Let's talk about Durmstrang

[anemonen]

Let’s talk about Durmstrang

Yesterday when I was researching Viktor Krum for my portrait of him, I came across a statement from JKR that Durmstrang is situated somewhere in the north of Norway or Sweden. This really surprised me. Based on Krum being from Bulgaria and Karkaroff presumably also of Slavic origin based on his name, I assumed that it would be maybe somewhere in the mountains in Romania or in the Ural Mountains or maybe even in the Alps since the name is derived from German. So, weird as I am, I lay thinking about this yesterday when I was trying to sleep.

Well then, let’s assume that Durmstrang is based on some sort of Eastern-Central-Northern European cooperation that decided that the north was a good place for a secret school (which do make sense, because there’s far between people up there). But then, based on the fact that the school is in Sweden/Norway, the likely main language is German and they have students from Bulgaria, they get students from an incredibly vast area. At least the size I showed in the map.


This makes me puzzle a bit at the fact that Durmstrang is smaller than Hogwarts, according to Krum. Germany alone is bigger than UK and Ireland put together, so even taking in account that D doesn’t accept Muggleborn students (let’s say that’s about ¼ of the students), it should be a lot bigger than Hogwarts. Or maybe it’s some sort of elite school for rich kids (seeing as Lucius wanted to send Draco there), or maybe there are lots of other schools in the area as well, as the Muggleborns would need a school to attend as well. Maybe some parents were sceptical to D’s reputation for dark magic or against the fact that Muggleborns weren’t accepted. What do you think?


Another thing I was thinking about: Say Snape was in fact the master of the Elder Wand when he was killed, would Voldemort have gained its allegiance? Would having Nagini kill Snape truly defeat him? I’m curious.

Comments

[ashindk.livejournal.com]

Very strange. Especially because Beauxbattons is so stereotypically French and Hogwarts is so British. And then she's just.... Lumped everything east of that together into something vaguely eastern European and placed it somewhere that's not related at all. I think it would have been much more logical to place it somewhere like Belarus...
A Scandinavian wizarding school would be extremely cool, though. There is so much to draw inspiration from! Trolls and elfs and huldra and nisse... Loads of haunted places too. But Durmstrang is just very un-Scandinavian. I would think a Scandi-school would be very relaxed and liberal, just like the muggle versions are, compared to other schools around the world. No uniforms, calling teachers by their first name and things like that...

[anemonen.livejournal.com]

Yes. I always pictured that wizarding schools in Scandinavia would be more like the regular schools here; not boarding schools, but smaller, local day schools in wizarding villages and bigger cities. What you're saying about the schools being pretty liberal makes a lot of sense too. It would be so cool to see someone delve into the magic society of Scandinavia (although maybe it's just us Scandinavians who would think so) :)

[ashindk.livejournal.com]

Lol! That's probably true :-)
How many of us are there, anyway? I can think of five, including you and me. That's a very small audience.

[anemonen.livejournal.com]

I only know of five also; nenne, huldrejenta, sylvaticginger and us. Not a very big audience I suppose ;)

[ashindk.livejournal.com]

Yup, those were the other three I was thinking about.

[ashindk.livejournal.com]

I just remembered this fic: Snatched by blamebrampton
I don't know if you've read it. It's set partially in Finland, so not Scandinavia as such, but close enough :-) (and it's a really good fic, so if you haven't read it, you should)

[anemonen.livejournal.com]

Oh! Thanks for the rec, that sounds great. Close enough, definitely :)