contradiction between book 5 and 6???

[frodobaggins]

In book 5 Hermonie is hit by a curse from the death eater Dolohov in the department of mysterys.
on page 847 form OotP
"THe curse Dolohov had used on her, though less effective than it would have been had he been able to say the incantation aloud, had nevertheless caused, in Madam Pomfrey's words quite enough damage to be going with"

However in book 6 the kids at hogwarts very clearly learn that you can say spells silently with there full effect.

so why didnt that spell do the full harm?? you dont need to say a spell for it to be 100% effective.

in fact when voldemort is fighting DD in the entrance to the ministry of magic he fires off many killing curses without saying anything

is this just a mistake or is there something to this????

 

[ThirdProphecy]

As we learn in book 6, non verbal spells are not this easy to use. So I guess that Dolohov luckily has not enough practice to produce a curse with full effect...

cu around,
TP

 

[frodobaggins]

so your trying to tell me a death eater experienced in the dark arts cant do the magic of a six year student???

 

[Piper]

I don't think all Death Eaters are so experienced and sharp. Some of them are rather dim witted I am thinking, probably from the inbreeding they have done to keep the children full blood magical.

 

[Rory]

I don't think all Death Eaters are so experienced and sharp. Some of them are rather dim witted I am thinking, probably from the inbreeding they have done to keep the children full blood magical.

No kidding.
Just look at Crabbe and Goyle!

 

[halliemei]

I think this is actually a good point and quite a conundrum. In my opinion, it's related to what Harry learns about "nvbl" spells from the Half-Blood Prince. Some spells are intended to be done verbally only or non-verbally only. Even Dumbledore has to say some of the spells. I would think that indicates that some spells actually aren't as effective (if at all) non-verbally. Of course, it could be a contradiction (similar to the Thestrals that "suddenly" appear in book 5).

 

[frodobaggins]

of course there is the possibilty that since the death eater had the silencing curse on him and he meant to say the spell verbally it didnt work. idk just a thought

 

[cagedcactus]

I agree with both Frodo, and HM.
I think we have seen it in books so many times and a little in movies too.
Once in a while DD will just flick his wand or hands, and things will happen. Like lighting the beacons, summoning a chair, changing the appearance of things, so in short magic of lesser effort can be achieved that way NVBL.
But then he also shows his brilliance in NVBL spells in OoTP when he fights Voldemort. Voldemort himself is good at that too.
I think mostly as Snape suggested, keeping your mind closed, and practicing on NVBL spells hard, can earn you the ability to do so. But then the potent should be there too. Not all wizards are going to be able to do that. Like that DE in OoTP who was silenced.

 

[frodobaggins]

ya all magic doesnt even require a wand.

i dont know if its said but it is implied in the books that they know when a kid has the potential to use magic when they simply do magically things.

perfect examples are harry blowing up his aunt and tom riddle doing those things to the kids in the orphanage.

 

[serophis]

Also note...when Voldemort fought Harry and priori incantatem was created between their wands, didn't Voldemort actually verbally say the spell? I believe that you have to also decide between whether the spell will be verbal or non for it to have full effect before beginning it...and with a dark magic curse to work against someone, you have to really mean the spell, to really hate and want to cause pain...and what better way to do this than to yell. This emotional utterance causes the body and mind to fully experience the feeling that you wish to portray, and your wand acts as a channeler for that action.

For example, in the beauxbaton (sp?) school when magic is spoken in a different language, I doubt they point at their suitcases and yell "Pack!" in english for their luggage to pack itself. They would yell the french counterpart of the word instead. You see, it isn't always the words themselves, but the feeling you have as you cast them.

This discussion does bring up one good point, though...what is it that actually creates a spell? For example, if Snape created "-corpus" (sorry, don't have my book with me) spell on his own, what exactly was it that caused this spell to work? Of course he knew what he wanted it to do, but Harry didn't when he accidentally used it on Ron. And what about Sectumsempra? Harry had no earthly idea what it was supposed to do, only that it was some kind of offensive or defensive spell, but it worked anyway. Is there an official spell registry? I doubt it, but somehow this spell that Snape had written down seemed to work pretty effectively for one that Harry had no idea what it did.

Well now my head hurts...I need to stop thinking too much this late at night.

 

[kashlie]

when harry finds out about non-verbal spells, does Snape not actually say that not all wizards and witches can do it?

 

[serophis]

Not sure; unfortunatley I don't have the book with me at the time.

However, we learn from Snape that it requires quite a bit of concentration to cast a spell...what happened during the attack to the death eater would have been enough to greatly break his concentration; if it kept me from speaking, I know I'd probably be too distracted to emit the full power of the spell.