So I was watching a video by Super Carlin Brothers on YouTube and they addressed how the Pensive, the Mirror of Erised, and the Veil may be related to the Deathly Hallows. I won’t get into their full theory here, but I will say that they theorize that they are precursors to the actual Deathly Hallows. One of the things they touch on very briefly is that they may be connected to thestrals, the invisible flying horse-like creatures that are featured in the books.
They point out that the thestrals can only be seen by someone who has seen someone die, like Harry and Luna, but also only Harry and Luna can hear the whispers from the Veil. Why does this matter?
Because I think that these three possible proto-hallows may actually be made FROM thestrals.
Basically, anything that is has to be made from something. Matter matters, as it were. Therefore these three objects must have been made from something. Let’s look at the more basic: The Veil. In the simplest terms, a veil of any kind is a piece of fabric, which is made up from threads woven together. We know that the Elder wand contains a thestral hair. Now here is a picture of a thestral…
Not exactly known for its hair, is it. Well its specified that it’s a “tail hair”. Now you really can’t have access to a thestral hair unless you…have a thestral. It’s talked about briefly that the Peverell brothers who were closely associated with the Hallows, possibly having made the Hallows, had access to a herd of thestrals, which would explain easy access to thestral hair. Which brings us back to the Veil, because that veil had to be woven from something and since it’s a veil leading to the land of the dead, it makes sense that it would be woven from thestral hairs. Pretty sure if you have a herd of thestrals, finding enough hair without being detrimental to the herd should be a pretty easy task.
So there you have it, the Veil is probably made from thestral hair, and magic. But mostly thestral hair.
So what about the Pensive?
The Pensive is a little more tricky because its liquid contained in a bowl, but which is the magic, the liquid or the bowl?
Well let’s look at this from a more existencial view, what are memories made of? When we see them in the film they appear as kind of a liquid, and are dropped into the liquid of the bowl. Memories are basically dead events, events from the past which have already happened. So how could a thestral possibly connect to a bowl of liquid? The bowl that is the Pensive, whether it be the metal or the stone one, is decorated with runes. These runes could be etched with either a piece of a thestral, such as a hoof or a bone, but rather that getting that gruesome, I’d prefer to think that the etched runes are actually treated with thestral tears. Thematically it makes sense, even if I’m personally not fond of a crying animal, but it makes the element that much more rare and special.
Now…the mirror. That is significantly more tricky to riddle out, so for that we’d have to look into some magical biology and the person most closely associated with it. The Mirror of Erised is, by the Super Carlin Bros theory, the mirror is closely associated to the Elder Wand and Antioch Peverell. What does the Elder Wand represent? It’s the tool for which you can get pretty much anything you want, it’s the most powerful wand ever made. The Mirror of Erised represents everything you desire, you can literally see what you want the most. If Antioch’s primary focus is personal gain, then he probably isn’t that concerned about the welfare of others, or the animals under his care.
Let’s take a quick side street and look at unicorns in the Harry Potter universe. When we see Voldemort feeding on the blood of a unicorn we see that it’s a thick, silvery substance. Its reasonable to assume that most magical equines have similar colored blood, silvery. Mirrors in the Renaissance period, about the time the Peverell brothers were alive, were treated with silver (or a silvery substance) and then pressed on with glass to maintain a shine. Its possible that in making the mirror, Antioch slaughtered a thestral and used it’s blood to make the mirror. Consequently killing a creature to make a magical object usually yields unfavorable results. If Antioch was trying to make a mirror that would give him what he wanted, and slaughtered a magical creature to make it, then it wouldn’t likely give him what he wanted, just make him look at it. Magical items are tricky like that.
I really don’t have much to close this out. I recommend checking out the Super Carlin Bros video that led me to this rabbit trail, and check out their other videos as well.
Thanks for reading.
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