Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Group

Question:

kris1295
kris1295
Student
High School - 9th Grade

What exactly is a horcrux? 

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Posted by kris1295 on Friday August 31, 2007 at 8:30 PM and tagged with harry potter, harry potter and the half-blood prince, horcrux, themes.

Answers:


  1. brendawm Teacher
    High School - 9th Grade

    eNotes Editor

    Best answer as selected by question asker.

    A horcrux is basically a piece of a person's soul stored in an object to keep it alive; therefore making the person more than mortal. Horcruxes are extremely evil objects, however, as it takes an ultimately evil act to create one--the act of murder--most wizards would never dare even speak of them. That is the reason Harry and Dumbledore have such a difficult time gaining any information about them. Tom Riddle had great aspirations to make himself immortal; therefore he not only created one horcrux, he set out to divide his soul into seven parts, believing that seven was the most magically powerfully number. With this in mind, he committed numerous evil acts in an effort to insure his immortality.  Hope this helps. Brenda

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    Posted by brendawm on Friday August 31, 2007 at 8:38 PM


  2. leaannw1 Teacher
    Middle School

    A horcrux is an object (can be animate or inanimate) in which a part of a person's soul can be saved to help protect them from death.  It is evil and the is considered  very dark magic and most wizards don't speak of it.  Tom Riddle used 7 objects to try to protect his soul, ranging from a diary to a snake.  Each had to be destroyed seperately.  When it was destroyed, the part of the person's soul inside of it, died.

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    Posted by leaannw1 on Friday September 7, 2007 at 3:38 PM

  3. lostinthought
    lostinthought Student
    High School - 9th Grade

     A horcruz is a piece of a person's soul that the person then chooses an item to place it in.  The item may be of value or a trinkit of somekind.  They are dark magic and tears a persons soul apart. In order for you to make one you have to kill a person, therefore ripping your soul in half. They are rarely brought up or mentioned for this reason. Tom Riddle wanted to know about them to be immortal.  Later as he becomes Voldemort he tears his soul 7 times b/c it is the most magical number.  So does that explain it enough?

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    Posted by lostinthought on Saturday November 17, 2007 at 4:39 PM


  4. xxalannahxx Student
    High School - 9th Grade

    A horcrux is a piece of a persons soul that is stored in an object to keep the person alive. Horcruxes are evil objects and it takes something really evil to create one the best way to create one would be murdering someone. Voldemort did not only create one but seven and he stored seven pieces of his soul into objects that meant something to him ranging from a diary to a snake. He split his soul into seven pieces because he believed seven was the magic number. Every time Harry destroyed one a piece of Voldemort died. For example in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets when Harry stuck the Basilisk's fang into the diary, Voldemort's memory as a sixteen year old was destroyed. Does that explain it?.

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    Posted by xxalannahxx on Sunday March 29, 2009 at 2:46 PM