Gellert Grindelwald

**Gellert Grindelwald** was a character in the *Harry Potter book series*.

Gellert was a very powerful and dangerous Dark wizard, who could have surpassed Tom Riddle in skill and power. Grindelwald fought a war in order to obtain international wizarding dominance in defiance of the International Statute of Secrecy for what he defined to be "For the Greater Good".

He attended and was expelled from Durmstrang Institute for conducting dangerous experiments. He later won the Elder Wand, adopted the symbol of the Deathly Hallows and founded Nurmengard. In 1945, Grindelwald was defeated by an old friend, Albus Dumbledore and locked up in Nurmengard until he was killed by Voldemort decades later.

## Biography

### Early life and education

Gellert Grindelwald was born in around 1884 in an unknown place. He was the great-nephew of Bathilda Bagshot. He attended Durmstrang Institute and became very drawn to the Dark Arts championed by the school. He excelled in many fields and began experimenting with the Dark arts.

The experiments involved hurting other people, and eventually even Durmstrang would not enable the dark nature of Gellert at their school. They expelled Gellert from the school at the age of 16, by which point he had developed a fascination for wizarding artefacts.

### Friendship with Dumbledore

Grindelwald spent time wandering in search of the knowledge and power of the Deathly Hallows. By the summer of 1899 (not long since he was expelled), he went to Godric's Hollow in England when he found out it was the former home of the original owner of one of the Deathly Hallows.

Grindelwald's great-aunt lived in Godric's Hollow, and she let him live with her for the summer. She provided very minimum supervision and a home of many books and documents about the magic world and it's artefacts which suited Grindelwald very well. In the summer, he befriended Albus Dumbledore, a teenager who had a lot in common with Grindelwald. They both had substanial knowledge and magical power, and at the time had the same ambitions and spent a lot of time debating.

The two became very good friends in their mutual search for the Deathly Hallows which they hoped would bring them the coveted immortality and invincibility, and it then became known that Gellert and Albus both opposed the International Statute of Secrecy and hoped to found a new order that overturned that law and gave them complete dominance over the international wizarding society (and muggle society), electing powerful and wise witches and wizards in power and putting the Muggles back in their place.

Grindelwald had long hated the fact that witches and wizards had to cower in secrecy from muggles in a way akin to fear, and had the idea that the law protected and benefited the Muggles, and not the wizarding world which the government claimed. He adopted the slogan proposed by Albus saying "For the Greater Good", which explained the actions they intended to make in order to achieve their goal of giving the power taken by the law, back to the wizarding world.

Unfortunately for Grindelwald, Albus would not go with Gellert in the end. He had only adopted the same goals of Grindelwald motivated by the fact that he had a younger sibling, Ariana Dumbledore who was brutally attacked by muggles which left her with no control of her magic. It broke the family and led to their mother, Kendra being killed in an incident when Ariana had no control of her magic, and it left Albus and their brother Aberforth Dumbledore to look after Ariana. Albus had other ideas of what to do with the Deathly Hallows, wanting to put the family back together again while Grindelwald wanted to make an army of the dead.

Family was very important to Albus and it led to an argument that broke their friendship. Aberforth found out about Grindelwald's plans, and he was angry that Albus would consider both leaving the family or taking the poorly Ariana with him for personal goals, which he felt was wrong and selfish. He neither approved or condoned their plans, and it eventually led to an argument between Albus and Aberforth.

The argument enraged Grindelwald who used the Cruciatus Curse on Aberforth. Albus was angry about that, and he began duelling Grindelwald. Aberforth then joined in and during the ensuing chaos, Ariana was killed. Grindelwald accepted part of the blame for her death, and fled the country with the help of a portkey arranged by Bathilda who never saw him again, without Albus,, who from then on, would begin avoiding Gellert out of fear that he knew which one of them had the wand which killed Ariana. Albus would later changed the opinions he had and find he and Grindelwald to be in the wrong for the plans they made.

### Gaining power

Grindelwald continued to pursue the Deathly Hallows and eventually located the Elder Wand, then owned by a well known wandmaker. He broke into the workshop, subdued the wandmaker with a spell and then took the wand. Grindelwald had probably found out he would not have to kill the former owner in order to gain the loyalty of the wand, which many others believed. Grindewald at one point, adopted the sign of the Deathly Hallows for the army he would begin founding.

At one point, Grindelwald founded Nurmengard, a home base and prison for enemies. Grindelwald carved the words "For the Greater Good" on the entrance, the slogan proposed by the young Albus and adopted by Grindelwald.

### Defeat

Grindelwald's war being international meant he spent less attention on Britain in particular and focused on a much bigger picture. It also meant that he avoided any kind of confrontation with Dumbledore who was attempting to avoid Grindelwald anyway. It led to rumours that they both had a fear of each other's power. Albus had spent years finding ways around people's calls to confront Grindelwald, since many people thought only he had the power to defeat him.

Dumbledore later claimed that he avoided Grindelwald because he was afraid that Grindelwald knew which one of them killed Ariana. Eventually, people's demands became too much and he had to track Grindelwald down. It was then 1945, and the two engaged in a confrontational duel of legendary proportions that eye-witnesses claimed was an incredible duel matched by none other in history. Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald even when Grindelwald owned the Elder Wand. The wand switched loyalty to Dumbledore but even he later admitted that he was only a "shade more skilful" than Grindelwald. The defeat of Grindelwald was a huge event and turning point for the wizarding world.

### Death

Grindelwald was imprisoned for life in Nurmengard, the prison he had invented. About 53 years later, Grindelwald woke up and found he was no longer alone in the cell. Voldemort (a new Dark wizard gaining power in the Second Wizarding War) wanted to find the Deathly Hallows and broke in, demanding Grindelwald tell him the location of the Elder Wand. Grindelwald was expecting Voldemort to show up eventually but was unafraid of him.

He had nothing but contempt for Voldemort and found he had a lack of knowledge of the Deathly Hallows. He laughed at him when he demanded he tell him the location, saying he would never win the Elder Wand. It enraged Voldemort and he killed Grindelwald with the Killing Curse.

### Legacy

The memory of Grindelwald's crimes continued to affect people many decades later. He had killed many people to the point that the sign of the Deathly Hallows became very connected with him and people found it wrong to bear it, even when it had nothing to do with Grindelwald originally. Grindelwald was once found to be cool by later pupils of Durmstrang, who copied Grindelwald carved Deathly Hallows sign they found in a wall, thinking it made them look powerful. However, pupils who had family killed by Grindelwald would teach them better not to do that. Grindelwald was never very powerful in Britain and the things he had done would be not be widely known in Britain, but Grindelwald was however mentioned in many books.

## Appearance

When he was younger, Grindelwald had golden blond hair which fell in curls at a longer length, "handsome" and a "merry" look which made him look triumphant. He had blue eyes. By the time he was killed, he was an old man with a frail, skeletal form and skull. He had sunken eyes, wrinkled cheeks, and the majority of Grindelwald's teeth had fallen out.

## Notes and sources

1. ↑ In *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 18, Rita Skeeter says Grindelwald was expelled from Durmstrang at age sixteen, and it was not much time after that that he travelled to Godric's Hollow. That happened in the summer of 1899, immediately after Dumbledore graduated from Hogwarts.
2. ↑ Grindelwald was killed during the Easter holidays which happen in Spring.
3. ↑ Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 18 - "At sixteen years old, even Durmstrang felt it could no longer turn a blind eye to the twisted experiments of Gellert Grindelwald, and he was expelled."
4. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 27
5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 18
6. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 35
7. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 24
8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 8
9. ↑ Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 18 - "They say "For the Greater Good" was even carved over the entrance to Nurmengard." 'What’s Nurmengard?' "The prison Grindelwald had built to hold his opponents."
10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 2
11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 23
12. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 18 - "It was the golden-haired, merry-faced thief"
13. ↑ *Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*, Chapter 13- He had "had a gleeful look about him. His golden hair fell in curls to his shoulders."