#ignotus peverell

[hollowed-theory-hall]

Related a little to the elder wand, how do you think the Peverell brothers created it? We don't have much information about them (I don't entirely trust the tale of Beedle the Bard). I would very much like to hear your opinion about the Peverell brothers and their relationship with the deathly hallows.

P.S. I really like your theories, I hope I don't bother you!

Thank you! 😊

And you're not bothering me at all, I'm just slow to answer asks sometimes.

As for not trusting the tale, yeah, the world of HP as depicted in the books doesn't really seem to include god-like beings the way Death is portrayed in the story of the brothers. I talked a little bit about the Deathly Hallows, Death, and the Peverell brothers here, so this is essentially a sequel to that post with just as many speculations and headcanons on my part.

Deathly Hallows and the Peverells: Part 2

I want to note I also posited that the Peverell brothers are the same ones who created the veil that we see in the Department of Mysteries (I wrote in that original post the brothers were born around 1210s, but that information came from the movies behind the scenes, and is likely inaccurate. Since then I came up with a headcanon I like better, that they are the sons of William Peverell, and therefore were born likely around 1080s). It isn't super relevant to how the Deathly Hallows were made, but I wanted to note this here nonetheless.

Let's start with what we do know about the artifacts themselves:

All three hallows are incredibly sentient, like the sorting hat or the Book of Admintence and Quill of Acceptance.

They are uniquely powerful, but we do know of other powerful magical artifacts from the same time period and it's unclear how special they are, but I'd go on a limb and say the results are near impossible to replicate.

Then there are the unique abilities of each artifact:

The wand is like any wand, except more sentient and powerful (more on that here and here)

The stone, which I posed here can't really raise the dead and only imitates them based on the users' own memories of the deceased.

The cloak, which makes you more invisible than other cloaks, lasts longer than any cloak and might (as I mentioned in the first part) allow you to go into the veil without dying.

So, I want to talk about the sentience aspect that they all share first and then go into each one of them as their own artifact.

Sentient Magical Artifacts

Arthur Weasley says this regarding the Ginny using the diary:

“Ginny!” said Mr. Weasley, flabbergasted. “Haven’t I taught you anything? What have I always told you? Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can’t see where it keeps its brain. Why didn’t you show the diary to me, or your mother? A suspicious object like that, it was clearly full of Dark Magic — ”

(CoS, 304)

This implies sentient magical artifacts aren't that unheard of and are likely still being made. We actually see quite a few of them, from portraits to the mirrors in the early books. The question is, how? how do you breathe life into an object?

We know wands are always sentient to a degree, and however that is accomplished should be similar in theory to how any item would be turned sentient with magic.

Like always, I'm going back to the three primas of Alchemy:

Salt - body - the item

Sulfur - soul - the actual sentient part

Mercury - spirit - life that binds the soul and the body.

So, we've got a body, that's the easy part, the harder part, as I discussed with Horcruxes, is literally everything else. So, I went to see how other artifacts can have a sentience, a mind, where does the soul come from?

So what I could find is this regarding the Sorting Hat, a known sentient magical item:

Legend has it that the hat once belonged to one of the four founders, Godric Gryffindor, and that it was jointly enchanted by all four founders to ensure that students would be sorted into their eponymous houses, which would be selected according to each founder’s particular preferences in students. The Sorting Hat is one of the cleverest enchanted objects most witches and wizards will ever meet. It literally contains the intelligence of the four founders...

(from Pottermore)

The four founders who enchanted the hat, literally placed their own intelligence into the hat, making it sound not so different from a Horcrux. The Mauraders Map is quite similar too, as an item enchanted by four people which includes their very essence in their enchantment. "Copies" of Messers Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs... and it got me to thinking about magical portraits.

Because Magical Portraits, like these sentient items, capture the "soul" of a person at the time of painting. Their knowledge and personality at the moment, captured forever. Just like the hat which is a combined effort of all four founders, or the Marauders' Map which has the Maradaurs insulting Snape and even reacting to his specific words:

“Mr. Padfoot would like to register his astonishment that an idiot like that ever became a professor.”

In response to Snape referring to himself as "Professor". It shows the map is much more sentient than we usually think. Just like the magical portraits we see.

So, the answer to how all these are made is likely the same one. If we figure out how you enchant a item sentient, we figure out the map, the hat, all wands, the hallows, and all magical portraits. So the question becomes how would you magically imbue your own soul (or another's for portraits and wands) into an object without using very dark magic to ritually kill yourself?

Unlike a Horcrux, you don't want to bind your actual soul, just create a mimicry of it. A portrait, something that looks and acts like you, but isn't. And for mimicry, you wouldn't need an actual part of your soul.

So, I thought, what irl examples can I look to try and figure out how you'd go about it, and then I thought about the Golem of Prague. I'm not going to go into the story, but basically, it's a legend in which a Jewish rabbi creates a clay golem to protect the Jewish community in Prague from antisemitic attacks and pogroms. In these stories, the body Is the clay, the "soul" is often a piece of writing inserted into the golem or written on its forehead (what's written on it differs between different legends) and the spirit comes from god. So, I took inspiration from that while thinking of something that'll be more in line with the world of Harry Potter.

How to manufacture a soul image:

The soul/sulfur in Alchemy refers to the combination of the two volatile aspects — air (the Selfconscious Mind) and fire (the Superconscious Mind). This would explain why sentience and intelligence require a soul, but the fact that it's a combination of air and water is what I want to focus on since I think the phrase I used earlier: "to breathe life into" is surprisingly accurate.

So, what you need to mimic a person's soul for a portrait, let's say, is their breath and something of them that is a stand-in for their entire person.

If we go with the golem stories, this could be a piece of parchment with their name on it, something that represents only them. Considering how sacred names are in Greek and Egyptian mythologies and how in northern European folklore true names are used to bind magical creatures, this seems fitting. The type of focus names have in the HP books, with the taboo on Voldemort's name, also indicates names having weight magically. We also know the Homonculous Charm the Marauders Map uses recognizes a person's name as a definite, magically recognised aspect of their being.

But then, we don't see little slips of parchment in any of these items, their soul is imbued into the body itself. So, I theorize that breath is used as the name. Instead of just capturing any random exhale of air, you request the person state their own name into the vial and capture their name on their breath.

(for wands it's different since it heavily depends on the core, but in the case of the Elder Wand, I believe this is how its sentience came about as I'll discuss more later in this post)

How to manufacture life:

The spirit is the bridge between the volatile aspects and the fixed aspects, as such, its a combination of Water (the Subconscious Mind) and air (the Selfconscious Mind).

I don't have a specific ritual in mind, but what you need to represent life, is liquid. You can use blood in it, but that would only be necessary if you desire to mimic a specific person. Basically, you make a potion to be the "life essence" or spirit of this item. I don't have the full ingredients list, but it's mostly water, a lot of alcohol (plant spirit), and something that represents the life of the sentience you are mimicking, be it blood or another material (like hair is used in Polyjuice potion to represent the body of the specific individual whose form you wish to take).

Combine everything together:

You'd need to release the breath of the person into the item as the item is soaked in the spirit and cast some spell to bind it all. Unlike with the Horcrux, you aren't really making any oath and it isn't an actual soul you're working with, just the mimicry of it.

So, what does all this have to do with the sentience of the Deathly Hallows?

Well, I think each hallow has the sentience of the brother who made it. As in, I think they used their own name and breath (and probably blood) to make each of their respective hallows. Antioch the wand, Cadmus the stone, and Ignotus the cloak.

Now, let's go into the specifics:

The Wand

I believe the Elder Wand is more sentient than other wands because it is Antioch's consciousness and "soul copy" in there. Most wands use their core as a "soul stand-in" and while this does create a sentient wooden stick (how sentient would depend greatly on the wood and core in question), a human sentience breathed into a wand like it would be into a portrait would make it appear much more sentient, since, well, it's a person (well, a mimicry of a person).

So, I believe Antioch placed his own knowledge and personality into the Elder Wand, explaining it being as picky and fickle as it is. Its unique power is likely a result of its materials and manufacturing. I don't think it's impossible to make another wand like that, which made me feel something is missing, some extra oomph that'll make how revered the wand is to make sense.

So, what could be this extra oomph?

I think the extra oomph comes from Antioch's "echo" in the wand. Harry is told wands don't just cast spells on their own after the Battle of the Seven Potters in book 7, I think that might be why the Elder Wand is so revered. It can cast magic on its own, and powerful magic at that.

Harry's holly wand had to go through some super rare magical gymnastics with Harry and Voldy's connection to get to a point where it was capable of casting magic on its own with intention. The intention part is important as there are plenty of wands that heat up or even explode when they're bored, but they aren't casting precise spells. It's more like a general show of displeasure.

So, my headcanon is that the Elder Wand, if it wants to, could cast proper spells like any wizard. It's probably the only wand that could kill a wizard without a caster using it, so it really does make it a "Deathstick".

(I headcanon the name came about after the Elder Wand killed someone without the caster actually casting anything. Said caster, being Antioch, who the wand liked, because I think he was the kind of guy who'd love to fuck his own clone)

The Stone

The stone, I believe shows figments based on memories, and not the actual dead, and it holds the sentience of Cadmus Peverell.

As such, what the stone does is some very complex Legilimency (not unlike the sorting hat that already existed when the stone was made). First, in looking into your memories, and second in showing you these representations of people. Harry knew all the people the stone showed him and knew they were dead (He saw Remus' corpse in the Great Hall right before he left for the forest). But this explanation feels lacking, it lacks that certain oomph.

So, I like to believe the stone does know who's alive and who's dead, I think it has that knowledge so it could never show you a manifestation of your memories of a living person. But how? And what stone is it?

Let's start with the stone. The tale says Death picked up a random pebble, but throughout the books, it isn't described as a random pebble:

It was large, rather clumsily made of what looked like gold, and was set with a heavy black stone that had cracked down the middle

The black stone with its jagged crack running down the center sat in the two halves of the Snitch. The Resurrection Stone had cracked down the vertical line representing the Elder Wand. The triangle and circle representing the Cloak and the stone were still discernible.

A pebble from a river shore is likely to be smooth and grey, not black and clunky with an engraved Deathly Hallows symbol on it. So, what stone is it likely to be?

I think it's a black obsidian. They symbolize inner reflection, revealing hidden truths, and letting go of emotional baggage, which is what the stone was meant to do, allowing Cadmus to move on from losing his wife by bringing her back. This inner reflection the stone is associated with would work well with how I think the figments it makes you see are reflections of your own memories of the deceased.

As for why it can tell who's dead and who isn't, I think it's an enchantment. I already mentioned the Homonculous Charm (used on the Marauders Map) that can show living people present in a certain area. I think, this speculated charm on the stone, is one of Cadmus' own making, and it works very much like a Homonculous Charm, in that it knows to recognize the names of everyone in the world, and so, tell if someone is dead or not. It sounds like a lot, honestly, but I think it is possible.

I do like to think Cadmus really was trying to bring people back from the dead. He used obsidian for its association with the hidden, like the afterlife. The Legilimency was so the stone could know who he was trying to bring back and the Homonculous-like Charm was to locate the descesed. Except, it ended up not really working and just gave a form to his memories of the dead and not the dead themselves.

The Cloak

The cloak makes one invisible, more invisible than other cloaks, and its enchantment seems ever-lasting. I also, believe the cloak is just as sentient as the other two hallows, carrying the knowledge and personality of Ignotus Peverell.

Now, most invisibility cloaks in the wizarding world are thought to be made from Demiguise hair, as a Demiguise can turn invisible at will. But I think this particular cloak is different. I think it is made from Thestral hair, the same as the core of the Elder Wand. Thestrals are associated with death, invisible to those who haven't seen death, so the ability to be completely invisible is present in the material.

I think the Thestral hair the cloak is made of is enchanted in a way that'll make it invisible to everyone, even those who've seen death, which would make the legend of the cloak: "hide from even death himself" make sense with the origin of how it was made.

So, essentially, the cloak is made from Thestral hair that was magically tricked into thinking no one has seen death (so it'll remain invisible) and has the knowledge and personality of Ignotus Peverell.

In Summary:

The Elder Wand is uniqly sentient having an image of Antioch Peverell's soul. It's special in being not only a powerful and picky wand but being able to actually cast spells, due to having a fully human sentience which wands do not generally have.

The Resurrection Stone like the wand, holds the sentience of Cadmus Peverell. It is made of obsidian and shows figments based on the memories of the user through Legilimency. The stone would never show a living person though, as it can tell who's alive through a variation of the Homonculous Charm.

The Invisibility Cloak holds the sentience of Ignotus Peverell and is made of Thestral hair tricked into thinking no one has seen death and like this: "hides even from death himself"

At least, these are my best guesses.

[coffeefrenchandhistory]

The Veil of Death

So @artemisia-black​ asked me to write up a meta commentary, and I’m absolutely going to do so. 

The Veil of Death in the Ministry for Magic. A giant stone archway in the Death Chamber of the Department of Mysteries. When Harry and co. arrive to rescue Sirius from the Death Eaters, they encounter it. 

But more importantly, this stone archway had whispers emanate from it. Hermione couldn’t hear it. Harry could, whispering that he couldn’t quite make out, and Luna could as well. Luna says “there are people in there!” It’s curious that it’s Harry and Luna who hear the whispering — two individuals who had seen and understood death. Harry, who saw Cedric be murdered; and Luna, who saw her mother die. 

In the book, Harry "had the strangest feeling that there was someone standing right behind the veil on the other side of the archway... all that could be seen was the other side of the tattered black veil." (OoTP, Ch. 34). Harry’s instincts and deduction skills are usually very good. Look at his deduction in Chamber of Secrets when he works out how the students had gotten petrified. If he thinks there’s someone right behind the veil, there probably is. 

But where does the Archway come from? It’s said to predate the Ministry, that they built the Department of Mysteries around the Veil of Death. How could that be? Where would the Veil come from? 

Because it’s not just a veil. 

It’s a bridge. The bridge. 

In the story of the Three Brothers — Antioch, Cadmus, and Ignotus — the three of them were: 

“travelling along a lonely, winding road at twilight. In time, the brothers reached a river, too deep to wade through, and too dangerous to swim across. However, these brothers were learned in the magical arts, and so they simply waved their wands, and made a bridge appear across the treacherous water. They were halfway across it, when they found their path blocked by a hooded figure, and it was Death. He was angry that he had been cheated out of three new victims, for travelers usually drowned in the river.” (The Tale of the Three Brothers)

Death was furious at the brothers and pretended to congratulate them. So why would he give them gifts, angry and frustrated as he was, and not ask for anything in return? 

I think he did. But first he gave them gifts that were from the river. The river that separated life from death. 

To Antioch, Death “crossed to an Elder Tree on the banks of the river” for the man who wanted an unbeatable wand. Elder trees in Celtic mythology, after all, symbolized regeneration; the end and the beginning. To Cadmus, he “picked up a stone from the riverbank” for the man who wanted to bring back those who died. A stone which had touched the waters that always killed. And for Ignotus, who wanted to be crafty and slip away from Death... he received a cloak. 

Something fluid and silvery gray went slithering to the floor where it lay in gleaming folds. Ron gasped. 

“I’ve heard of those,” he said in a hushed voice, dropping the box of Every Flavor Beans he’d gotten from Hermione. “If that’s what I think it is -- they’re really rare, and really valuable.” 

“What is it?” 

Harry picked up the shining, silvery cloth off the floor. It was strange to the touch, like water woven into the material.�� (Philosopher’s Stone, Ch. 12)

The water of the river, which always killed the traveler, woven into the cloak. And that brings me back to the cloak and the veil. Death was angry at the brothers. They had cheated him of his due. The river always killed the traveler — and the brothers had cheated him. And Death is not the kind of entity who would let these three get the better of him: the braggart with the unbeatable wand, the obsessive who craved his loved ones beyond the veil, and the brother who wanted to hide away. 

So Death gave the brothers their gifts, their prize, in exchange for something. 

Antioch was killed by his own bravado. Cadmus died for his obsession. But Ignotus? How do you catch a man who can hide invisibly? 

You lure him, of course. You get him to cross a bridge. 

Death gave the brothers their gifts, yes, but he took something in return. The bridge that forded the chasm between life and death. The bridge the brothers had created out of stone. Death created an archway and placed as a veil the remains of the cloak he wore as a curtain. 

He would tempt them. Luna and Harry, after all, and seen and comprehended death. Luna saw her mother die. Harry saw Cedric murdered. They saw and understood death. And when they were near the veil, they heard the whispers of their loved ones. “There are people in there!” said Luna. 

Death would give the brothers Peverell a gift, yes — but he would never again be cheated his due. He would ensure he would never be cheated again. He would lure them to the bridge, to ensure he would never have to hunt for who he wanted for years. 

The bridge would lead always and forever lead to Death…

[hp-brainrot]

I spent the past hour trying to make heads or tails of the Potter-Peverell-Gaunt family tree and when they lived/died with only a few individuals as reference. I am proud of how it turned out on family echo though. I'm not sure how it'll help in my main books and hm era fics but whatever....

[hptheboywholived]

[disneysooner]

“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” - Mark Twain

I haven’t seen Puss in Boots: The Last Wish yet, but of all the things I’ve seen and heard about Death Wolf, he reminds me a lot of Death from the Tale of the Three Brothers in the Harry Potter franchise. While, yes, death can be scary, and sometimes comes when you least expect it, we one day have to accept that fate. These two were just doing their job of bringing those who were on the brink to their end; I don’t see them as villainous for that (even if both look the villainous part).

For example, both of them ended up making a deal with a living being that when they have lived their lives to the fullest and are ready, they would return for them.

For Death Wolf, Puss had evaded death for so long due to his nine lives. He decides to let Puss live and enjoy his last life, and acknowledged he would return. Puss knew this, and accepted that.

For Death in HP, the third brother did evade Death due to the Cloak of Invisibility. But when his time came, he greeted Death as an old friend and accepted his fate.

[cecenyss]

Maybe the reason witches and wizards from Harry Potter grow up to be so strange is because one of their children’s books growing up has two of the main three characters dying because of their own hubris and also because Death is a whiny little bitch who threw a hissy fit because three wizards crossed a river

[longdeadwizard]

Ignotus, trying to sneak out to see Death: *silently begging for no one to be awake* Cadmus, leaning on the counter with a cup of tea: Hello, brother. Ignotus, jumping a foot in the air from fright: *Fearful screech*

[fic-ive-read]

Link To The Fic

[saltiest-suga-courtesyofnamjoon]

So me and my friend was talking about Plath and her poems a while back. And we like.. really got into it and we were talking about her works especially when describing Death was like..so thought-provoking and all right? And then one thing led to another and she then kinda came up w this theory and well..it just developed into something lol and i just wanted to share it here so here it goes :

Sorry if the quality isn't clear i tried my best to put it together the right way.

Disclaimer: neither me nor my friend are native English speakers. We just talk in English because it's easier to express that way. Also we didn't steal this from anywhere or anything it just really came up randomly and we made up the rest along the way. We don't claim it to be an original maybe there have been others who had similar ideas or theory etc but we def didn't steal it from anyone or anywhere. And lastly, well hopefully none of you will want us to stick our heads into an oven. Bye.

[hiinnys]

happy new year! just came on here to say that i was rewatching deathly hallows 1 and thinking about what a concidence it was that harry was both the chosen one and a descendant of ignotus peverell, only to realize that it wasn't a concidence at all.

ignotus asked for the invisibility cloak so Death couldn't find him before he was ready, and before he finally greets Death, he passes the cloak off to his children so Death cannot find them before they're ready, either. the assumption is that the cloak continues down the family tree in this fashion until it inevitably reaches the potters, james specifically. dumbledore "borrowed" the cloak from james, ultimately removing it from the family tree (for a time), thus preventing james from being able to hide himself, lily, and harry when voldemort found the safe house, resulting in both his and lily's death and harry's almost-death.

in other words, when the cloak was taken from ignotus' line, Death was finally able to find his family (in the form of voldemort) before they were ready to die.

(this connection runs even deeper in book considering harry uses the cloak throughout the battle of hogwarts to evade voldemort, revealing himself only when he is ready. what's more, the reveals happen twice: first, in the forest, when harry is willingly walking towards his death and second, in the great hall, when harry finally has all of the information and all of the mysticism and fear of voldemort has finally been removed. in fact, from memory, harry even exclusively refers to voldemort as tom in the final scene, completely destroying the power dynamic voldemort has worked so hard to create between them. therefore, one might say, quite like his ancestor, harry only removed the cloak of invisibility when he was ready to die and, when he did so, he greeted Death as an equal.)

[poetryandbloods-blog]

The Peverell brothers were descendants of a secondary branch of Salazar Slytherin. All three were attractive, intelligent and influential. Seeing the limits set in magic as only something that could be broken. They were widely admired for their ingenuity and skill. But when it seemed that the Peverells were willing to go beyond what society considered moral, they began to be seen with different eyes.

Os três viajaram pelo mundo procurando uma forma de dobrar a morte, encontraram o Véu da Morte, dois portais que datavam do Antigo Egito, ao estudar o Véu as relíquias surgiram. Não se sabe até que ponto a história das relíquias é verdadeira (objetos dados pela própria morte) ou se são fruto da criação de três mentes brilhantes.

After the death of the brothers, one of the Veils of Death was taken to the British Ministry and the other to the French Ministry, even centuries later no other wizard was able to unravel the mystery of the Veil.

Cadmus and Ignotus left descendants, with time and the incessant search for relics, their descendants abandoned the Peverell surname.

[potterwatchsblog]

31 December 1926:- Tom Marvolo Riddle was born.

Facts about Tom Marvolo Riddle:-

1:- Tom Marvolo Riddle is popularly known as 'Lord Voldemort'.

2:- Voldemort also developed the unusual ability to possess living creatures.

3:- Voldemort was born out of failed love i.e. his mother used to feed love potions to his father and stopped when she was pregnant. Due to this Voldemort doesn't understand 'Love'.

4:- Wizarding community avoided saying his name, calling him 'You Know Who' and 'He Who Must Not Be Named'.

5:- Voldemort is thought to be one of the most talented Legilimens.

6:- He wanted the job of teaching Defence Against The Dark Arts but was denied twice.

7:- Voldemort and Harry Potter were distant cousins. Voldemort was descendant of Cadmus Peverell while Harry was descendant of Ignotus Peverell.

8:- Though he was brilliant and received many offers to work for the Ministry of Magic, Riddle decided to work at Borgin and Burkes after graduation.

9:- The name Voldemort means 'Theft of death'.

[ellorypurebloodculture]

Five Sentences Ficlet with a Dark High Lady Peverell (based on the theory that the 3 brothers also invented the 3 Unforgivables Antioch/Avada, Cadmus/Crucio, Ignotus/Imperio) ?

High Lady Harelda Peverell, Lady Harriet Potter to the idiots at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, bites back a smirk as the little Death Eater who escaped Azkaban and snuck into the school disguised as an old Auror pauses when it's her turn to go next.

"Potter?" he asks, his stolen magical eye whirling in his Polyjuiced head, seeking permission even though he knows what the outcome will be.

"I'm ready, Professor Moody," Harelda says, reassuring him that he has her permission to proceed.

"Imperio!"

Harelda smiles, darkly pleased as her classmates gawp as she doesn't obey a single command that follows, all unknowing that every magical directly descended from High Lord Ignotus Peverell is immune to the curse he created.

[hptheboywholived]

12 July 1214 Ignotus Peverell, the original owner of the Cloak of Invisibility, is born.

[hollowed-theory-hall]

I was reading the post on Harry being the master of death (and absolutely loved it ❣️) but I want to ask few questions if you don't mind:

1. What do you mean by the cloak not working for anyone other than Harry? His friends has also used it and it had worked pretty well for them... And also when he passes the cloak to his kid (James) will it not work for him properly?

2. Draco disarmed Dumbledore and then become the owner of elder wand? But did the wand really chose him? As it did with Harry and not change it's alliance when voldemort (unsuccessfully) killed him? Or after Dumbledore it shifted it's alliance directly to Harry?

3. If Harry doesn't want to die (which is very ooc, but still) will he not die?

4. What other things Harry would be able to do as master of death?

Sorry for so many questions! 😅... But I simply love your analysis and how you tell so much about something no matter how very little it's mentioned which completely makes sense!

Lots of love 💝

First of all, thank you so much!

Lots of love to you too 💕

I definitely don't mind asks, love them actually, though it might take me a while to answer them 😅

As for your questions:

1. Okay, so I mentioned it here, it's not that the cloak wouldn't work at all, but I headcanon/speculate it wouldn't work to its full potential. What I mean is kinda like how the Elder Wand behaved with Voldemort, where it worked as a wand, but not anything extraordinary:

“My—my lord?” said Snape blankly. “I do not understand. You—you have performed extraordinary magic with that wand.” “No,” said Voldemort. “I have performed my usual magic. I am extraordinary, but this wand. . . no. It has not revealed the wonders it has promised. I feel no difference between this wand and the one I procured from Ollivander all those years ago.”

(DH, 551)

I kinda feel the cloak would be the same at the hands of someone who wasn't its master, it will work like any other invisibility cloak, but for its master, it could probably do more. For example, hide him from death, hide him more completely in a way a regular invisibility cloak wouldn't. I think it just does what it does to a lesser effect to anyone other than its master.

And when Harry passes it to his son, it'll work for said son like it did for Harry (once Harry dies) since that's how the ownership passes.

2. I talked about the Elder Wand and how it chooses its master here already, long story short, it's playing favorites and chooses who would win the duel so it could go with the winner. The wand picked Harry, so Draco was never really its master, I believe (neither was Voldemort for that matter).

3. I think so. I think he would remain alive for as long as he wished to, just like the first owner we of the cloak, Ignotus Peverell. He hid from death until he was ready to move on and Harry could do the same. Eventually, Harry will choose to die though, otherwise, he wouldn't be the Master of Death (as I talked about in the original post).

4. I don't think being the MOD gives you that much extra abilities or power. I always thought of it as something subtler. It's not like Harry would practice necromancy or anything like that (the necromancy we see in the HP universe is all a perversion of death and goes against its rules, no way is the Master of Death creating abominations like infri). He won't die unless he wishes to, I think he's the only person who could go into the veil and walk back out. But I don't think it gives him any control over ghosts or anything like that (I should probably write about ghosts at some point but they are not quite in death's domain, so I don't think being the MOD would help Harry with them) nor do I think Harry could summon spirits from the afterlife. In the HP world, it seems the dead are dead and can't come back once they move on, and there are very few circumstances that would allow a MOD to do something about someone who is already dead.

Basically, being the Master of Death is mostly about yourself and your ability to die, and less about any unique magic that allows you to influence the world. At least, that's what I headcanon/see it as. Especially considering how I see being the MOD like Ignotus Peverell's "greeting Death like an old friend", that's really all there is to it, I think.

[seriousbrat]

Seriousbrat, sorting hat fiend… what kind of magic do you think binds the hat to sorting? Harry talks about choosing, but do you think that’s true, or was Harry just a Gryffindor through and through? Every year the Sorting Hat complains about dividing kids, yet every year he sorts psycho material into Slytherin, to be around other psychos. Does he have any power of manipulation? Could he send someone like Snape - lonely, full of dark thoughts - simply somewhere else? Could he send someone like Cedric to Slytherin to, idk, be a good influence on others? Or does powerful ancient magic forces him to go through the kids like a machine production line, separating them into evil, brave, smart, and miscellaneous?

JKR talks about choice a lot, but imo opinion the text always undermines it - Harry “chose” gryffindor, but is there anyone more chivalrous, brave and daring than him? She talks about the power of choosing who you want to be, but ultimately, Harry’s inheritance of the cloak and direct blood ties to The Original Man Who Cheated Death really assisted his victory. There are self fulfilling prophecies through the books. I forgot what this question was even about!

This is an interesting question! I don't think the sorting hat has the power to send anyone into the "wrong" house on purpose. The parametres of its spell probably force it to do its duty as intended, but taking into account what the students themselves want is the only way it has of rebelling, even a little, against that. I don't think it's sorting psycho material into Slytherin, it's sorting kids who want to be in Slytherin into Slytherin. If Cedric wanted to be in Hufflepuff and wanted to be the type of person who would be in Hufflepuff, I don't think the hat would be able to send him anywhere else. Imo it has to be neutral and make the best choice for the individual being sorted rather than thinking about any wider implications.

I think the idea of "choice" is more complex than that, and when it comes to the houses I think it's also symbolic. Harry doesn't choose Gryffindor exactly, he says 'not Slytherin,' because he's choosing not to be like Voldemort and all the other dark wizards who have come out of Slytherin. The hat considered Ravenclaw and Slytherin as well as Gryffindor, because Harry is smart and has a desire to prove himself-- I think the point is he could have fit well into any house, but Gryffindor represents the person that Harry wants to be. Luna is as brave as any Gryffindor and more than some, but what she values is intelligence. Hermione is just as clever as the best Ravenclaw, but she values bravery, that's who she wants to be. Peter, who isn't actually very brave at all, was sent to Gryffindor because he values and admires bravery in others and wants to emulate it.

So imo Harry's choice isn't as simple as the words he said to the hat. I think the hat would have put him in Gryffindor anyway, because it would have sensed the person Harry wanted to be and set him on that path. Even if you're not particularly brave or clever etc, trying to be is still a choice that you make every day, and eventually through trying you can become it.

re: the Cloak and Ignotus Peverell... maybe. In part I think this is symbolic to set Harry up as the opposite of Voldemort, who sought the elder wand, but Harry is only in this position because Voldemort chose to go after him in the first place. It could have easily been Neville, another "true Gryffindor" who was able to pull the sword out of the hat. I think Neville killing Nagini (and Harry 'passing the baton' to him) is meant to signify that if it had been Neville, Neville would have succeeded, but he might not have succeeded in the same way Harry did. He might not have used the Hallows at all. There is a serendipitous aspect to magic in HP, as in things just have a way of working out-- but for me this doesn't really take away from the theme of choice.

Voldemort or no, Harry was always going to be the inheritor of the cloak, but he still chose to start fighting Voldemort when he was 11 years old, and if he hadn't the cloak might never have mattered. If Voldemort hadn't chosen Harry, and Harry hadn't chosen to fight him, then the twin cores problem might not have come up, which would mean Voldemort wouldn't have sought out the elder wand. It's interesting to think about!