Changes: Grand Staircase

Revision as of 20:43, 5 October 2019

Warning!

At least some content in this article is derived from information featured in Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery. Spoilers will be present within the article.

"There were a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on a Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump."

— Description^[src]

The Grand Staircase is a massive stairway in Hogwarts Castle, the structure is mainly used to access each floor of the castle, including the dungeons.^[1] Rowena Ravenclaw was the Hogwarts founder who invented the concept of moving stairs.^[2]

Description

Moving stairs — The ever changing staircases

There are hundreds of Portraits covering the walls in this tower, some of which conceal secret passages to other areas within the school. The multiple staircases in the Grand Staircase lead from platform to platform and go as high as the seventh floor where they come to an end. The stairs also have a knack for moving around the staircase chamber, usually when a student is walking up one of them. There are also many trick stairs that cause the victim to sink through a step and require another person to pull them out. However, it is second nature to most of the older students to jump them.^[1]

Behind the scenes

The Fat Lady's portrait is on the seventh floor landing in the later films making it entirely visible to passers by; however, in the first film, her portrait is shown in a corridor somewhere else in the Castle.
In the third movie, it's shown that Grand Staircase travel upward to more than ten stories.
In the first two films the stairs are shown to have door to corridor at every landing. But in the next films, one floor is equal to two floors in the first two films.

Hogwart Grand Staircase — The Grand Staircase in 1998

In the first five films the stairs are shown to be constantly moving, something which is never mentioned in the novels. When the stairs are seen again in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, it has a different appearance with grandeur marble stairs and the stairs no longer move. Upon leaving the Entrance Hall the wider middle staircases travel upward while the staircases to the side travel downward. However, they could have stopped moving for the battle. Also the staircase could have moved to match Snape's running of the castle giving students enough room to move in large collective groups up and down the stairs without stopping. It may be possible that the Grand Staircase remains this way in future films, as the CGI Model of Hogwarts from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 is reused in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.
When Dolores Umbridge takes over the school in the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix she has Argus Filch take down all the portraits from the Grand Staircase. She also puts speakers constantly reciting her Educational Decrees on each floor. When Albus Dumbledore is restored to Hogwarts, the portraits are restored as well.
In the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Prefects lead Ravenclaw students to their Common room, where they walk down the stairs from the Entrance Hall, which leads to the Dungeons where the Slytherin Dungeon is. But in the video game adaptation of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix we see that Cho also walk down there, and there is a single platform that faces a plain wall.
Although this structure is referred to as the "Marble Staircase" on The Wizarding World of Harry Potter (see this image), on the books the Marble Staircase is a flight of stairs connecting the Entrance Hall with the first floor.
In LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4, the staircases are controlled by a portrait, who changes the levels the staircases lead to.

Appearances

The Harry Potter Wiki has 70 images related to Grand Staircase.

Notes and references

↑ ^1.0 ^1.1 Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Chapter 7 (The Sorting Hat)
↑ Pottermore

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[PS7-1] 1.0 ^1.1 Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Chapter 7 (The Sorting Hat)

[PM-2] Pottermore

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 {{Quote|There were a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on a Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump.|Description|Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone}}
-The '''Grand Staircase''' is a massive structure in [[Hogwarts Castle]], mainly used to access each floor of the castle, including the dungeons.<ref name="PS7"/> [[Rowena Ravenclaw]] was the [[Hogwarts founders|Hogwarts founder]] who invented the concept of moving stairs.<ref name="PM">{{PM}}</ref>
+The '''Grand Staircase''' is a massive stairway in [[Hogwarts Castle]], the structure is mainly used to access each floor of the castle, including the dungeons.<ref name="PS7"/> [[Rowena Ravenclaw]] was the [[Hogwarts founders|Hogwarts founder]] who invented the concept of moving stairs.<ref name="PM">{{PM}}</ref>
 ==Description==