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"Are you a wizard, or what?"
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- Ron: "Someone must have blabbed to her!"
- Hermione: "They can't have done...because I put a jinx on that piece of parchment we all signed. Believe me, if anybody’s run off and told Umbridge, we’ll know who they are and they will really regret it."
- Ron: "What’ll happen to them?"
- Hermione: "Well, put it this way...it’ll make Eloise Midgen’s acne look like a couple of cute freckles."
- — Hermione Granger to Ron Weasley about the jinx[src]
This jinx was used by Hermione Granger in 1995 as a safeguard against traitors within Dumbledore's Army. Hermione placed it on a piece of parchment signed by all D.A. members so that if any of them betrayed the group, boils would form on his or her face across the cheeks and nose, forming the word "SNEAK."[1]
When Marietta Edgecombe betrayed the D.A. to Dolores Umbridge, this was precisely what happened to her. She was so humiliated that she would not show her face for almost a year. Her best friend Cho Chang considered Hermione's jinx a "horrible trick," arguing that Hermione should have at least told everyone that she had jinxed the parchment, but Harry Potter retorted that he thought it was a "brilliant idea." This was the row that triggered the end of their romance.[1] Marietta had the marks even the following year[2], indicating that a counter-jinx could not be found or that Hermione refused to give it to Marietta. The boils did fade with time, but left scars.
Behind the scenes
- The jinx may be related to the Furnunculus hex, which causes boils to erupt on a person wherever the spell hits.
- It is possible that this jinx only activates if the targets willingly break the contract, because in the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Cho Chang was forced to betray the D.A. through Veritaserum, and the jinx did not activate, meaning coercion will not trigger it. However, the jinx was not mentioned at all in the film adaptation.
Appearances
- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Mentioned only)