What makes someone fit in Slytherin House from Harry Potter? Slytherin, along with Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, and Ravenclaw, make up the four Houses of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The Sorting Hat has the ability to pick which House a new student should belong to. But that hasn't stopped readers and movie viewers to play along with the concept and chose their own house so we broke down the characteristics of Slytherins.
The official mascot for House Slytherin is a large serpent and the colors of the emblem are green and silver. The House element corresponds with water as serpents are often associated with their fluid movement. Slytherin was founded by Salazar Slytherin, a pure-blood wizard with the gift of Parseltongue. He helped build Hogwarts as one of the four founders and instituted how Slytherins would be hand-picked into the House. Salazar eventually left Hogwarts due to a growing rift between he and the other founders.
Slytherins are known in Harry Potter for their leadership, ambition, and resourcefulness. Members of House Slytherin tend to take charge as they are very achievement oriented. This creates a competive nature in academics and sports, perhaps best seen in the Harry Potter movies their rivalry with Gryffindor in Quidditch. Members of the House are described as cunning but they are also known to disregard the rules at times. House Slytherin produces the most Dark wizards out of all four Houses.
Horace Slughorn was the Head of House Slytherin until Severus Snape took over by the time Harry Potter started at Hogwarts. After Snape took over as Headmaster, Slughorn returned to the Head of House position as well as Potions Master. Other notable names that were sorted into House Slytherin included Merlin, Bellatrix Lestrange, Dolores Umbridge, and Draco Malfoy.
The most notable Slytherin would certainly be Tom Riddle, the boy who later became Lord Voldemort. Part of Salazar's focus in picking Slytherins was the importance of being a pure-blooded wizard. He had a disdain for Muggle-born students and hoped that Hogwarts would institute a stricter policy when it came to blood purity. The Sorting Hat was known to take lineage into account but not every Slytherin is a pure-blood, as was the case with Tom Riddle and Severus Snape.
Indeed, Harry was almost sorted into Slytherin before he begged the Sorting Hat not to pick the particular House. The bad reputation and history with Dark wizards turned Harry off from wanting to join the House. The Sorting Hat took his preference into account and picked Gryffindor instead. Dumbledore made sure to remind Harry that he possessed many traits of Slytherins. This goes to reiterate the notion that most people possess traits from more than one Hogwarts House in Harry Potter.
