Salazar Slytherin

**Salazar Slytherin** (2 November 956 - 15 August 1038) was a pure-blood wizard, noted for his cunning and determination. He was regarded as one of the greatest wizards of the age, respectively as a Parselmouth and as a skilled Legilimens. Slytherin was one of the four founders of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry along with Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff and Rowena Ravenclaw, as well as the namesake of the Slytherin House.

He mistrusted Muggle-born students to the point of proposing that they should not be accepted at Hogwarts. However, when he expressed his opinion to the other Hogwarts founders, they did not agree with him. In response, he left the school, never to return. Slytherin died sometime after creating the Chamber of Secrets, concealing a basilisk, ready to have the Chamber reopened to purge the school of those who, in Slytherin's view, were unworthy to study magic.

## Biography

### Early life

Salazar Slytherin was born during the first millennium A.D. and was raised into a pure-blood family. He and his family had the rare magical gift of speaking Parseltongue.

At some point, Slytherin created his own wand, made of snakewood with a core of basilisk horn. He taught it the unique ability to "sleep" when commanded in parseltongue.

### Hogwarts founder

Around 993 A.D., Salazar Slytherin founded Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in his adulthood, with friends Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff and Rowena Ravenclaw, though he later severed ties with Gryffindor. He even appeared to have carefully selected members of his own House.

The qualities which Slytherin prized in his "handpicked students" included resourcefulness, determination, and a certain disregard for the rules, along with the ability to speak Parseltongue. He also selected his students according to their cunning, ambition, and blood purity. His House within Hogwarts was symbolised by a serpent, with House colours of green and silver.

#### Leaving Hogwarts

> I always knew Salazar Slytherin was a twisted old loony, but I never knew he started all this pure-blood stuff. I wouldn't be in his house if you paid me. Honestly, if the Sorting Hat had tried to put me in Slytherin, I'd've got the train straight back home....
>
> Ron Weasley expressing his disdain for Slytherin's views

After founding Hogwarts and co-existing for years, during the 11th century, a rift eventually began to grow between Slytherin and the other founders. Slytherin disliked taking students from Muggle families, seeing them as untrustworthy and unworthy of being taught magic, and tried to persuade the other founders to only take students from pure-blood families. However, the other founders didn't agree with Slytherin, particularly Gryffindor. Eventually, Slytherin and Gryffindor had a bitter and possibly even violent argument over the subject, (it is possible that they duelled, or that a civil war of sorts broke out between the houses). Slytherin chose to leave the school eventually, but he had left the Chamber of Secrets and his Basilisk behind, and he later died at an old age.

### Post-mortem

According to ancient legend, as told by History of Magic Professor Cuthbert Binns, Salazar Slytherin was responsible for the construction of the Chamber of Secrets beneath Hogwarts dungeons. It was specifically created for the purpose of purging the school of all Muggle-born students. The Chamber contained a basilisk which could be controlled only by his own "true heir", and use it to purge the school of all Muggle-borns. At least part of the legend was revealed to be true in 1943, when Tom Marvolo Riddle, the heir of Slytherin, opened the Chamber and used the Basilisk to attack Muggle-borns.

One girl the Basilisk actually killed was a ghost known by the name of Moaning Myrtle. The opening to the Chamber of Secrets is located in the bathroom she now haunted, and can only be opened by speaking Parseltongue, as Slytherin could. Riddle opened the Chamber again in 1993 through the use of one of his seven Horcruxes, his diary. Using the bit of his soul encompassed by the diary, he possessed Ginny Weasley and forced her to do his bidding. While he still attacked Muggle-born students, his ultimate goal was to lure Harry Potter into the Chamber and kill him.

Salazar Slytherin owned a locket emblazoned with the letter *S* that became an heirloom of his last known line of descendants, the Gaunts. Merope Gaunt sold the locket to Caractacus Burke. It was then bought up by Hepzibah Smith, who had a love for antiques. It was subsequently stolen from her by Tom Marvolo Riddle. Riddle would later turn the locket into a Horcrux, and conceal it in a seaside cave he had visited in his youth. The same locket was later removed from the cave by Regulus Black and Reign Gaunt (a descendant of Slytherin), who with the help of their house-elves Kreacher and Blanche destroyed it. This act of destruction removed all of the Horcrux's power.

Years later, during a Horcrux hunt, Harry Potter, Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley found a note from Regulus and Reign of the locket. The three would later find that Black and Gaunt hunted Horcruxes themselves.

There were also portraits of Slytherin hung at Hogwarts Castle, one guarding a secret shortcut between the dungeon's antechamber and the Entrance Hall side room. The password required to gain access to said shortcut was *Mortal Dread*. The other was hung at the Headmaster's office, part of the Headmaster portraits gallery.

In the 1997-1998 school year, Slytherin's heir, Riddle (now known as Lord Voldemort), realised his ancestor's wish of purging the school of Muggle-borns via another method: by taking over the Ministry of Magic and using falsified propaganda. Voldemort managed to have Muggle-borns evicted from the wizarding world, and at the end of the year, Voldemort even claimed that Hogwarts no longer needed Sorting, and that Slytherin's symbols, shields and colours would suffice. After Voldemort's death, all of this was repealed, and Slytherin's ultimate desire ended in failure.

By the 21st century Salazar Slytherin's bloodline survived through the Gaunts, Blacks, Riddles, Cavaliers, Yaxleys, Lestranges, Averys, Turners, and Winchesters.

## Physical description

> Then, as Harry drew level with the last pair of pillars, a statue high as the Chamber itself loomed into view, standing against the back wall... It was ancient and monkeyish, with a long, thin beard that fell almost to the bottom of the wizard's sweeping stone robes, where two enormous grey feet stood on the smooth Chamber floor.
>
> Description of the statue of Slytherin

The statue of Salazar Slytherin in the Chamber of Secrets depicted an "ancient and monkeyish" man with a "long thin beard that fell almost to the bottom of his sweeping robes." His beard was white in colour. Marvolo Gaunt, a blood relative, was similarly described as being monkey-like in appearance.

## Personality and traits

Salazar Slytherin was known to possess great cunning and determination, qualities he prized in students of Slytherin House. At one point, the Sorting Hat referred to him as "power-hungry Slytherin". He seemed to stop at nothing to get what he wanted; this was proven when he constructed the Chamber of Secrets to purge Muggle-borns, despite the fact that the other founders disagreed with his beliefs. This unrepentant ruthlessness mixed with pure-blood supremacist views would later be adopted by numerous descendants of his, the infamous Voldemort not least of all.

Slytherin was also quite proud and vain, as he went to the trouble of immortalising his image in the Chamber of Secrets in the form of a titanic statue standing several dozen feet tall, something that the other three founders were never known to have done. An effigy of such proportions would certainly reflect a grandiose image of oneself. This love of grandeur was apparently passed onto his bloodline as well, as the descending Gaunt bloodline ended up squandering their fortune for self-indulgent lavishness long before the generation of Marvolo, who continued to flaunt the little heirlooms he had left in front of others.

Slytherin was said to be one of the greatest wizards of his age, with extensive magical abilities, particularly in Legilimency. When considering Sorting a student into Slytherin, the Sorting Hat looks for Slytherin's traits in the student, including cunning, determination, ambition, and resourcefulness.

## Magical abilities and skills

> It matters, because being able to talk to snakes was what Salazar Slytherin was famous for. That’s why the symbol of Slytherin House is a serpent.
>
> Hermione Granger informing Harry Potter of Slytherin's ability as a Parselmouth

* Parseltongue: Salazar Slytherin was one of the earliest recorded Parselmouths and used this ability to control a basilisk. His house's symbol is a serpent due to this, and he passed this trait on to his descendants.
* Legilimency: Slytherin was said to have been a skilled Legilimens.
* Dark Arts: There are rumours that he originally built the Chamber of Secrets as a place to teach students dark magic as an academic class. Indeed, he was capable of casting the Killing Curse and the Imperius Curse, which were not unforgivable during his lifetime, and was skilled in the handling of cursed objects, showing him to have been a powerful Dark Wizard.
* Wandlore/Wandmaking: Slytherin created his own wand of snakewood and basilisk horn. He also taught it the unique ability to "sleep" when instructed.
* Basilisk **breeding**: Slytherin managed to breed a basilisk and kept it alive in the Chamber of Secrets for over one thousand years, surpassing its average nine-hundred year lifespan.
* Charms: With the combined abilities of the other founders, he helped to bewitch the Sorting Hat into a sentient and talking magical object with personality, to sort students well after their lifetime. He could also produce at least a non-corporeal Patronus.

## Possessions

* Wand: Slytherin owned a wand made of Snakewood with a Basilisk horn core. It was passed down through the generations until it was stolen from Gormlaith Gaunt by her niece Isolt Sayre, and later buried on the grounds of Ilvermorny School in North America.
* Locket: Slytherin owned a locket which he passed down to his descendants. It was later turned into a Horcrux by his descendant Tom Riddle.
* Basilisk: Slytherin owned a basilisk and kept it in the Chamber of Secrets.

## See also

* Godric Gryffindor
* Helga Hufflepuff
* Rowena Ravenclaw
* Salazar Slytherin's Basilisk
* Salazar Slytherin's Locket
* Tom Marvolo Riddle
* Chamber of Secrets

## Etymology

The name **Salazar** is originally a Spaniard name. Salazar is a surname meaning old hall (from Castilian Sala (hall) and Basque zahar (old). The name originates from the town of the same name: Salazar, in northern Burgos, Castile. Although nowadays northern Burgos is not a Basque-speaking region, it was during the early Middle Ages when the surname appeared. Its origins are also related to a certain noble family, the Salazars, that held a fief in the area. During the 10th century, the surname appears as mentioned in Navarre, where it spread and there even exists a Salazar Valley. It later also spread to the rest of the Basque Country, being specially common in Biscay during the 15th century. During that time, Lope García de Salazar, a famous writer, took part in the Reconquista of Cuenca, where he was granted a fief and founded a notable family.

Alonso de Salazar Frías was a 16th-17th century Spanish inquisitor who is famous for convincing the Spanish Inquisition that most of the witchcraft cases were based on insanity and confessions made to stop torture, rather than accurate cases of people associating with the devil. He was able to stop convictions based solely on testimony

Meanwhile, *Slytherin* may refer to the words "sly" as well as "slithering", which is the form of locomotion of snakes, possibly referring to his rare ability to talk to snakes called parseltongue.

## Credits

All rights to this character belong to JK Rowling (or whomever you give credit to for the Harry Potter Universe). However, I (MidgardianofAsgard) created some of the information in this page myself.