#levicorpus

Filch was begging about it and Snape just did.

In the books wizards always wear robes and don't know how to match or even put on muggle clothes... yet Ron wears gym pants under his uniform robe.

And why exactly do they do not know muggle clothes? Rowling said (relatively) recently that many wizards attended muggle primary schools before being admited to Hogwarts. The Weasleys, for example, were homeschooled by Molly, but that's not the case for everyone, so all these wizards should have had learnt something about muggles during their years at primary school...

And still on the Why topic, I have read wizards got stuck in the fashion that was in fashion when the Statute of Secrecy was established (1689-1692), when they lost* contact with muggles (* but did they? all the kids going to primary schools?), except robes weren't really in fashion for men by 1689!

By 1689, men wore breeches and stockings under buttoned justaucorps (wich were knee long).

And, yeah, I get it. Harry Potter wasn't suppossed to be a big deal or to be taken seriously, so no one felt the necessity to do the proper research to be History compliant.

So I try to imagine wizards in actual late 17th century fashion ...but then SWM doesn't make sense! Because levicorpus just would't have exposed his underwear, which was kind of a decisive part of the event.

So --- imagine that Sev has just developed Levicorpus and its counter, perhaps in an attempt to achieve unaided flying like Lily. Perhaps he even worked on it with her. It somehow spread from there to the whole school despite being non-verbal. Perhaps, aided by Death's cloak, James stalked them - or perhaps Lily told him about it. Or maybe Sev himself wanted to impress someone else with it. It's all very plausible.

But now I'm thinking... he might have realized that he had accidentally developed a spell that could be used to stop someone from running after him, and that could only be undone with a specific counter. Only Severus could put them down, which would go some way toward neutralizing the 4:1 factor (since otherwise, he could have just used Petrificus Totalus).

This. The bathroom scene. I have so much to say.

Firstly, the contrast between the movies and the books. I completely DO NOT agree with Harry using a spell that he did not know the consequences, he did not know what it would do, that was dangerous and incredibly stupid and reckless.

However, that being said, unlike in the movies Harry made no move to confront, he just sort of stopped, shocked. All’s he was doing was seeing why Draco was hanging out with Moaning Myrtle of all people - cause that’s what you do in your spare time at Hogwarts uh huh , Harry get a new hobby love.

This also had nothing to do with Katie. Whereas the the movies it was shown almost like Harry was looking for some sort of a fight, on Katie’s behalf. That’s might just be my interpretation but it’s felt like that. Both times (book and movie) Draco is the first to attack, in the movie it is more implied that Harry’s confrontation provoked him.

Now to some extent, Draco’s reaction is not unsurprising, and in some sense I do pity him because he is struggling - but I’ll get to that later, and why it doesn’t go a long way. He’s getting defensive and attacking because his nemesis found him crying. I’m not saying however that it was the right course of action.

Now , you’ll see in the second picture that Draco attempted the Cruciatus Curse on Harry.

Literally crucio.

He tried to torture him.

Whether he would have succeeded in successfully casting the curse or not doesn’t matter. It’s the fact he tried. On a fellow student. This is a curse that sent people insane, that Harry has felt multiple times and Draco probably can’t even countenance the pain it causes.

I find a lot of the time, it feels as though they watered down the curse, especially within FanFiction, and the consequences of that are sort of glossed over. Now this may just be me. But this curse is quite literally a form of torture and I can’t emphasis this enough, it’s an unforgivable curse. You may argue that Draco was in a dark place, that he was panicking or whatever else, but that doesn’t justify his actions. It is never okay to try and torture a classmate.

Harry’s reaction - and again, I do not condone this in the slightest - using a spell that he did not know how it would work, was the most stupid thing he’s ever done. And I mean it, that is most definitely, for me, his worst moment I can think of in the books right now. That being said, he used it not to harm to Draco necessarily, you have to remember this is a two-way duel, they have a rivalry, this is the spur of the moment and that goes for both of them.

But Harry is defending himself from being tortured. Now if you look at the other spells he’s uses in this scene - Levicorpus, Leg-Locker - are all ways to apprehend or stop Draco from attacking, these spells are not hexes or curses that are aimed to cause pain. When he uses Sectumsempra to me it seems as some wild last ditch effort to prevent Draco from casting crucio - and for all intents and purposes, it worked.

(Also side note, all of them except Sectumsempra and Crucio were silent , that’s a powerful feat on both their parts.)

Now if you look at what happened afterwards, Malloy is hurt, and very badly.

But if you look at Harry’s reaction, he see’s what the spell did and he’s instantly horrified. He didn’t want that to happen, he didn’t want Draco to get hurt, that wasn’t his intention. And what sets them apart.

You might argue that Draco didn’t want to hurt Harry, he was just acting out of fear. I disagree, though I’m sure some of that was just him panicking, and as I said earlier his actions certainly weren’t the best way to go about it, attacking someone. Anywhere else this would be assault, and Harry was acting in self defence.

You see, at the end of OOTP, Draco confronts Harry. He very bluntly blames Harry for his father being placed in Azkaban. Now this is understandable, that’s his father, whose been taken away from him and Draco is a fifteen year old kid whose never known life without his father, I’d be more surprised if he didn’t blame Harry. Also to add that he quite clearly still blames Harry;

‘And he stamped hard on Harry’s face. Harry felt his nose break; blood spurted everywhere ..’

“That’s from my father. Now let’s see ..”

Of course there comes a point where you have to accept that someone’s actions are their own, and the consequence of them are not someone else’s fault. Lucius chose to do what he did. So we know at the very least Draco blames Harry for his fathers imprisonment. We also know that Draco just spent half a year finding different ways to kill a man, without caring for the consequences of those around him. Such as Katie being cursed, or Ron being poisoned. He didn’t stop trying no matter who got hurt.

Some of this may be attributed to the fact it was Voldemort who gave him this as punishment for Lucius failing - which again, might be a contributing factor, maybe Draco believes it to be Harry’s fault he’s in this position, but I’m just speculating - and of course he’s scared, I’d be absolutely terrified too. That’s completely understandable.

But at the same time, Draco was quite happy to join the Dark Lord at the beginning of the book. Such as when he’s talking with Blaise and Pansy and Crabbe and Goyle, he’s excited, he’s ready to drop out of Hogwarts for good to become a Death Eater. I never get the impression that Draco disagreed with Voldemort’s views, and again some of this will come down to his nurture, but he has a brain too, and is obviously capable of forming his own opinions, there too comes a point when you have reevaluate that maybe blood supremacy might not be true. Apparently not.

And for all the racist, biogoted, cruel comments he made, bullying people because they have less money, because they have no parents, because are smarter than you?? No, I personally believe Draco definitely had the supremacist ideals.

This is why I also believe that he did want to hurt Harry in the bathroom.

It’s like how Harry wanted to hurt Bellatrix after she killed Sirius, which is why I do have some pity and empathy for Draco, because he’s struggling, he is, and he scared and he doesn’t believe he had a choice.

But also, thinking of it logically and from an outside perspective - because I imagine if I was in that situation I would be terrified too - he does have a choice.

He does.

I can understand why you wouldn’t to some extent, tell someone, but at the same time if you have a death threat thrown at you, what do you do? Realistically, idealistically, you go to someone who can help you. Again, I understand why you wouldn’t, but Draco was at Hogwarts. And instead of spending a year trying to kill Dumbledore, the guy who at the very least suspected what was going on, and by the end of the book knew, why not go to him.

(Yeah, I can think of many reasons, but that’s a discussion for another time.)

Think about it though. Draco could’ve been placed under the Fidelius charm in a safe house and not had to do anything, if Dumbledore himself was secret keeper (and the man died, as far as I’m aware that should change being in hiding? Voldemort still wouldn’t find him) Draco would be one of the most protected people. I’m just suggesting there are many ways Draco did have a choice.

I suppose Draco is a victim of himself in that respect, which is why my empathy for him doesn’t go a long way.

And I mean if you think about it Harry didn’t have a choice. He was chosen by Voldemort, and by Dumbledore to an extent. He was always the saviour - he didn’t want to be , he didn’t, he just wanted a normal life goddamnit - Harry was just as stuck if not more so than Draco in a position he never wanted, for people who spent their time showing no consistent loyalty towards him and a society that left him without a word in the hands of people who abused him.

There is so much more to this than Draco just being a victim, as he very much appears so in the movies.

What if Levicorpus wasn’t meant to just suspend somebody in the air by the ankle, but was meant for auto-levitation, and revealed to be not perfected enough? What if Levicorpus was a failed innovation that led to the birth of another spell?

Think about it.

Levicorpus—that comes from "levitation" and "corpus" which means "body". This spell says "levitate the body".

Then, this spell focuses on the ankles. It turned out bad, and it seems to be Snape’s mistake in engineering Levicorpus, because the upper part of your body risks falling over (precisely what happens when you cast the spell), but the idea has some merit: I’m sure you’ve watched series where a character focuses their magical power on the feet to fly. It’s not like Mobilicorpus, which makes you whole body fly at an awkward angle and may not be appliable to oneself. If you want to fly, you might want to set a levitation spell on your ankles so you can "walk" in the air, and choosing the ankles might be a way to get more stability instead of the feet which you have to bend to walk.

And we know this is Snape who invented it, Snape, who had a friend capable of a bit of levitation as a kid (Lily) and who learns to fly at some point (DH). Wouldn’t he want to discover a way to fly like Lily did? A way to fly without brooms, him who seems to suck at it? Wouldn’t he want to impress people (Voldemort?) by showing how he invented a Charm to make yourself fly?

This sustains the theory that

1) Snape’s spell wasn’t meant to attack people (not even in self-defence!) but was just a way to impress and innovate,

2) Snape used it on himself for tests (or even animals, or dead animals etc, and the spell was stolen only because someone could have stolen his book for instance) because he wanted to fly and not make the others levitate,

3) the thoery that Snape is the one who taught Voldemort how to fly instead, after perfecting his spell.

NB:

We can wonder if Levicorpus derived from Mobilicorpus...

Snape practicing Levicorpus on animals near Hogwarts with Mulciber watching over his progress. Lily is rightfully disgusted. Note the violation of school rules by not wearing a  typical uniform.