The Resurrection Stone is a fabled object, one of the three Deathly Hallows purportedly created by Death to reward Cadmus Peverell.
History[]
Origins[]
In the story of The Tale of the Three Brothers in the book by Beedle the Bard, the Resurrection Stone is created by Death itself to reward Cadmus Peverell for using magic to escape a perilous river. Along with the reward his brothers received, the Resurrection Stone was one of three fabled Deathly Hallows.[1]
After obtaining the Stone, Cadmus parted ways with his brothers and returned home. He turned the Stone thrice and revived his late fiancée. Over time, he realised that she did not belong in the living world. She was cold and distant and he could still feel a veil between them. Cadmus killed himself to be with her and so Death took the second brother for his own.[1]
Others like Albus Dumbledore have proposed that the Resurrection Stone was created by Cadmus himself, with he and his brothers having possessed great skill.[2]
Disappearance[]
After his death, the Stone disappears and is not discovered for centuries. It is passed down through his lineage until the Gaunt family possessed it but they were unaware of what the Stone really was. The stone had been set into a ring. In the twentieth century, Marvolo Gaunt, wore the ring to flaunt his blood purity. After his son Morfin Gaunt was imprisoned for attacking Tom Riddle Snr., he bragged about the ring to Bob Ogden.
Marvolo died and left the ring to Morfin. Two decades later, he was wearing the ring when his long-lost nephew, Tom Riddle Jnr. visited to find out about his wizarding family. After learning that the ring was a family heirloom, he pocketed it and framed Morfin for the murders of the Riddle family. Tom also wore the ring with the Stone for some time but also didn't realise what it was. When he decided to create Horcruxes, he used the murder of his father to turn the ring into his first Horcrux.
Discovery[]
After transforming the ring, he put it back in the Gaunt shack surrounded by numerous magical protections to keep the Horcrux safe. Albus Dumbledore eventually started researching Voldemort's past and tracked down the ring to the shack. He somehow managed to retrieve it and realised that it contained the Resurrection Stone. Unaware that there was a lethal curse put in the ring, he put it on to be with his beloved late sister, Ariana Dumbledore. In doing so, he activated the terminal curse and would have died very quickly if he had not intervened with the help of Severus Snape.
With his life expectancy cut very short and a crippled hand, Dumbledore used Godric Gryffindor's Sword to destroy the Horcrux within and sealed the ring with the Stone inside the first Golden Snitch that Harry Potter had caught. After his death, the Snitch was bequeathed to Harry. After receiving the Snitch, he realised it had an inscription saying "I open at the close". However, he did not understand how to open it at the time. Dumbledore put charms upon it to ensure that it wouldn't open until Harry learned that he was also a Horcrux and accepted he had to die.
Harry carried the Snitch with him in a moleskin pouch over the next few months. During the Battle of Hogwarts, he learned the truth through the memories of Severus Snape and decided to walk to his death to destroy the Horcrux within him. In the Forbidden Forest, he felt that was finally able to open the Snitch. He placed it to his lips and stated his intention to die which caused the Snitch to open and the Stone to fall into his hand. He turned it thrice in his hand and was joined by the shades of James and Lily Potter, Sirius Black and Remus Lupin. They encouraged him to find the courage and keep going to face Voldemort.
Once he reached Voldemort, the Stone slipped out of Harry's hands onto the ground. When he was struck with the Killing Curse, he was in possession of the three Deathly Hallows and thus was the "Master of Death". Harry decided to leave the Stone in the forest with the intention that it would lose there forever.
Notes and sources[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 22
- ↑ The Tales of Beedle the Bard: Albus Dumbledore's notes on The Tale of the Three Brothers