Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Advice

So I am almost done with my Harry Knitted Objects--my last one is going to be a Hogwarts Unity bracelet (beaded knitted bracelet). I am going to use each swarovski crystal beads in each house color. Ruby for Gryffindor, Emerald for Slytherin, (I've seen/read references to these specific jewels in the books relating to each house) I am assuming Ravenclaw is sapphire, and here's where I need advice: should use Yellow Topaz for Hufflepuff or Black Obsidian or diamond.

On a side note I have noticed that each house color paired with a precious metal: gold, silver, bronze, and coal(?)--now I am assuming that coal is being considered a metal--just by all the other pairing...what are y'alls thoughts on this?

Should I use topaz or obsidian?

4 comments:

Just A Knit Wit said...

I'd go with topaz. From what I've seen the value of the metals/stones goes downward and those poor Hufflepuffs seem to get the shaft every time. Using diamond would rather go against this trend.

lostarts said...

The whole "color" and "metal" thing seems to come from blazoning arms.

Each house has a coat of arms (in the house colors). You can describe arms with a color picture or by blazoning them (describing them verbally).

Blazoning has strict rules. There are colors (red, green, blue, black and brown), and metals (white and yellow). The colors and metals are described in French. Colors cannot touch colors and metals cannot touch metals in the design.

For Hufflepuff, the color is black, and the metal is gold.

I used to belong to the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA). We reenact the Middle Ages and Renaissance.

We are expected to choose arms, which means we have to learn enough to create arms under the rules, and most people can at least blazon their own arms.

My blazon is "Per chevron, azure and argent, all mullety, counterchanged."

Per chevron means the field is divided in a chevron shape.

Azure and argent means above the chevron, it's blue, and below the chevron it's white.

Mullets are five-pointed stars. All mullety means strewn with mullets.

Counterchanged means that the two colors used are reversed on the design.

So, I have white stars on a blue background on the top and blue stars on a white background on the bottom.

I think I would choose topaz for Hufflepuff.

Birdwell said...

Jo--that is SO cool. Now you need to write a post about each Hogwarts House Coat of Arms. It would be fascinating.

Knitwit Thanks as well...I went out last night and bought some topaz beads (which for some reason was a lot harder than I thought it would be)

lostarts said...

I've seen in the movies that they HAVE coats of arms, but they went past so quickly that I couldn't really see what they were.

Also, I don't remember reading a description of any of the arms in the books, so I don't know if I'd consider the arms in the movie to be accurate. I just remember at the end of SS that there WAS a Slytherin coat of arms to the left of the screen, and that the colors and coat of arms changed to Griffindor after Dumbledor awarded the extra points.

The color/metal combination reminded me of arms, and SS showed that they have arms, so that's undoubtedly where they got that way of speaking about the colors.