- Termeritus Shanks: "Ere, blimey, if it isn't Harry Potter! Read all about you I has. Everything. Always in the paper you are."
- Harry Potter: "Er, yeah. Only, most of it's not true."
- Termeritus Shanks: "Not true?! Not true?! Aw, it's in black and white innit? Got to be true."
- — Termeritus Shanks's portrait and Harry Potter in 1995.[src]
Termeritus Shanks [2] was a wizard. He seems to like reading newspapers, and is interested in knowing the headlines of the day. He believed every word he read on the Daily Prophet, including the stories about Harry Potter and Albus Dumbledore published during the 1995-1996 school year. He has portraits of himself hung at Hogwarts Castle.
Biography
1995-1996 school year
By 1995, Shanks had a portrait hung at the Hogwarts Library, guarding a shortcut to the fourth-floor corridor, under the password "No news is good news". Said shortcut was reserved to the staff only. When Harry Potter, who was being highly discredited by the Daily Prophet at the time, asked if he could use this secret passageway, Shanks made an exception for the student was constantly featured on the paper. The portrait agreed to give the student the password in exchange for the headline of the day ("TRAGIC DEMISE OF MINISTRY OF MAGIC WORKER", concerning Broderick Bode's assassination). [3] Shanks had other portrait at the Grand Staircase, concealing a secret passage to the Clock Tower Courtyard. Its password was "Audaces fortuna iuvat" [4]
1996-1997 school year
Shanks's portrait was kept at the same place at the Library, but hiding a different shortcut, leading to the Grand Staircase. The new password was "Happy Headlines". [5] The same shortcut could also lead to the second-floor corridor. [2] When he heard Harry Potter talking to Hermione Granger about Draco Malfoy's mysterious endeavours at the seventh-floor, he gladly told him the new password in order to help him on what he deemed a "big scoop". [5]
Personality and traits
Termeritus Shanks was quite a naive wizard, believing everything he read on the papers. [3] Despite this he was brave, speaking Lord Voldemort's name out loud when he was at large. [5] He would gladly help students in matters he deemed to be sensational, to the point of giving his password to them despite the passageway being reserved only to the staff. [5]
Behind the scenes
- Termeritus was voiced in both the Order of the Phoenix and Half-Blood Prince video games by Jonathan Kydd.
- On the German version of the video game adaptation of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix he had a very high voice and sounded like a woman.
Appearances
- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (video game) (Appears in portrait(s))
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (video game) (Appears in portrait(s))
Notes and references
- ↑ The portrait was seen wearing clothes similar to those wore by Gilderoy Lockhart on the Duelling Club sequence of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (video game). Also, he is seen wearing a ruff, placing him around the mid-sixteenth century to the mid-seventeenth century; it would be unlikely that a sixteenth/seventeenth century lady would be portrayed wearing trousers.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (video game) - NDS version
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (video game)
- ↑ Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (video game) - GBA version
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (video game)