because they will have been familiar with their social circles, cultural experiences, level of wealth, and expectation of knowing someone with considerable social influence from childhood.]

while hogwarts appears to be a state-funded school [although it also expects an enormous amount of financial investment on the part of parents - such as buying all the textbooks], the fact that its real-world parallels are so elite [and, therefore, come with a specific "look" in the british cultural imagination] means that the student body is incredibly well-heeled and working-class students stand out enormously in a way very rich students do not. hogwarts also exists - like real-world elite schools and universities - as a way of propping up the status quo of the class system by which the wizarding world functions. its pupils have an expectation of procuring jobs in the civil service and other influential professions - using not only connections established at school but connections they possess through their [male] relatives. many hogwarts students we meet in canon are related to someone who occupies an elite position in the wizarding executive or is otherwise socio-politically influential.

at school, then, regulus would have been completely, perfectly average in terms of social position. i also like the idea of him as perfectly average in terms of intellect - and as a good, but not exceptional, seeker. this provides a really interesting point of contrast with sirius, who - while he's also not socially unusual in terms of class [and i will never vibe with tropes like him being followed by whispers going "omg, he's a black, that means he's important"] - stands out in that he's the first black in generations not to be in slytherin, that he's precociously intelligent, and that he - and the rest of the marauders - are class clowns and show-offs.

and i like the idea that this would give regulus a desire to stand out - to be considered the most important person in the whole school. we can get a hint of this in canon - the picture of sirius and his friends harry sees in deathly hallows is immediately contrasted with a picture of regulus sitting in the seeker's position in the team photo. the seeker who acts alone.

and i think this desire for notoriety is what drives him to sign up to become a death eater - that he decides he's sick of having parents with the perfectly normal level of social influence and a brother who is more popular than him, and that he thinks that he's cleverer and more worthy of attention than everyone else in the castle and the world better start showing it.

[and i've never bought - i'm afraid - the idea that he and sirius are close. it's clear from canon that regulus had no issue being thought of as "a much better son" than sirius, and that he colluded with his parents against him. sirius can love him - and miss him, and regret how they were never able to repair their relationship - but i don't think this means that he feels he's lost a bestie.]

that he holds sincere blood-supremacist views is a given - because within the world in which he lives, these are completely normal and held completely casually [i.e. that slughorn is shocked lily could be muggleborn because she's clever]. the more virulent expression of these views - saying "mudblood", etc. - is clearly considered ill-mannered, but not something which might have any real impact on one's social standing [draco malfoy uses the term with impunity while at school, and nobody ever considers that informing a teacher of this would result in him being punished; equally, nobody from the crowd who witness the event reports snape for calling lily a mudblood].

and so i think it's clear that he becomes interested in joining the death eaters - and starts putting together his terrorism pinterest board - because his mainstream belief that being pureblood is better crashes into his desire to be special to form a conviction that riding the coattails of voldemort's ostentatious malevolence is the way he can become famous.

[in this, he is very like snape.]

my assumption is that regulus is one academic year below sirius, meaning that he was born in 1960-1961. my assumption is also that he receives his dark mark while still at school - probably at some point in his newt years [so the academic years 1977-1978 and 1978-1979].

the standard view - expressed vehemently by various order members in half-blood prince - is that voldemort has no interest in death eaters who are still at school.

the order is wrong about this, obviously - not only when it comes to their refusal to accept that harry's right about draco malfoy being marked, but also in the fact that several of the death eaters who are very young at the end of the first war, barty crouch jr. [who is still young enough to be described as a "boy" in 1982 at the earliest], chief among them, must have been taken on by voldemort prior to graduating.

but it seems fair to say that admitting teenagers into his inner circle is unusual for voldemort, especially when those teenagers don't really offer him anything useful. crouch, for example, could be put to work informing on his father's movements. regulus is - as i've said - just ordinary.

and so my view has always been that regulus is marked by voldemort as a favour to bellatrix. i think this partially because i'm bellamort trash, partially because i think it's a nice narrative parallel between regulus and draco [who are very similar] to have bellatrix be responsible for regulus' recruitment when she's canonically vociferously in favour of draco's, and partially because realising that voldemort thinks of him as just some guy who warrants [essentially] a pity dark mark would be a big blow to regulus' conviction that joining the death eaters would make him impressive.

[i also think regulus is recruited before 1978 because i think there has to be a shift in voldemort's modus operandi at about this point, in order for the fact that sirius says that his parents got cold feet about what the dark lord was prepared to do after regulus became a death eater to make sense. my view has always been that voldemort's violence prior to c.1978 overwhelmingly targets state institutions and people connected to them and/or people with known anti-voldemort political views, meaning that ordinary citizens can regard these people being killed or injured as reasonable risks of their jobs and/or behaviour. and then that after c.1978, the dark lord begins targeting civilians - including upper-class pureblood civilians - indiscriminately, which makes his casual supporters start to waver a bit.]

so, let's suppose that regulus leaves hogwarts in june 1979 and finds himself expected to participate as a full death eater, after having been let off all the dirty work by virtue of being at school...

as i've said, regulus has an enormous number of narrative parallels with draco malfoy. and i think that the best way to think about him is to write him as sharing draco's canonical attitude to voldemort's cause - that he believes whole-heartedly in the message of blood-supremacy the dark lord promotes and that he has no problem with people he considers subhuman [mudbloods and blood-traitors] or unimportant [faceless families massacred in their own homes] being subjected to violence in the name of that message, but that he lacks the character traits necessary to perform that violence himself, to see it done to people he likes, or to witness what it actually involves versus the image he has of it in his head.

and so i imagine he starts struggling pretty quickly with the fact that being a death eater isn't quite as easy as he thought it would be when he was making voldemort fancams on tiktok. and that part of the reason he's primed to turn against the dark lord is because of the tension he feels warring within him at the fact that he's still a blood-supremacist, still desperate to be important, and yet growing disenchanted.

i don't however, think this is why he does what he does... so let's get into that:

why does regulus turn against voldemort?

let's be clear about one thing - regulus turning against voldemort has nothing to do with him having some sort of damascene conversion against blood-supremacy.

[or, at least, that's what i think.]

the outline of regulus' defection that we get in canon goes as follows:

voldemort asks someone to lend him a house elf. we know that regulus volunteers kreacher, because he told kreacher so - and so i imagine voldemort mentions at a meeting that he wants to procure an elf [although, of course, he doesn't elaborate on why] and regulus immediately jumps up and says "pick me, my lord" because he sees this as an opportunity to get voldemort to finally notice him.

his assumption must be that voldemort will use kreacher for a purpose which is considered normal in wizarding society - i.e. that he will require him to do something akin to domestic service, perhaps preparing potions ingredients.

it evidently does not occur to him that voldemort would transgress this social boundary and harm kreacher. not - to be clear - because i think that regulus was some kind of abolitionist legend, but because we see several characters express the view in goblet of fire that how barty crouch sr. treats winky is his own business, and that it is impolite for respectable wizards to comment on how anyone else treats his slave. this sort of social behaviour will have a second part - that it is impolite for respectable wizards to treat anyone else's slave in a way which goes beyond what wizarding slaveowners see as normal.

or: that it's fine to be lent a slave to serve you, but very much not fine to nearly kill that slave [someone else's property!] for your own gain.

kreacher informs regulus what voldemort asked of him, which makes regulus suspicious about what the object voldemort deposited in the cave was. regulus then decides to investigate.

kreacher tells us that regulus goes away for an indeterminate period of time and then returns to grimmauld place "disturbed in his mind".

dumbledore claims in half-blood prince that voldemort appears not to wear or display the objects the horcruxes are made from after he turns them into horcruxes. i think we can agree with this or not without it affecting the story - i quite like the idea that voldemort doesn't make the locket until the later 1970s [maybe after the murder of dorcas meadowes, the only person in the first war other than james and lily to have canonically been killed by him personally], but we can also say that he might have worn or displayed it when it was already a horcrux. certainly, regulus must have seen the locket - either on voldemort or somewhere in his lair - and, after kreacher tells him what happened, he goes to see if it's still there.

when he discovers it isn't, he comes to an important conclusion. one which requires a little detour...

how does regulus know what a horcrux is?

i complained at the start of this answer about the black family being portrayed as unusually immersed in the dark arts - rather than some sort of familiarity with the dark arts being perfectly normal for people of their social class.

and i am sure that you might think I'm about to have to eat my words, since i'm not going to try and deny that regulus was able to identify a horcrux all by himself...

but, actually, i'm just chucking malevolently at the opportunity to clamber onto my soapbox and say:

horcruxes are canonically not magic which only a handful of people know about. where voldemort goes beyond the theory of horcruxes which a wizard of regulus' class-background would be familiar with is that he makes seven.

this doesn't mean - to be clear - that i think it was ever common to make a horcrux [i don't think the wizarding world is quite that lawless...], but that it was reasonable to know they exist, in the way that we might have some general understanding of something macabre - like techniques for disposing of a body - which would enable us to suspect if we saw a neighbour behaving strangely while doing one of those things...

after all, slughorn can suggest [even if he doesn't believe this is what he wants to do] that voldemort could justify his interest in horcruxes by using the excuse that he's working on a project for defence against the dark arts.

that harry, ron, and hermione don't know about them is a result of a combination of their own lack of interest in the theory of the dark arts, the information blackout instituted by dumbledore at some point after voldemort graduates [and my theory as to why dumbledore hates horcruxes even in the forties? grindelwald made one - hence why dumbledore is so hopeful at king's cross that the rumours of his repentance might have been true...], and the fact that they don't discuss their mission with anyone [tonks, kingsley, and moody, who literally have to specialise in dark objects as part of their jobs, would one hundo have known what a horcrux was].

[what they would not have known is what voldemort's horcruxes were likely to be made of and where they were likely to be. it's this - rather than the idea that horcruxes are completely unknowable magic - that is why it has to be harry in charge of hunting them down: he's the only person in the series who knows voldemort well enough to realise that, for example, he'd have hidden one in gringotts because of his jealousy at being excluded from this pillar of wizarding normality.]

so, regulus has a little rummage, works out the locket has disappeared, and has no trouble - especially because voldemort mentions in goblet of fire that he'd told his death eaters he couldn't die [which regulus might not have thought was him speaking literally] prior to 1981 - guessing what it's being used for.

and so, regulus turns against voldemort.

and i think that he does this because the horcrux makes it impossible for him to pretend any longer that voldemort's aims are - when the ministry is forced to the negotiating table by his paramilitary activities - an oligarchy in which upper-class pureblood families benefit and muggleborns and blood-traitors become second-class citizens, but which doesn't deviate too much in terms of its overwhelming norms from the way wizarding society functioned at that time. instead, he is confronted with the undeniable fact that voldemort intends to reign forever as an immortal absolute monarch, and that he has never had any intention of elevating regulus and people like him to the positions of importance he so craved.

[we see something similar happen to draco, whose increasing fear of voldemort throughout half-blood prince and deathly hallows is clearly driven by him realising that voldemort isn't joking when he says that he'll kill him and his parents unless he obeys orders, but is joking when he says he'll be considered a valuable servant should he manage to kill dumbledore...]

and so his death - and his threat to destroy the horcrux - is a repudiation of his beliefs. but, specifically, it is a repudiation of his conviction that voldemort was a primarily political figure who would act as a champion of the pureblood class-system. it's him recognising that voldemort would not stop with a takeover of the ministry - he would kill and kill forever, concerned only with how much further he could venture beyond the norms of magic.

[hollowed-theory-hall]

Was the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black actually any special, and were they seen as some kind of royalty to outsiders?

Because in every (or most) fanfic I’ve read with them, they are always depicted as being way above anyone and everyone else, even their own partners. The only ones good for them, or the only ones who understand them, are the ones with black blood running through their veins. As if they are some sort of gods that no one, but others with their blood, can touch. And everyone loves (and/or hates) them and wants to be a part of their family because they are so powerful and attractive, but watch out because they are prone to being crazy.

Which is actually another thing I wanted to point out and ask:

Did the Black family actually have some kind of curse of madness?

Hi 👋

Now, like many, I'm not immune to being completely fascinated by the Most Ancient and Noble House of Black, so I was pretty stoked about this ask.

For the first part, are the Blacks actually as important as they make themselves (or fandom makes them to be)?

The short answer is not really, but they are important.

Now, the long answer:

I mentioned here how I believe the Wizengamot functions like a council of lords (which is what the Witengamot is named after in our real world), as such, families like the Blacks, the Longbottoms, and even the Potters likely do have a "noble title" (for lack of a better term) that allows them a seat there.

That being said, I don't think the Blacks are above any of the other families there, not really, but they think they are. The Blacks are an old wizarding family, they can probably trace their family tree back to the founders' era and perhaps even before, and it's important to them. They take pride in this legacy of one of the oldest pure-blood families in Britain. The Malfoys, for example, are probably richer than the modern Blacks, but they don't have the Wizengamot title and they came from France, they're not British Pure-Bloods, not originally, and I think the Blacks as a whole would look down on that. But other Wizengamot families that have just as much British history should be their equals then, and they are unless you ask a Black. They are a very proud family, and they might think they're above everyone, but they're the only ones thinking it.

I also personally headcanon that they have more houses aside from Grimmauld Place as well. I mean, back in the Regency and Victorian era it was common for richer aristocrats to have a manor away from London and then a townhouse/manor in London for the social season. So, I kinda assumed that's what Grimmauld Place initially was. So it isn't the family manor the way Malfoy Manor is and there is a Black Manor somewhere in the countryside.

For the second question:

No, I don't think the Black Madness is real.

Let's define "madness". Since it isn't really a medical term, I'd go with the dictionary on this one:

So, we'll treat it as repeated foolish, frenzied, or uncontrolled behavior that cannot be explained by other factors.

We don't meet many Blacks, and most of the ones we do are far from mad (I'll get to Bellatrix and Walburga).

Both Narcissa and Andromeda are completely sound of mind. Sure, they might have made mistakes, or rash decisions on occasion, but that's being human. They both care deeply for their families and act in their best interest. And they are intelligent, logical, controlled, and consistent in their behavior. So, two Black sisters are not insane.

What about the Black brothers, Sirius and Regulus?

Well, neither of them ever read as mad to me. Regulus was obsessed with Voldemort until he realized what he got himself into and his actions weren't ones of a madman, a desperate one, maybe, but not mad. He was smart enough to figure out about Voldmort's Horcruxes and smart enough to do something about it without Voldemort knowing.

Sirius isn't at the best of mental state when we see him considering it's after 12 years in hell on earth. But he is logical, sane, and sound, especially during Goblet of Fire in which he uncovers the plot with Barty Crouch Jr perfectly, just getting the wrong Death Eater. He comes to correct conclusions about people and is clearly intelligent:

“I don’t know,” said Sirius slowly, “I just don’t know . . . Karkaroff doesn’t strike me as the type who’d go back to Voldemort unless he knew Voldemort was powerful enough to protect him. But whoever put your name in that goblet did it for a reason, and I can’t help thinking the tournament would be a very good way to attack you and make it look like an accident.”

(GoF, page 334)

Yes, his mental state deteroits in OOTP when he's back at Grimmuald Place, but that's Sirius dealing with his grief, trauma, his sense of helplessness, and complicated feelings about his family. He never was mad, even then, just in a really shitty situation.

And yes, he was cruel as a teenager, but as I keep saying later in the post, cruelty does not equal madness.

So, what about Bellatrix, the fandom's poster child for the Black Madness?

I don't think she's insane either, well, at least she wasn't until Azkaban. In her trial, she is quiet throughout the proceedings, looking board, even, until the verdict is given:

The dementors were gliding back into the room. The boys’ three companions rose quietly from their seats; the woman with the heavy-lidded eyes looked up at Crouch and called, “The Dark Lord will rise again, Crouch! Throw us into Azkaban; we will wait! He will rise again and will come for us, he will reward us beyond any of his other supporters! We alone were faithful! We alone tried to find him!”

(GoF, 595-596)

She is fanatical, sure, but there's no baby talk like we see in OOTP, she is cold and clearly understands the situation, she isn't in a frenzy but in control. She just knows about at least one Horcrux so she truly believes what she is saying and from her point of view, it makes sense she believes that. I won't say she is right to torture and murder Voldemort, no, she is cruel and sadistic, always was. But you can be cruel and sadistic without being mad.

The baby voice she was useing when talking to Harry in OOTP was a taunt as well, not how she usually speaks:

“Never used an Unforgivable Curse before, have you, boy?” she yelled. She had abandoned her baby voice now.

(OotP, 810)

The moment he cast an unforgivable and she started treating him seriously she dropped the baby voice.

She is cruel and fanatical, but not insane. She rightfully suspects Snape throughout HBP and DH, she is aware of her surroundings enough to see Snape's loyalty is odd when many others don't. She is intelligent and logical. She can keep herself in check when she wants to, she's, just, obsessive, and willfully blind to anything to do with Voldemort because she practically worships him.

But, she isn't mad in the sense the Black Madness seems to imply. Also, I think how we see her, post-Azkaban is worse than how she was before. I think we met a less stable, crueler version of Bellatrix, not that she wasn't cruel before, but she was more stable I think. I mean, she did spend about 14 years in Azkaban, and Fudge said Sirius looked too sane to him after a decade in the place. The Wizarding World expects the prisoners in Azkaban to lose it. So, is it really a wonder Bellatrix was affected by her time there?

And what about Walburga who screeched about blood-traitors and mudbloods constantly? Well, I think, like Bellatrix, we're seeing the worst of her.

I mean, Walburga had her portrait painted after:

Her eldest and favored son ran away from home

Her second obedient son joined the Dark Lord and then disappeared. She likely believed he died a painful torturous death of a traitor considering that's what everyone thought.

Her husband died soon after, leaving her alone with Kreature in a gloomy home that hasn't felt like a home to any of them since the war started brewing in the 1970s. Since Sirius left.

So, I think the version we see of her, is one who was grieving. She was lonely, bitter, and in mourning. And that is the state of mind the portrait captured. I think magical portraits capture the person as they are when they sit down to have the portrait taken, so it captures all of Waburga's pain, and Walburga, proud daughter of the house of Black spits acid instead of letting her pain get to her. Instead of allowing herself to feel the guilt that is weighing her down.

Walburga was never been the picture of a good mother, or of stability, but I mentioned here and other times that I don't believe Walburga was physically abusive at any point, but she always had high expectations for her sons, especially Sirius. She probably had control, and she wasn't always as frenzied as we see her, we just see a version of her broken by life, and when she broke, she got so much worse.

So, I don't think there is a curse of Black madness, not really. It's just the Black family had shit luck in the Wizarding Wars, and to a degree, it was their own doing — their pure-blood mania that sent their kids away.

As for other members, well, we know Alphard was sane enough to give Sirius money when he ran away. We know Araminta wanted to legalize muggle-hunting and Elladora started the tradition of hanging house elves' heads on the walls. The thing is, you don't need to be mad to be cruel, you can be perfectly calm, collected, and intelligent and still do unimaginable horrors. In the case of Araminta and Elladora, they don't consider muggles and house elves as human, as equal to them. therefore their pain and suffering aren't cruel in their eyes, it's like killing a deer and mounting its head on the wall, it's an animal, and it's fine. I don't think they were even necessarily cruel towards other wizards, just towards those they considered lesser, who they thought of as animals. They weren't good people, but that doesn't make them mad.

I think there is something to be said about evil not always equaling insanity and that people who'd be medically considered completely sane can do a lot of evil. I think calling every evil character insane or mad cheapens these terms and has always felt to me like a cop-out. Insane is what you call someone you want to Other, to forget that the evil they committed was done by a person, it's a way to wave their behavior away and say: "Well, I can't understand why they did that, they're insane," and this kind of excuse for characters' behavior always left a bad taste in my mouth. Evil can be done by perfectly sane humans, and I think that angle of analysis, is much more interesting because then you force yourself to understand. You force yourself to face the humanity in a character in a way calling them mad won't allow you to. Real evil is hardly ever so simple as "madness" makes it out to be.

(As a side note, I think it's possible quite a few of the Blacks have mental health issues, but that's very different than how terms like madness and insanity are thrown around and portrayed)

[the-south-north]

percy weasley and regulus black mirror each other

their families have high expectations of them, which they work hard to fulfill

percy and regulus are the "good" sibling, doing everything their mothers ask of them, never causing trouble, etc.

they idolize the ministry (especially crouch sr.) and the death eaters (voldemort), respectively

with familial approval/encouragement, they join the ministry and death eaters, respectively

each pursued their ends further than their parents were willing to go. percy trusted the ministry more than dumbledore and achieved a higher position than his father–which his family did not support. orion and walburga black eventually change their tune on voldemort as well (i believe they thought him too dangerous).

eventually, percy and regulus defect–while hoping to protect their families. percy reunites with the weasleys at the battle of hogwarts, while regulus dies alone, in secret, so that his parents don't suffer the consequences of his betrayal. both percy and regulus could have been sorted into the other's house, since familial pressure (the blacks are always slytherin, the weasleys are always gryffindor) played a major role in their sorting, rather than just their characters. au fodder.

[my-castles-crumbling]

*winks* Sorry, I only fall in love with fictional men.

[fandoomrants]

Love how Sirius is the older sibling but he somehow has younger sibling energy.

Like, yes, he's protective and all but somehow Regulus is the more composed, responsible and serious (ha!) one.

[forestdeath1]

Where does this idea come from that the Black brothers are all dramatic and theatric? Regulus writes sad poems and lies on the floor soaking in his teenage tears and sorrow, while Sirius makes up fancy insults and tries to look artistic, entertaining everyone around him.

None of what they did or said is really dramatic or theatrical.

Sometimes their words might sound a bit lofty, but that's because all the Blacks were raised in a family culture that was a bit "elevated". It’s not about them being "naturally" dramatic or theatrical; they’re brought up differently, part of a family culture where honour, dignity, and "knightly" behaviour are more than just empty words. As the saying goes, some are into painting, some into literature, and some into sausages the Malfoys.

So, it's not just personal; it's the upbringing imposed on the Black character. These attitudes don’t just appear out of nowhere; one isn’t born with them, yet all the Blacks (even Narcissa to some extent, and she’s got more guts than Lucius) have them. Honour means different things to them, but it is still honour. They all stay true to their ideals, what’s important to them, they are fearless, not afraid of death, and honest in their actions and thoughts. I think it’s more family than personal.

Both Regulus and Sirius are very focused on the concept of honour, though they see it differently. You could write this on their tombstones:

Mine honour is my life; both grow in one. Take honour from me, and my life is done. Then, dear my liege, mine honour let me try; In that I live, and for that will I die.

(I’m purposely ignoring whose words these are — it doesn’t matter here)

Regulus "I face death in the hope that when you meet your match you will be mortal once more"

And Bella "You should be proud! If I had sons, I would be glad to give them up to the service of the Dark Lord"

And Sirius "I want to commit the murder I was imprisoned for..." and "THEN YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED! DIED RATHER THAN BETRAY YOUR FRIENDS"

It's not about their personal theatricality; it's about how such people see the world. These people view the world through a lens where pride, honour, and dignity aren't just idealistic, they're real and ingrained structures that live within them. It's the morality of knights versus a utilitarian approach, choosing what's right over what's just beneficial.

The independence of the Blacks’ thinking leads to unique outcomes — each person has their own idea of what's "right."

Regulus isn't just a sad boy with poems, forced into a vile organisation, then betraying Voldemort out of immense pity and love for a house-elf. And Sirius isn't just an artistic dancer on the bar with witty insults.

Both Regulus and Sirius have very clear views of what's right and wrong. Sirius is incredibly brave, as is Regulus in his own way — joining the Death Eaters at 16 is brave and dangerous, but if it's the "right" thing to do, it's worth it. And if the "right actions" lead to the destruction of the entire line—well, you know... He writes such a letter believing he is dying with honour, in contrast to Voldemort, a dishonourable being who, indeed, views honour as nothing but an empty word. I believe Voldemort was quite adept at manipulating these notions of "honour" among some purebloods. Voldemort is utterly utilitarian.

The same goes for Sirius — his upbringing and ideals are mistakenly attributed to excessive drama and theatricality, as if he's some clown who deliberately makes up fancy insults and entertains the crowd by dancing on tables. This destroys the essence of Sirius, turning him into an aesthetic leech created for amusement and consumption (of attention, things, pleasures, etc.), and turning everything into an aesthetic object. Consumption and Sirius are completely opposite concepts. Nothing he does is for the Other; there's no theatricality in his actions, no fashion, no aestheticism for the sake of it, no consumption for the sake of consumption. Sirius is a man of Grand Concepts, as is Regulus.

[sofoulandfairaday]

Actually very curious to hear your thoughts and head canons on Sirius + Walburga + Orion

Under the cut, because it's very long. But I'd love it if you read it all. I hope it succeeds in being eloquent, it's hard to put my thoughts into coherent writing for such a sensitive topic.

I don't think that the majority of this fandom actually understands the subtleties of abuse. Also, too many people weirdly like the idea of abused characters, and emphasize their torments, especially physical ones, as a way of... I don't know, evoking more sympathy for them? This happens all the time with Sirius Black.

@ sofoulandfairaday, was Sirius Black abused in your opinion?

Yes.

But not in the way people think.

I am fascinated with stories that explore generational trauma, the cycles of abuse that get repeated over and over. I think Sirius was abused in the way the Roy kids in Succession are abused, in the way that the people in The Crown are abused. It's not that the people in themselves are abusive it's that the family system is.

This doesn't excuse individual adult responsibility because, at a certain point, it becomes your duty not to pass on your traumas to your children. But traumatized adults raising traumatized children is something much more realistic, to me, than “The Blacks liked torturing their children for fun” (wtf?).

The Blacks were an upper-class family in the 1950s. To put this in perspective, my parents both got physically reprimanded as children (1970s), and my grandparents did too (1950s-1940s). It was just the way things were. It wouldn't have been seen as weird if they had been hit, at the time. Do you know when corporal punishment was abolished in UK schools? 1986. And people say Snape was abusive to his students. Bro, 1986. The world has changed a lot in the last 20/30 years but it's a little unfair, in my opinion, to judge their times entirely through our lenses.

And even in light of this... I don't think the Blacks were that physically violent. Maybe Orion clipped his sons behind the ear when they really misbehaved, or threatened physical punishment, but they most likely never truly hurt their kids. I also don't think they raised their hands like filthy Muggles, so maybe... Stinging Hexes? Going to bed without supper? They definitely did not use the fucking Cruciatus curse on their children. The torture curse. The one that scrambles people's brains if used for too long. Sometimes I think that authors don't put thought behind what they write, or exaggerate for the shock value, which... doesn't really sit right with me, to say the least. I don't really care for character bashing of any character. I don't care for painting Walburga & Orion as Disney villains who hurt their children because... they? like? hurting children?

With this being said, I'm pretty sure they were emotionally abusive, maybe psychologically abusive. Tons of families are like that, even nowadays.

Master always liked his little joke,” said Kreacher, bowing again, and continuing in an undertone, “Master was a nasty ungrateful swine who broke his mother’s heart — ” “My mother didn’t have a heart, Kreacher,” Sirius snapped. “She kept herself alive out of pure spite.” Kreacher bowed again and said, “Whatever Master says,” then muttered furiously, “Master is not fit to wipe slime from his mother’s boots, oh my poor Mistress, what would she say if she saw Kreacher serving him, how she hated him, what a disappointment he was — ”

According to Kreacher, Sirius broke his mother's heart when he left. That might have been a dramatic choice of words (Sirius definitely thinks it is because he replies in kind) but perhaps it wasn't.

The problem with the Blacks' love for their children isn't that it wasn't there, it's that it seems very conditional. I fully believe that for a time, when he was a kid, Sirius was a little prince, a perfect pureblood heir. Given his temperament, he might have been the bad child, always in detention compared to Regulus, who was probably quieter, more shy, more poised. Except. Despite all of this or maybe because of all of this, he was probably the more respected out of the two: more handsome, more charismatic, more outspoken, stronger, quicker. Someone like Bellatrix (and Walburga too, I think) must have respected him much more than his brother, even though they probably said the opposite out loud. Sure, they liked Regulus more, but everyone knew he wasn't the brightest out of the two stars. I think the Blacks respected and praised strength.

Want proof of this? Sirius himself calls Regulus soft and an idiot. How many times do you think he heard that sentence as a child?

For these reasons, it's always been my headcanon that the two brothers grew up resenting each other subtly: Sirius probably envied that his brother was their mama's favourite, the one who was shown more affection, despite being not as bright as him, not as good. But children are petty and have very strong senses of pride. In stressful environments they latch onto the identities they create for themselves: if Sirius painted himself, in the family dynamics, as the strong one, the one who doesn't care, the one who rejects even his parents' rare moments of affection, he will most likely never be the one to go to them to beg for their love, or kisses or whatever. On the other hand, Regulus was probably babied by their parents, but never truly treated like the heir, like the competent, brilliant one. His mother might have been more tender with him and yelled at him less, but children are perceptive.

Also, Grimmauld Place has all the characteristics of the Haunted Hause trope, horror film style (which I cannot get into here lest this becomes a dissertation), but generational trauma likely permeates those walls. Merely being back in the house is enough to trigger Sirius' depression.

Sirius is my pride, but Regulus is my joy sort of dynamic for the Blacks and their parents, me thinks.

They love each other but are also constantly pitted against each other. They fight for their parents' love. They think the other had it easier.

Then, Sirius is sorted into Gryffindor. Now, he's already fighting back against his parents now (he's almost 12, the perfect age), but it's always been a little headcanon of mine that Sirius doesn't know how much this will damage him until it happens. We see, again and again and again, in-universe, how much stress the Sorting put kids through - what if I'm not in this house my parents were sorted into? From the way he appears in Snape's memories on the Hogwarts Express, I think Sirius must have thought it hilarious if he was sorted into Gryffindor, the first Black ever to be one. Truly a most rebellious act. This lasted about... seven seconds?

The next day, Walburga sends a Howler and she's the most displeased Sirius has ever heard her, this is not a joke, Sirius, how dare you? You are such a disappointment etc.

Disappointment. The family disappointment.

This becomes Sirius' new persona. The more he leans into it, the more his mother doubles down. Headcanon n°2: they have the same personality, Walburga and Sirius; Regulus takes after Orion.

Golden-child/scapegoat dynamic ensues, worse than ever. This is the abuse I was referring to: no matter how brilliant, how high his grades, how good Sirius is, it'll never be enough. He's the foil to Regulus - less good in school, less brilliant, less popular, less... So. He fraternizes with Mudbloods and werewolves and dissenters of our Lord and Saviour Voldemort, which is a disgrace. He comes back from his first year saying Muggleborn instead of Mudblood, puts up semi-naked Muggle girl posters in his room with a permanent sticking charm - every time Walburga is in there her stomach flips in disgust. He buys himself a Muggle motorbike.

He can never bring himself to tell his parents that he wants their love and approval and they think he wants everything but. Not just that, they think he's actively trying to drive them to an early grave with all of that rebelling.

This, by the way, puts an enormous amount of stress on Regulus. Now he has to step up, wants to step up, to prove himself as finally better, but also he doesn't want to lose his older brother, but also he can never live up to the comparison, but also why do his parents love him now that Sirius is gone, why couldn't they love him better, sooner? This breeds resentment. Desperate to prove himself, he joins the Death Eaters (whose ideas he fully embraced anyway, let's not forget that Reggie was a racist little arse).

Why did Sirius run away?

This fandom makes the MISTAKE of thinking that Sirius ran away because his parents were evil and mean. No. Nu-uh. That's not what happened.

“But… why did you…?” “Leave?” Sirius smiled bitterly and ran his fingers through his long, unkempt hair. “Because I hated the whole lot of them: my parents, with their pure-blood mania, convinced that to be a Black made you practically royal… my idiot brother, soft enough to believe them… that’s him.” Sirius jabbed a finger at the very bottom of the tree, at the name Regulus Black. A date of death (some fifteen years previously) followed the date of birth. “He was younger than me,” said Sirius, “and a much better son, as I was constantly reminded.”

Sirius hated his parents and his brother, but he doesn't offer any indication that they were physically violent towards him - sure, they sound like dicks and they definitely created a situation of emotional abuse (why can't you be more like your brother?), which is still very scarring for a child/teenager, but no indication that they ever brutalized him.

I'm not saying this to argue that emotional or psychological abuse (lying, gaslighting, justifying treating your children horribly with oh, but I'm doing it for your own good, etc.) is less damaging than physical abuse. But I think that half the fandom just writes in a few rounds of Cruciatus to get out of writing the hard stuff - the complexities, subtleties, two-way pain of dysfunctional households.

When Sirius ran away from home, Orion and Walburga blasted him off the family tree. That means that he couldn't come back even if he tried to. He had no family any longer. Running away from home is something that a teenager in Sirius' situation and with his personality might conceivably do - and I'm sure it did hurt his family. But his betrayal was followed by their own betrayal.

Also, I want to contrast this with BELLATRIX and the way she speaks of Andromeda (because we all know that she's actually referring to Andromeda in that first quote):

“Cissy, your own sister? You wouldn’t — ” (HBP) “She is no niece of ours, my Lord,” she cried over the outpouring of mirth. “We — Narcissa and I — have never set eyes on our sister since she married the Mudblood. This brat has nothing to do with either of us, nor any beast she marries.” (DH)

and Walburga:

“- comes back from Azkaban ordering Kreacher around, oh, my poor mistress, what would she say if she saw the house now, scum living in it, her treasures thrown out, she swore he was no son of hers and he’s back, they say he’s a murderer too -”

Bella, even after 25 years, still calls Andromeda her sister. Sure, Ted and Dora can rot - nay, she wants to actively kill them -, but Andy is her sister. Walburga declares that Sirius is no son of hers. She cut ties with him just as much as he cut ties with them. He lived with the Potters until Alphard died and miraculously left him gold; he didn't have a Galleon to his name otherwise. This is incredibly hurtful for a child. He was sixteen.

So. Anyways. This is getting rambly, but I hope I got my point across.

As for pure headcanons, that have no actual basis in the text:

All the Blacks are hot, but Orion & Burgie were not the hottest of them. That title goes to Alphard & Lucretia and then Sirius & Bellatrix in the next generation.

Orion is like Regulus in nature, and Walburga is like Sirius. Ice and Fire. On the other hand, physically, Sirius looks like his dad and Reggie looks like his mum. (Which is not to say much because they are second cousins, and the Black genes are strong lol)

(By the way, they are second cousins guys, not first cousins, not brother and sister!)

Orion wears exclusively shades of black and grey.

He's a quiet man, likes to read, despises noise.

A heavy drinker since he was young, it became a coping mechanism after Sirius' turbulent teenage years, almost drank himself to death when Regulus died. That's not what got him in the end, but it could have very well been.

Walburga always had a temper on her, could scream like a banshee, but she wasn't insane until one son abandoned her for the lowliest of scum and she lost her youngest boy and her husband in the span of six? three? months.

Austere. I can imagine her with her hair pinned up, high necklines... always very proper, with a severe type of beauty. I really like that aesthetic for her.

Crack: Definitely involved in the infamous Love Triangle of '43 when Tom Riddle tried to ask her out (to get access to the Black Family library's Dark Arts books) and she rejected him (not my headcanon btw, I remember reading it on here but I can't remember who came up with it rn - if anyone knows, I'll give credit!). Guess who was smitten with him? Alphard. Chaos of the kind you're thinking ensues.

Theirs was a semi-arranged marriage (there were wink-wink, nudge-nudges from other members of the family and the two of them decided it would be advantageous). I don't think they loved each other but they had a good partnership, gave the House of Black two heirs. (lol, see how that turned out)

Walburga had pregnancy issues, which I headcanon for every single woman of the House of Black, except the only one who was-maybe-sorta-kinda relying on them: Andromeda.

That's all, folks!

(I think.)

[arliedraws]

I wonder if the relationship between Regulus and Sirius deteriorated only after Regulus was sorted into Slytherin. I think Regulus would wait to shun his brother like his parents did until he was “safe” in Slytherin himself. What if he were sorted into Gryffindor too? He would have needed Sirius on his side to look after him.

As soon as he’s sorted into Slytherin, though, his attitude towards Sirius changes. Second-year Sirius is a bit bummed his brother is in Slytherin, but whatever, they’re brothers, it’s fine. When Sirius attempts to talk to Regulus soon after, Regulus makes a show of being cruel to his rebellious Gryffindor brother in front of his new friends. This hits Sirius like a slap in the face. It hurts him. And Sirius, though he would never show it, is crushed because he knows he’s now lost his brother too. So, he’s just as cruel back, and for the rest of their relationship, he treats Regulus with cold indifference.