Twins

[OliveOil_Med]

I have a pondering or two about twins in terms of twins when it comes to the world of Harry Potter.

In terms of identical twins, would it be possible for one to be a Muggle-born witch or wizard while the other is a Muggle? Or because they come from the same egg, would it be either both or neither. I know this would be possible with feturnal twins, but I wonder with identical twins. The seem to be the popular sort of twins in the Harry Potter books.

[Almara]

Hm. I think you could pull it off either way, really - after all, we don't really know how Magic is inherited and works behind the scenes. If it's a genetic mutation of sorts, identical twins would probably either both be Muggles or both have Magical abilities, since they have the same genetic code. But, if what happens with Muggle-borns is more complex than just that (which is not too unlikely), then I suppose identical twins would not necessarily both be born with Magic.

[Black-Sand]

G'day

Well I'm working on a story where one twin is a muggleborn adn the other a muggle adn they are identical.

When writing a story about HP I tend to write under the impression that magic chooses muggleborns. Hermione adn Lily worked their butts off to understand all magic and Colin was always enthusiastic about all the things magic could do. So it seems magic chooses those who will use it responsibly.

Hope that helps!

...xXxLove SandyxXx...

[Karaley Dargen]

When writing a story about HP I tend to write under the impression that magic chooses muggleborns. Hermione adn Lily worked their butts off to understand all magic and Colin was always enthusiastic about all the things magic could do. So it seems magic chooses those who will use it responsibly.

Ah, I'm not so sure about that. Two things – A) Do you really think that JKR would have shown us a complete slacker Muggle-born? We don't even really get the slacker wizards, except for Ron and Harry sometimes (the Twins are busy with other magical stuff), and I think it would go somewhat against her.. well, maybe moral values to take someone who got that gift of magic and then doesn't do their homework.

And then there is B) If you were to start at Hogwarts the day after tomorrow, think about how you would be at school... would you be completely overwhelmed by the wonders of that magical world, always do your homework eager to learn more, or would you say "pff, eh, work, who cares, wanna go poke the Giant Squid?"

I imagine that Muggle-borns are just way too excited about going to Hogwarts, and all the new things to not want to learn everything about it. Or it is (as I see it in Lily's case) a somewhat competitive manner to prove themselves against prejudices.

If you're the child of wizards and have grown up with magic all around you every day, it is not as special anymore, and then it's similar as going to school for them as it is for children in our world. Probably a bit more exciting, because it is still... different, but I guess that a huge part of the wizarding children just aren't as excited about being a wizard.

Take Voldemort for example. Do you think Tom Riddle would have been so excited about going to a school if that school didn't make him "special"? Do you think he would have worked as much for Maths, Biology or English classes? I doubt it. (I'm using the Half-blood thing similar to the Muggle-born thing, because I don't think it's a given that a Wizard/witch and a Muggle have a Wizard child)

So I don't think that magic "chooses" eager and responsible people, but more that those people become eager and responsible because of their magical abilities. And of course I'm sure that there are Muggle-borns who are lazy at Hogwarts, too, but I think that for one thing this comes in their later years at school, when the novelty has worn off, and that there are fewer lazy Muggle-borns than Wizarding children.


Apart from that, I am very very sure that JKR has said something in an interview about this issue. I wish I could find and quote it >.<

If I'm not completely mistaken, she said something like... that there is a magical gene, and that if you would trace the bloodlines of a Muggleborn far far back, that you would probably find a wizard somewhere in their family tree, maybe centuries in the past.

There is a short story by Muriel Spark, called The Black Madonna, in which a white woman married to a white man gives birth to a black child, and after heavy suspicions about her cheating on him, blood tests reveal that her husband is indeed father of the child. If what I learned at school is correct, it is possible that there was an African-American ancestor a few generations ago, and the gene for dark skin just hid away for some time. Last year, a woman (from Ghana, the father of the children European) in Berlin gave birth to (obviously non-identical) twins, one had dark, the other light skin-colour.

Moving back to my original point – I think it could work the same way, if not more extreme (that the gene can "hide" without surfacing at all for a much longer time), with the wizarding gene. If it is a mutation that is inherited recessively (word?), it would only be possible for it to surface under very specific circumstances – similar to red hair (see Lily, the lucky girl).

Where was I going with this... right. So I think it has something to do with the DNA, and unless you have external influences change the DNA of one of the twins (for example: they would both have been magical, but for some reason the DNA of one changed, and now only the other one is left with magical abilities), I think you should make them both wizards/witches. Or you could of course make them non-identical twins who just look a lot alike.

Though you don't have to take my word for this of course, I could be totally wrong with all the DNA things, and maybe JKR never said that.


EDIT: I just found out something else on a page (google: sugarquill magic inherited dna). Apparently, piecing together various bits of information JKR gave in different interviews, magic seems to be a dominant gene if one of the parents is a wizard (i.e. wizard+muggle =more likely wizard than muggle child; wizard+wizard=much more likely wizard than squib), but a recessive gene else (muggle-borns can have muggle siblings; muggle-borns are less common). The page also has an essay about Mendelian Genetics and how they apply to the magic gene. So in case you didn't learn that at school and really want to go into the subject, maybe that would be interesting.

My point is still the same though –– magic has to do with DNA; identical twins have almost always the same DNA, hence it is very unlikely that there would be one twin with and one without magic.

[Momo Wellish]

Ah, I'm not so sure about that. Two things – A) Do you really think that JKR would have shown us a complete slacker Muggle-born? We don't even really get the slacker wizards, except for Ron and Harry sometimes (the Twins are busy with other magical stuff), and I think it would go somewhat against her.. well, maybe moral values to take someone who got that gift of magic and then doesn't do their homework.

I always thought that JKR was a bit biased on the subject of Muggle-borns. There had to be a few who weren't 'Hermione's or 'Lily's.

I don't remember exactly where, but I think JKR once said that Muggle-borns had some sort of magical ancestor.

Muggle-born twins would probably be the same, either magical or just Muggle.

[Equinox Chick]

I don't think you could have identical twins where one is a Muggle and one is a witch/wizard. Identical twins are produced from one egg and one sperm which on fertilization split in two - therefore the genes are identical. They would have to both be wizards.

There are strange cases where one egg splits in two before fertilization and both eggs are fertilized by two different sperm. In that case because they share the same egg (before it split as it were) they are more likely to look alike than twins from two different eggs.

With Muggleborns Justin Fitch Fletchley was Muggleborn - he wasn't seen as a slacker particularly but he wasn't a whizz kid like Hermione ... and Dean wasn't ultra remarkable either.


Carole
xxx

[OliveOil_Med]

With Muggleborns Justin Fitch Fletchley was Muggleborn - he wasn't seen as a slacker particularly but he wasn't a whizz kid like Hermione ... and Dean wasn't ultra remarkable either.

Except Dean wasn't truly a Muggle-born, and even though no one else knew that, J.K. knew it from the beginning and it is she who is weaving the story.

And as for Justin, wasn't he supposed to go to this ultra exclusivbe private school before he was accepted at Hogwarts? He must have had at least something remarkable about him for that to happen.

But I find myself deviating from my own subject a but. I shall get it back on track!

I feel like in a set of identical twins, there couldn't be one wizard and one Muggle. As it has been said, they come from one egg and one sperm. They even have identical DNA. And I feel like J.K. has established that magic is genetic in nature, so from a genetic standpoint, identical twins would probably have to be the same. Feturnal twins, though, could theoretically be different.

Identical twins could be very different personality-wise, but they probably would be different on this front.

[Karaley Dargen]

And as for Justin, wasn't he supposed to go to this ultra exclusivbe private school before he was accepted at Hogwarts? He must have had at least something remarkable about him for that to happen.

Connectioooon, I just can't make no...

That's what he had. Probably. Connections. I read something about him when doing research for one of the stories I'm planning, and apparently in Britain, names with a hyphen in them (Finch-Fletchley) indicate rich or aristocratic members of society. And also apparently it is more a matter of money and connections to get into a school like Eton than your actual test results. So I doubt that counts as an argument.

Sorry for straying off topic like that, I just thought I'd mention that Justin could have been a real slacker, theoretically.

[Equinox Chick]

Yeah, sorry, I forgot about Dean which is rather shaming as I'm in the middle of a story about him - HA!

With Justin - he was rich and aristocratic. To get into Eton you need either blueblood or a brain - not necessarily both. Hence Princes William and Harry were educated there and neither of them are smart, just royal. *ignores writs from the Windsor family*

Straying again - double barrelled names, these days, don't really indicate aristocratic blood. It could equally be that the parents aren't married and want their children to bear both their surnames.

Carole