10 Harry Potter Characters Whose Names Alone Spoil the Plot

Sarah
7 min readFeb 15, 2021

The wizarding world of Harry Potter is an etymologist’s playground. Very few characters have meaningless names, even the bland-sounding Harry Potter, whose name implies great leadership skills and the overthrowing of an old regime.

I mean, wow, spoiler alert.

By dissecting the names of certain characters in the Harry Potter series, some major plot points become blindingly obvious.

Photo by Rae Tian on Unsplash

Remus Lupin

Newsflash: Remus Lupin is a werewolf. No need to read the books or watch the movies to know this to be true — just take a look at his name! Lupin comes from the Latin word lupinus and gives wolves their scientific name: Canis lupus. In English, we use the word “lupine” to describe something that is wolf-like.

A werewolf, for example.

And Remus Lupin’s first name is interesting, too. Remus is one half of the legendary Greek twins, Remus and Romulus, who were raised by a she-wolf. The twins, who fought to the death, remind Harry Potter readers of Remus Lupin’s internal struggle with his dual identity as a werewolf.

It’s a sad story, but one which many readers will find relatable.

Did I just imply that some people are werewolves, or am I referring to the internal struggle…

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Sarah
Sarah

Written by Sarah

I write a lot (shocking, I know) and it's usually about animals, travel, outdoorsy stuff, and of course, writing.

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