Muggle
In the Harry Potter book series, a Muggle is a person who lacks any sort of magical ability and was not born into the magical world. Muggles also do not have any magical blood. It differs from the term Squib, which refers to a person with one or more magical parents yet without any magical ability, and from the term Muggle-born (or the derogatory and offensive mudblood), which refers to a person with magical abilities but without magical parents.
Usage in Harry Potter
The term Muggle is sometimes used in a pejorative manner in the books. Since Muggle refers to a person who is a member of the non-magical community, Muggles are simply ordinary human beings rather than witches and wizards. According to the author, J. K. Rowling, a quarter of the annual Hogwarts intake have two nonmagical parents; there have also been some children known to have been born to one magical and one non-magical parent. Children of this mixed parentage are called half-bloods (strictly speaking, they are 'Literal Half-bloods'); children with recent Muggle ancestry on the one side or the other are also called half-bloods. The most prominent Muggle-born in the Harry Potter series is Hermione Granger, who had two Muggles of unspecified names as parents. A witch or wizard with all magical heritage is called a pure-blood.
In the Harry Potter books, non-magical people are often portrayed as foolish, sometimes befuddled characters, who are completely ignorant of the Wizarding world that exists in their midst. If, by unfortunate means, non-magical people do happen to observe the working of magic, the Ministry of Magic sends Obliviators to cast Memory Charms upon them causing them to forget the event.
Some Muggles, however, know of the wizarding world. These include Muggle parents of magical children, such as Hermione Granger's parents, the Muggle Prime Minister (and his predecessors), the Dursley family (Harry Potter's non-magical and only living relatives), and the non-magical spouses of some witches and wizards.
Rowling has stated she created the word "Muggle" from "mug", an English term for someone who is easily fooled. She added the "-gle" to make it sound less demeaning and more "cuddly".[1]
A 'muggle' is, according to Abbott Walter Bower, the author of the Scotichronicon, "an Englishman's tail". In Alistair Moffat's book, A History of the Borders from Early Times it is stated that there was a widely held 13th century belief amongst Scots that Englishmen had tails.[2] Ernest Bramah referred to "the artful Muggles" in a detective story published decades before the Potter books ("The Ghost at Massingham Mansions",in The Eyes of Max Carrados, Doran, New York, 1924).
Rowling herself was sued for using the word "muggle" in the Harry Potter books.[3]
Notable Muggles
- The Dursleys, Harry's relatives with whom he lives
- Muggle Prime Minister
- Frank Bryce, the Riddle family gardener
- Tom Riddle Senior, Lord Voldemort's father
- Mr. and Mrs. Granger, Hermione's parents
- Tobias Snape, the father of Severus Snape
- Mr. Roberts, the manager of the campground the Weasleys stayed at for the Quidditch World Cup
- Seamus Finnigan's father
- Dean Thomas's family
- Colin and Dennis Creevey's family
Other usages
The word muggle, or muggles, is now used in various contexts in which its meaning is similar to the sense in which it appears in the Harry Potter book series. Generally speaking, it is used by members of a group to describe those outside the group, comparable to civilian as used by military personnel. Whereas in the books muggle is consistently capitalised, in other uses it is often predominately lowercase.
- According to the BBC quiz show QI, in the episode Hocus Pocus, muggle was a 1930s jazz slang word for someone who uses cannabis.
- Muggle was added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2003, where it is said to refer to a person who is lacking a skill.[4]
- Muggle is used in informal English by members of small, specialised groups, usually those that consider their activities to either be analogous to or directly involve magic (such as within hacker culture;[5] and pagans, Neopagans and Wiccans)[6] to refer to those outside the group.
- Muggle (or geomuggle) is used by geocachers to refer to those not involved in or aware of the sport of geocaching. A cache that has been tampered with by non-participants is said to be plundered or muggled.[7]
- Muggle is similarly used by Hash House Harriers to refer to members of the public who are not hashers.
- The name of a Louis Armstrong recording.
In popular culture
- The NBC science fiction drama series Heroes features a dog named Mr. Muggles, who is owned by the Bennet family. The writers of the show have stated that the dog's name is an allusion to the Harry Potter series as, like Harry, Claire Bennet has been adopted by a family who does not have any special abilities.
See also
References
- ↑ "2004: Accio Quote!, the largest archive of J.K. Rowling interviews on the web". accio-quote.org.
- ↑ Alistair Moffat, The Borders: a history of the Borders from earliest times, 2002, Deerpark Press, ISBN 9780954197902, pp.211-212
- ↑ http://www.cesnur.org/recens/potter_019.htm
- ↑ "BBC: 'Muggle' goes into Oxford English Dictionary". BBC News. 24 March 2003. Retrieved 5 January 2010.
- ↑ Jargon File: muggle
- ↑ Faith von Adams, "I Roomed with a Muggle", New Witch Magazine, Issue 5 (Fall 2003) pg. 34
- ↑ "Geocaching Glossary". Geocaching.com. Retrieved 20 September 2007.
External links
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Look up muggle or Appendix:Harry Potter/Muggle in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
- BBC: 'Muggle' goes into Oxford English Dictionary
- Muggle Guide: The Muggle Guide to the Harry Potter Wizarding World
- I Roomed with a Muggle: Tips for Living with Non-Magical People
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