Gaunt Shack
 | Warning! At least some content in this article is derived from information featured inHarry Potter: Magic Awakened. As such, spoilers will be present within the article. |
Gaunt Shack
Location information
Location
Owner(s)
Permanent residents
Affiliation
- "It was a few seconds beforeHarry’s eyes discerned the building half-hidden amongst the tangle of trunks. It seemed to him a very strange location to choose for a house, or else an odd decision to leave the trees growing nearby, blocking all light and the view of the valley below. He wondered whether it was inhabited; its walls were mossy and so many tiles had fallen off the roof that the rafters were visible in places. Nettles grew all around it, their tips reaching the windows, which were tiny and thick with grime."
- —Harry Potter's impression of the Gaunt shack upon seeingBob Ogden's memory of it in Dumbledore'sPensieve[src]
TheGaunt Shack was the ancestral home of theGaunt family, located in the woods just outside the village ofLittle Hangleton. It was shabby little shack housingMarvolo Gaunt, his wife, their sonMorfin, and daughterMerope.[1] Soon after Morfin died inAzkaban, the residence was later used as a hiding place for one of Lord Voldemort'sHorcruxes, thering that he stole from Marvolo.
Description[]
- "The house seemed to contain three tiny rooms. Two doors led off the main room, which served as kitchen and living room combined."
- — Harry Potter describing the layout of the shack[src]
The front door of the Gaunt Shack, with a snake pinned onto it by Morfin
The shack was small, dilapidated, and thick with filth, but was somewhat kept in check by Merope. The shack was poverty stricken and shabby, due to the family's lack of money. Morfin had nailed a dead snake to the front door of the shack. After Merope stopped taking care of the place due to her marriage and subsequent death, the house plunged even deeper into deterioration and declension. The insides became littered with a mass of filth, rusty pots and mouldy food that Morfin did not bother to clear out.[1] AsHarry Potterobserved viamemories, there were no books in the house.[2]
The house was surrounded by trees that partly hid it, which made Harry consider it a peculiar location to choose for a house or to have trees growing around it. The thicket of woods surrounding the shack blocked all light and view from reaching it, leaving a dark and secluded view.[1]
TheMuggle village residentCecilia considered the shack and surrounding area an eyesore compared to the rest of the beautiful land owned by theRiddle family, and wanted it to be cleared away were it not inhabited by the Gaunts.[1]
Inhabitants[]
- "Morfin was sitting in a filthy armchair beside the smoking fire, twisting a live adder between his thick fingers and crooning softly at it in Parseltongue... There was a scuffling noise in the corner beside the open window and Harry realised that there was somebody else in the room, a girl whose ragged grey dress was the exact colour of the dirty stone wall behind her."
- — Morfin and Merope within the confines of the shack[src]
The inhabitants of the shack: Marvolo, Morfin, and Merope
It was the home ofMarvolo Gaunt,Morfin, andMerope. They were the last remaining descendants ofCadmus Peverell andSalazar Slytherin living there in poverty, speakingParseltongue to each other in deplorable conditions.[1] It is unknown if the shack was passed down from descendant to descendant, as the family gold was squandered several generations ago; thus it is possible that the family moved into the shack when their funds ran dry before Marvolo was born.
After the deaths of the last three inhabitants, the shack was deserted completely, yet it was not cleared away by the villagers of Little Hangleton. Voldemort would deter anyone from even approaching the shack by placing powerfulenchantments on the area, in order to protect his second Horcrux he hid under the rotting floorboards.[3]
History[]
The Gaunt Shack and its inhabitants were once visited by theMinistry of Magic officialBob Ogden, who came to question Morfin about his habit of using magic in front of villagers. This is noticeably the first timeHarry Potter, watching this memory in thePensieve, seesTom Riddle Snr.[1]
Six months after Marvolo served his sentence, he returned to the shack in arrogant expectations that his daughter would be dutifully waiting for his return with a hot meal at the table. Instead, he found a clear inch of dust and her note of farewell. In another two and a half years later, Morfin returned and found his father dead and the family signet ring as the last heirloom for him to inherit.[1]
Tom Riddle visiting the shack in 1943
About sixteen years later, whenTom Marvolo Riddle came to visit Marvolo to learn about his heritage, he instead found Morfin, along with a mass of filth, rusting pots, and mouldy food, which made the house nearly unrecognisable before Marvolo and Morfin's incarceration, due to Merope no longer taking care of the cleaning. In lieu of fear for Morfin's derangement, young Riddle showed only disgust and disappointment at the deplorable household, having expected better for a long line of pure blood supremacists. After killing his father, Riddle framed Morfin for it, and left the Gaunts' house withMarvolo Gaunt's Ring. With that, the house became abandoned for years, and continued to deteriorate.[3]
Horcrux hiding place[]
After the death of the Gaunt family, the house was left deserted.Lord Voldemort decided to use this place to hide one of hisHorcruxes, which wasGaunt's ring taken from Morfin himself. The ring was left under the floor boards in the ruins of the house in a golden box with acurse of sorts placed upon it. Voldemort further placed many powerful spells to protect this location from possible intruders.[3] In the summer of1996,Albus Dumbledore visited the shack and retrieved the ring, reasoning that Voldemort would store his Horcruxes in locations relevant to him.[4]
In1998, Voldemort returned to the Shack to check on the Horcrux, after learning that one (Helga Hufflepuff's Cup) had been stolen from theGringottsvault ofBellatrix Lestrange. Fearing for its loss, Voldemort travelled to the shack, as well as theHorcrux cave. To his fury, he discovered that the ring had been taken from the Shack.[5]
Appearances[]
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince(First appearance)(Appears in flashback(s))
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (film)(Concept art only)
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows(Appears in vision(s))
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1(Appears on an extra feature in Disc 1)
- Pottermore
- Harry Potter: Magic Awakened(Mentioned only)
Notes and references[]
- ↑1.01.11.21.31.41.51.6Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 10 (The House of Gaunt)
- ↑Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 22 (The Deathly Hallows)
- ↑3.03.13.2Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 17 (A Sluggish Memory)
- ↑Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 23 (Horcruxes)
- ↑Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 27 (The Final Hiding Place)
