Summary
- Voldemort's Horcruxes were objects that contained pieces of his soul which Harry and his friends went on a mission to destroy.
- Each of Voldemort's 7 Horcruxes were important to his history.
- In addition to the six objects that housed Voldemort's Horcruxes, Harry himself became an unintentional Horcrux that needed to be destroyed for Voldemort's downfall.
The Harry Potter franchise finally revealed in Half Blood Prince that Voldemort was able to keep coming back because of his seven Horcruxes, but Harry and several others were able to destroy them all. One of the bigger Harry Potter mysteries in the movies and books was how Voldemort seemed to remain, in a sense, alive after the killing curse rebounded off of Harry, eventually leading to Voldemort's full rebirth in Goblet of Fire. Horcruxes, or dark magical objects in which a wizard can hide a piece of their soul, were introduced in the sixth installment, sending Harry on a quest to find and destroy them all.
The Half-Blood Prince movie cut several crucial memories from the books that would've given audiences greater insight into why Voldemort coveted these very specific objects, who they were taken from, and how they were made. Horcruxes are known in the Wizarding World to be supremely evil objects, so much so, that even most Dark Arts books won't divulge how to create them. It's described in detail in the books that Horcruxes can only be destroyed by very few, but powerful, means, and to create one, a wizard must first commit murder to split their soul. All seven of Voldemort's Horcruxes were eventually destroyed by Harry Potter and his allies.
7 Tom Riddle's Diary
Destroyed by Harry Potter
Voldemort's first of the 7 Horcruxes was introduced in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets before audiences knew what it truly was. The object was Voldemort/Tom Riddle's diary from his youth, and the first Horcrux that he created using Myrtle Warren's (Moaning Myrtle) death to split his soul. In a Lucius Malfoy storyline cut from the films, it was revealed that Voldemort gave Malfoy the Horcrux during the First Wizarding War with the intent to re-open the Chamber of Secrets at a different time. However, Malfoy believed Voldemort to be truly dead and decided to both free himself of the incriminating object and implicate the Weasley's by sliding it into Ginny's cauldron.
Harry destroyed the Tom Riddle diary Horcrux in the Chamber of Secrets with a basilisk fang that had been stuck in his arm. Harry didn't know at the time what he was doing, only that the Riddle that was trapped in that diary was becoming more powerful, and he figured the only way to stop him would be to destroy the diary. Basilisk venom is one of the few ways to destroy a Horcrux, as the venom's only antidote is Phoenix tears. Dumbledore guessed that Voldemort was utilizing Horcruxes when Harry first brought the diary back to him, but didn't let Harry in on these inklings until Half-Blood Prince.
6 Marvolo Gaunt's Ring
Destroyed by Albus Dumbledore
The second Horcrux to be made by Voldemort and then later destroyed by Dumbledore was Marvolo Gaunt's ring. Marvolo Gaunt was Voldemort's maternal grandfather, one of the last direct descendants of Salazar Slytherin with violent anti-Muggle leanings whose mind had been affected by generations of inbreeding for the sake of blood purity. Voldemort found out about his parentage while attending Hogwarts and paid the Gaunt shack a visit when he was 16, but found his Uncle Morfin instead of Marvolo, wearing the ring. When Morfin told him about his muggle father, Riddle stunned Morfin, modified his memory, stole the ring, and then proceeded to slaughter his muggle father and grandparents.
Riddle used the murder of his father to create the Horcrux ring, but only after asking Slughorn about making multiple Horcruxes. He hid the Horcrux ring in the wreckage of the Gaunt shack, which was later tracked down by Dumbledore. Technically both Deathly Hallow and Horcrux, as it contained the Resurrection Stone, Dumbledore was sorely tempted by the ring and succumbed to its curse, but was able to use the Sword of Gryffindor to destroy it. The Sword had been impregnated with basilisk venom after Harry used it to kill the basilisk in Chamber of Secrets, as regular goblin metal wouldn't have been able to destroy the Horcrux alone.
5 Salazar Slytherin's Locket
Destroyed by Ron Weasley
Salazar Slytherin's locket was the next Horcrux made by Voldemort in Harry Potter before being destroyed by Ron Weasley using the Sword of Gryffindor. The locket's history is much more complicated, and none of it is revealed in the Half-Blood Prince movie. The only Horcrux not to be destroyed within Hogwarts territory, the Gaunt family heirloom was initially passed to Voldemort's mother, Merope Gaunt, which she sold to Borgin and Burkes in Knockturn Alley for a pittance when she was on the verge of labor and Tom Riddle Sr. had run out on her. Eventually, the locket was bought by Hepzibah Smith, who also owned Hufflepuff's cup.
Hepzibah showed Riddle the locket and cup while he was working at Borgin and Burkes, and he stole both from her, using the murder of a Muggle vagrant to create the locket Horcrux. While crafting the Horcrux's protections in the cave where he terrorized two orphan children as a boy, he used the Black's House Elf Kreacher but was unaware that he could escape to safety at Regulus Black's call. This is how Regulus found out about Voldemort's Horcrux, and Harry first saw it in Order of the Phoenix while cleaning out Grimmauld Place. The golden trio tracked it down, and Ron used the Sword of Gryffindor to stab it.
4 Helga Hufflepuff's Cup
Destroyed by Hermione Granger
One of the most difficult Horcruxes to obtain was Hufflepuff's cup, and it was destroyed using basilisk fangs by Hermione Granger during Deathly Hallows Part 2. The cup was passed down through the Hufflepuff line before eventually landing in the hands of Hepzibah Smith, a client of Borgin and Burkes that Voldemort visited regularly. When she showed it to him (along with the locket), Voldemort quickly made the plan to murder Hepzibah and frame her House Elf Hokey while stealing the cup and the locket. He used Hepzibah's murder to create the cup Horcrux, but it's unknown at what point he left it in Bellatrix Lestrange's care.
Bellatrix didn't know that the cup was a Horcrux, much like Lucius Malfoy, but treated the item with the utmost care, placing it in her vault at Gringotts. Harry only speculated that a Horcrux was hidden in her vault based on her reaction to the belief that the trio had broken in while she questioned them at Malfoy Manor. Since the trio had lost the Sword of Gryffindor to Griphook at that point in Deathly Hallows, they had to wait to destroy the cup until Ron and Hermione could get down to the Chamber of Secrets during the Battle of Hogwarts to use the fangs from the basilisk skeleton.
3 Rowena Ravenclaw's Lost Diadem
Destroyed inadvertently by Vincent Crabbe
Ravenclaw's lost diadem was the last Horcrux Voldemort intentionally created before the killing curse rebounded, and was destroyed accidentally with fiendfyre that was produced by Vincent Crabbe, one of Draco Malfoy's friends at Hogwarts. The diadem had been stolen by Ravenclaw's jealous daughter Helena, who was tracked down to Albania by the Bloody Baron. Helena hid the diadem in a hollow tree before being killed by the Baron, and Tom Riddle managed to charm this tale out of her while attending Hogwarts. He left for Albania after procuring the locket and cup and managed to find it in the forest, using the murder of a nameless Albanian peasant to turn the diadem into one of the 7 Horcruxes.
Voldemort hid the diadem Horcrux in the Room of Requirement while attending a job interview there for the Defense Against the Dark Arts post. Harry first saw the diadem in Half-Blood Prince while hiding his potions book there, though he didn't know what it was at the time. He recalled this in Deathly Hallows and began looking in the Room of Requirement before being confronted by Draco Malfoy, Vincent Crabbe, and Gregory Goyle (though the characters would be different in the movie). Crabbe tried to use fiendfyre against them, a spell that Hermione knew would destroy a Horcrux but was too difficult to control, and proving her point, burned the room down, destroying the Horcrux in the process.
2 Voldemort's Snake Nagini
Destroyed by Neville Longbottom
Voldemort made the maledictus snake Nagini into a Horcrux while inhabiting his infant-like body during Goblet of Fire, and Neville Longbottom destroyed the Horcrux by decapitating her with the Sword of Gryffindor. The fact that Nagini was a woman with a blood curse that turned her permanently into a snake wasn't revealed in the Harry Potter series. Rather, this was found out during Fantastic Beasts: Crimes of Grindelwald. In Harry Potter, it's never explained how Voldemort and Nagini met, but it was likely in Albania, and she helped nurse him back to health with a potion made from her venom. Voldemort turned her into a Horcrux using the death of Bertha Jorkins.
A Goblet of Fire book-to-movie change that should've never happened was the omission of Bertha's story completely. Bertha Jorkins was a Ministry of Magic employee that was kidnapped by Peter Pettigrew and gave crucial information to Voldemort about the Triwizard Tournament and the location of his servant Barty Crouch Jr. Nagini is one of the few Horcruxes that Harry knows about in the Deathly Hallows movies, and because of her proximity to Voldemort, he is unable to kill her before sacrificing himself and therefore entrusts the mission to Neville. Neville is able to pull the Sword of Gryffindor out of the Sorting Hat at just the right moment during the Battle of Hogwarts, slicing off her head.
1 Harry Potter
Destroyed by Harry Potter
Harry Potter himself was Voldemort's final of the 7 Horcruxes and was destroyed by his own hand. The bombshell reveal that Harry was accidentally made into a Horcrux the night the curse rebounded was shown through Snape's memories, and put into motion the final part of the prophecy, "neither can live while the other survives." The night Voldemort first attempted to kill Harry, his soul was in a deeply unstable state, having already created five Horcruxes. Therefore, when the curse rebounded it split off and attached to the only living thing in the vicinity, which was Harry. The Horcrux was how Harry could speak Parseltongue and see Voldemort's thoughts.
Neither can live while the other survives.
Harry willingly walked into the Forbidden Forest during Deathly Hallows Part 2, prepared to sacrifice himself, and didn't raise his wand when Voldemort sent another killing curse at him. It was this decision that allowed the Horcrux in Harry to be destroyed, while Harry still got to live. While Nagini was technically the last Horcrux to be destroyed, Harry was arguably the most important, and one that Voldemort didn't know he created. Consequently, just as Harry had a bit of Voldemort in him in Harry Potter, Voldemort had a bit of Harry in him as he used Harry's blood for his rebirth, inadvertently assuring that Lily Potter's protection was ironclad.
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Harry Potter
- Created by:
- J.K. Rowling
- First Film:
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
- First TV Show:
- Harry Potter
- Cast:
- Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, Tom Felton, Alan Rickman, Matthew Lewis, Bonnie Wright, Evanna Lynch, Maggie Smith, Michael Gambon, Richard Harris, Ralph Fiennes, Helena Bonham Carter, Alfred Enoch, Harry Melling, Gary Oldman, Robert Pattinson, Warwick Davis, Oliver Phelps, James Phelps, David Bradley, David Thewlis, Katie Leung, Jason Isaacs, Imelda Staunton, David Tennant, Jamie Campbell Bower, Timothy Spall, Robbie Coltrane, Eddie Redmayne, Jude Law, Katherine Waterston, Ezra Miller, Dan Fogler, Alison Sudol, Johnny Depp, Mads Mikkelsen
- TV Show(s):
- Harry Potter
- Movie(s):
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Fantastic Beasts and the Crimes of Grindelwald, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore
- Character(s):
- Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, Dumbledore, Minerva McGonagall, Rubeus Hagrid, Dobby the House Elf, Draco Malfoy, Sirius Black, Ginny Weasley, Voldemort
