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Harry Potter And the Half-Blood Prince...
Who Is The Half-Blood Prince

The Half-Blood Prince... how odd that the speculation before the book was released centered on thoughts that the Half-Blood Prince would be a character who would work with Harry to protect him and help defeat Voldemort... a champion of all half-bloods and a strong force for good. As the true identity of the Half-Blood Prince is revealed, it does seem that he will be one of Harry's major foes and a strong soldier in the ranks of the Death Eaters.

Please do not continue on here if you have not read Chapter 28 of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. This article will tell you who the Half-Blood Prince is - and it will spoil the suspense and the drama of the revelation as you read the book. As in all of the Harry Potter books, there are many currents flowing together to this spot and knowing the answer to which character admits to being the Half-Blood Prince misses much of the importance of the HBP in the full story.

If you have no intention of reading the book [we suggest that you change your mind - you're missing some fantastically creative writing and brilliant reading], if you are an "open the book and turn to the last page" sort of reader and don't want to have to wait until Chapter 28 of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince to have the secret revealed, or if you have already read the book and need someone else's ideas as to why Jo Rowling would create this situation... read on...

Early on in the sixth Harry Potter book, Harry and Ron are allowed to go to the next level of studies in Potions. Since they both received less than perfect marks in their OWLS, the tests that determine how much they have learned in the first five years at Hogwarts, they assume that they will not be able to continue to study Potions at an advanced level. Dumbledore makes the surprise announcement that Professor Severus Snape will be the new DADA teacher and Professor Horace Slughorn will teach Potions. Horace Slughorn taught Potions to Harry's mother and still remembers her as one of the best and brightest students he ever had in any of his classes. Slughorn is more than happy to have Harry Potter as one of his students and they join the Potions class.

Since they didn't know that they would be taking the class, they don't have any of the books or class materials. Slughorn allows them to use old second hand books stored in the cabinets. Ron's book is in great condition, but Harry's copy of Advanced Potion-Making is marred by all sorts of notes and scribbles that make the book hard to read. At first he is annoyed, but then the boy wizard realizes that the student who made the notes was a genius in potions and spells. The scribbles are really improvements on the potions and spells that are printed in the book. Harry begins to follow the inked in advice and soon becomes the best student in the potions class. He looks through the book and discovers that the previous owner was a student called The Half-Blood Prince!

Harry first thinks that the book might have belonged to his father, but after he speaks to Remus Lupin he discovers that the book is nearly fifty years old...much too old to have belonged to his father or any of his friends. Hermione does her usual brilliant work in the library to discover that there was a student named Prince at Hogwarts during that time. Eileen Prince, but there isn't much information about her. She didn't go on to become a famous or powerful witch. It seems that someone with the ability shown in the Half-Blood Prince's scribbles in the Advanced Potion-Making text would have gained a bit of renown in the wizarding world. Harry and Ron believe the prince was a male student, but Hermione is sure that Eileen is the Prince who added notes to the margins of the book.

The real answer is revealed in Chapter 28. Snape screams at Harry,

"You dare use my own spells against me, Potter? It was I who invented them — I, the Half-Blood Prince! And you'd turn my inventions on me, like your filthy father, would you? I don't think so...no!"

But as in all of the Harry Potter books, this revelation raises more questions than it answers.

Harry knows the book was in use before his father or Snape were students at Hogwarts. That means it was not a new book when Snape scribbled his notes. Could the book have originally belonged to Eileen Prince? In Chapter 30 Hermione reveals to Harry and Ron that her library research has found that Eileen Prince was Snape's mother. Eileen married a Muggle named Tobias Snape...which means that Severus Snape is not a pure-blood by any definition. Dumbledore trusts Snape completely to the end... could this be because Snape does have a strong allegiance to the half-bloods? Clearly, Voldemort's crew are determined to eliminate the mixing of Muggle and magical blood. This makes Snape's future as a Death Eater very unlikely to be secure. Snape's actions, as horrible as the result is, are motivated by good - by a vow made to Malfoy's mother that he would protect her son. Snape risks everything to save the boy.

Why was Snape's copy of Advanced Potion-Making left in the cabinet with all of his notes intact? Was it an accident or was Harry supposed to find the annotated text and receive special tutoring from the Half-Blood Prince? If Dumbledore wanted Harry to learn from Professor Snape, what better way to arrange it? Harry would never have trusted any information coming directly from Snape, but the notes in the textbook taught him many secret potions and spells that will surely help him in the future.

It will be very interesting to see how the Half-Blood Prince is used in the final Harry Potter Book. He has already helped Harry by providing a text of excellent spells and potions that are not common knowledge. Harry learned more from Snape's book in his sixth year than the potions teacher was able to teach him in the all of the previous five years. Will the knowledge Harry has been given by the Half-Blood Prince help him to defeat Voldemorte? Will he be able to use it to defend himself against Snape? Will the Half-Blood Prince, Snape, turn out to be the person that Dumbledore believed he was? Will Harry and Snape ultimately work together to end the terror of the Death Eaters? Why was Draco's mother so certain that she would find help in Skinner's End? Why did Snape agree to the Unbreakable Vow to help Malfoy...a vow that means death if it is broken. Is there more to the relationship between Draco Malfoy and Snape than we know? We'll have to wait for the seventh book to find out...