Olympe Maxime

"I'm big boned!!"

- Olympe Maxine.

Olympe Maxime is the headmistress of Beauxbatons Academy of Magic. Maxime's preferred mode of transportation when travelling with her students is a great powder-blue carriage drawn by twelve winged palominos (seven in the film adaptation), Abraxan winged horses, which Madame Maxime breeds. She was described as being elegant and wearing black satin robes. She is also described as having olive skin and handsome features.

Olympe Maxime first appears in 1994, when she and some of her students arrive at Hogwarts for the Triwizard Tournament.

Biography


It is revealed that Maxime's huge size is due to her half-giant background. She fiercely denies this claiming that she has "big bones", although she is around the same height as fellow half-giant Hagrid.

Upon first sight, Hagrid immediately crushed on Madame Maxime, which he showed by attempting to groom himself properly. Given his lack of social graces, however, this wasn't so successful. But Olympe took advantage of this to find out what comes in the future tasks. During the summer of 1995 Hagrid and Madame Maxime visited the giants to send envoys to them. Hagrid described her spellwork as "brilliant." She separated from Hagrid during the return journey, however, because he would not abandon his half-brother Grawp, who proves to be a highly taxing travelling companion; she returned to Beauxbatons alone.

In 1997, Madame Maxime was among those paying respects at Dumbledore's funeral. While Hagrid and her comforted each other during the occasion of Dumbledore's funeral, it may have been inspired by the emotion of the moment; it is as yet unknown whether they have intentions of pursuing a romantic relationship.

Name
Olympe is the French word for Olympus, the mountain home of the Greek gods. Maxime is French for "principle." It is derived from the Latin "maxima", the feminine form of "maximus," meaning "greatest" or "biggest."