Love Potion

**Love Potions** are a concoction which appears throughout the *Harry Potter book series*. Even though real love can't be manufactured, love potions induce a powerful and false infatuation.

## About

Love Potions create a very fake and powerful infatuation in the drinker towards the intended person. The drinker will suddenly behave very romantically toward their "love" and obsess over them, acting silly and unreasonable. Since it was not possible to artificially induce actual love, any feelings caused by the potion do not produce real affection or true love.

The duration of a Love Potion depends upon several factors during manufacture. One known Love Potion has to be produced with the weight of the drinker in mind and the attractiveness of whoever is brewing it for effectiveness. It has a duration of twenty-four hours. The effect of every known love potion wears off naturally in time so they have keep administrating further doses. The longer the recipient keeps drinking the concoction, the effect will gradually increase in strength because love potions mature over time.

There is a potion which counteracts the effects of a Love Potion. Once the effects wear off, the drinker will remember how they acted causing further embarrassment. A known ingredient in at least one Love Potion is frozen Ashwinder egg. Amortentia is a very powerful Love Potion. It has a pearlescent appearance and the smell is dependent upon whatever each person finds appealing.

## History

In 1925, Merope Gaunt gave one to Tom Riddle, a Muggle who lived in her village. Merope was infatuated with him but she was very plain so she didn't get the attention she craved. When he drunk the potion, they eloped together and she fell pregnant with their child. She stopped giving him the potion in the hope that he would now truly love her and stay but he ran away, leaving her and their child behind.

Molly Weasley brewed a Love Potion when she was a young girl.

On Valentine's Day in 1992, Professor Lockhart told students at Hogwarts to ask Professor Snape how to make a Love Potion but Snape did not happy about it. Harry Potter thought the first person to ask him for a Love Potion "would be force-fed poison". Two years later, Hermione Granger was suspected of using a Love Potion to gain affections of Harry Potter and Victor Krum when Pansy Parkinson gave an interview to Rita Skeeter implying it by demanding Professor Dumbledore investigate her.

Before 1995, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry banned Love Potions.

In December 1996, Romilda Vane gave a Love Potion to Harry in a box of chocolate cauldrons. He didn't open it because Hermione had warned him there were several girls planning to sneak him a Love Potion. In March, Ronald Weasley found it and thought it was his birthday present. He ate a chocolate cauldron and started to obsess over Romilda. Harry had to take Ron to Professor Slughorn to get an antidote.

Students taking N.E.W.T. level Potions learned about Amortentia, a very powerful Love Potion.

## Trivia

* It is unknown why Love Potions are legal in the wizarding world due to their nature of taking away a person's free will. It could be dangerous and controlling like the Imperius Curse.

## Notes and sources

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 *Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince*, Chapter 9
2. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince*, Chapter 6
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 *Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince*, Chapter 10
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 *Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince*, Chapter 18
5. ↑ Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: An A-Z of Fantastic Beasts
6. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban*, Chapter 5
7. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets*, Chapter 13
8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 *Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire*, Chapter 27