The Main Entrance Gates to Hogwarts are located a short distance from Hogsmeade Station. The gates would be opened on the first day of term and carriages pulled by Thestrals would take students up to the castle. The Entrance Gates are made of magnificent wrought iron and are flanked by two columns topped with statues of winged boars. Just a few yards from the gates is a small guardhouse with a tall chimney. During the 1993-1994 school year, the gates were guarded by Dementors attempting to apprehend Sirius Black. In 1996, before the students traveled past the gates, Professor Flitwick and Argus Filch stood guard checking off the names of students and searching them before allowing them to continue up to Hogwarts. The gates were protected by anti-intruder jinxes, which were cast by Albus Dumbledore over the summer of 1996.
Behind the scenes
- The winged boars that frame the gates may be a reference to Chrysaor, the brother of Pegasus, who is sometimes depicted as a winged boar.
- The design for the winged boar statues that flank the gates featured on the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was based on that of Il Porcellino, a bronze fountain of a boar (sculpted and cast in around the 1630s) located in Florence, Italy.
Appearances
Harry and Luna about to cross the doors.
- Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (First appearance)
- Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (video game)
- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (film)
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (video game)
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Appears in vision(s))
- The Wizarding World of Harry Potter
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 5-7