Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Places/Chamber of Secrets
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| Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter - Place | |
| Chamber of Secrets | |
|---|---|
| Location | Hogwarts |
| Permanent Residents | Basilisk |
| First Appearance | Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets |
Contents |
[edit] General Overview
At the time of his departure from Hogwarts, after a falling out with the other three founders of the school, Salazar Slytherin is supposed to have created a chamber, placed a monster within it, and sealed it so that only his true heir could open it. In the centuries since that time, this "chamber of secrets" has been sought many times, but never found.
[edit] Extended Description
The Chamber was in fact opened, approximately fifty years before the time of the Harry Potter series, by Tom Riddle (who later styled himself as Lord Voldemort). At that time, the monster within the Chamber, a basilisk, killed a girl (Moaning Myrtle); this put the school on the verge of closing down, because it was obviously unsafe to keep students there. The threat of being forced to leave the school was sufficient to cause Riddle to re-seal the chamber. Riddle was as fond of his home as Harry was. Riddle managed to frame Rubeus Hagrid and Aragog as being the Heir and the monster respectively; as the Chamber was not then re-opened, and no more victims fell to the basilisk, Riddle's version of events became accepted as fact by all except, perhaps, Professor Dumbledore.
Harry's re-opening of the Chamber and defeat of the basilisk should have cleared Hagrid's name; it did secure his release from Azkaban, where he had been consigned when it was thought that he was once again opening the Chamber.
The key to opening the Chamber is Parseltongue; one must say "open" to the entrance in Parseltongue for it to open. The ability to speak to snakes has been linked to Slytherin's descendants, thus the belief that only the true heir of Slytherin can open the Chamber.
Ron and Hermione re-enter the chamber in Harry's seventh year; knowing that Basilisk venom will destroy a Horcrux, and having a Horcrux they need to destroy, Ron, who has twice now heard Harry pronounce the word "Open" on Parseltongue, opens the Chamber by imitating the sound of the word. When Harry sees them, they are carrying the destroyed Horcrux and a great stock of Basilisk fangs.
According to J. K. Rowling's instructions to the film-makers who made the film of Chamber of Secrets, the chamber itself is located under the lake on the Hogwarts grounds. (Source: Interview with the filmmakers on the extended features of the DVD release.)
[edit] Analysis
[edit] Questions
- We are told that Salazar Slytherin lived a thousand years or so ago, and presumably created the chamber then. While castles of the era did have interior toilets ("garderobes") in the Muggle world, running water was only invented barely two hundred years ago. Suggest a reason that the mark of Slytherin, that opened the passage to the Chamber, could have been placed on a faucet.
[edit] Greater Picture
As mentioned, only a Parselmouth can open the Chamber, and it is widely believed that the ability to speak Parseltongue is only passed to the heirs of Slytherin. As an heir of Slytherin, Tom Riddle could certainly be expected to speak Parseltongue, and so he is able to open the Chamber. Harry, with a piece of Tom's soul, is equally able to speak the language, and apparently Dumbledore has learned it, although Dumbledore did not try to find the Chamber. One must wonder why he did not; as a teacher at the school the first time the Chamber was opened, he must have had all the clues that Harry was working with. Perhaps he did not learn Parseltongue until much later in his life, and time had made the need to find the Chamber less pressing.
Ron and Hermione later managed to open the Chamber; in need of something to destroy the cup Horcrux, they visited the Chamber to retrieve some Basilisk fangs, which apparently still had sufficient venom to destroy the Horcrux. Ron had been present when Harry opened the locket Horcrux, another artifact of Slytherin's which would open only when addressed in Parseltongue, and simply parroted the sounds Harry had made to open the locket, in order to open the Chamber.
