Magic in Harry Potter - Dark Arts

The Dark Arts are those magical spells and practices that are usually used for malicious purposes. Practitioners of Dark Arts are referred to as Dark witches or wizards. The most prominent of these is Voldemort, known to them as the Dark Lord. His followers, known as Death Eaters, practice the Dark Arts while doing his bidding.

The type of spells characteristic of Dark Arts are known as curses, which usually cause harm to the target. All, to a certain degree, are in some circumstances justifiable. The motivation of the caster affects a curse's result. This is most notable in the case of Cruciatus: when cast by Harry, angered by the death of his godfather by Bellatrix and desiring to punish her, it causes a short moment of pain. As Bellatrix herself comments, righteous anger does not allow the spell to work for long. When cast by figures such as Voldemort, who desire to inflict pain for its own sake, it causes intense agony that can last as long as the Dark witch or wizard desires. Use of Dark Magic can corrupt the soul and body; Voldemort has used such magic in his quest to prolong his life and obtain great power. Dark Arts also caused Voldemort to look deformed and inhuman, a side effect of splitting his soul into Horcruxes.

According to Snape, the Dark Arts "are many, varied, ever-changing and eternal... unfixed, mutating, indestructible". They also appear to be the most common form of magic used by criminals, while dangerous spells used by others in the books are frequently labelled Dark. In magical dueling, for example, there are any number of spells that may be used to attack, immobilise, or disarm an opponent without causing pain or lasting harm; however, spells such as the Cruciatus Curse or Sectumsempra, judged to be Dark by reliable authorities, wound or seriously distress a victim in some way.

In the Wizarding world, use of the Dark Arts is strongly stigmatised and even illegal; however, these spells are prevalent enough that even before the rise of Voldemort, many schools, (including Hogwarts), taught Defence Against the Dark Arts as a standard subject. Techniques include anti-curses and simple spells to disable or disarm attackers or fight off certain creatures. Some schools, such as Durmstrang, teach Dark Magic. A Dark Arts class was also taught at Hogwarts while it was under Death Eater control.

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Famous quotes containing the words dark and/or arts:

    O conspiracy,
    Sham’st thou to show thy dang’rous brow by night,
    When evils are most free? O then, by day
    Where wilt thou find a cavern dark enough
    To mask thy monstrous visage?
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

    If it were not for the intellectual snobs who pay—in solid cash—the tribute which philistinism owes to culture, the arts would perish with their starving practitioners. Let us thank heaven for hypocrisy.
    Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)