Quicknation    Lord Voldemort

Images of Lord Voldemort: G Y AOL AV MSN Books of Lord Voldemort: B

Lord Voldemort results from: AltaVista A9 AOL Clusty Gigablast Google Lycos MSN Teoma Wisenut Yahoo

Lord Voldemort Lord Voldemort after his return in the fourth Harry Potter movie, in which he is played by Ralph Fiennes series. He is an evil wizard bent on securing unmatched power and achieving immortality through the practice of Dark Magic. Voldemort has appeared in all the novels except for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. He is widely considered one of the most forceful, powerful, and evil villain figures in modern children's literature.

Voldemort is so feared in the Wizarding world that his name is considered to be ineffable. Most people refer to him as "" rather than say his name out loud. His followers, the Death Eaters, do not use his name, but instead refer to him as "" or Master. Voldemort is considered one of the most powerful wizards alive. It has been said that the only wizard he fears is Albus Dumbledore, headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, though Voldemort has always denied this.

table

Lord Voldemort was born Tom Marvolo Riddle on New Year's Eve 1926 to Tom Riddle Sr. and Merope Riddle, née Gaunt. Through his mother, he is the last descendant of the famous ancient wizard Salazar Slytherin. Through his father, he is a descendant of the squires of Little Hangleton, an aristocratic Muggle family. He was named Tom after his father, and Marvolo after his maternal grandfather Marvolo Gaunt.

Riddle was raised at Stockwell orphanage in London. His mother had been abandoned by her husband once he realised that she had used magic to persuade him to marry her. She died in poverty and ill health an hour after Tom's birth. It was Dumbledore's task to find Riddle when he reached age eleven and invite him to study at Hogwarts. By that time he already showed great potential as a wizard; he could move things with his mind, make animals do his bidding, talk to snakes, cause people pain, and, in his own words, "make bad things happen to people who annoy[ed him]". However, he also displayed cruelty, a disregard for others, a need for absolute and total control, and a lack of moral judgement. He, in fact, matched the clinical definition of conduct disorder (the childhood predecessor to antisocial personality disorder).

In his first meeting with Dumbledore, Riddle was seen to be a sharply intelligent and calculating boy with a cold, smoothly expressionless face intended to prevent others guessing what he was thinking. He was sure that he was born to be different, and detested the name "Tom", which he deemed to be too common. At Hogwarts, he was generally successful in concealing his true motives. He was a gifted and exceptional student, made a prefect and eventually the Head Boy. However, Dumbledore never forgot what Riddle had confessed to him on their first meeting, and never fully trusted him.

Riddle attended Hogwarts from 1938 to 1945 as a member of Slytherin house. During holidays he was obliged to return to the orphanage, where he continued to terrorise other orphans. He quickly gathered a group of followers, particularly fellow Slytherin students, whom he referred to as friends, but for whom he felt little or no compassion. Many of these people became Death Eaters, including Avery and Rodolphus Lestrange. Among these he began using the name "Lord Voldemort"; "I am Lord Voldemort" is an anagram of his full name, Tom Marvolo Riddle. After leaving Hogwarts, he chose to abandon his original name and use his adopted name openly.

During Riddle's fifth year at Hogwarts, he opened the Chamber of Secrets, created by his ancestor Salazar Slytherin, leading to the death of Myrtle, a Muggle-born student. Only Dumbledore ever suspected him sup, as Riddle had exercised his considerable charm over most of the other staff, including Potions master Horace Slughorn sup. Instead, fellow student Rubeus Hagrid was framed for the incident by Riddle, and was expelled.

Before Riddle graduated from Hogwarts, he returned to Little Hangleton, hoping to meet his maternal grandfather, Marvolo Gaunt and confirm that he was a descendant of the Gaunts (and, through them, Slytherin). Instead, he met his uncle Morfin, learning of his grandfather's death and his father's non-magical nature. He stole an heirloom ring from Morfin, murdered his father and Muggle grandparents, and modified his uncle's memory so that Morfin would confess to the murders and be found responsible for the deaths by the wizarding world. Frank Bryce, the Riddles' gardener, fell under suspicion from the Muggle police, as the door had not been forced and Bryce was the only person with keys to the house. The cause of death could not be determined, however, and Bryce was released, although he was regarded with suspicion by the other villagers until his death in 1994 at Voldemort's own hand. () In this way, two men were blamed for the Riddle murders and Tom Riddle kept the black Gaunt ring and returned to Hogwarts.

After completing his education, Riddle sought to become a teacher at Hogwarts. Dumbledore speculated that Riddle had ulterior motives in seeking the job, and persuaded then Headmaster Dippet to turn him down. Riddle instead took a job at Borgin and Burkes, purveyors of dark magical objects. He left the store after acquiring, by theft and murder, two more relics of the Hogwarts founders. Salazar Slytherin's locket had once been an heirloom of the Gaunt family, but had been bought by Burke for a tiny sum when Merope Gaunt had been homeless and starving. It was sold to Hepzibah Smith, who now paid for her purchase with her life and the loss of her own family heirloom, a goblet bearing the Hufflepuff badger which had once belonged to Helga Hufflepuffsup. Hepzibah Smith was a distant descendant of Hufflepuff. Riddle again planted false memories so that someone else would admit to the crime, this time Hepzibah’s house-elf, Hokey. Dumbledore later discovered that Riddle intended to use the relics to create Horcruxes, containers for portions of his soul which might protect him from death.

Little more is known about Riddle until he rose to power as Lord Voldemort in the 1970s. The dark wizard Grindelwald was vanquished while Riddle was 18 so it is possible that the two met, and that this was one influence upon him. It would seem that when Voldemort first appeared, he started his campaign with the idea of "purifying" the Wizarding race by purging Muggle-born people (notably despite, or perhaps partly because of, his own 'half-blood' heritage), which appealed to the old Wizarding families. Later he showed more "his true colours", which led to him losing support from some of the old magical families. There have only been hints at the full horror of his attempt at control. Fear spread as many of Voldemort's Death Eaters became infamous for using the Unforgivable Curses against those who stood against them, and through the Dark Mark, , used to "mark" a site after committing a murder. Voldemort himself used brutal punishments to ensure that the Death Eaters remained faithful to him.

Prior to his open reemergence, Riddle briefly resurfaced to contact Dumbledore, now the Hogwarts Headmaster, asking again to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts. Ten years had passed since he left the school (i.e. it was about 1955). Voldemort was appearing much less human, and asked to be called by his assumed title rather than his given name, which Dumbledore would not do. Instead, Dumbledore confronted Voldemort with his actions since leaving Hogwarts. He guessed, and rightly so, that a wizard with Voldemort's abilities would not repeatedly apply for a teaching job unless he had ulterior motives. He refused to grant Voldemort the job. Since that time no person has held the Dark Arts post for more than one year, and it is believed by wizards that this is due to a curse placed by Voldemort.

After being rejected from Hogwarts, Voldemort's plans became much more ambitious. He used spies, either Death Eaters or people under the effect of the Imperius Curse, to infiltrate places of significance, particularly the Ministry of Magic. Many Aurors and members of the Order of the Phoenix were murdered while tring to organise resistance against him. Much fear, chaos and suspicion spread in the wizarding world; many people being questioned as to whether they were under the Imperius Curse, or purposely doing Voldemort's bidding. Many of these victims were set free after it was discovered they were cursed, but it was never entirely clear whether wizards such as Lucius Malfoy had acted freely or under a curse.

Until early 1980, despite efforts by both the Ministry of Magic and the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort appeared to be on the verge of victory. It was not until his encounter with James and Lily Potter that he fell from this position of power.

In early 1980, Sybill Trelawney, great-great-granddaughter of a famous and gifted Seer, Cassandra Trelawney, entered a trance in the presence of Dumbledore and uttered a prophecy:

dl"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches ... born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies ... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not ... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives ... the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies ..."ion of the prophecy: Neville Longbottom (born July 30) and Harry Potter (born July 31). Severus Snape, who had already become a Death Eater by that time, was caught eavesdropping while Trelawney was giving the prophecy, by Dumbledore's brother Aberforth, who is bartender at The Hogs's Head pub in Hogsmeade). Snape failed to pass on the latter part of the prophecy, and thus Voldemort missed key details about his coming foe. Voldemort determined Harry, a half-blood like himself, was the most likely of the two infants to be a threat, and thus "mark[ed] him as his equal"; even though Neville was the pure-blood of the two (and thus presumably the "better" wizard). By choosing Harry, Voldemort established and confirmed that Harry was to be the one to whom the prophecy referred.

On October 31st, 1981, Voldemort arrived at the home of James and Lily Potter, prominent members of the Order of the Phoenix who had thrice defied him (as stated as a condition of the prophecy), in Godric's Hollow. The Potters knew Voldemort was searching for them, and had gone into hiding by means of the Fidelius Charm, a very powerful enchantment that hides a secret inside a single, living soul. Originally, family friend Sirius Black was the Secret-Keeper, but he switced roles with another, Peter Pettigrew. Pettigrew betrayed the Potters and gave Voldemort the knowledge of their whereabouts. James Potter was killed in the confrontation, and Lily sacrificed her life attempting to save her son. This act of love granted Harry an unexplained charm of protection, which foiled Voldemort's attempt to use , the killing curse, on the baby.

Voldemort had intended to use Harry's murder as part of the necessary ceremony to create another Horcrux. However, due to the protection spell, the killing curse backfired on Voldemort, and the one-year-old Harry became the first and only known survivor of the curse. The curse created the infamous lightning bolt scar on Harry's forehead, and created a link between their minds. Voldemort was reduced to a barely-alive shell of his former being, and virtually disappeared for over a decade. He only survived the backfiring of the killing curse because he had previously split his soul into six pieces, five of which were already imbued into Horcruxes. He later created the desired sixth Horcrux (which Dumbledore believed to be the snake Nagini) using the murder of Frank Bryce.

The protective charm bestowed on Harry by his mother's sacrifice - importantly, a sacrifice she chose to make but need not have made - afforded him a lingering protection against direct attacks by Voldemort. This charm was kept active as long as he had a home among Lily's blood relatives and only until he came of age (at seventeen). For this reason, Albus Dumbledore took the rescued baby Harry and left him in the indifferent and even neglectful care of his aunt and uncle, the Muggles Vernon and Petunia Dursley.

The news of Voldemort's downfall spread fast through the wizarding community. Without his personal power to back them up, many of his supporters defected or gave themselves up. A few faithful followers attempted to find him, but were unsuccessful and were caught and sent to Azkaban. The atmosphere of terror that had held sway so long over the wizarding community (not just in Britain, but all over the world - Voldemort had international followers such as Antonin Dolohov as well) was lifted. Overnight, Harry Potter became a celebrity, popularly called "The Boy Who Lived."

Voldemort led a shadow life in a forest, where even continued existence was a struggle for him. His only remaining power was the ability to occupy the bodies of others, and he frequently possessed snakes. Animal bodies made it difficult for him to perform magic, a crucial obstacle to regaining his strength and restoring his physical form.

"Lord Voldemort (voiced by Richard Bremmer) on the back of Quirrell's head in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone"

In the early 1990s, Professor Quirinus Quirrell, teacher of Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts, encountered Voldemort in the forests of Albania during his travels. Whether tempted by promises of power or overcome by trickery, Quirrell submitted to the Dark Lord's service and allowed Voldemort to possess him. He travelled to London and attempted, with the help of his new master, to steal the Philosopher's Stone (called the Sorcerer's Stone in the American version of the book), which would have allowed Voldemort to regain his former power and to become immortal. Voldemort planned on drinking from the Elixir of Life enough to restore him to a , in which he would continue to rely on his Horcruxes. Finding that the stone had been moved from Gringotts to Hogwarts, VoldemortQuirrell set about finding ways to break through the many layers of security now around the Philosopher's Stone. Voldemort's plans were, however, thwarted by Harrysup to ashes.

Voldemort returned to hiding, angry that his Death Eaters had forsaken him, and afraid that he would not be able to find another wizard to possess. He remained in hiding for two years in Albania. In this interim, Death Eater Lucius Malfoy secretly sent one of Voldemort's horcruxes – the diary kept by the young Tom Riddle – into Hogwarts by passing it secretly into the possession of student Ginny Weasley. By means of this sinister diary, the memory of Riddle managed to manipulate Ginny into opening the Chamber of Secrets once again, nearly killing a number of students. Riddle then tried to drain Ginny's life-force to allow himself to regain physical form outside the book. Harry, however, defeated him once again. It is not known what would have happened had Ginny been destroyed by this past version of Tom Riddle, but author J. K. Rowling has noted it would strengthen the present-day Voldemort. Lucius Malfoy was not aware that the diary was a Horcrux and had no idea that it contained a piece of Voldemort's soul - he simply intended to get rid of a Dark item and discredit Arthur Weasley by planting it on his daughter.

Luckily for Voldemort, a series of incidents forced Peter Pettigrew, who had betrayed Harry's parents to Voldemort, to leave hiding and to go in search of Voldemort. While seeking his one-time master, he kidnapped Bertha Jorkins, from whom Voldemort learned enough to formulate a plan to create a primitive for himself, rudimentary but still corporeal, allowing him to perform magic. He then used an ancient ritual of Dark Magic to recreate the he had before his curse rebounded at the beginning of the first book. Harry's blood formed a part of this process of rebirth, preventing the effect which caused Voldemort to almost die when he first tried to kill Harry. Many Harry Potter fans suspect that this will eventually prove to be Voldemort's undoing; when Harry was telling Dumbledore about how Voldemort had removed the charm over Harry, Dumbledore had in his eyes a look of triumph, seeming to know something no one else does. After being reborn, Voldemort summoned the Death Eaters back to him, and attempted to kill Harry — but Harry escaped the Dark Lord yet again (see below).

At first, the British Ministry of Magic refused to believe that Lord Voldemort had risen again. The Minister for Magic (Minister of Magic in American Editions), Cornelius Fudge, began a process of discrediting both Harry Potter and Albus Dumbledore by playing upon their ambiguities; Fudge professing that Dumbledore was somewhat confused and senile, and that Harry Potter was attention seeking and psychologically unstable.

Dumbledore responded by recreating the once disbanded Order of the Phoenix, setting up headquarters in Sirius Black's family home at Number 12, Grimmauld Place, London. He also sent envoys to persuade giants, and other non-human magical beings away from Voldemort's side. Unfortunately, the giants, Dementors and werewolves had already allied with Voldemort.

Meanwhile, Lucius Malfoy, having returned to Voldemort's service, sought to gain influence within the Ministry, encouraging Fudge to believe that the real threat to his authority came from a powerful Dumbledore, not a resurgent Voldemort. Away from the gaze of the Ministry, Voldemort was waiting and plotting carefully. Only a handful of wizards – the Death Eaters and the members of the Order of the Phoenix – knew or believed he had returned - allowing him a free hand in his schemes against both the ministry, the order, and most importantly, Harry Potter.

After engineering a plot to secure the break-out of some of the Death Eaters from Azkaban, Voldemort embarked on a scheme to kill Harry and retrieve the full record of Trelawney's prophecy regarding Harry and Voldemort, stored in the Ministry's Department of Mysteries. His plot failed, and the only copy of the prophecy was destroyed. All but one of the Death Eaters sent to retrieve it fell into the hands of the Order of the Phoenix after a running battle inside the Ministry building.

There followed a wizarding duel between Dumbledore and Voldemort, until finally Voldemort vanished, taking Lestrange with him. He was seen by the Minister for Magic, however, who finally accepted that Voldemort was back. This led to a return of the earlier fear and suspicion among the wizarding community, which was fueled by Voldemort's continuing attacks and schemes as he regained strength.

Voldemort's next step was to engineer an attack on his most formidable enemy, Dumbledore himself.sup This was attempted by Draco Malfoy, who managed to arrange access into Hogwarts by means of two enchanted cabinets, which bypassed the extensive protective enchantments placed around the school. Despite the fact that this allowed Death Eaters the chance they needed to enter Hogwarts, it was Severus Snape who used Avada Kedavra against Dumbledore, after Draco Malfoy refused. With "the only one he ever feared" dead, Voldemort's greatest enemy (bar HarryLord Voldemort is no more, and the scales of the battle have now tipped, it seems, in favour of the Dark Lord.

Voldemort is described as having very pale skin, snake-like slits for nostrils, red eyes and cat-like slits for pupils, a skeletally thin , he had the slit nostrils and green eyes rather than red. Earlier in life, as Tom Marvolo Riddle, Voldemort was described as very handsome, with black hair. The transformation into his monstrous state is believed to have been caused by practicing extremely advanced dark magic, for example in creating Horcruxes to split his soul, and as a result of his downfall.

Voldemort, like most dark-leaning wizards descending from pureblood wizarding families, shows considerable hatred for muggles and non-pure-blood wizards and witches - or mudbloods. This despite the fact that Voldemort himself is a non-pure-blood wizard himself (his father was a muggle). Riddle ultimately changed his name, by way of an anagram, from "Tom Marvolo Riddle" to "I am Lord Voldemort", as a way of removing his own muggle heritage, and he killed the Riddle family, partly because they were muggles, and partly due to their abandonment of his mother and himself.

In the process of his transformations, along with the physical changes, Voldemort seems to have also forgotten important details from the past, which led to his undoing on several occasions. In , he states that he had forgotten about the ancient magic which protected Harry as his mother died to save him. In he forgets that the tears of the phoenix have healing powers.

There are some notable similarities between the young Tom Riddle and Harry Potter - both were half blood orphans, raised in unhappy conditions, until they were admitted into Hogwarts; and there are some physical similarities: both have black hair, and are tall by their mid-teens, and both have thin faces. Both felt more at home at Hogwarts than anywhere else in the world. In fact, Dumbledore once noted that Voldemort probably had more profound feelings of attachment for Hogwarts than he ever had for anyone or any thing.

After much speculation, J. K. Rowling, author of Harry Potter, revealed that Voldemort's greatest fear is "ignominious death," and that his boggart would be his own corpse. What Voldemort desires most is to be all-powerful and eternal living – which is what he would see if he were ever to look in the Mirror of Erised. Dumbledore also stated in that Voldemort secretly fears both corpses and darkness, though, "it is the unknown we fear when we look upon death and darkness, nothing more," (Chapter 26).

Voldemort is a Parselmouth; something he inherited from Salazar Slytherin (it seems that most of his Gaunt ancestors have inherited this highly unusual trait) and passed on to Harry Potter through the backfired curse that forged a lifelong physical connection between them. He is also known as the greatest Legilimens and Occlumens in the world - being able to read minds, as well as shield his own from penetration.

He is attributed as being one of few people able to create and comprehend Horcruxes, to such an extent that he attempts to gain immortality through them. - similar to those used by the mythical creatures known as liches, although the liches' phylacteries require neither the user to "split" his.

Voldemort's magic wand is made from yew, a wood associated with immortality and which produces a poisonous sap. It is thirteen and a half inches long, has the feather of a phoenix at its core, and in the movie, what appears to be a bone handle. The wand's maker, Mr Ollivander, got this feather from Dumbledore's pet phoenix, Fawkes. Fawkes gave just one other feather to be used in a wand, and ironically this wand "chose" to belong to Harry. Because the two wands have a core coming from the same source, they tend to work improperly when used against each other. If they are forced into battle, a or "reverse-spell" effect occurs, where each wand forces the other to regurgitate shadows of previous spells it has cast, in reverse chronological order. All of this plays an important part in Harry's escape from Voldemort at the end of .

The wand connection is yet another symbolic connection between Harry and Voldemort; their minds are also connected. in Harry first discovered that he could access Voldemort's thoughts and emotions, and from then on whenever Voldemort was extremely angry or in pain, Harry's scar would burn painfully. Similarly, Voldemort also discovered their connection in and used it to attempt to possess Harry and use him as a spy. It seems that, in many ways, Harry's and Voldemort's lives are tied to each other's.

he is merely a face on the back of Quirrell's head. This was achieved by computer generated imagery voiced by Richard Bremmer. In that film, he was also shown in a flashback sequence when he arrived at the home of James and Lily Potter to kill them. In this scene Voldemort is played by Ian Hart, the actor who played Quirrell in the same film.

In , Voldemort appears as a memory of his younger self, Hogwarts student Tom Riddle, who is played by Christian Coulson. In , which is the first time Voldemort is seen in his actual physical form, he is played by Ralph Fiennes. The assumption that this casting will be preserved in the filming of .

Characters seem less uncomfortable hearing Voldemort's name in the films than in the books.

Voldemort's given name was Tom Marvolo Riddle. In the second book he explains that the appellation "Lord Voldemort" is derived from an anagram of his name:

dl

This is also a clever play on words, as his name, Tom Marvolo Riddle, is also itself a riddle.

Like a number of other names in the Harry Potter novels, "Voldemort" seems to have French origins. Indeed, can also translate as "from", giving "flight from death". Given Voldemort's fear of death and quest for immortality, this meaning is also appropriate.

J.K. Rowling personally uses a French pronunciation for his name, i.e. Vol-de-mor (with a silent t).

In translated versions of , Voldemort's original name is changed to accommodate the anagram. In the Polish edition, however, translator Andrzej Polkowski decided not to make any changes, presumably because of the difficulty of translating the anagram into a meaningful sentence. In the Portuguese edition (as distinct from the Brazilian edition), the name was similarly left untranslated.

; "Vilijn" (Voldemort's last name) and the Dutch word "Vilein" are equally pronounced, while the word "Vilein" means "evil" or "mean". is transliterated from the English and not translated (transliterated English words are common in the language where there is no Hebrew equivalent in wide use).In this case, the name was changed to sound like Frankenstein, while Mrlak should have an allusion to death