Half-blood

"Most wizards these days are half-blood anyway. If we hadn’t married Muggles we’d’ve died out."

- Ron Weasley discussing blood purity

Half-blood is the term commonly given to wizards and witches who have a Muggle/Muggle-born parent and magical parent. By the 1990s, half-bloods were the most common type of magical person, as the wizarding population would have become extinct had they not inter-married with Muggles and Muggle-borns.

Due to the dominance of the magic gene, children born to at least one magical parent will almost always be magical themselves. A non-magical child born to a Muggle and a wizard is considered a Squib (not a Muggle).

Attitude towards half-bloods
"You dare speak his name with your unworthy lips, you dare besmirch it with your half-blood's tongue, you dare... He dared — he dares — he stands there — filthy half-blood —"

- Bellatrix Lestrange's prejudice against Harry Potter's half-blood status



Those who believe in the importance of blood purity consider half-bloods to be inferior because of their Muggle heritage, though superior to Muggle-borns. Occasionally the term "half-blood" can be used in a derogatory manner, similar to the epithet "Mudblood"; Bellatrix Lestrange and the portrait of Walburga Black did so on multiple occasions.

Some half-bloods expressed prejudice towards those with Muggle heritage, despite having some themselves, and clung to what wizarding heritage they had. Notably, Lord Voldemort hated Muggles and Muggle-borns, despite having a Muggle father, and denied his half-Muggle heritage, leaving hints that he was a pure-blood instead, emphasising his heritage to the famous pure-blood ancestor, Salazar Slytherin, to make himself more believable. Severus Snape may be another example; his self-entitled nickname was "Half-Blood Prince" because his mother, Eileen Prince, was a pure-blood witch and his father, Tobias Snape, was a Muggle. However, Remus Lupin reported that he never used the nickname openly. This, as well as Snape's membership in the Death Eaters, suggests he may have been ashamed of his Muggle heritage, at least in his early life. In fact, these people, along with some other Death Eaters, pretend to be pure-bloods, hiding their Muggle heritage from anyone else; most of them are half-bloods due to centuries of dilution and decline of what may be called as a true "pure-blood". Ironically (or perhaps because of), regarding the Prophecy concerning his defeat, Voldemort chose to go after a half-blood Harry Potter instead of the pure-blood Neville Longbottom.

When the Ministry of Magic fell under Voldemort's control in 1997, Muggle-borns were openly persecuted and pure-bloods were favoured above all else. Half-bloods were still accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, but were not treated as well as the pure-blood students.

Behind the scenes

 * On J. K. Rowling's draft list of students in Harry Potter's class, which is not considered canon due to several contradictions with the novels, the following students were mentioned as half-bloods:
 * Susan Bones
 * Mandy Brocklehurst
 * Millicent Bulstrode
 * Michael Corner
 * Tracey Davis
 * Anthony Goldstein
 * Wayne Hopkins
 * Megan Jones
 * Sue Li


 * In the GBC version of PS G, there is a boy in Slytherin who went to Charm school and is listed as being likely half-blood.
 * On the draft class list, Hannah Abbott was listed as a Muggle-born, but in a later interview, Rowling stated that she had always thought of Hannah as a pure-blood. To compromise, she was made a half-blood.
 * An interesting fact of note is that despite the ideals that pure-bloods are inherently more powerful wizards, several of the most powerful or particularly adept wizards and witches in the series are in fact half-blood, such as Lord Voldemort, Albus Dumbledore, Severus Snape, Minerva McGonagall, and Harry Potter.
 * Due to Dean Thomas's father being dead, Dean himself was unable to prove his half-blood heritage during Voldemort's reign. As such, he was regarded as a Muggle-born.
 * The trio of Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Ron Weasley consists of all three types of Wizards. Harry being half-blood, Hermione being Muggle-born, and Ron being Pure-Blood.

Appearances

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 * J.K. Rowling: A Year in the Life
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 * J.K. Rowling: A Year in the Life
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Notes and references
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