Changes: Gryffindor Tower

Revision as of 11:56, 1 December 2012

Gryffindor Tower, also known as the Gryffindor Common Room^[1], serves as the common room for students in Gryffindor house at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Entrance

The entrance to the common room is located behind the portrait of the Fat Lady on the Seventh Floor of Hogwarts Castle. A password is required to enter it. A circular hole is behind the painting leading to the common room.

Known Passwords

1991-1992 school year

Caput Draconis (Latin for "Dragon's Head")
Pig Snout

1992-1993 school year.

Heshasasastsihh

1993-1994 school year

Fortuna Major (Latin for "greater luck")
Flibbertigibbet
Oddsbodikins
Scurvy Cur

1994-1995 school year

Balderdash
Banana Fritters
Fairy Lights

1995-1996 school year

Mimbulus mimbletonia

1996-1997 school year

Abstinence
Baubles
Dilligrout
Tapeworm
Quid Agis (Latin for "How are you")

Common Room

The common room is a circular room where Gryffindor students can relax after a long day of studying. It is full of squashy armchairs, tables, and a bulletin board where school notices, ads

, lost posters, etc. can be posted. A window looks out onto the grounds of the school, and a large fireplace dominates one wall. The walls are decorated with scarlet tapestries that depict witches and wizards, but also various animals. It is usually where celebration parties are held after Gryffindor Quidditch victories, or when Harry Potter completed a task for the Triwizard Tournament. It was also the location for Harry and Ginny Weasley's first kiss following Gryffindor's Quidditch Cup victory in 1997. The common room fireplace was used on several occasions by Sirius Black to contact Harry while he was on the run from the Ministry of Magic.

Dormitories

The Gryffindor dormitories are also located in the Tower, with two doors leading off from the common room that open to spiral staircases. One of them leads to the girls dormitory, the other to the boys. The stairs to the girls dormitories are enchanted to become a slide if any boy attempts to climb them, but not vice versa, since it was deemed that girls were more trustworthy than boys, and Hermione Granger went into the boys' room on several occasions.

Behind the scenes

When Ron Weasley and Lavender Brown began dating, one chapter of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince described them as being "in a prominent corner of the common room". However, the Common Room is circular. It is possible that there are nooks or alcoves in various areas around the wall.
The charm used to make the Girls' Dormitory stairs into a slide may be the Glisseo charm. It is never stated if similar enchantments are placed on the entrances to the Girls' Domitories in other houses, but is highly likely, as Hermione identifies the Founders collectively as the ones responsible for the charm.
In the video game adaptation of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, after going through the portrait-hole, there is a short stone hallway leading to the actual common room. This hallway also leads to an old room behind a tapestry, a quiet study area for Gryffindor students, frequently used by Percy, and a secret bathroom used by Fred and George Weasley as an in-school joke shop.
The Chamber of Secrets video game is also the only place in the games or the films where the common room is accessed by crawling through an actual hole (albeit a square-shaped one). All other adaptations depict a doorway.
In the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, the entrance is on one end of a hallway. Whereas in the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and the video game adaptations of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, it is located on the Seventh Floor of the Grand Staircase Tower. As the shape of the common room doesn't change, one explanation of this change of location may be that these particular stairs were not there in the first movie, and were built to replace the corridor during the summer of 1992, before Harry's third year started.

Owl flying to Gryffindor Tower — Gryffindor Tower at one corner of the Quad

In the film adaptations of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, we can see the Gryffindor Boys' Dormitory is shown to be located in a small tower (see above) at one corner of the Paved Courtyard close to the Clock Tower. This is consistent with the Fat Lady's location in Philosopher's Stone, but it is inconsistent with Fat Lady's location in the third film and fifth and sixth video games (in the Grand Staircase Tower). One possible explanation is that the portrait is a secret passageway or shortcut which connects the two areas of the castle.
In the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Harry and Ginny have their first kiss in the Room of Requirement instead of the Gryffindor common room.

Appearances

61K9GM2ZWNL — The Gryffindor Tower as a LEGO set.

Notes and references

↑ Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (video game) - PS1 version

Hogwarts Castle
Towers
Astronomy Tower · Bell towers · Boathouse Bell Tower · Central Tower · Clock Tower · Dark Tower · Faculty Tower · Founders' Tower · Greenhouse tower · Gryffindor Tower · Headmaster's Tower · Hospital tower · Hufflepuff Duelling Turrets · Lookout Tower · Marble Staircase Tower · Moaning Myrtle's Bathroom tower · North battlements · North Tower · Octagon Tower · Pepperpot · Quidditch tower · Ravenclaw Tower · Ravenclaw Tower roof terrace · Right Long Gallery tower · Small Locked Tower · South Tower · Suspension Bridge towers · The Quad battlements · The Tower · Training Grounds tower · Turris Magnus · Turris Medius · Upper Hall tower · Viaduct Courtyard Gatehouses · West Tower · West Tower battlements
Portraits, statues and other artwork located in the towers
Albus Dumbledore · Armando Dippet · Affpuddle of the Cheerful Countenance · Valeria Myriadd · Dexter Fortescue · Dilys Derwent · Oraclitus Spheer · Fat Lady · Niamh Fitzgerald · Sir Cadogan · Slytherin knight · Hufflepuff lady · Heliotrope Wilkins · Severus Snape · Phineas Nigellus Black · Vulpus · Quentin Trimble · Limebert · Ravenclaw bust · Ravenclaw lady · Rowena Ravenclaw · Walter Aragon · Quidditch player · Professor · Female etiquette teacher · Gryffindor lady · Gryffindor man · Gryffindor man · Gryffindor man · Gryffindor seeker · Red-haired witch · Young maiden · Vase with flowers · Group of women in crinolines · Pangur Donn · Sinister-looking monks · Winged horse

[1] Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (video game) - PS1 version

[1]

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 ===[[1994-1995 school year]]===
 *Balderdash
 *[[Banana Fritters]]