Shrieking Shack

The **Shrieking Shack** is an abandoned house in Hogsmeade. It has an appearance in *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban* and *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*. An entrance to the Shack is through a secret passageway on the grounds of Hogwarts Castle, entered by tapping a knot in the trunk of the Whomping Willow to paralyse it. It was built for Remus Lupin to hide in when he transformed into a werewolf.

## About

It is placed on a slope on a hill near Hogsmeade. The building looks very creepy, every entrance is completely sealed shut and it has an overgrown garden. On the inside, the building is very dusty and untidy with broken furniture probably caused by Lupin when he was a werewolf. The windows are boarded shut and the staircase is crumbling away.

The Shack was thought to be a very haunted building. Even the ghosts of Hogwarts wouldn't go in because they thought a very rough crowd lived in it. The Shack isn't truly haunted because the screeching and banging the villagers heard were Lupin when he transformed into a werewolf.

### Layout

A downstairs room in the Shack has a door to the right that leads to a hallway. There is a hole in the wall which leads to a secret passageway. Through the hole, round a corner and down a slope is the passageway which goes to the base of the Whomping Willow on the grounds of Hogwarts Castle. By tapping a knot, the vicious tree is subdued long enough for anyone to get in and out.

Up the stairs is a landing which leads to a bedroom that has a four-poster bed and dusty hangings.

## History

In around 1971, Professor Dumbledore had the shack built just before a new student, Lupin began attending Hogwarts School. Lupin was a werewolf and needed to be isolated when he had to transform, and chained up for safety. He further built a secret passageway leading to the Shack, and planted the Whomping Willow in school grounds to guard it.

Because the Wolfsbane Potion was yet to be invented, it was very painful for Lupin because he couldn't eat. He broke the furniture in the house, and the howling caused villagers to think the Shack was haunted by a rough crowd of ghosts. People began avoiding the Shack, and wouldn't go in. The building was soon a place of interest to Hogwarts School students when they got to go to Hogsmeade, but they were too scared to go in.

Having trained to be Animagus, James Potter, Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew began joining Lupin. They included the secret passageway leading up to the Shack in the Marauder's Map. They gained confidence in keeping Lupin docile, and began leaving the Shack and wandering round at night.

Black once pulled a very cruel prank on a student they bullied, Severus Snape. Snape was suspicious of what they were up to, so Black told Snape how to get past the Whomping Willow to find an answer. He nearly got to Shrieking Shack when Potter had found out what Black had done, and intervened to stop Snape getting attacked. However, he saw a werewolf Lupin through a hole at the end of the passageway in the Shack.

Even years after Lupin graduated and the howling stopped, people were still too wary of going to the Shack and continued to think it was haunted. In their early years at Hogwarts, Fred and George tried to get in but failed because every entrance was sealed. Fred and George learned about the secret passageway to get in, by going through the Whomping Willow but didn't know they could subdue the tree by tapping a knot and found it too dangerous to try.

In February 1994, Harry and Ron headed to the Shack, because Harry had never saw it before. He was hiding under a Cloak of Invisibility because he wasn't supposed to be in Hogsmeade. Draco, Crabbe and Goyle found Ron and thought he was on his own. They began taunting him, but Harry began throwing dirt and they thought it was ghosts of the Shrieking Shack. They wanted to fight back, but Harry's head popped out of the cloak to their shock and they run back down the hill.

In June 1995, Black dragged Ron and Peter Pettigrew (who was a rat), to the Shrieking Shack. Harry and Hermione pursued and Crookshanks helped. Lupin and Snape deduced where they had gone and later joined. Black told Harry he was innocent, and Peter was caught.

## Notes and sources

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 18
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 14
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 17
4. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 5
5. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 8
6. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 10
7. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 19