Lycoris Black

## Lycoris Hesper Black

**Lycoris Hesper Black** (11 August, 1904 – 28 July, 1965) was a pure-blood English witch, the middle child of Sirius Black II and his wife Hesper Gamp and sister of Arcturus Black III and Regulus Black III. Lycoris never married and never had children.

She was a lifelong friend of her first cousin, Boudica Tremblay. For some time, Lycoris lived alone in Bath. She was the maternal aunt of Lucretia Prewett (née Black) and Orion Black.

She was the great aunt of Sirius Black III and his brother Regulus Black IV, but died in 1965 when they were very young. She was also the great aunt of Altair Black and Aquila Black, but seeing as she passed away several years before they were born, she never knew them and they never knew her.

## Biography

### Early life (1904-1915)

Lycoris was born in the early hours of 11 August, 1904. Her birth was celebrated by her mother, father, and grandparents. She was born just a day after her cousin Boudica Tremblay, the daughter of her aunt Millicent.

The Tremblay sisters were known to spend a lot of time at the Black estate. Boudica and Philippa were childhood friends of all three of Sirius Black II's children, which included Lycoris.

Lycoris was born into the Black family, an old and very wealthy pure-blood wizarding family known for their belief and espousing of pure-blood supremacy. Her father, Sirius Black II, was Head of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black until his death in 1952. She had an older brother, Arcturus Black III, who would later become head of the family upon their father's death.

She also had a younger brother, Regulus Black III.

### Hogwarts years (1915-1922)

Lycoris Black received her Hogwarts letter in July of 1915. Sometime before leaving for school, she purchased a wand made of fir and dragon heartstring from Ollivander's Wand Shop in Diagon Alley, London.

She was sorted into Slytherin House on 1 September 1915 with her cousins Boudica Tremblay and Alban Goshawk. They made quite a little trio in school.

She was one of the earlier members of the Slug Club, an exclusive group made up of Professor Horace Slughorn's most well-liked and sometimes even famous students. She was invited to be apart of the club in her third year in 1917. Members of the club also included her brother, Arcturus Black, as well as Ogden Rutter, a Beater on the Gryffindor Quidditch Team that later went on to play for England.

She left the school in 1922 upon the completion of her seventh year.

### Later life (1922-1965)

Lycoris Black was present at the wedding of her brother Arcturus Black III to Melania Macmillan in 1923. The ceremony was so incredibly lavish that it made the front page of *The Daily Prophet*. Featuring over two hundred invited guests, the ceremony took place in Tisbury, Wiltshire.

## Etymology

*Lycoris* means "twilight" in Greek. This name loosely fits into the Black family tradition of naming people after stars, in the sense that twilight denotes the times of day when the stars first begin to appear, or to disappear. It is also a genus of flowering plants in the Amaryllis family that is associated with death and reincarnation in Chinese and Japanese folklore; another member of family with a name of flower is Narcissa Malfoy. Ovid and Virgil also mention a mistress of Mark Antony called Lycoris. It is also possible that this name was derived from the plant and sweet liquorice. The name is also similar to that of Lycorias, a Nereid (sea nymph) of Greek mythology.