Death Eaters

"They were a motley collection; a mixture of the weak seeking protection, the ambitious seeking some shared glory, and the thuggish gravitating towards a leader who could show them more refined forms of cruelty."

- Albus Dumbledore on the Death Eaters

Death Eaters (possibly known in their earliest years as the Knights of Walpurgis) were a group of Dark wizards and witches that followed Lord Voldemort. They often wore black hoods with snake-like eye slits to cover their faces. Every Death Eater had a Dark Mark burned into his or her left forearm. When Voldemort touched one of them, every Death Eater felt it, allowing them to Apparate to their leader's side.

Ideology
"Many of our oldest family trees become a little diseased over time. You must prune yours, must you not, to keep it healthy? Cut away those parts that threaten the health of the rest... And in your family, so in the world...we shall cut away the canker that infects us until only those of the true blood remain..."

- Lord Voldemort on his goals in Malfoy Manor

Ideologically, the Death Eaters sought to destroy Muggles and wizards of Muggle lineage, and gain complete power and control over the entire world as well as restore the magical community to pure-bloods. The Death Eaters idealized pure-blood wizards, which is ironic considering that their leader, Lord Voldemort, was a half-blood with a Muggle father.

Not all of them could claim to be pure-bloods, and in fact true pure-bloods probably did not exist, as the claim is based on selective genealogy; possibly many of them were half-bloods clinging to their pure-blood ancestors. One such was Severus Snape. A half-blood, Snape called himself "The Half Blood Prince" while a student at Hogwarts school, a reference to his mother's wizarding family, the Princes. Judging by Bellatrix Lestrange's reaction to being told that Voldemort was a half-blood by Harry Potter, the Dark Lord lied to his followers about being pure-blood.

The Death Eaters also attacked purebloods who opposed them, such as Gideon and Fabian Prewett, who were members of the Order of the Phoenix. It is thought that their main targets were Muggle-borns.

It is also assumed that as Voldemort was trying to find ways to conquer death, Death Eaters sought similar goals, hoping that by following the Dark Lord, he would share his found secrets with them.

Origins and the First War
By 1970, the Death Eaters were an organization formed from people Tom Riddle, now Lord Voldemort, knew from his time at Hogwarts as well as their relations. Nearly all of those recruited were from Slytherin House as students. Actively recruiting an army of Dark Wizards and creatures, with the belief that his hidden horcruxes granted him immortality, Voldemort and the Death Eaters planned to overthrow the Ministry of Magic and rule their way.

Death Eater activity during the First Wizarding War consisted of attacks on wizards, witches, and large numbers of Muggles. These were initiated by the Death Eaters often, but not always, on the orders of Voldemort. When the Ministry did not suffer an ostensible collapse in the eleven years of Voldemort's reign, the Death Eaters began to attack prominent wizarding families. As a result, fear gripped the wider wizard community.

Severus Snape reported to Lord Voldemort the part of the prophecy he had heard while listening in on a conversation between Albus Dumbledore and Sybill Trelawney which predicted that either Harry Potter, the son of Order of the Phoenix members James and Lily Potter, or Neville Longbottom, son of Order members Alice and Frank Longbottom, would be the one to destroy Voldemort. Voldemort went to the Potters personally, seeing them as a greater danger to him. Despite being under the protection of the Fidelius Charm, Voldemort was able to get into their home because James entrusted his old friend Peter Pettigrew as Secret-Keeper, and Pettigrew subsequently betrayed the secret to Voldemort.

Snape failed to overhear the entire prophecy, including the announcement that Voldemort himself would mark his own equal. Although Voldemort killed James and, despite Snape's pleas that she be spared, Lily, the Killing Curse rebounded off Harry and hit Voldemort, destroying his living body. However, due to his extensive performance of Dark Magic, Voldemort's soul survived and escaped.

Bellatrix, Rodolphus and Rabastan Lestrange, as well as Barty Crouch Jr., tortured the Longbottoms into insanity, but did not apparently attack Neville. They were captured and sentenced to Azkaban.



Between The First and Second Wars
With the disappearance of their leader, the Death Eaters largely fell into chaos. The Ministry arrested and imprisoned many Death Eaters in Azkaban, though some eluded justice by claiming the Imperius Curse had been used on them, like Lucius Malfoy, or by turning in other Death Eaters, as Igor Karkaroff did. Most followers hid their allegiance to Voldemort and therefore did not try to find him.

Outbreaks of Death Eater activity did occur, although rarely, during the thirteen years of Voldemort's absence. Perhaps the most notable event being the riots at the four hundred and twenty-second Quidditch World Cup in 1994, during which a group of Death Eaters attacked the camp of Wizards and Witches as well as a nearby Muggle family.

The Second Wizarding War
In June of 1995, Lord Voldemort finally returned to a physical body through a dark potion created by Peter Pettigrew. The body was human-shaped, though hairless and with many serpentine features.

Moments after Lord Voldemort finally regained his body, he summoned his followers to him by touching Peter Pettigrew's Dark Mark. Some proved too afraid to return to him, such as Igor Karkaroff, while others who were dead or imprisoned remained absent. Severus Snape did not return on the guise that he had to appear more loyal to Dumbledore and the Order of the Phoenix; Snape returned two hours later. Despite several absences, there were several who returned the call, including Lucius Malfoy, and Crabbe and Goyle, who had sons at Hogwarts.

Harry Potter was present for Voldemort's return to power, and even dueled against Lord Voldemort and defeated him in a spectacular display of Priori Incantatem, revealing that the cores of Voldemort's and Harry's wands were related. Harry managed to escape and tell Headmaster Dumbledore of Voldemort's return.

The Minister for Magic (Cornelius Fudge) and most of the Ministry of Magic originally refused to believe that Lord Voldemort returned. Though Harry Potter and Albus Dumbledore served as dissenting voices, the majority of the public chose to believe in the Ministry, as well as its wider propaganda and smear campaign against Potter and Dumbledore.

Armed with this advantage, the Death Eaters keep a low profile in order to maintain their standing in the wizarding world. Due in part to the Ministry's refusal to remove the Dementors from Azkaban, a proposition Dumbledore supported immediately following Voldemort's return, the Death Eaters informally recruited the Dementors to the cause. Similar progress was made with giants. The quiet revolt of the Dementors fostered a mass breakout of imprisoned Death Eaters from Azkaban in early 1996.

In late spring of 1996, Voldemort sent a group of twelve Death Eaters, led by Lucius Malfoy, into the Department of Mysteries in order to steal the prophecy concerning himself and Harry Potter. Having originally attacked Harry Potter based upon a partial recounting of it, Voldemort now desired to hear the full version in order to understand entirely the nature of the connection between himself and Potter. Harry was lured there, along with five other members of Dumbledore's Army, when Voldemort used their connection to give Harry a vision of his godfather being tortured.

However, Harry and his friends managed to elude the Death Eaters and the prophecy was eventually destroyed. A battle ensued between the Death Eaters and several members of the Order of the Phoenix. Eleven of the twelve Death Eaters were captured; Voldemort and Bellatrix Lestrange fled, but not before Ministry officials witnessed the returned Dark Lord.

The raid was a failure for the Death Eaters because their reactivation was no longer a secret and several members were deported to Azkaban, and the return of Voldemort was proved to the skeptical Ministry. Revealed at last to the wizard community, the Death Eaters proceeded to resume their earlier lifestyle and behavior. Kidnapping, torturing, and assasinations of wizards, witches, and Muggles began anew as the Second War began.

Plottings and Tactics
"Not content with corrupting and polluting the minds of Wizarding children, last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defense of Mudbloods in the Daily Prophet. Wizards, she says, must accept these thieves of their knowledge and magic. The dwindling of the purebloods is, says Professor Burbage, a most desirable circumstances... She would have us all mate with Muggles..."

- Lord Voldemort ridiculing Charity Burbage to his followers before killing her

Voldemort began to understand more about his failures in killing Harry Potter, and with his Death Eaters, planned several courses of action. One was the overthrowing of the Ministry of Magic. Another was capturing Harry Potter and killing him. While Voldemort went on his own personal quests and stayed out of sight of the wizarding community's eye, he worked through others, including Yaxley at the Ministry, and Severus Snape and the Carrows at Hogwarts.

The meeting place for the Death Eaters was the Malfoy Manor. At this place, the Death Eaters would make reports and the Dark Lord would give them orders. On one occasion, Voldemort took reports on goings on at the Ministry of Magic by Yaxley, though was more impressed with reports by Snape regarding the Order of the Phoenix's plans to move Harry Potter. Voldemort also ridiculed Bellatrix Lestrange and the Malfoys for the marriage of Remus Lupin, a known werewolf, to Nymphadora Tonks, a relative of theirs. At this meeting, Charity Burbage, a professor of Muggle Studies at Hogwarts, was murdered by Voldemort and then fed to Nagini. Voldemort also took Lucius Malfoy's wand to fight against Harry Potter, believing his own to be inferior to Harry's.

Attempt on Harry Potter
"That's him, it's him, it's the real one!"

- Death Eater after Harry Potter cast Expelliarmus, his "trademark" spell

Still opposed by the Order of the Phoenix, who knew it wasn't safe to trust the Ministry of Magic, Voldemort knew through Snape that Harry Potter would be moved from the house of his aunt and uncle a few days before his seventeenth birthday, which is when spells protecting him would have broken. The exact details of this move were unknown to the Death Eaters at large, though Snape manipulated Mundungus Fletcher with magic and knew the plans, only telling the Dark Lord enough to display loyalty.

As a congregation of members of the Order of the Phoenix including Alastor Moody, Arthur Weasley, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Nymphadora Tonks, Remus Lupin, Rubeus Hagrid, Bill Weasley, Fleur Delacour, Fred Weasley, George Weasley, Mundungus Fletcher, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger, along with Harry Potter himself, left the home of the Dursleys, the Death Eaters attacked immediately. They could not tell right away which pair included the real Harry Potter, because six of the congregation had used Polyjuice Potion. It was assumed that Harry would be with the strongest members, so Moody and Shacklebolt were attacked most fervently at first.

During the ensuing battle, Snape used Sectumsempra to attack the Death Eater in front of him, but missed and slashed the ear off George Weasley. Bellatrix Lestrange tried very hard to kill Tonks, but she did not succeed in while Tonks herself injured Rodolphus Lestrange. Alastor Moody was killed by Voldemort himself. However, numerous Death Eaters were injured, and one was supposedly killed.

When Harry Potter used Expelliarmus, which they had come to consider Potter's trademark spell, against Stan Shunpike, who was under the Imperius Curse, they knew the real Harry to be with Hagrid. Voldemort himself was present, flying without the aid of a broomstick, and led the charge against Harry. Despite their attempts to capture the boy, they were thwarted by Harry's spellwork, Hagrid's selfless courage, and finally, when Harry crossed into a protective spell over the home of Ted Tonks. Lucius' wand was snapped by a spell cast by Harry's wand, infuriating Voldemort even more.

The Fall of the Ministry
"The Ministry has fallen. Scrimgeour is dead. They are coming"

- Kingsley Shacklebolt through his lynx patronus

During the wedding of Fleur Delacour to Bill Weasley, the Ministry of Magic was overthrown and Rufus Scrimgeour was killed, and Pius Thicknesse was installed in his place, though controlled by the Imperius Curse. The wedding was attacked by a squad of Death Eaters, and at the same time several other locations of Order of the Phoenix members were attacked by Death Eaters.

Under the control of the Death Eaters, such acts as the Muggle-born Registration Act were put in place, a reward was set for Harry Potter, marking him as Undesirable Number One, and a Taboo was put in place for audibly saying the word "Voldemort."

Headmaster Snape
Severus Snape was hired as Headmaster of Hogwarts for what would have been Harry Potter's seventh year at Hogwarts. There, he faced fierce opposition from Minerva McGonagall and other professors, as well as the remaining members of Dumbledore's Army, including Neville Longbottom and Ginny Weasley.

The Carrows were also there at the school, with Amycus Carrow teaching Defence Against the Dark Arts, though in reality he taught the Dark Arts. His sister, Alecto Carrow, took over Muggle Studies, though the course became a brainwashing of the superiority of wizard kind over Muggles.

The Elder Wand
Though Voldemort did not place a lot value in the tale of the Deathly Hallows, he was obsessed with finding a wand that would defeat Harry Potter's, and believed his own would not do it. At the advice of Ollivander, Voldemort used a different wand against Harry Potter (Lucius'), but that, too, failed, to the surprise of Voldemort and Ollivander.

Voldemort decided to go on a quest to find the powerful wand of legend, the Elder Wand. First, he sought and found Gregorovitch, who he killed when it was found out he no longer had the wand. He then sought and found Gellert Grindelwald, who, like Gregorovich, gave the Dark Lord very little useful information.

"Kill me then! You will not win, you cannot win! That wand will never, ever be yours!" Gellert Grindlewald to Lord Voldermort, moments before his death at the hands of the latter.

Voldemort then, remembering that Albus Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald decades before, decided to travel to Hogwarts, unearth the body of the deceased Headmaster, and take the wand from it. That mission, he assumed, was completed, and he now believed that he had the wand that would win any duel.

Escape from Malfoy Manor
During Harry Potter's time hidden from the Death Eaters, he accidentally said Voldemort's name and thus triggered the Taboo placed upon the name. He, Ron and Hermione were captured by a group of Snatchers led by Fenrir Greyback and brought to Malfoy Manor. Before either Lucius or Bellatrix could summon the Dark Lord, Bellatrix spotted Godric Gryffindor's Sword among the trio's possessions and interrogated Hermione using the Cruciatus Curse to find out where they got the item. In the meantime, Dobby the house elf came and rescued Harry, Ron, Ollivander, and Luna Lovegood from the basement. He, Harry and Ron saved Hermione and took various wands from the house's occupants before fleeing; Dobby was killed by Bellatrix in the process.

As punishment for summoning him without successfully holding Potter, Voldemort punished all present and forbade them to leave the manor.

Destruction of Voldemort's Horcruxes
Unknown to Voldemort or his Death Eaters — except Severus Snape who was secretly betraying the Dark Lord — Harry, along with Ron and Hermione, was out seeking the Horcruxes of Voldemort. Regulus Black had already removed Salazar Slytherin's Locket from its hiding place, though had been unable to destroy it. Albus Dumbledore destroyed Gaunt's Ring with Godric Gryffindor's sword and Tom Riddle's Diary had been destroyed by Harry in his second year with a basilisk fang. Thanks to Snape's help through his doe Patronus, Ron Weasley was able to find the sword of Gryffindor and destroy the locket horcrux.

Harry Potter concluded from Bellatrix's behaviour at Malfoy Manor that a horcrux was in her safe at Gringotts Wizarding Bank. With the help of Griphook, Harry, Ron, and Hermione entered the bank and took Helga Hufflepuff's Cup, escaping on a dragon. The Cup was later destroyed by Hermione Granger using a basilisk fang when she and Ron entered the Chamber of Secrets.

Though the three companions were successful, Voldemort learned from hearing about Harry's venture into the bank that they were seeking his horcruxes. In panic, he went to the places the horcruxes were hidden, leaving Hogwarts last, but in the process revealing to Harry Potter that Hogwarts was indeed the last place to go.

The Battle of Hogwarts
"If you continue to resist me, you will all die, one by one. I do not wish this to happen. Every drop of magical blood spilled is a loss and a waste... I command my forces to retreat immediately. You have one hour... I speak now, Harry Potter, directly to you... I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences. This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman, and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour."

- Voldemort's ultimatum during the final battle

Voldemort, along with his Death Eaters and other allies, attacked Hogwarts and those defending it in May 1998. During this battle, Harry, Hermione and Ron managed to find the final horcrux, Rowena Ravenclaw's Diadem, in the Room of Hidden Things. It was accidentally destroyed by Vincent Crabbe's out of control fiendfyre curse.

However, it was revealed to Harry that he himself had accidentally been turned into a horcrux. He willingly took a Killing Curse from Lord Voldemort in order to destroy it, but because his mother's sacrifice lived on in his blood, the blood Voldemort took in himself in order to regain a body, Harry was not killed. Because he was the true master of the Elder Wand, Harry won the final duel, killing Voldemort once and for all.

After the battle was lost by the Death Eaters, many of those who survived were arrested, while others went into hiding. After Voldemort's death, the Dark Marks on the Death Eaters' forearms faded into scars.

Behind The Scenes

 * Despite his allegiance with Lord Voldemort, Fenrir Greyback was not an official Death Eater due to the fact that he was a werewolf.
 * Narcissa Malfoy was not officialy a Death Eater, never having been branded with the Dark Mark, even though she was married to Lucius Malfoy and was the sister of Bellatrix Lestrange. However, she is usually regarded as de facto Death Eater as she may have participated in the tormenting of Muggles the night of the 1994 Quidditch World Cup, relayed information to Voldemort which led to the Battle of the Department of Mysteries and the murder of Sirius Black, sat in on Death Eater meetings (though this may simply have been because they were held in her home at the time, much to her discomfort), and was given the duty of finding out whether or not Harry Potter was truly dead. However, she was not known to have participated in any battles, and she ultimately lied to Voldemort about Harry's death and thus helped bring about his fall.
 * Quirinus Quirrell was loyal to Lord Voldemort but he was not a Death Eater.
 * Several Death Eaters with the same last name have been mentioned in the series (e.g. Lestrange, Avery, Mulciber), which suggests that fealty to Voldemort may not end with the person themselves, and extends to their children. It is equally possible, however, that the children have similar ideological views to their parents.
 * Dolores Umbridge was never explicitly mentioned to be a Death Eater; however, she was a sympathizer who committed crimes against Muggle-borns at the Ministry of Magic while it was under Voldemort's control
 * While the majority of the group were males, two explicitly mentioned female Death Eaters were Bellatrix Lestrange and Alecto Carrow. Another unnamed woman was described in the first chapter of the Deathly Hallows, but it is possible she was Alecto.

Mangemort