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“Yes, it’s rather funny, really, that next to no-one realised the snake that Harry set free in Philosopher’s Stone turned out to be Voldemort’s final Horcrux, Nagini.”

— (not actually) J.K. Rowling

Read this here in the morning so started thinking over this! Any clarifications?

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Bhargav
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    You show the quote, but didn't link to the source, or specify where you read it. Can you do so? – David Stratton Apr 09 '12 at 02:43
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    http://mypotterexperience.tumblr.com/post/7871824436 This is the source , i knw its not so authentic but still thought worthwhile to discuss about it – Bhargav Apr 09 '12 at 02:45
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    The quote you're basing your question on is not by J.K. Rowling: http://elluhhh.buzznet.com/user/journal/10843221/nagini-not-snake-sorcerers-stone/ As for Nagini being the snake in the Sorcerer's Stone, they are not the same snake. If you Google "is the snake from Sorcerer's Stone Nagini?" the answer comes right up. :) – Slytherincess Apr 09 '12 at 03:02
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    It only took 6 years, but we now have an official confirmation that it's not Nagini. – Valorum Sep 25 '18 at 18:42

4 Answers4

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Well, it doesn't seem likely for a couple of reasons:

  1. The voice of the snake in the zoo in the first film is male, while Nagini is female.

  2. The book says the snake is a Boa Constrictor, which is a non-venomous snake. Nagini, however, is venomous. (I believe in the first film the snake in the zoo was changed to a Burmese Python, which is also non-venomous.)

  3. I believe the first book describes the snake in the zoo as brown, whilst Nagini is said to be green.

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    You can tell the gender of a snake's voice? Has someone been practicing their parseltongue? – Xantec Apr 09 '12 at 03:40
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    @Xantec Well, I was assuming the actor they chose to give the English voice-over of the snake's lines in the theatrical release matched the gender of the snake. I also assume they had at least one parselmouth on set to advise on such matters during filming. –  Apr 09 '12 at 03:59
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    Nagini's voice always sounded female to me! :) – Slytherincess Apr 09 '12 at 05:10
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    @Slytherincess "Nagini" means "female cobra" in Hindi. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C4%81ga. – Jay Aug 30 '14 at 06:14
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    @Jayraj - Yes, I subsequently learned this! Funny that Nagini isn't described, physically, as a cobra, though. I read on the Wiki that "nagaraja" (sp?) means "king of snakes" and IIRC the female version of nagaraja is nagini. :) – Slytherincess Aug 31 '14 at 15:34
  • @Slytherincess - "Nagaraja" actually is the common name for King Cobra (Naja Naja) in India. Basically "Naag" = Cobra. "naagin"/"Naagini" is the feminine equivalent. Kinda like prince - princess ;) – Stark07 Feb 02 '15 at 07:40
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    Also the Cobras in Rudyard Kipling's 'Rikki-Tikki-Tavi' are called Nag and Nagaina. – Simon Hibbs Aug 26 '16 at 12:37
  • I want to say there also is a very similar name in The Jungle Book. Can't be sure what it is but possibly Nagaina too? Something like that anyway. That or my memory is faulty and/or I'm mixing it up with another story. – Pryftan Aug 18 '17 at 22:08
  • @Pryftan: The story of Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (mentioned in the comment directly above yours) is from The Jungle Book. The movie adaptations are all Mowgli, all the time, but the two Jungle Books had an eclectic mix of stories on top of the Mowgli canon; only three of the seven stories in the original Jungle Book were Mowgli stories. The other four included two stories set in India with unrelated characters, one set in Afghanistan, and another in the Bering Sea. – ShadowRanger Mar 10 '23 at 01:47
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The quote should read as follows:

Yes, it was rather funny, really, that next to no-one realised the ring Voldemort turned into a Horcrux was in actuality the One Ring of Power created by Sauron.

J.K. Rowling

Edited to add: The quote you're basing your question on is not by J.K. Rowling: see here. As for Nagini being the snake in the Sorcerer's Stone, they are not the same snake. If you Google "is the snake from Sorcerer's Stone Nagini?" the answer comes right up. :)

FuzzyBoots
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    The first part of this post is just a joke; the link in the second part has gone dead (this is exactly why link-only answers are deleted on SE); and the third part is just telling the OP to use Google (which, as the top Google result is now this question, is pretty circular). Sorry, but this answer isn't up to your usual standards :-) – Rand al'Thor Nov 04 '17 at 01:18
  • @Randal'Thor top google result for YOU! which is probably because of cookies but maybe also because it has 65000 views. Anyways, if other joke answers don't get deleted for historical significance, I don't see why this one should. – Edlothiad Nov 09 '17 at 11:17
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    @Edlothiad Other joke answers DO get deleted, despite upvotes or historical significance. https://scifi.meta.stackexchange.com/q/10117/31394 – Rand al'Thor Nov 09 '17 at 11:25
  • @Randal'Thor but this is an answer. "As for Nagini being the snake in the Sorcerer's Stone, they are not the same snake." Don't know what you want to delete it as, but it's as "bad" as 53% (random number) of questions on the site. If you felt so strongly you'd have nuked it yourself – Edlothiad Nov 09 '17 at 11:26
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    @Edlothiad Not sure why you assume I "want to delete it" - as you point out, I could have nuked it myself in that case. – Rand al'Thor Nov 09 '17 at 11:30
  • @Randal'Thor Hmm missing a "would" that would make it less "you want to" and more "you thought about". – Edlothiad Nov 09 '17 at 11:33
  • @edlothiad - Can confirm. Rand has deleted some of my amazing joke answers even after they hit the favorite posts of the quarter blog. – ibid Nov 09 '17 at 16:16
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J.K. Rowling has confirmed (via a twit) that the snake in the zoo is definitively not Nagini

And Nagini ended up in a zoo?!

JKR: Noooo... I thought I'd shot that one down! The escaped boa constrictor in Philosopher's Stone wasn't Nagini. It was never Nagini. That's an incorrect but very persistent fan theory!

JKR Twitter

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Valorum
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  • This is a very great answer!! :) – Obsidia Sep 25 '18 at 18:42
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    JKR being all vocal on twiddler at the moment. Saying all kinds of crazy stuff. Lots of answers coming :-) – Valorum Sep 25 '18 at 18:45
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    Answers... or new contradictions based on stuff she forgot she ever said? :p anyway, good find! – Jenayah Sep 25 '18 at 18:47
  • @Valorum I’m sure all of yours will be great! :) – Obsidia Sep 25 '18 at 18:51
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    Yes, but apparently Nagini also used to be a "Maledictus", and was capable of transforming between human and snake forms. As much as I love the Harry Potter books, I'm not convinced we should be paying much attention to what JK Rowling has to say any more... – Anthony Grist Sep 25 '18 at 18:55
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    @AnthonyGrist - There has been much discussion off-site about quite what drugs Rowling has access to now that she's a billionaire. – Valorum Sep 25 '18 at 18:57
  • @AnthonyGrist WTF? Where's that from? Nothing pops up when searching maledictus on SFF. I'm not brave enough to Google that and face poorly written fan theories "becuz its truuuuue lolz i luv hp", but if you've got a word of God link, care to share it? – Jenayah Sep 25 '18 at 19:14
  • @Jenayah - Discussed extensively on JKRs twiddle feed; https://twitter.com/jk_rowling?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor – Valorum Sep 25 '18 at 19:16
  • @Valorum facepalms great, give it two months and here come the fanfic-ids about that new thing JKR pulled out all of a sudden. Move on, lady :/ – Jenayah Sep 25 '18 at 19:22
  • "Confirmed via a twit"? Presume that's a typo. Otherwise, too meta. Unless she's started stealing Roald Dahl characters... – Jules Sep 25 '18 at 20:47
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    @Jules - On Twitter one twits. – Valorum Sep 25 '18 at 21:06
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No, the snake in the first book is not Nagini. As was mentioned earlier, the snake from the first book was bred in captivity. IIRC, the snake never left captivity before Harry freed it.

In order for Nagini to be that snake, that snake would have had to find Voldemort sometime during the books.

This is in addition to the other reasons listed above.

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