I recently found that there is a small town in Suffolk called Snape, and that it’s apparently the namesake of Severus Snape. It reminded me that Rowling made often made subtle references in her naming, but I don’t really understand why she chose to honor this particular village, or what Severus means.
The ones I do get:
Harry Potter (and his father James) are probably tributes to James Henry Trotter of “James and the Giant Peach”
Remus Lupin – in mythology, Remus was suckled by a wolf, and Lupin sounds like wolf in Latin or French, or something
Black – implies evil. All the family members seem to be named after stars: Regulus from Leo, the lion; Bellatrix from Orion, the hunter, and Sirius from the (ha ha) dog star.
Albus Dumbledore – albus is white implying good, and a dumbledore is a bumblebee, so AD might buzz around the hallways of Hogwarts.
Malfoy – evil deeds in some kind of vulgar Latin. Draco is dragon, and Lucius is like Lucifer?
What about the Weasleys? That’s a loaded word, but they don’t seem to live up to it. You’d expect Weasleys to be prominent in Slitherin House, not Gryffindor.
Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose has a character named Severinus who’s an herbalist-- I suspect that was an inspiration for Severus (in name, at least: The characters aren’t at all alike in personality).
Well, Severuswas also the name of a Roman Emperor. I suspect Rowling liked the S’s in Severus Snape, for their snaky-ness, and Severus also is an intimidating name.
I’ll dig up the cite when I get home but Rowling said the weaselys are named for the weasel. It’s because she likes weasels and feels they have a bad rep.
It also sets up an easy dig from Malfoy and his ilk. An excellent way for an author to show how shallow a character is is to show them going for the easiest possible insult when looking to put down a rival.
Malfoy = bad faith. Knights in the Faerie Queene are named things like Sansfoy (faithless) and Sansjoy (joyless). For faith read loyalty–Malfoy means they’re disloyal.
Rowling also appears to have a love of alliterative names that would make Stan Lee blush (or look on approvingly)
Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Salazar Slytherin.
All four Hogwarts founders?!
One might think that perhaps it just happened to be the naming fashion a thousand years ago, but that fails to explain the aforementioned Severus Snape, along with Bathilda Bagshot, Luna Lovegood, Cho Chang, etc…
The wikipedia page for Lord Voldermort has (well, used to have I haven’t checked lately) show all the hoops translators have to jump through to give him a real name, like Tom Riddle, that they can make into an anagram, that sounds spooky – something like mort, in each language.
I always figured Harry’s surname – Potter, was sort of a literary MacGuffin. You’d assume the surname came from an ancestor who was actually a pottery maker. But does that even make sense for a magic using family? We’re all just left wondering.
Also, the Weaslys seem to have contrived names from Arthurian legend, or at least very ultra typical British names – George, Ronald, Arthur, Percy. Like Eric Blair thought his name wasn’t English enough, and he had to write under the name George Orwell. The Weaslys are normal. Normal, I saw. Perfectly dull and unassuming, typical English family. Nothing odd about them at all.
I think that’s because of Mr. Weasley’s fascination with Muggle culture, he gives his children more Muggle-ish names. On the other hand, the families that are deep into “pure-blood” mentality give their children more clearly wizardish names.
I definitely get the feeling that Christianity never took hold amongst the Wizarding community, so it makes sense that the biblical names wouldn’t be common. (The usual oath is “By Merlin!” where we might say “Oh my God!”, for example.)
Salazar Slytherin’s first name, I once read, was inspired by Antonio Salazar, the authoritarian ruler of Portugal during the time Rowling briefly lived there.
Dawlish, the Auror, was named after the Devon town which Rowling occasionally visited.
Dumbledore is an obsolete English word for a bumblebee, because Rowling said she could imagine the headmaster humming to himself as he walked around Hogwarts (odd that the books and movies never showed him doing so, though).
ms rowling also used lists of saint names for her characters. many writers use baby book names, but using saint lists gives you names like nymphadora, who with metrodora and menodora were early martyrs, (sept. 23rd old calendar).
then you have families that have naming schemes like the blacks who went with star names.
I don’t think so. She has stated that “Harry” is her favorite boy’s name, and I believe the Potter came from a childhood friend.
I think it’s simpler than that: Sirius Black = Black Dog, which is what his animagus form was. I’m still kicking myself that I didn’t make this connection the first time I read Prisoner of Azkaban.
Malfoy sounds more like Old French than pig Latin. I think I read somewhere that Rowling speaks French and used the old form of it for many names to make it sound ancient, and both familiar and exotic at the same time for an English audience.
But I wouldnt know more, I think she’s a really bad writer to start with. Hardly read much of her stuff (and never a complete book).
Also, Bellatrix is Latin for “female warrior,” and Bellatrix is without doubt the most aggressive and bloodthirsty female, maybe even character, in the series.
